Monday, December 30, 2013

From a Mother to her Children

So for the past couple of weeks Facebook has been flooded with lists; 10 Things a Mother of Boys Should Know, Things a Father Should Know About Raising Daughters, 25 Things a Mother Should Never Say to Her Daughter, etc., etc., etc...It got me thinking about what I want my children to know.  So here is MY list...

8 Things I Want My Children to Know

1.  Stickers are not decorative accents. 

I have never seen Martha Stewart place a Doc McStuffins sticker on a dusty sage wall or a frosted bathroom window...even on those Do-It-Yourself Home Improvement shows where the budget is a hundred bucks and they frame wrapping paper as a 'one of a kind' art piece have they ever included stickers.  The final straw was yesterday when I was on the toilet, turned to get some toilet paper and there was a sticker with a frog saying, "good job".   So please, for the love of all that is Holy stop sticking them to the walls, floors, windows, kitchen chairs, mirrors, books, toy box, drawer pulls on the kitchen cabinets and any other god forsaken place only a child's mind can think of...

2. Dresser drawers slide closed just as easy as the slide open. 

Please keep this in mind as you change your clothes for the 19th time in a day.  I walk around the house closing dresser drawers muttering to myself "drawer open, drawer closed"  a la Mr. Miagee, "wax on, wax off"...please take the extra 1/10 of a second and just close the door.  It would be one small step in saving my sanity.

3. Rainbows belong in the sky, not on your body. 

Just because all the colors come together cohesively in a beautiful arc does not mean you should wear them all...together...at the same time.  Yes, Anna, it is true that your shirt is purple, your pants are purple, socks are purple and even your headband is purple but that does not automatically make them a perfect match to be worn together.  At times you may feel compelled to wear as many colors as humanly possible, please don't.  Dressing oneself is a wonderful skill that showcases ones independence...please don't blow it by making yourself look like a flippin' peacock on Ecstasy.

4. Sleeping with me is not a treat. 

Not for me anyway.  Now, girls, please don't get me wrong...I love you all more than life itself and the best part of my day is early in the morning when you climb into bed, make a 'mommy sandwich' and we snuggle...there is nothing better.  However, that being said, I am less than thrilled when one of you sleeps in my bed.  You are all less than 38 pounds...how in the hell is it possible that you take up the entire bed?  If I get 26 minutes of combined sleep it is a good night.  Can we please just stick to the morning snuggles and get over the notion of having any all night slumber party?

5. Your shows aren't all that good. 

Now, I love watching your mind numbing dance shows, singing shows, running and jumping shows, magic shows et. al because you are my children and I love you.  I love the fact that you want are willing to bare your souls, be vulnerable, take a risk and all those other artsy cliches.  I love that you love me enough that you want to impress me.  Those are the reasons I love to watch your shows...certainly not for the entertainment value...Because, the truth is your shows kind of stink.  Not trying to be mean...Just stating a fact.  I know you are doing your best Katy Perry impersonation but honestly, when you are hitting the high notes more often than not it sounds as if you just stepped on the cat.  Oh, and while we are at it  your knock, knock jokes really aren't up to snuff either.  Again, I laugh because you are trying your best and I want you to know I appreciate your effort.  Knock, Knock.  Who is there?  Meatball.  Meatball who?  A meatball is up in a tree playing with a squirrel.  Yeah, not funny.  So please limit your performances to immediate family only...they are truly something only a mother and father could love.

6.  You all have crappy timing. 

I don't know how it is possible to raise 3 unique children that all have such bad timing.  I have not had a warm meal, crispy bowl of cereal or cold drink in 6 years.  Just when I start to cook, one of you desperately needs me for something  such as; showing me a commercial for some "As seen on TV" piece of crap, telling me you just spilled 3 wheat thins...you know, weighty issues of a life and death magnitude.  It doesn't end with spoiled food...oh no, it extends to when I am in the shower or trying to pee and you HAVE to have a juice box NOW!  Or how one of you always happens to get hurt and burst into a crying fit at the exact moment my doctor, insurance company or work calls.  Little Emily, you are not immune to this genetic mutation that plagues your older sisters...how is it possible that you know the exact moment my ass touches a chair to sit down and eat said cold meals?  It. Happens. Every. Friggin. Time.  It is a wonder that Chuck and I even found the time to have a 3rd child.  Girls, as a favor to your mommy, please work on your impeccable timing.  Thanks.

7.  Please don't take "STOP & Shop" literally. 

When shopping with you it is as if time stands still.  I love the fact that you are starting to understand the concept of money...earning it, saving up for something and then practicing your emerging math skills in the store aisle.  However, and this is a big one...I cringe when you get birthday money or a gift card.  Why?  Because I know at some point I will spend an entire afternoon (and early evening) looking at every ass aching item in the store...probably more than once.  I love that you are both so thoughtful, conscientious and good financial stewards but in this one situation can't you just be normal, hedonistic preschoolers and just grab the first craptastic toy you see?

8.  Your sh*t is not special. 

I mean that literally.  Everyone poops.  I do, you do, your friends do, the President does, even The Silver Fox does.  Now, I love me some Anderson Cooper but even I don't want to see his crap.  Yours is no more special than the next person.  No need to save it for posterity.  Now I am not much for surprises (unless it is a new bracelet with Emily's name on it...hint, hint babe) so walking into the bathroom to find a floating turd is not the ideal way for me to start, or end my day.  Leaving a floater is just plain uncivilized.  For Christ's sake flush your sh*t.

