I would take the reglan and anxiety would wash over me in a tsunami of restlessness. I was in pain and nauseous. I would throw up and fall back into bed where I would lie for the next 15 hours with nothing to do but remain still in between the vomiting spells until 7 p.m. when I could be devoured once again by the sweet, numbing prozac of sleep. I mourned consciousness ever 4a.m of every day.
No one would help me. I began to lose a pound a day. My bdad1s foreboding voice echoed in my head. Images of my dying Parents floated in and out of my mind. Their suffering, the loss of appetite, the pain, the lethargy, the anxiety and depression-mimicked my own, and THEY DIED. I was terrified. I had learned that illnesses of the sort were the victor, unbeatable foes, and that I was as mortal as my Parents had been.
My lovely child... the one that I sang to, the one that I'd been hoping for, the one that I loved and wanted, the one that we had named Tennessee the day we found out we were pregnant... our lovely little miracle was being (incredibly) transformed into nothing more than an illness that was torturing me (an illness which killed Charlotte Bronte and still kills today, though rarely). Pretty soon my silent tears turned into wailing. My husband couldn1t help me and felt inadequate and helpless. He didn1t know what to do. He thought I was either going to die or lose my mind, and everyone was telling us how abnormal it was-except the doctors, who weren't telling us anything.
His parents just let us handle it so as not to interfere. They were afraid to take responsibility for what might happen if they led us in any particular direction. My best friend hated me from the moment the pregnancy test was positive (because of her inability to get pregnant with her new husband), and so she was no help to me. In fact, she called me to tell me how rude I had been to her when she came to visit for the last time. My offense? It took me five minutes to answer the front door, and I vomited from all the ringing.
One morning I just woke up and snapped. I felt I just couldn't go on. My attitude was one of pure, selfish, primitive survival. I rationalized by adopting the attitude of, 3hey, it1s either you or me, kid... and I'M not gonna die. Terrible I know, but it was like my heart was gone, and all I cared about was getting physically well. No more hospitals, no more throwing up, no more worrying, no more panicking, no more contradictory opinions, no more pain, no more anything... no more. Uncle.
I went to a counselor in a last ditch effort to save our baby (from myself). She prescribed an antidepressant (Zoloft) to at least try to deal with the ensuing mental disquiet (which some of the medical profession DARED to think was the cause of my h.g. and not the result. One doctor said I was obsessed with my pregnancy on my records. (How could I NOT be obsessed?). The prescription was filled. I took the medication and woke up projectile vomiting through out the evening. I called the counselor. After a few moments, it became clear to she and I that I had accidental overdosed. You see, the insurance would only pay for 100mg pills while the counselor1s instructions were for 25mg pills. She told me to take on one pill a day to start off. This is what the bottle said and this is what I tried to do, but I ended up taking a 300% increase of the drug, because no one told me to cut the pills into fourths - they weren1t scored or anything. My counselor forgot that managed care would only pay for the drug in bulk and almost cried when she thought of what might have been done to me and my baby. I told her it didn1t matter anymore.
I called the doctor one more time and told her that I was going to terminate the pregnancy, because I couldn't take it anymore. I tried one last time to get admitted into the hospital, but this particular doctor told me there were women with worse problems in the hospital and they actually WANTED their babies. That tore it.
I demanded to be admitted. She laughed and said just because I wanted to
be admitted she didn1t have to do it. She had me come to the E.R. to
have a nurse determine if I even needed to be admitted, but when I got
there, the nurse was a psychiatric nurse and only intended to determine
whether I needed to go to the mental hospital or not. She asked me if
the baby was planned. I told her s/he wasn1t, but that we loved and
wanted him/her. I told her that we weren1t the type of people that just
*had* to have a baby - that we weren't trying desperately, that we were
just going to let it happen and if it happened then it would be
wonderful. She wrote, "patient says she and her husband have never
wanted to have a baby," on my chart and concluded that I needed to be
admitted to the county psych ward as a mental patient. She ended by
saying, "the only danger now is to the fetus." She's not a medical
doctor to make that judgment. In fact, one of the male doctors walked by
the room and heard me crying so he came in and said (surprise), "you're
very dehydrated; you need an i.v."
