9w0d: Not for the party puker

This first part is a bit awkward to write. I don't want to complain, but I don't want to lie, either. So let me state up front: As un-enjoyable as all this puking is, I would not trade it for the world. I would rather vomit 8 times a day for 9 months straight than the alternative. And the other symptoms--the boobs that feel like they've gone 8 rounds with Muhammad Ali, the being so tired I have to fight with myself to stay awake every morning, every afternoon, and every early evening, the constipation, the POSSIBLE increased irritability (psh, what do husbands know?), the fact that the only thing I wanted to eat yesterday was Spaghetti-Os (WTF, what grown-up even *thinks* of those)--they are no problem. They're kind of awesome, in a way, because they remind me that I'm not making this up.

But the puking. I will take it, I will own it. But...did I get hit hard with the vomit-stick. I spent some one-on-one time yesterday with an IV drip and a brand-new diagnosis of "Hyperemesis gravidarum". From my nursing school and my ability to speak medical-ese, I can tell you that literally translates into: "way too much puking, seriously". Woohoo!

I'm on Zofran. I went on it at about 6 weeks. My RE gave it to me. My OB and I discussed it at my last appointment. It went like this:

"How often do you vomit?"
"Well, when I only take the Zofran once per day, about 6-8 times. When I take it twice, maybe 3?"

Her eyebrows went clear up. She recommended always taking it twice, possibly even 3 times. (You can take it every 8 hours. I take it right when I wake up and then 8 hours later. I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night to puke. Good times!) And she told me to keep an eye on my urine, which is actually a hobby of mine anyway. If it's dark, it's bad. She told me that my babies will do just fine at stealing all their nutrients from me, so dehydration is our main concern. (But maybe she's just saying that since I'm fat.)

Yesterday was just a bad day. I slept in, and when I woke up, I was already puking. And I couldn't stop. I almost passed out--maybe I even did for a few minutes. My husband works Saturdays (until August 18th, anyway), and our cats are useless in an emergency. I couldn't stop puking long enough to let the damn Zofran dissolve in my mouth. I drove myself to the ER with a plastic bag on my face. It's only about 5 minutes away, and all down-hill. They didn't even make me wait the usual 4 hours. And they put a call in to my OB's office (which is on the 4th floor of the hospital's "women's wing"). I don't know what the OB's office said, but I assume something like, "Yeah, she vomits a lot. Give her some drugs and send her home."

So, 3 liters of saline poured into a vein it took them forever to find, and some IV Zofran, and I was on my way.

And now I'm taking it 24 hours a day.

All of which means, I really should have known better a few nights ago.

***********

Remember my intrauterine bleed/SCH thingy? Well, I was put on pelvic rest for it a long time ago. Pelvic rest is not what it sounds like--a nice, relaxing beach vacation for your pelvis, where it consumes whiskey sours and smokes clove cigarettes while watching lovely sunsets. Pelvic rest is a euphemism for NO SEX FOR YOU, BITCH.

And a dirty little secret: it's not just about taping up "Crime Scene--Do Not Enter" over the vagina. (Because, of course, the Crinone and dildocam enter whenever they please!) It also includes the following restrictions: no nipple stimulation, and no orgasm. And of course, because I was scared and bleeding, my response was "yes, of course, anything".

(For the record, I did not ask if anal was ok. I figured it wasn't, since that also involves the pelvic cavity. And also, I didn't want my RE going "Oh...*that* is why you couldn't get pregnant!" Because that was not what we were doing! We're not idiots!)

And while I'm still on the "anything to keep these babies" train, the pelvic rest restriction is really irritating. My hormones are like a teenage boy's. I've never wanted sex more. Some of that could be the forbidden fruit angle, and maybe some of it is my body trying to replace lost fluids from vomiting. And I've been having lots of sex dreams and even sleep orgasms. Which, there's no way to prevent that, so I'm trying not to feel guilty. But also, if I'm having an illicit orgasm every now and again, it sucks that my husband doesn't get to be a part of it.

So we've got a junior-high type relationship. Some making out, some cuddling, no second base, and every now and again I give him a hand job. Sound fun to you? Nice and fulfilling? Didn't think so.

Which is why, on Thursday night, I decided to give him a blow job.

I think you can all see where this is headed.

And yes, that's where it went.

The very second he began finishing, I began vomiting.

OMFG.