So there it is...my list of things I want my children to know.  It may not be as poetic as some of the other lists making the rounds on social media sites but if you really look deep inside your own self I bet your own list would be quite similar.

Happy New Year!!


Monday, December 23, 2013

It's a Christmas Miracle!!!

The hole in my belly left over from my botched c-section is officially closed!!!  Hallelujah!!!  I went to the plastic surgeon on Thursday and the hole is completely closed!!  No more packing, no more flippin' seaweed and for the love of God no more burning the edges!!!  It doesn't look pretty but at this point I don't care if my belly looks like Freddy Kruger's face. My insides are no longer outside and that is all I care about!!  I honestly thought that I would be dropping Emily off at college with my convenient new change purse still intact.  But the stars finally aligned and it healed!

I had a little more than an hour to kill before having my final OB appointment so I headed to my secret hiding spot in the hospital.  There is this lovely waiting room reserved for family members who have a loved one in surgery.  It is has comfortable chairs, couches, TV's and clean bathrooms.  It is way better than waiting in the main lobby with the dregs of society that hang out there.  See my previous blog post, "I Don't Have Enough Bones For That"...it gives a pretty colorful description of the clientele I am speaking of.  So Emily and I head for the surgical waiting room to bide our time.  In order to keep up the charade of actually belonging in there you need to keep your head down, look somewhat sad/concerned, but, don't overdo it or the circulating social worker will come over and check in on you.  I don't feel guilty taking up a seat in there, I mean after all they put me through the past few months, but I don't want to waste the social workers time...that would just be wrong. 

So it is time to see my OB, she agrees, the wound is closed.  She asks if I want a little more Silver Nitrate on it...Ummm, let me think about that for a sec...the wound is closed, do I want to burn it one last time just because?  NO!!  She did tell me that she has a patient that had a tiny opening in her c-section and started with the Silver Nitrate right off the bat so she didn't end up in my situation...glad they learned something from my case and they can help others with it, just wish I wasn't such a flippin' science experiment for the past 13 weeks.  The saying, "practice medicine" is so true...I have a lot of respect for the modern medicine; without it I wouldn't be here (I had heart surgery as a baby), who knows if Anna would be here (I needed surgery when I was 4 months pregnant with her) and I know Emily most likely would not be here so I am not knocking it altogether, but, they sure as sh*t got a ton of "practice" at my expense lately.

But back to my OB (for the record her hands are clean in all of this, she did not deliver my baby and was not present in any of the subsequent procedures)...so it is time to say good-bye to her.  She had tears welling up in her eyes...I have known her for almost 7 years now, she has seen me through my greatest joys and my lowest of sorrows...and now it was over...it was weird saying goodbye to her...it was kind of like when you break up with someone you still care about but you know it is for the best.  She told me that no matter what she is still my doctor and I can call her anytime I need her.  Now, I do really consider myself lucky to have had her as my doctor but I am hoping that our relationship will just be a fond memory.  But, if you read one of my earlier blogs you know that I am terrified that in addition to screwing up my c-section Romeo, the hairless kid wonder, also effed up tying my tubes.  Now to be honest I didn't do much research on the procedure and in my mind they were going to be tied into cute little bows and that would be it.    Well, in the past I have used Google for good...looking up recipes, toys, directions, etc.  Turns out you can use it for evil too.  Since I have had a ton of idle time on my hands lately I have been googling everything under the sun.  There are WAY more search results for "Tubal Ligation Failure Rates" than there is for straight up  "Tubal Ligation"...the web is full of medical studies, articles and a boatload of personal accounts of tied tubes failing.  I have seen stats saying up to 3 out of every 1,000 failing.  If you have been following my blog for the past two years you know the kind of luck I have...You know what?  Chuck and I are best friends...I think we will get along as plain old roommates just fine.

So my doctor says I can return to "regular activity" in two weeks.  She doesn't want me to push things and pop open the hole.  That means I get to go back to work in two weeks.  YAY!!  I am not saying one is better than the other, but, for me personally I like getting out and going to work.  I have a lot of respect for stay at home moms, that is the toughest job in the world!!  I am not cut out for it...someone would eventually lose their life and I am not saying who, but for the record I am bigger and stronger than all three of my children.  So you do the math...