By the time I got to the mental facility the administrator of the
hospital took one look at me, interviewed us very briefly, and shook his
head in disbelief. "You're not crazy, you're sick! You don't need to be
here; we can't give you the medical treatment you obviously need." Did I think of
consulting another doctor at that point? Of course not. There was only
one way out of the madness and physical pain, and sadly, I made the
appointment.
I will spare you the horrifying trip out of town, the screaming, begging
protesters and the unimaginable, impossible emotional pain of the actual
"procedure" (which I almost did not go through), the callousness of the
"doctor" (who wouldn1t even allow us to have custody of our child1s body
in order to give him/her a proper burial) and the nurse who said "what do
you care?" when I asked the sex and weight. I will spare you of a description of how I felt as I got
up off the table and fainted in a puddle of my own blood and the
remnants of my precious, loved baby which came flooding out of me. I will spare
you the details of my subsequent spiritual death and the way I feel upon
waking to experience the emptiness of each new day.
My doctor stated on my medical records that I called her and told her
that I was back at work which led her to believe the hyperemesis
gravidarum was not the problem. I never called her and said this. I have
my work records which prove that she made a huge, important judgment
based on a fallacy which she created. I don1t know what my future
doctors will think when they read my records. I would hope that it
wouldn1t affect the way they treat me, but I don't see how they wouldn't
be affected after reading, essentially, "patient never wants to have
kids and is obsessive and hysterical."
When my Christian friends at work found out what I did they carefully gave me a 30 day sick leave and rehired another teacher 10 days into that leave without telling me. They also informed me in a letter that I need not reapply there. A few of the parents (a doctor, a pharmacist, etc.) called my home telling me that they were fighting the board for me, relaying some of the cruel, ignorant remarks others were happily offering and spreading, and vowed to stand up for me in court if I would only consider filing a case - which I would not, as I felt that I, the terminator of my beautiful 4 month old baby, deserved everything I had coming to me. Women talk of how they prayed to God not to miscarry and I feel terrible that I prayed for just the opposite. I would have done anything to get out of the torture and neglect... and I did.
I had an illness that I knew nothing about at the time (of course, now I feel like an authority on it), couldn1t get answers from overworked doctors, didn1t get the care I needed because of unconcerned medical staff and insurance, experienced little understanding from coworkers, friends, family, doctors, etc.
When I went back to my doctor for the 3post operative2 check up she informed me that I had not wanted my baby enough and, at the very least, not as much as other women want their babies. This sent me into hysterics. Other women hadn1t been through what I had. I can1t be excused; I stole the world of a beautiful human existence. I am not seeking exoneration for a sin that I know was ultimately my own. My child1s life was my responsibility and mine alone.
I can not tell you the judgments I receive from people who have never been afflicted with the illness. They cause real pain and exacerbate an already inflamed sense of guilt. I am the caretaker of my own torment, and I do my job quite adequately without the assistance of others. But it seems to be the general opinion that if one loves and wants one1s child, one should endure any torture for any length of time and even die trying to have that baby. For myself, I can1t say that, in philosophy, I disagree. But I was not myself after weeks of metabolic disturbance and medical neglect.
I have heard from many women who had hyperemesis gravidarum and they kept their babies and made it out alive and well. I have heard from 5 (married) women who had poor medical care and terminated. All of our situations are as unique as snowflakes; the way we dealt with our time of crisis was determined by scads of intricate factors.
I would NEVER have harmed my child had I been devoid of such an illness. It is painful to think that anyone would dishonor my child by believing s/he was unloved and unwanted; that is not the case. I tried for 4 months to endure it. I wanted my baby. I loved my baby. I would have had my baby if it had been physically possible.
I have held the memorials, made the confessions, prayed the prayers, written the letters, cried the tears, dreamed the dreams, planted the flowers, engraved the stone, lit the candles, commissioned the jewelry, appointed the mass and memorialized my child in every way humanly possible in my efforts to love, honor, cherish, respect, remember and hold onto my holy, innocent child whose undoing I precipitated. I am worn to the bone; it will never end. The stone in my heart can never be excised.
That's the story of Tennessee, our shooting star. The grief is impossible; I don1t know where to go with it. I can no longer function normally in society, choosing instead to live like a hermit. I simply float here searching, trying to find anything on the disorder or on the unique grief I endure which is compounded by the most horrible, real guilt imaginable. I fight for nothing; Tennessee is gone.