I have never, ever, ever killed the mood quite like that, quite so quickly, quite so awfully.

I learned my lesson, and will probably be getting served with divorce papers on the grounds of severe inflection of emotional distress.

In the mean-time, off to study for finals.

8w5d: Yesterday

Yesterday was a big day. I went to the school early, since I needed to talk to Student Services. It was time to tell. All the students know, my clinical instructor knows, my sim lab instructor knows, and I was about to have to tell my pharmacology prof as well ("I'm on Zofran and sucking hard candies and ginger and eating all the time and stuff, but I still sometimes have uncontrolled vomiting episodes. I know you are very strict about your exams, but if I get up and run out, I'd really appreciate if you'd let me back in. It's twins, see."). So I figured I should tell them, so they didn't get grumpy about being the last to know.

It went pretty much as expected, with them telling me to go to school as long as I can, but if I miss too much, they'll put me on medical leave, plain and simple. And totally fair--no one wants a nurse who missed the whole week on pediatric wound care or whatever. Because my program runs once a year, I'd have to wait a whole year for the 3rd semester to roll back around. Which, the more I think of it, might not be a bad idea at all. Affording it would be hard, but think of me being able to spend every single minute of every single day in the company of my babies. That sounds ideal. (For now!)

The hilarious part was their reaction to it being twins. I live in Utah (and yes, I was once Mormon, but no, I most certainly no longer am, hence the drinking, sexing, swearing, gay-marrying (well, ok, I didn't do the last one, but I would like the right to do so) sort of lifestyle I lead), so there's no way in hell I'm the first pregnant nursing student. I even said that to them (without the hell part), because they were just speechless. Finally one of them was like, "Wow...twins! You must have been so surprised!!!"

Well, yes and no. Surprised that there was any baby at all trumped surprise that there were two. Two was unexpected, but entirely within the realm of probability. But...these ladies do not know I'm a big fat infertile. We haven't told very many people, but everyone we'd told "twins" to up to that point knew our history. Twins with IVF isn't a big shock. My clinic has about a 30% twin rate of their live births. But for someone who doesn't know my history, I guess twins would be a big surprise.

I said, "Well, not really. We had help getting here and have had a miscarriage before, so we're very cautiously excited, and it's also why we planned this pregnancy, even knowing about my school commitments." (Thus, cleverly, I let them know it was planned and cut short a lecture on "really bad timing".)

Maybe I've just spend way to much time in the ALI community, but I see twins, especially fraternal twins, and think "one of us". I'd sort of assumed everyone would hear twins and think "fertility drugs". None of their business, but they're not wrong.

Anyway, after that I had an exam (finals are next week, so of course every exam and paper were due yesterday), then ran to my OB appointment. I met the actual OB and liked her a lot. Even though she was the harbinger of doom: "With multiples--even di/di like you've got--you are a higher risk for everything. Gestational diabetes, pre-term labor, and preeclampsia are our biggest concerns. I won't let you go past 38 weeks. That's sort of the equivalent of 42 weeks for a singleton. Most of our twins go at 34-36 weeks. And about 60-70% of my twin moms get c-sections."

Well, none of that was unexpected, but it sounds rather stark in black and white. When I was a teenager, I wanted the whole home-birth water birth hippy natural thing. As I learned more about myself and my complete willingness to take on blame for any- and everything, I decided a home birth was probably not for me. But I still really wanted a natural birth. I do still want that. I was unable to get pregnant the way I wanted to, and will likely not get the birth I want.

As long as I get the babies I want, it's worth it.

I won't turn down a c-section. I don't want a baby to get hypoxic because of my selfish desire to "experience it all". I hope I can go vaginal, but if not...oh well.

Then out came the table-side ultrasound, which was probably constructed for 4-year-olds to play doctor with. She found the babies but couldn't see anything--couldn't measure them, couldn't look for heartbeats, couldn't check out my bleed. So I was sent downstairs to the MFM clinic.

Where I waited, waited, and then said, "I'm sorry, I've got an exam. We'll just have to reschedule." They could get me in at 4:30.

I rushed back to school, 5 minutes late for my exam. And then left immediately afterwards, back to the hospital. Where they saw my babies.

I love my babies. Itsy's heart was at 168, and Bitsy's was at 169. Twins! Itsy measured 3 days behind Bitsy, but since previously (s)he was 4 days behind, I am taking this not as measurement errors, but as proof positive of a growth-spurt. They're both within range for gestational age, and I hate to brag, but they're really fucking cute.