So when all is said and done I will have been relatively inactive for 15 weeks.  I have been allowed to do daily living activities but nothing beyond that.  So that has not been helpful in trying to get the baby weight off.  Let's called a spade a spade...I am pretty soft around the middle theses days.  I would like to blame it all on the baby and the medical clusterf*ck that ensued that way I would not have to take any personal responsibility, but....my addiction to Dunkin' Donuts Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate and their Red Velvet Drizzle donut may or may not have played a part in my post baby weight issues.  The biggest mistake I made was taking my first sip...I was hooked from the get-go.  I am not going to lie it has become a big problem!  They say admitting it is the first step, right?  Well it has gotten so bad that I am making excuses to go get the most delicious combo every introduced.  Hey Sara, you didn't cry today?  Hot cocoa!  The baby is sleeping in the car?  Let me swing through the drive thru to kill some time.  This next one is the lowest...it was a snowy day and I was really jonesing for a salty car (that is my code for salted caramel hot chocolate) and I needed to come up with a plausible excuse to get my 4th in a week.  Here is what I came up with.  I decided to make spaghetti and meatballs for dinner...oops!  No garlic bread...hmm, what to do?  what to do?  I know!  When I pick Sara up from school we will go through the drive thru and get some french bread rolls (yes, they sell those at Dunks, you're welcome!) if I had to explain myself to anyone I could justify it by saying that it was the middle of a snowstorm, the weather was too bad to drag the baby out to the grocery store and my kids needed bread damn it!  Off to the Dunk we go...oh and since we are there I might as well get a salty car to go...why waste the trip?  See, I can justify anything and now you can see why I had to get off the pain meds ASAP!  Which leads me to my newest fantasy...I told you I was afraid to be alone in a room with my husband for fear of being the 1 out of a thousand that gets pregnant despite medical efforts not too...so now I've got The Coop...let me set the scene (don't worry, there is no way it will get sexual, give it a minute and you will see why)  So I am home alone and the doorbell rings.  I answer it.  Staring at me with his piercing blue eyes is the Silver Fox himself.  As if Anderson Cooper showing up at my door was not enough, he is holding a large Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate AND a Red Velvet Drizzled Donut!!  He comes in and we sit on the couch and get down to business, forget talking about the Bashar al-Assad Regime, forget the debacle that is Obamacare, forget keeping them honest...we go straight for the good stuff; little man babies, prancercising and Gerard Depardieu.  We giggle all night long sipping our cocoa's and nibbling on our donuts.  Some people have Cinemax, I have The Coop...

I need to nip this addiction in the bud soon...I really want to have a wardrobe that does not include maternity yoga pants...so if after the holidays you see me about to put any type of crap in my mouth feel free to slap it right out of my hand.

So thankfully this chapter of my life seems to be coming to a close and the girls get a kick-ass doctor's kit out of it.  I gave them all of the leftover medical supplies to play with, even the seaweed!  They have been witnesses to so much the past few months, as Chuck likes to say with a far away,knowing look in his eyes, "I have seen things...", the girls have been processing it through their play...their poor babies have been getting the brunt of it...Oh, and this morning Sara was playing "health insurance"...hopefully I haven't scarred them for life.










Sunday, December 15, 2013

Lessons Learned

Emily is going to be 12 weeks old tomorrow.  3 months has gone by so fast, but, with all of the complications it can at times feel like a lifetime.  This experience has been a very humbling one for me.  I have had to learn how to ask for and accept help from others, learn to prioritize and how to let stuff go.  In reflecting on the past 84 days I have come to realize;


*  I have failed my children as a parent.  I always thought I was raising independent, strong girls filled with kindness and compassion for others.  NOPE!  When I was down and out they did not care!!  Apparently having a hole in your belly and a back that is revolting against you means nothing when your children want Lucky Charms.  At one point when I was literally crying out in pain one of my children asked why I was crying and I told her my back hurt really bad and she accused me of faking and then proceeded to ask me for a snack. 

*  My suspicion that our cat Lucy is out to kill me was validated.   I was in excruciating pain and I was leaning against the island in the kitchen for support.  The damn cat climbed up on my shoulder and snuggled around my neck like a flippin' fur stole.  She would not move and since I was unable to move I had to just stand there with her on my neck until she decided to get off.  I honestly believe she was hoping I would just die off from the pain.  Let me tell you, the thought to just give up did cross my mind  But Hah!  The friggin' joke was on her!  I waited her out.  I was not going to let that stupid cat win.  I waited  for a good 10 minutes...standing there motionless and contemplating what the hell happened to my life that I have a cat standing on my shoulders and there is not a damn thing I can do about... and then she finally gave up!  Point Mommy!!

*  The small town we moved to 4 years ago, the one I have been dying to get out of is filled with some pretty amazing people!!!  When all this crap went down people came out of the woodwork to help us out.  Whether it was offering to wait with the baby so I wouldn't have to take her out of the car at school drop-off or put the stroller in the trunk for me, to watching my kids, driving them to and from school and making meals...it was ALL appreciated!!  It has really made me rethink the whole moving away idea.  Along those lines I want to thank everyone for the emails, cards and phone calls of support they really helped lift my spirits.  I could not have kept my sanity if it were not for my parents, sister and mother in law.  They have gone above and beyond and we are so grateful.   I also really want to thank Laurie C. for setting up the meal delivery program...it was a HUGE help and I know Chuck and the girls truly appreciated it.  Nikki R., Renee C., and Dawn G. thank you for being surrogate moms to my girls the past 3 months.  It has been beyond stressful but thankfully when the girls were with you ladies I had one less thing to worry about.  "Thank you"  just doesn't seem adequate...

*   Don't trust anyone with your life who is named after a Shakespearean character.  Romeo may have been the Chief Resident, but I am thinking he may have won that distinction more because his fellow classmates felt bad he was stuck with a sh*tty name and less due to his medical skill set.

 *  The human body stinks.  Not figuratively, literally.  It does.  It stinks.  Not much more to say on that one.

*  I have let go of the small stuff.  I really had to rely on Chuck to keep everything running smoothly here at home.  He would work full time and then come home and have to do everything around here.  I couldn't do anything for a while.  I knew he was doing his best and I didn't want to look a gift horse in the mouth so I wouldn't complain when the small spoons were mixed in with the large spoons or when the kids dishes were kind of haphazardly thrown into the cabinet.  That kind of stuff always bothered me, but, you know what?  I have realized that really does it matter if the big, blue, plastic bowl is teetering on top of the small pink princess one?  No, it doesn't...get over it Erin don't waste your energy on the small insignificant stuff.  I am referring to this as the new "zen" Erin.  I know the kids have noticed a difference and I am hoping that this is one of the life lessons I don't forget in a few months. 

