Healing

It's been almost a month since my last post. Luckily, things have been pretty slow around here. I guess it has been a time for healing... in many different senses of the word.

On June 15, 2012 I finally got my back surgery. I knew it wouldn't be a quick fix, but I was disappointed by the results. I came out of surgery in excruciating pain and, since I had been on Vicodin for so long, the pain meds barely scratched the surface. Although my surgeon had told me that some people don't even need medication after the procedure, it was painfully clear (pun intended) that I would not be one of those people. Progress has been slow and at my four week appointment, my surgeon was disappointed that I was still experiencing sciatica pain. (The sciatic is a large nerve that runs down your back and legs and, when pinched, causes pain and numbness.) However, I also saw a spine specialist that same week who was optimistic and quite pleased with my progress. (I guess this is why we get second opinions, huh?) I had learned of a new treatment called fibrin, which regrows discs in the spine, that is going through the final stages of clinical trials. I wanted to know if this specialist knew the fibrin guy and what other options he might have for long-term care of my spine now that the herniation is gone. He spoke highly of this new treatment, but said it would cost me between $15,000 - $30,000 since I need three levels... and I might need to have the procedure done more than once. (It's not FDA approved yet, so no insurance will cover it.) Since we had already gone down that financial road for IVF in the first place, his second (and actually much more emphatic) suggestion was to get in the best shape of my life and stay there. So that's what I'm doing.

My husband and I have both been on a health and weight loss track, so we joined a local gym. And yes, in case you're wondering, we have in fact used the membership. I have to take it slow because, technically, I don't have the okay to do anything more than walking and riding a recumbent bike. But I'm determined to get active and get my body back into shape. Of course, I want this so that I can get back into my "skinny" pants (not skinny jeans), but it's also about the health of my spine. And that will affect my entire life... and my ability to potentially carry a child again (hopefully just one, this time!) which we hope to do in another 4-6 months. I'm sure some people feel that is too soon emotionally, but I feel that it will help the healing process. We have never ignored or repressed our feelings about losing our three babies. We can't get them back, but we can try again and hopefully have a successful second journey.

So... we are healing. There are still tough days, but there are more good ones than bad. We have seen new lives come into the world since we lost ours and we have hope for more healing in the coming months. I will be returning to work in August, which I am both eager and terrified to do. I posted awhile back about how hard it is to tell some excited person that our triplets didn't make it. And all of my students knew. I dread entering the classroom and having to tell students this... and then having to continue my day as a professional. Luckily, I'm doing a soft return to work. Since it's the middle of our 8-week session, I get to work on the office side for a few weeks. My hope is that I run into enough students to spread the word before my true role at work begins again. But I suppose I'll jump that hurdle when I get to it.

For now, we are continuing to take one day at a time. We work through the bad days, celebrate the good ones, and we try to keep each other motivated to continue healing and strengthening our bodies and our spirits. And, all things considered, I think we're doing pretty well.

I Don't Want a Baby

I know, I know. Shocking... and not, right? But it's not what you think. After a lot of thinking and a lot of talking, I've determined that I have never wanted a baby; I have wanted children. Let me explain.

If you've been reading my blog for any length of time, you know that I have never been - and probably never will be - a kid person. There are some people who, when they see a baby, feel drawn to it as if by a mysterious force. They just have to pinch her little cheeks or pick him up for a cuddle. Not me. This is no new revelation for me, but it has become more obvious lately because my best friend just had a baby.

Now, I had a very intimate role in my friend's birthing process. More intimate than most, I'd imagine. Due to complications, the dad was not going to be able to attend the birth, so I volunteered to be her "birthing buddy." I wasn't sure exactly how that would go and I was a little nervous about it for several reasons, not the least of which was losing triplets less than four months prior. But I was determined to do it... and do it I did.

When the time came, I took her to the hospital and stayed with her through the night during contractions, epidurals, walking the floors, dilation, and small failed attempts at rest. I even had the "daddy bracelet" which meant that, other than Mom, I was the only one who could sleep in the room or visit the nursery, if he was taken there for any reason. Up until this point, people had asked me how I felt about my best friend being pregnant. (We were only about three weeks apart, gestationally.) And honestly, it hadn't really bothered me. I knew the birth would be a different ballgame, but I also knew it would be much different than my own experiences, so I hoped that would be enough to get me through.