I've rambled for a while, so I'll post about sex later. Specifically, the sex I am not allowed to have, and the things I've screwed up while non-screwing lately. I'm all class, over here.

8w3d: My husband thinks he's old.

It's really been bothering him lately. He worries about having the energy to keep up with our kids, but mainly he just keeps saying, "I'll be almost 60 when they graduate!"

How do I handle this? I grew up in Mormon-land. Women start having babies in their late teens or early twenties. Their husbands are all almost exactly 2 years older than them (because the young women marry returned missionaries). So yeah, young. But then they have 8 kids, and so suddenly, not so young. Several of my friends had parents in their 50s when I was in high school. My mom was young when I was born, but 30 when she had my brother. I'm 31, so I don't really see a problem with my age. But my husband is 8.5 years older than me. I can kind of see where he's coming from. 50 sounds old. 60 sounds ancient.

But seriously, it's not. His situation is so difficult. He has no grandparents, and his parents are not in good health. His mom has Turner's, and so was pretty much never in good health. She had a stroke about 3 years ago and hasn't really recovered well (but certainly better than many, frankly). His dad...well, I don't really know. His dad is an ex-military man of "that generation", where men simply did not do a damn thing around the house. When they visit us or we visit them, he puts me to work. Not his son, certainly not him, but me. I go along with it, since we see them so rarely that a fight isn't worth it. So really, his dad is probably in perfectly fine health, he just doesn't do anything. Which means they're moving in with my sister-in-law, a total saint and freaking awesome lady.

I try to point to my grandparents--in their late 80s and doing great. They've slowed down a lot over the past 5 years, but neither has been hospitalized, neither has major health problems, neither can't drive, etc. They go on vacations, go to those "lifelong learning" classes. Or my great-aunt. Now, she's almost 90 with Post-Polio syndrome. And has been a widow for 12 years now (her husband died of pancreatic cancer, out of the blue). And she's incontinent, which is sad. And can't drive herself anymore, also sad. And she sometimes forgets things. Not the important things, but she'll call me twice to invite me to Thanksgiving dinner and then not call my older sister at all. That sort of thing. So...old, but still ok.

60 really isn't old. But he feels like it is.

And he doesn't want any children after these ones, because he'll be too old.

This is heartbreaking to me. Look, I have no idea about twins, I really don't. I've never been a steady babysitter for any, nor do any of my friends or cousins or anyone have twins. It might very well be that I'm done after them too. Or that, frankly, we look at things and decide we could have vacations with 2 kids, but not 3, pay for 2 college tuitions, but not 3, etc. I mean, you never know. It may be that I never want to do fucking IVF ever again, god I hate it! (I do, I hate IVF. But I love it, since it got me pregnant.) But I might want more. And yes, he may change his mind. But the notion that this pregnancy may be my only one is already making me sad and nostalgic and FUCK INFERTILITY IN THE ASS.

8 weeks!: The frat house

That's what I'm calling my uterus.

Because they're fraternal twins. GET IT?!?!?

I know it's really not that funny, but I can't stop cracking up. My little frat babies in there, demanding higher BAC levels from their cords, thinking that once they can move their elbows, they'll probably start a band or something...

I can't believe my babies are already so naughty! But what can you expect from frat brats anyway? :p

7w6d: Ok, yeah, I freaked out

7w6d is when I lost my last baby. Who the fuck was I kidding thinking I could make it through today?

I actually made it till about 2:30pm, and then I called my RE's office. It's a holiday weekend here in Utah, so I assumed (correctly) that there would just be a skeletal staff. I talked to a nurse and was like, "Look, you can tell me if I'm being crazy, and it's ok, I'm just really nervous..." and explained the situation to her, about my appointment and their machine and having to wait. This nurse is not one of my favorites, and I figured she would tell it to me straight. I was expecting to hear, "Well, try to relax and everything will be fine." Instead she was like, "You've got a slow twin and a sinus bleed, come in now."

They had my ass on the table and a wand up my twat in half an hour.

They are very concerned about my sinus bleed. I don't really know anything about that, so I've just been putting it out of my mind and focusing on the babies. But apparently it's much larger than they're comfortable with. I frankly don't know what to make of it. What is going on is, I am bleeding inside my uterus. But it's not in the gestational areas really, but it's not going away. And as my babies grow, my uterus grows, and, most importantly, their placentas grow and start taking over the walls of my uterus. Bleeding into the forming placentas would be bad.