*  Your mom was right when she would tell you to make sure you have clean underwear on.  I am taking that one step further for the ladies and reminding you to make sure your "area" is part of your emergency preparedness plan.  You never know when you will be on full display for the entire medical community (and a random Chinese man), or when you will need to have a giant, super sticky bandage placed over it and ripped off by a new person every 3 days.  Do your self a favor and make  Nair a bathroom staple. 


*  Obama Care isn't the only thing driving up insurance premiums.  Case in point; during the height of my medical crisis I was getting supplies delivered to my home every day.  Had I wanted to, I could have opened up my own walk-in clinic.  After I ditched the wound vac I had a ton of set-ups for it.  The rental fee for the vac itself was $56 a day.  It needed a new canister ($6) and sponge/tubing set ($21) every 3 days.  Thankfully I have good health insurance that covered the cost.  However, when I no longer needed the vac the company would not take the supplies back, even though they were all sealed in its original, sterile packages.  What a waste!!!  So I asked my VNA nurse if she had any patients with wound vacs that don't have insurance that could use them.  It seemed so wasteful to throw them away.  She said she did.  Now, if that is true or not I can't say.  She may have passed them along to a needy patient or she may have set them up, surrounded them with incense and my picture and looks at them lovingly as that is the last connection she has to me.  Remember...she did have some stalker like tendencies towards me...could happen.

* Again, and this one I can not stess enough...if you are having surgery, general anesthesia is your friend!  Take it, embrace it and enjoy it.  Surgery with out it is just as unpleasent as you would imagine.  A lesson I wish I hadn't learned.  I just HAD to prove a point...

*  Chuck is an amazing guy.  I always knew he was, I mean, I married him after all.  But he has handled all of this in stride.  He has had to rearrange his work schedule on more than one occassion,  had to be both father and mother to the girls, laundry, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, working full time, planning  two birthday parties, packed my wound,...the list goes on and on.  Through it all he has not complained, not once!!  Thankfully he has a good sense of humor about life too.  A few weeks ago I had the worst headache of my life, now I know you are supposed to go to the ER if you ever have the worst headache ever, but I just couldn't do that to him.  He had fallen asleep on the couch and I couldn't wake him to go to the hospital with me again.  Suddenly I began to vomit.  It came on so fast I couldn't make it to the bathroom, it was violent.  It was everywhere, the floor, walls, on the dresser.  As I was puking up round two in the bathroom he got up and cleaned it all up.  I told him to leave it, I would do it, but he did it.  I just kept apologizing for the past couple of months and he said no need to and he just kept cleaning the puke.  Sounds crazy but it made me love him even more.   I am so glad I never settled on a mate.  He is so much more than I could have asked for in a husband.  And yes, I know how lucky I am to have him. 


*   As I look back over the past 12 weeks I go from being angry at being cheated out of the newborn bonding time with Emily, to feeling sad for all the chaos Sara and Anna have had to endure to feelings of indescribable gratitude for having been blessed with another healthy child after being told that was pretty much an impossibility.  This has been a difficult process both physically and emotionally and it is just now with hindsight I am realizing just how grueling it has been.  No matter what, I will do anything for my children...even have surgery without anesthesia!! I would do it all over again to have what I have.  They are the reason I get up everyday and I have come to realize that I am ONE TOUGH Mother!!!!!!


Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Baby's Got Back!