And indeed it was. I was front row for the baby's birth - yeah, literally holding her legs while she pushed. There was no hiding from what was really going on and at times, it was hard. But I'd find something benign to focus on, like the clock, get myself evened out and jump back in. There were only two moments when I really lost it and, all things considered, I think that was pretty good. But that's not the story I meant to tell. For me, the revelation came a bit later.

It really wasn't until after my friend had been moved up into Postpartum and I held her son for the first time that I realized that I really had no emotional attachment to this child. Other than being his mom, I couldn't have been in a more intimate position in his life at that moment, but I understood what an increasingly growing number of parents are saying about not experiencing that love at first sight moment with their infants. I loved this little guy, but I wasn't in love with him. And, if I am really honest with myself, that's kind of how I felt about our own children. With Ewan, I didn't know how to feel. It was so foreign and strange to have this little thing on my chest. I had no idea what to do with him. When Sebastian and Amelia were set in the same place two days later, I felt a slightly stronger connection, but I didn't know how to be in love with them yet. And, tragically, I won't have the chance to develop that love with them.

So what does this make me? I'm the one who paid $13,000 to have babies and I'm now admitting that I didn't love them. What's wrong with me?! Nothing. (At least I hope not.) I think it's perfectly normal to not know how to love your first baby. This doesn't mean that I don't miss ours terribly. But I think the difference is that I mourn our children, not our babies. What I mean is that I don't want a baby. I don't yearn for little wiggling arms and squished up faces. If that was the case, then I think I would have been a wreck during my friend's delivery and I would be fawning over every little one I could get my hands on. But I'm not. What I want is our children. I want to experience their baby years, of course; but it's more about them as people than as infants, toddlers or teens. When I mourn for them, it's for the people they could have been, not the preemies we held for a precious few hours. And oddly enough, this brings me comfort and it is allowing me patience. I think if it was a baby I wanted, I would be yearning after them left and right (especially since everyone around me seems to be pregnant and popping out babies). But I don't want a baby; I want our child. And for that, I think I can wait.

Something to Talk About

I was a shy child. Anyone who knew me back then could tell you that. I often hid behind my mom at events and rarely spoke up. As you can probably guess, that's changed over time. I may have more stage fright than you might expect from reading my posts (and since I teach for a living) but when there's something that needs to be said, I will do my best to say it. Or, in this case, write it.

There are just so many things that people don't talk about. You'd think in our day and age we would be over these social taboos, but we're not. That is one of the reasons why I have chosen to write this blog and keep it up despite the loss of our pregnancy. People don't talk about the IVF process. People don't talk about what really happens during pregnancy. And people certainly don't talk about miscarriage and pre-term births. Throughout our process, I have asked myself "why?" and I've tried to break the cycle and talk about it... and people are reading what I write, so I hope that it is helping. And tonight I happened upon a TED Talks by Rufus Griscom and Alisa Volkman, the husband and wife team that co-founded babble.com. They spoke about four parenting taboos, one of which was miscarriage. There, I found Alisa Volkman answering one of my "why" questions - why don't women talk about miscarriage? It apparently happens quite often, so why the big secret? In their experience and research, shame was the answer for many women. Many women felt like they were at fault, at least partially, for the loss of their pregnancy. That is heartbreaking.

I had asked this same question to my sister several weeks back. She is not a mother and has not experienced miscarriage, but she proposed a similar theory. She didn't necessarily speak of women feeling they are to blame for their loss, but that perhaps there was a stigma attached or they felt shame in some other way. After watching this TED Talk, I also wonder if it's a fear of tarnishing the illusion of parenthood. Griscom and Volkman make the point that many couples are sold a false image when they jump on the parenting bandwagon. They see pictures of beautiful, smiling families having summer picnics or frolicking in the surf, yet no one tells them about the loneliness and depression, the crying kids, or the financial struggles to come. And if we talk about our families not being perfect - or worse - that not all pregnancies are easy and go as planned, then the shine starts to tarnish and people begin to question our abilities to... what? be parents? be "normal?" be true men or women? I'm not sure.

Now I understand that speaking about miscarriage is painful. Trust me, I completely understand that. And that also makes it difficult to talk about with others. But I think there is such value in the talking. We never question training, counselors or mentors for things like going to college, choosing a job/career, getting married, etc. These people and services help us to prepare mentally for things to come so we don't walk into our first job expecting to get paid $50 per hour with amazing benefits and where we can make our own hours. Why should we give one another more guarded information about something as monumental as becoming a parent?