They were pretty clear with me that they don't usually see patients past 8 weeks and don't really manage this sort of care, but all 3 RE doctors are going to conference about my bleed (2 of them have seen it on the u/s), and decide what to do. They want it to stop bleeding without clotting, so it's tricky. Apparently just hanging out on my low-dose aspirin has not done the trick.

They're also putting a call into my OB's office. From the sound of it, 3 of their daughters have delivered out of that practice, and they're just going to throw their weight around on my behalf. Which is pretty awesome, if a touch scary.

Good news is, Itsy and Bitsy are both alive and growing!!! I'm beyond thrilled. Itsy is still measuring about 4 days behind, but is having consistent growth. The heart-rate was 134. Bitsy is measuring exactly to the day on track, and had a heart-rate of 159!

So my babies seem to be fine, and my uterus needs to just kick itself into shape.

Tomorrow marks brand-new territory for me: 8 weeks pregnant. And also happy anniversary of the Mormons settling the Valley, thinking they were in Mexico (little did they know, Utah had been sold). The thought of anyone mistaking Salt Lake City for Mexico is pretty hilarious in this day and age, by the way.

7w5d: All that and more

I lost my last baby at 7w6d. I know, I know, this pregnancy is different. And it is, but it's still impossible for me to forget about it. This whole week has sucked.

Also, I think I've told you guys I'm an idiot? I went off my SSRI after seeing the heartbeat. Mine was not the best choice for pregnancy, and I didn't want to be on any at all come the third trimester, so a brief chat with my RE ("it was infertility that made you depressed, and now you're pregnant") and they went in a drawer. I probably should have waited till Week 10.

I didn't anticipate every step of this week being haunted by the fact that, at this point in my last pregnancy, everywhere I went, I wondered: is this where I will miscarry?

And I'll be honest: my two biggest symptoms are puking and wanting to sleep 23 hours a day. It's hard to be cheerful when you're dog-tired and bent over the toilet much of the time. Again, if this actually meant I'd get a baby, I wouldn't hate it. But I was sick (though admittedly not this sick) in my miscarriage pregnancy, and so I just don't feel that reassurance. Instead of feeling pregnant, I feel more like I've got a weeks-long flu with a high probability of dead baby at the end.

The glass, she isn't even close to half full.

(You all hate me right now. That's ok. I hate myself too.)

So the appointment.

They were running behind. Very behind. I waited for an hour. I'm not lying, an actual solid hour. And I guess it was just my nurse, because they kept taking other women back. There was a woman--an obnoxiously loud belly-rubber. I mean, she was rubbing her damn belly so loudly I could hear her hands on her shirt from clear across the room. It wasn't a nice, soothing "rub...rub...rub..." It was more "I'll get this grease out of the pot no matter HOW hard and fast I must scrub!" "Rubrubrubrubrubrubrub". I hated her. She was taken back and then sent downstairs to deliver, so then I felt like a bitch. She was probably rubbing out her contractions or something else late-term that I know absolutely nothing about.

There was a mom with two little boys under five. She just sent them to the chairs while she chatted with the receptionist. The boys were not well-behaved. I actually really like toddlers and such, but man, these kids were naughty. I had awful thoughts about their mom, primarily along the lines of "she clearly doesn't care about the two she has, WTF is she doing having another?" I mean, she wasn't just checking in. She was chatting. They chatted till she got called back, and then she yelled (seriously!) at her boys to follow her.

I had to vomit, and they wouldn't let me use the restroom because "we'll need a sample". I snapped "it's not that", left the office, and used the restroom in the hall.

I came back and got called in.

One of those boys was laying on the floor in the hallway. Mom was nowhere to be seen. The nurse stepped over him and was like "I guess he likes the floor". I guess so.

I peed as instructed. They then weighed me. Then she took me to an exam room, and left.

She came back and took my blood pressure. At this point, I realized she was "the nurse" I would be seeing. She never told me her name. I felt too awkward to ask it.

She said, "We tested your urine, and you're pregnant."

I said, "I know. I'm here from my RE's. I've had two ultrasounds. It's twins. I wrote all this down? And I brought the pictures with me, if you'd like them."