Problems that is!  So if having a putrid, festering hole in my belly were not enough, my body decided to betray me even more.  A few weeks ago my back started feeling stiff.  I figured it was from sitting around for 8 weeks.  I started to feel better so I decide to take a walk with the baby.  It was a short walk on a flat road.  Nothing strenuous.  Apparently  that was WAAAAAY too much excitement for my post partum self.  I always tell Chuck I am just not made to exercise.  At then end of the walk as I folded up the stroller my back went into a spasm.  OK, lesson learned no more exercise.  I am more than ok with that.  I figure I will rest overnight and wake up refreshed.  NOPE!!!  I woke up in even more pain.  It was so bad that I needed to go to the ER.  This time we opt for a local hospital.  After an exam, blood tests and some X-rays they determined due to 8 weeks of inactivity my core muscles had atrophied, who knew that had any strength to them to begin with? Hmm, you learn something new everyday! So due to the weak muscles my back had destabilized and went into a spasm that would not release.  Oh, and since I was 8 weeks post partum with a seroma (aka the hole) they had to check it to make sure that wasn't the issue.  So now in addition to everyone in the Boston area seeing my "area" we can add many members of the Central MA medical community to the list as well. They called in everyone, its not everyday you see a seroma...glad I could help with their education.  So they prescribe a muscle relaxant and send me on my way.  I sleep pretty much until the next morning.  Monday, November 18th.  My 7th wedding anniversary.  I wake up a little before 5 a.m. and try to get up to go to the bathroom.  I can not move.  Chuck needs to help me.  I take a Motrin and head back to bed.  Chuck takes the baby to his mom's house since I can't care for her while taking the muscle relaxant.  The girls get up and I have to help get them ready for school.  It takes all I have to get out of bed.  I have NEVER felt pain like this before.  It feels like a 500 pound Sumo wrestler is sitting on my shoulders and my lower back doesn't feel connected to my spine....my body feels like a real live Jenga game.  I feel like any minute my torso is going to fall right off of my hips.  The pain is beyond description.  With every step I am screaming out  some sort of primal, guttural noise.  You would think the girls would show some type of concern, maybe have a little compassion for their mother who at this point is on the verge of passing out from the pain.  Literally.  All of the sudden it sounds like a swarm of a thousand bees are buzzing in my ears and my vision is getting kind of tunneled.  Holy crap!  I am about to pass out while home alone with Sara and Anna.  I force myself onto the couch and have Sara grab me the phone.  I have to call 911.  I can't pass out here without another adult in the house.  Not so much for the psychological harm that may be caused my children seeing me in that state...more so for the fact that they probably wouldn't notice.  They would go about their morning and see this as a golden opportunity to eat Ho-ho's and Pringles for breakfast and though Sara knows how to call 911 I am almost certain she wouldn't because if I were unconscious she would have a slight opportunity of getting out of school for the day (her life's mission).  She wasn't going to do anything to jeopardize that chance, no matter how slight....if that meant sacrificing her mother's life for the greater good, so be it.  So back to the 911 call.  I have never called 911 before.  In my book that is reserved for true emergencies...not the BS calls I have seen made while working in the ER.  I have seen someone take an ambulance to the ER for their baby's diaper rash and once a dad called a rescue when his children were around someone with the swine flu, mind you they had no symptoms and were perfectly healthy but I guess you can never be too sure.  Now, I am not a health care auditor or anything but, I am pretty sure that is not a great use of resources.  So even though I am in the worst pain of my life I am still hesitant to make the call, but make it I do.  The dispatcher answers...I tell him I need an ambulance.  He asks for what and I say, "umm, to take me to the hospital?"..."yeah, I assumed that, but why?"  Ooops.  So I tell him my situation and he sends them right over.  In the meantime my friend comes to pick the girls up for school...take that Sara!!  The ambulance arrives and they have to figure out how to get me out of the house.  The problem being we have a ton of steep stairs out our front door so a stretcher is a no go.  They could put me in a chair and carry me out but they advise against that.  They say it is very uncomfortable and patients tell them it is extremely painful.  So that is out.  They decide to take me out the back door.  I can not move so they need to carry me.  One paramedic under each arm and gingerly drag me out of the house.  My toes are barely scraping the ground...imagine if you will one of those peaceful hippie protestors getting arrested.  You know how the police pick them up under the arms and the protestor kind of floats just above the ground?  Yeah, it was like that.  I can just imagine what the neighbors are thinking because you know they are looking out their windows.  Is she sick?   Is she hurt?  Is she protesting stores opening on Thanksgiving day?  But I didn't care...I needed help and boy did they make me feel good before we even left the driveway!  They got an IV in, meds running and my pain manageable.  So we go back to the same ER as the day before and I have the same clothes on...it was too painful to change.  I had on the same BRIGHT red shirt and of course it was the same nurse as the day before.  So this time they add pain meds to the muscle relaxants.  No pain now!!  So poor Chuck has to leave work early yet again and come spend our anniversary in the hospital.  This guy is a saint!  So the next 2 days are a blur...in my medication induced stupor I promised Sara a kitten, a puppy and a pool for the backyard.  I also had various phone conversations that I don't remember, so if I had a chat with you around the middle of November don't hold me to anything I may have said.  Again, no worries, the baby was safely with my Mother in Law.  After 2 days I stopped taking the muscle relaxant, I didn't like the way it made me feel at all.  After another couple of days I would only take the pain med if I really, really needed it.  It is a pretty addictive med and I kept thinking of all the stories that start with a back injury and end with an addict.  But by Friday I needed to get out of the house and I really wanted to do something special with the kids.  They have been getting the sh*t end of the stick lately.  So we make plans to go to Bass Pro Shop to see Santa.  I did need a little somethin', somethin' so I took some pain meds.  As we were driving to see the Big Guy the girls were asking how he got there...we explained that the elves must have dropped him off and they are scouring the skies to try and find his sleigh.  All of the sudden I scream out!  AHHH!  There they are!  I was looking up too and just at that moment a flock of geese fly by.  I swear on my children's lives when I say I was 100% certain that I had just seen Dasher and Dancer and the rest of the gang.  Chuck bursts out laughing because he knows I wasn't reacting like that just for the sake of the kids...he knows I think I really saw them.  He gives me a look as if to say, "you know they aren't real, right?"...between the over the top promises I have been making, the hallucinations and just not liking the way they make me feel I have decided to lay off the drugs all together. Though there was one time I was in agonizing pain, took a pill and felt like a million buck half an hour later and I told Chuck I was rethinking this whole drug addict thing and he told me he was OK with it...he really didn't want to be a single parent forever.