So I wanted to share this TED Talk with you because I, too, believe that we need to talk about the taboo in order for people to build appropriate expectations for parenting. This way, we can all enjoy the process and find comfort with those who have experienced its highs and lows instead of groping our way in the dark, feeling isolated despite the others just out of reach beside us in the blackness.


http://www.ted.com/talks/rufus_griscom_alisa_volkman_let_s_talk_parenting_taboos.html

Mother's Day

I've never really thought much about Mother's Day. Sure, we get together and celebrate our moms by buying them trinkets, taking them out for brunch and writing them sentimental cards. But what about women like me? What about those who are mothers in one sense, but for whom the day is not a happy one, but a painful reminder of losses, not gains?

This was my first Mother's Day as a mother and yet it was not what I had imagined it to be. A few people wished me a happy Mother's Day, but others either forgot or didn't know how to breach the subject. Both are acceptable because it wasn't really something I wanted to be reminded of. In fact, I didn't want to be out on Sunday at all. I didn't want any well-intending waitress to ask if I had children. I mean, what do I say to that? Do I tell a feelings-sparing white lie and say no? Do I say, "none living"? I'm not sure. Part of me wants to go with the second response, not to make others feel bad or embarrass them (because, really, it's not their fault). I guess it's more because 1) I don't want to ignore the fact that I did have children - either for my sake or for theirs - and 2) it would bring more attention to this taboo issue of miscarriage and preterm births. But it's hard to get the words out sometimes and it's even harder to see that person stammer and apologize for something they had no fault in.

So on this Mother's Day weekend, we decided to say our final farewells to our triplets. We had waited longer than intended, but my body and our schedules had simply not permitted us a trip out of town... and it wasn't something either of us were looking forward to doing. We decided early on that we didn't want the remains to stay in our home. It's not that we didn't want to hold on to our children or to preserve their memories; we just didn't want to do it in that way. In some ways, it was too painful for me to have the shadow of their bodies in our home. But now that it's gone, there is a part of me that mourns it. I can understand the desire for people to hold on to their loved ones, even in death. Even when we know that there is nothing of that person left within that body. There is a part of me that craves their closeness and holding on to that hideous blue box with the cheesy white dove on it fulfilled that to some extent. But I do not regret our decision. I prefer knowing that our children's spirits are free and their bodies are back within the cycle of life and nature. That their DNA is disbursing amongst the plants and animals of this world and, in that little way, they live on. For me, that is better than having their remains with us or buried within the earth.

On Sunday, while my husband spent some time with his family, I took one of our dogs, Bones, and headed up to the hills. We didn't do much walking due to my back problems, but we drove around and did make a few stops to wander about. Bones thoroughly enjoyed himself and it was refreshing to be away from home and people who knew our situation. No one asked me how I was doing. No one wished me a happy Mother's Day. It was just Bones, me, and the winding road. I know Brian was sad not to be with me, but sometimes it's better to be alone... just for a time. And I knew he was waiting for me when I was ready to go back home.

And so I made it through my first Mother's Day, less than three months out from our children's first and last breaths. At the beginning of the year, there was a good possibility the babies would be born and we would be spending our Mother's Day in the NICU. Little did we know. In some ways, it all seems a lifetime ago or like a dream that only felt real. But we made it through the toughest part. Now, we are slowly putting February behind us, one moment at a time... Mother's Day included.

Two Months

It's been two months since our life path took a downward turn. On Feb. 23, 2012 we lost our first born son, Ewan - the first of triplets to come into this world for far too short a time. In some ways, this feels like an eternity ago. In others, the pain is so close that I can't believe two months have passed. And in other ways, it seems too surreal to have actually happened. I have days where they rarely cross my mind, but others where the urge to touch them is so incredibly strong that I can do nothing but mourn the distance. I'm afraid today may be one of those days.

The thing that continues to surprise me the most is how much I miss these children that I didn't ever get a chance to know. So many people who have lost loved ones will say that they expect to see them walk through a door or show up for work or to a family function. I guess I've never had that experience. The loved ones I've lost have not lived near me or have slowly faded from my life (generally due to illness) before they have actually passed. In that way, I had learned to live without them long before they were truly gone. But in this case, we never really had our loved ones. It's weird because they were obviously with me all of the time, but I never really felt them or experienced them. Because of where the placentas were, I never felt the babies kick or move until they were out of my body. This is also something I mourn. If I had felt their movement during the pregnancy, I would have been able to feel their presence for longer than the few hours we had them after their births. But that's all the time we were given. On so many occasions, I feel like we will get them back. I know it's impossible, but it's such a horrendous thing that sometimes my brain won't let me acknowledge that it actually happened and those 5 1/2 months of pregnancy were for nothing. But then I remember the pictures and sneak a peek at the ashes we still have not been able to scatter, and I realize that it did happen. That I can't change it and I will never know my three beautiful children and it breaks my heart. It's amazing how quickly life can change.