She said, "Yeah, but sometimes people come in with symptoms, and that's it. And it turns out they're not pregnant."

Well, ok then. I gave her all my pictures, and stressed the ugly ones--the sinus bleed, the bleeding ovary, Itsy measuring behind with a slow heartbeat.

She was like, "Yeah, let's go over your history."

So we did. No, no, no, no, no. Look, we don't know any of my husband's history. Adoption. No, nothing. No seriously, nothing. On the form where you asked? I said it. I also said we did Counsyl, see that, right there? Under "any genetic testing"? So no, we would not like the CF screen. Quad testing? Isn't that useless with multiples? ("Well, it might not be twins, we don't truly know at this point.")

What am I afraid of? Loss. Loss. Loss. Look, lady, I don't give a fuck that your whole office shares a call for delivery. Really, I don't. I know some women are all attached to their doctors and only want someone they know delivering their baby. I am much less greedy. I just want a delivery. I want someone who knows what they're doing, but I just want a baby outside me. I don't care if it's magical, not at this point. Did I mention my previous miscarriage? A lot?

I'm a vegetarian and borderline anemic. Anything I should do? Want me to eat meat? I will. ("You can talk to the doctor about that. Have you scheduled your 12 week appointment?") Should I take extra vitamins, minerals, hippy water sprinkled with baby dust, anything? ("The doctor will let you know.")

And then..."any questions for me?"

"Yes. How are my babies? Do we still have two heartbeats?"

"Let me go talk to the doctor."

And she came back, and told me the doctor wants to see me next week, for an ultrasound. And then, "We have a table-side machine, but it has really bad resolution. So we'll see what we can see."

Can't we just hop downstairs, where L&D is, and use one of theirs? Or something??? I mean, you've got a week to set this up.

Also, on that day, the only day you can get me in, I have a quiz at 8 and an exam at 12:20. Your 10:30 appointment better be on time, or I will walk out and just never walk back.

No news is...well, just no news

I'll write more later, but essentially my appointment was one big zero.

Wanna know what they measured? My weight and blood pressure.

Wanna know what they tested? My urine. For hCG. That's right, they had me POAS. Well, in a cup and they dipped the stick. But they didn't even test for white blood cells or anything fancy.

Then they charged my insurance probably something like $800 and sent me away.

Good news is, I get an ultrasound next week. Bad news is, "the machine has really bad resolution, so we'll see what we can see". Gee thanks.

I miss my RE's office. :(

7w3d: Puking Better Mean Babies

I'm not complaining. I'd go through years of vomiting daily, or even 4-6 times as is my norm right now, if it means I get a live baby out of it.

But if it doesn't, I'm going to be really fucking pissed.

I'm very nervous about my appointment tomorrow. I've never been to a real, live OB. (My gyno was actually a nurse practitioner.) I'm already hating the women in the waiting room, with their big, round bellies and their peace of mind.

This practice is highly referred by my RE, and when I said I was a patient of his, they were very excited for me and knew right what that meant. When they asked me my LMP and I responded with "it was IVF, I'm due March 4th", they were like "awesome, we'll put that in". The receptionist was nice to me when I called and said, "It turns out it's twins, do I need to do anything special for my appointment?" (No.)

But I'm still nervous. Because I'm an impostor, a pretend-preggo who should know better.

Because what if they won't give me an u/s? I'm still worried about Itsy's heart.

Or what if they do, and it's bad news?

When, when, when will I be normal?

7w1d: Can't stop thinking about it

It was at 7w1d in my last pregnancy that I had my second ultrasound and was told the pregnancy was non-viable.

That's where I am today, and I can't stop thinking about it.

6w4d: Heartbeats. Kinda.

HEARTBEATS!!!!!!!!!!!

Of course, it wasn't completely smooth sailing. Baby B popped right into view, measuring right on target, heartbeat easily visible and picked up by the machine at 119. Baby A was harder--my uterus is very retroverted and angled all funky, so they had a hard time even getting proper measurements. It looks like the CRL is about 3 days behind, and the sac 2. So, who knows. The heartbeat was very hard to find, and the machine couldn't pick it up at all. A manual count put it at 80, which is low. But my RE said he thinks everything is "probably" fine, and discharged me to the OB.

So I've got at least one, "probably" two healthy little babies.

I'm hoping I'll be able to enjoy things now...