Another unpleasant side effect of this back injury is the inability to properly "cleanse myself" after using the bathroom.  I have, as Chuck likes to call them T-Rex arms.  He believes they are disproportionately shorter than the average persons.  I am not saying I completely agree, but, if Cee Lo Greene and I were to go in for a hand shake we would both have to make sure to have a breath mint ahead of time.  We would be getting kind of close.  So there is no front to back or even back to front going on at this time.  Now in a pinch all of us ladies have had to drip dry before and I decided albeit begrudgingly to go with that course of action...my thought process being; smelling like the Andrew Square T station after the St. Patty's Day Parade has got to be better than the putrid, festering stench coming from the hole in my belly, oh yeah, don't forget about that!  I did however, have to make the conscience, and completely unwise decision to not take care of any "other" bathroom business for a while.  A decision that would come back to bite me in the ass...later in the week I HAD to go, I couldn't wait any longer.  It was just as miserable as I had expected.  My back was still in a spasm and I was in unbelievalbe pain.  Now I had to do this too?  I was sure I was going to either blow out my back or ass.  Neither option was good.  I swear you could hear my scream clear across the country.  Yeah, it was that bad.

It is now a few weeks since my back problem and I am starting to feel good again.  I met with a plastic surgeon last week and finally got some good news.  The hole in my stomach is pretty much all filled in.  They burnt it again with the silver nitrate and Chuck gets to do that for me once a week.  I am sure in some weird, twisted way he might get a little satisfaction from putting that acid stick on my belly after all I have put him through.  I go back again next week and hopefully that will be it...no more hospital trips...A Christmas Miracle!  I am banking on that because if not there really is nothing medical left for them to do.  Chuck and I have been brainstorming though should we need a back up plan.  The biggest problem is the skin apron covering the hole...it can't get air in there to heal.  Chuck said we should install a chin up bar and get some of those boots so I could hang by my ankles..that would do the trick and is a lot less invasive than my idea of piercing my belly with one of those disc earrings with the large holes in them on either side of my belly button and then hoisting the skin apron up with some bungee cords attached to my shoulders...that would air it out real good.

On more than one occasion as I was sitting in my mesh undies (which Michelle Duggar may have 19 kids and counting, but she has nothing on me when it comes to the mesh undies...I still have about 2 years worth in my closet) I have said to Chuck if we send a picture to MTV of me in the undies with the wound vac and the breast pump hooked up there would no longer be a need for the show Teen Mom...they would wire their vaginas shut!!  Teen pregnancy would be wiped out completely.

So as my visits to the hospital begin to wind down I am having to say goodbye to some great nurses I have met along the way.  As one said goodbye she said she hopes that is it, that I don't have to come back.  Then it hit me like a ton of bricks and I was filled with panic and said, "oh Kendra...I am sure I will see you back here next year when I have my next baby."  She said, "what?  I thought you said Emily was your last child"..."she is supposed to be"  I said and then added, "but the ass clown that botched my c-section is the same person who tied my tubes..."











Wednesday, December 4, 2013

As easy as pulling duct tape off of raw pizza dough

Huh? What?  Pizza dough?  Don't worry my friends we will get there.  Let's catch up a bit.  Now where were we?  Let's see; I had a baby, she was delivered by Romeo (the hairless kid wonder), my stomach started bleeding two weeks later and we left off when I was at the hospital and they told me it was a lot of blood...

So much has happened I will give you the highlights, or more accurately, the low-lights.  So what happened?  Apparently a blood vessel was bleeding under my incision for quite some time.  They may have not clamped it off during the section, or it could have ruptured on its own.  I think they missed it during the section by a few things they said and how Romeo reacted when we crossed paths again.  But, it doesn't matter, it is what it is.  So here I am at OB triage bleeding from my belly.  They had to open up the incision and see what was what.  That was fun, shots to the belly are as pleasant as you would imagine.  Anyway, the blood had formed a pocket under my skin and now that it was released it left a 5 inch hole in its place.  The discussion was to either take me to the OR to take it down and fix it or give the wound the benefit of the doubt and trying packing it with the hopes it will close up.  The attending thought the best course of action was to give the wound a chance to heal with packing.  They packed it up with a few  feet of gauze and taught Chuck how to do it.  The gauze needed to be changed twice a day.  As we were heading out I asked what the chances were I would end up needing the surgery in the end.  A 40% chance.  I told him I didn't like those odds.  He tried to make me feel better by saying it is better than a 50-50 chance.  Yeah, I guess, but I told him if something weird were to happen...it was bound to happen to me.  A truer statement has never been spoken.

So we head home and try to relax the rest of the day.  7 p.m. comes and it is time to change the packing.  I lie down on the TV room floor, Chuck gets all the supplies ready and the girls get snacks.  Oh yeah, they couldn't wait to see the hole in my belly.  They get some Cheeze-its and step right up for a birds eye view.  Chuck grabs hold of the shoe lace shaped packing gauze and pulls.  He yells and drops the gauze.  Sara yells and Chuck grabs for some paper towels.  Apparently when teaching him how to pack it they neglected to tell it it may GUSH BLOOD when you remove the packing.  Poor thing was horrified!  The kids grimaced but kept on eating their Cheese-its.  It gets better though, he now needs to repack it...which really is a nice way of saying stuff a 4 foot bandage into your wife's abdomen using an over sized Q-tip.  So this plays out twice a day over the next several days.  Enter the visiting nurse.  So now I have a stranger coming into my home every day to pack the wound.  At this point so many people have seen the wound Chuck is convinced when all is said and done everyone in Massachusetts will see my vagina at some point.   Keep in mind my c-section scar is about and inch or two above the business end of my private parts.  Oh, and, I went into labor a week before my scheduled date...so in my mind I still had a week to "prepare"...catch my drift ladies?  Hey Bobo, I have your squatch right here (my nerdy Animal Planet watchers will get that reference)  Great, so not only do I have a newborn to care for and a hole in my belly now I have to make sure my house is clean everyday?  Great.  So the VNA nurse takes the packing out and complains that Chuck did it incorrectly and placed 2 pieces of gauze and that was absolutely not OK.  I assured her Chuck placed 1 piece of gauze.  I know he did.  I watched him.  So she repacked it with one long piece.  That night Chuck pulls the gauze out and it is only about 6 inches.  It is supposed to be about 4 feet.  Crap!  It broke.  So poor Chuck is digging around inside my belly with the Q-tip and can't find the other piece.  He is really poking around.  I felt so bad for him!  He kept saying he became an engineer for a reason!  It is now 8 at night.  I call the doc on call.  I am no doctor or nurse but I thought having a rouge piece of gauze free floating through my abdomen may warrant a call.  The on call doc seemed put out that I called.  Sorry to bother you lady.  She told me not to worry,  I had an appointment already scheduled for the next day...just pack the hole with MORE gauze.  Yup, on top of the missing piece!  I know right?  Seems like asking for trouble (or an infection perhaps?)...but, again, I am not a doctor or nurse...so who am I to question her thought process.