So, two months out. Where does that leave us? Despite the waves of sadness, I still believe we're handling this experience in a healthy way. We continue to talk about it when needed, distract ourselves when necessary, and try to look towards the future without ignoring the past. My body is finally starting to recover from a horribly prolonged healing process. It took a second D&C to rid my body of extra crap in my uterus so that I could stop bleeding, cramping, passing blood clots, and running 100+ degree fevers. Now that one aspect of my health has recovered, I'm focusing all of my efforts on getting my insurance to preauthorize the spine surgery that I need for a full recovery. I'm scheduled for a second (more powerful) epidural injection in about two weeks to help with the pain and have been calling Cigna almost every day to follow up on the appeal process. I also have a referral in to another spine specialist for back-up and possibly other options. I am determined to fix this last remaining physical reminder of this horrible period in our lives so that I can get back to normal day-to-day life. Right now, I will begin short-term disability and not return to work until the beginning of July. Hopefully, that will be enough time to process the appeal, get the surgery and recover. Until then, my life is pretty sedentary and uneventful. (Except for all of the angry phone calls and lots of time on hold.) Although I still can't quite fathom the idea of returning to work and being held responsible for a batch of students, the idea of going back to "normal" life is definitely appealing. Not to mention wanting to rid myself of this physical pain. I am very grateful, though, for my gracious employers, full-time work that offers short-term disability benefits, and a fabulous husband who supports whatever I need in order to heal physically, mentally, and emotionally.

So, onward and upward. My battle to slay the dragon that is Cigna and win my prize (can back surgery really be considered a prize?) continues. Hopefully my three month post will be filled with good news and healing of all sorts.

So Over It

In life, things seem to ebb and flow. No one expects to be "up" forever and we certainly hope we don't have to be "down" for too long, either. It's a matter of balance. It doesn't matter what your faith or religion, we all believe things generally even out in the grand scheme of things. So perhaps this year is just me paying for the good things that have happened for us lately, but honestly, I feel I've paid my share and am ready for things to turn back around. They don't need to be great or even good. I'll take neutral. Neutral would be fantastic.

This has been a bad week - maybe couple of weeks - for me. I have worked really hard to analyze myself and keep myself looking at the positive to stay off of antidepressants, even though it may not look that way from the outside. But it's getting harder and harder to stay afloat. It's like being stranded in the middle of the ocean. At the beginning, you're just fighting to keep your head above water. Then, you get in the groove. It's hard, but you realize that you can do it with slow, steady, controlled movements. But eventually, you get worn out and the waves start slapping you in the face and all you want is a little break so you can catch your breath, but it doesn't come. When I feel like this, I recap what my life has been like. It seems like that would bring me down even more - and sometimes it does - but it also brings justification for my emotions and my apparent lack of sanity.

In the past eight weeks, I went from having a healthy "normal" pregnancy with triplets, to having a shortened cervix that prompted home bed rest, to throwing my back out, to a vanished cervix that caused hospital bed rest (and horrible drugs), to losing our firstborn son, to losing our son and daughter, to having a D&C, to returning home, to making decisions about our deceased children's remains, to learning I have a large herniated disc that may cause permanent damage, to learning back surgery is the way to remedy this, to getting my first epidural shot (without the promised "happy drugs"), to learning that my insurance has denied my surgery, to a series of phone calls to fight the denial, to a second epidural shot (tomorrow). That's a lot of shit to go through in eight weeks. And this doesn't count the heartbreak, bleeding, passing of clots, and complete breakdowns that come with birthing and losing three children.

Now, as I continue to fight Cigna and gather information in case this second review is denied, I find that I'm quickly losing strength. I am drained. I am lost. I am at the end of whatever metaphorical rope I have managed to hold onto in these last two months. A friend sent me a text today asking how I was doing. My first response was "fine," but I followed it up with another text saying that I lied. The only good news I've received in eight weeks of hell is that I don't have to have a second D&C, the prospect of which was horrible news when I received it. How can anyone be fine after all of that? I'm too rational to be suicidal, but I am so over this. I'm ready to go home. I need this to start going a better direction... or... I don't know what. I just know I can't handle much more. Some people have said that God won't give me more than I can handle, but I want to punch those people. (Sorry if you're one of them. I know your heart is in the right place.) I'm telling everyone right now. I can't handle any more. I NEED things to go right and they need to start going right immediately.