Well, you guessed it!  Infection!  By the time I get to the hospital the next day a distinct odor is wafting up from my belly.  The doctor takes one look at it and sends me right upstairs, upstairs being the operating room.  Yeah, I made it into the 40%, like we didn't see that coming.  So there I was sitting in the pre-op holding area with my smelly belly hooked up to a breast pump.  A great look.  A resident comes in with two way too eager medical students.  At this point I am exhausted, tired of having to tell my story over and over again and frustrated with my lack of privacy.  I am not sure if in order to be a doctor at this particular hospital you need to be missing the gene that remembers to close a door behind you.  Every single time someone would come in or leave the room they would leave the door wide open.  The majority of my visit was sans pants but no one cared.  I forget to mention earlier that when I was at the hospital the day the hole reared its ugly head while they were cutting the incision down they had the door and curtain open,  So a lovely Chinese man from across the hall ditched his wife in labor to come and check out my cooter clean out.  But I digress...back to the over eager students...I am muttering under my breath about Chuck's prediction coming true of everyone seeing my vagina.  The girl says, "oh, don't worry...it is totally normal for us to see it"...I let loose like never before!  "NORMAL?", "NORMAL?"..."there is NOTHING normal about me sitting here naked pumping milk out of my boobs in front of strangers, with a rancid hole in my belly stinking up the room while my newborn is home with a babysitter and not her mother."  The resident asked the students to leave and surprisingly I never saw them again.  Oh, and then the anesthesiologist tries to come in.  I say try because he can't figure out how to open the flippin sliding door?  Are you kidding me?  This person is the single person responsible for MY LIFE in about 10 minutes.  Not much confidence there.  They do the surgery and afterwards spring on me that I would need to be admitted overnight.  Hey, thanks for the heads up, it isn't like I have 3 kids and need to make arrangements or anything.  So I stay overnight.  Long story short, after a ton of miscommunication, a run in with Romeo...he said he was sorry I was in this situation, I said he was the one who delivered my baby, he asked if I was sure.  I said "yeah, pretty sure, there aren't very many Asian doctor's named Romeo"...what I really wanted to say was, "Is your malpractice insurance up to date?".  So they send me home with a wound vacuum.  It is a black sponge inserted into the hole, about 6 feet of clear plastic tubing attached to a vacuum pack that you carry around in a fanny pack.  So as to not bore you with all the details I will give you a few bullet points about "Vacky", that is what the girls nicknamed it...

        *It ticks.  Like a time bomb.  Constantly.  It seems to get very loud at night.  I kept thinking of Poe's Telltale Heart.  The night time ticking truly was making me insane.  I couldn't sleep, Chuck had to sleep on the couch, between the ticking and the extension cord wrapped up in the sheets it was just too much.

     *You could see the blood and other grossness being sucked through the tubing.  I didn't venture out much but when I did I just wanted to carry a huge neon sign explaining that it was not pee.  Somehow in my mind blood and pus is a bit more dignified to carry around in a fanny pack than urine.

     *You have to carry it everywhere. Many times I would forget and just get up and walk away.  It would bang Emily's crib when I would try to put her to sleep, it would bang her head at times.  In turn I would get pissed at it.  yeah, I know it is an inanimate object but I did harbor a lot of hatred for it.  One day it fell on the floor waking Emily up  and I was so pissed I kicked it across the floor.  Please take note, if in the future you find yourself the proud owner of a wound vac don't kick it across the floor.  It will never end well.  You're welcome.

     *The tubing was held in with an 8 x 10 piece of clear super sticky film.  It needed to be changed every 3 days.  I could only shower the day it was to be changed.  The smell was indescribable.  I think Cindy Anthony said it best when she said, "it smells like a damn dead body in there" (Nancy Grace watchers will appreciate that sound bite).  The smell was overwhelming.  You know when a dead body is found, the news always interviews a neighbor who made the call because of the really bad smell coming from the house.  I know of which they speak.  It was the most disgusting smell I have ever encountered.  I could not escape it either.  Remember the hole is right about my "area" when sitting down, which is pretty much all I was doing..the crotch to nose difference was only about 12, maybe 15 inches.  It friggin smelled!  It made me want to vomit.  The smell was everywhere.  My bedroom was the worst.  So now to the duct tape and pizza dough you have been wondering about.    The super sticky film barrier would need to be removed.  Emily is my third child.  I was 2 weeks post partum at the time.  There was nothing taut about my belly.  When the VNA would pull it off it would be as if she were pulling duct tape off of pizza dough.  Not easy to do.  Oh and don't forget I hadn't had taken care of business before delivery and now here I am even 2 weeks later, so every 3 days I got the pleasure of a free bikini wax from a stranger.  Oh, and every time they came to change the vac it would be a different nurse.  I was so sick of making small talk with strangers as they ripped off my skin, hair and dignity as they literally put their face in my crotch to analyze the smell.  To add insult to injury they didn't even buy me dinner afterwards!

So I had the vac in for 2 weeks.  As you can imagine it didn't go smoothly...it malfunctioned a time or two, I had to make several emergency trips in to the city to get it reattached.   At the 2 week mark the vac had not had a significant impact on the healing process and I was D.O.N.E--Done!!  I went back to my  OB's office with guns blazing.  I was not leaving with the vac.  I would chain myself to the exam table if need be.  So the medical assistant comes in.  She is a temp.  She is at least 80 years old if she is a day.  She is even wearing an old lady shawl.  She asks me how I am.  I lay into her, pleading my case as to why I am not leaving with the wound vac (the smell, the ticking, whacking Em in the head, waking her up when it bangs the crib, the removal of several layers of skin with each dressing change, etc., etc...She looks overwhelmed. Get a hold of yourself Erin, she is elderly.  Back off, she is wearing a shawl for Christ's sake!  A SHAWL!  So I apologize and wait for my OB to come in.  She does.  As soon as she walks in she comments on the smell.  She opens the dressing and proceeds to put her face in my crotch...I guess the pungent stench wasn't enough, she needed to really get a  good whiff.  The nurse comes in with some supplies, lasts a minute or two but needs to leave...THE SMELL WAS THAT BAD!!  She is an OB nurse...she smells gross things all the time.  My belly hole sent her over the edge.  I guess the saying is true, Go Big or Go Home!  Did I mention that I wasn't going home?  Not with that flippin wound vac anyway.  So the decision is made to send me back up to the OR.  At this point there has been so many miscommunications and dropped balls that I am questioning EVERYTHING, even the way they are breathing.  So I ask about the procedure.  They explain it to me.  I ask if this is something that can be done with just local anesthesia...I wanted to keep my eyes on them.  They relent and let me do it with out being put under.  OK, here is a tip for you...if you are ever given the option of having surgery done with anesthesia get knocked the eff out!!   What they did to me would not be allowed under The Geneva Conventions.  It was downright criminal.  Oh, and it turns out I am not as tough as I thought.  Halfway through I was dying!  Actually, dying may have been the easy way out at that point.  But I survived.  I can't say the same about a nursing student that was observing.  I am not sure if it was the god awful smell wafting from my stomach hole  or the brutality of the procedure but she left.  She never came back.  I think she may have given up medicine entirely...I am not quite sure but last week as I was driving by the Gap I could have sworn I saw her working the sales floor...

I did leave the hospital that night without the vac so I should be grateful for small miracles?  I am now 10 weeks post partum and I remain vacuum free...sadly, not hole free.  Since the vac removal the corrective procedure they did was not successful.  They tried packing with gauze again, fail!  They tried  packing it with seaweed, I sh*t you not, you read that correctly.  Other than making my wound smell like low tide (which is awesome since it is in such close proximity to my crotch...insert your own joke here) it also failed!  Last time I was at the hospital they tried using Silver Nitrate to speed the healing.  When I worked in the ER I remembered when burn patients came in they used something called Silverdene.  The patients loved it, it had a cooling effect.  For the mere fact of both things beginning with the word Silver I assumed the Silver Nitrate would be the same.  BIG MISTAKE!!!  I was laying on the exam table chatting with the doctor when she put it on.  I wanted to scream at her, "WTF?...you are burning me!!!", but since my 4 year old was in the room all I could say was, "wow, that feels kind of warm".  So all the other stuff didn't work I had no hope that charring my skin would make a difference and sadly, I was right.  In addition to the countless trips to the hospital, a gross skin infection (remember I have that lovely skin apron covering the hole...if you are a new blog reader check out my old post "My Body is a Wonderland"...that will explain the apron)  a VNA nurse who bordered on being a stalker (at one point Anna asked in front of her if she was the crazy nurse), we have had 2 birthday parties, school events and a few holidays.  This has been the most action packed 10 weeks ever!!  Not the maternity leave I had imagined!  So tomorrow I am meeting with a plastic surgeon to see where we go from here...I think I am going to lobby for them to throw in a free tummy tuck while they fix the hole.  It is the least they can do for all the trouble they caused me.  Today is my birthday...I am 41.  As a birthday gift to me she slept until 6:30 this morning!!  (She has been sleeping from 8 p.m. to 5:30 for a while now.  I think she believes if she is the best baby ever I will stop leaving her with sitters and actually spend some time with her.)  But no worries, Anna got up at 5:20 to remind me it was my birthday...she is so considerate like that!I keep telling myself this is the payback I get for having the nerve to have a baby after 40.  But I would do it all again 10 times over because I have my sweet Emily baby...

Sounds crazy right?  If all that weren't enough I had a whole other situation to deal with about 2 weeks ago....again, I can NOT make this stuff up!!  The next chapter involves an ambulance, flying reindeer and a puppy.  Stay tuned...