I am sick of being in pain. I am sick of being sedentary. I am sick of being in too much pain to exercise. I am sick of wearing maternity clothes that only remind me of what we have lost. I am sick of having nothing to talk about but my fights with Cigna and how my medical appointments went. I am sick of making people feel awkward just by my presence. I am sick of taking pain meds. I am sick of crying at the drop of a hat. I am sick of having to explain my medical history to every freaking doctor and their however many assistants. I am sick of people responding to the loss of my pregnancy by asking, "All of them?" I am sick of making my husband sad and/or frustrated because I'm sad and frustrated. I'm sick that we haven't been able to scatter our children's ashes because of my back pain. And I'm sick at the prospect of not getting surgery and having to live in this hell forever. I am at a total loss and I am so over it.

Movie Magic

We all know that movies employ their own special type of magic - from costumes to makeup and special effects to overly wrought scripts. But I always thought that actor's reactions were the most overdone of all. No one is really that in love. No one would react in that extreme a manner to a dramatic situation. But I've come to realize that some of those reactions are not so fictional; I simply hadn't experienced the stimuli needed to evoke them.

My first real experience was this was a few years ago. I was commuting from Fresno to Visalia, 100 miles round trip through mostly farmland, and on my drive home one day noticed a strange smell. I then started to scan the road for the source of said aroma and I noticed one of those big, blue trashmobiles - the kind that usually clamber through your neighborhood at some God awful hour to toss your bins into their larger one. But this one was different - there was a cow leg sticking out of it. I soon realized that the truck was carrying what appeared to be a large heap of bovine carcasses! And as soon as that realization hit me, my hand immediately shot to my mouth as a small gasp escaped from my lips... just like one might see in a movie.

As traumatic as that was, it doesn't hold a candle to what I have experienced lately. When people say their heart is breaking, you feel it's cliched and (at least I) generally feel they are being over-dramatic. When you see characters in movies doubled over and in tears, I write that off to emotional manipulation - and sometimes just bad acting. But it is actually possible to feel that kind of sadness. I understand that now. It is possible to feel like something inside you has been ripped apart and you don't know how to be whole any more. Now, the movie situations may not accurately correlate to those emotions, but they are possible.

Today, I learned of another emotion that I previously felt was over-dramatic and unrealistic - and I wish I could say it was a happy one. This evening I received a call from the surgery scheduler about my back surgery. I had been groomed to expect good news and have been preparing for surgery early next week, but the news was not good. My insurance (Cigna) had denied my claim. I went numb as the scheduler explained the situation and gave me some tips on how to appeal it (which, luckily, I had the good sense to write down) but I knew the aftermath would not be pretty. When we finally hung up, I was in tears because my surgery had already been put off two weeks and I have been in an increasing amount of pain in the last few days. Plus, I mean, seriously!? Could I just catch a break here? Please? But then I went from sad to gut-wrenchingly sad to almost catatonic. I would just stand in the kitchen and stare at nothing or find myself rocking slightly in some random spot - just like in the movies. And then I was mad! So mad that I was punching the air because I didn't have anything else to hit. I couldn't believe it. I had never felt like that before and, with any luck, I won't have to feel that way again. But it is possible. I just think Hollywood trivializes those emotions by pairing them with more benign events, which makes people like me doubt their existence and even possibly wonder if something is wrong with me because I haven't had those reactions to those experiences. And now that I have experienced them, well, I kind of wish I hadn't.

Although they may lend to an interesting blog or musing session, most of my movie magic emotions have stemmed from shock or despair and I feel I've had enough of those things. I am ready for the happy ending that Hollywood also promises. This is the point in my story where the audience thinks, "Wow. She can't take much more of this" and then things start to look up: the fairy godmother appears, the hero gets a chance to prove himself, the hero/ine realizes an important clue that will help solve the mystery. That's what I want. I can't get my children back and I can't reverse the damage done to my body, but some magical insurance fairy can certainly work her magic to get me this surgery covered so that my healing can begin and I can set a path for "normal" life once again. So come on Hollywood. It's time for some real life magic here.