It's 7AM and I've been awake for hours. I just can't get my brain to turn off. I come home from work exhausted but as soon as I lie down my brain starts working. I think that I fell asleep last night after lying in bed for 4 hours. Then a little after 4 I had to get up to use the bathroom and that was the end of my nights sleep, my brain kicked back in gear.
A lot of the time that I do sleep I have nightmares. The subjects of my nightmares vary, but the worst ones are of losing this baby or losing Clay. At least when I wake up after one where I lost Clay I can just snuggle up to him, he's there.
Last night before I went to bed I was having contractions. I have them all the time, it's fairly normal, but I have to be conscious of them. More then 4 an hour can be trouble. Of course I was worried that I would fall asleep and they would get worse and I wouldn't know it. If were to get any worse we would have to go in to be monitored, down to Labor and Delivery. Having to go back to Labor and Delivery (which is pretty much inevitable) scares the crap out of me, in fact just thinking about it is enough to start up a panic attack. We have some horrible awful memories from labor and delivery triage. I am afraid that walking in there would be enough to trigger a full flashback. Of course, if I thought something was really wrong, I'd go.
I've also been worrying about work a lot. They couldn't afford me to go to part time when I did, but now another one of the supervisors is leaving and they aren't replacing him. That means they need me even more. It makes me feel pretty bad and pretty useless. When I ask my boss what I can do for her, she usually says, "be able to work 40 hours again." This week she told me "you know the timing of this pregnancy really sucks for me." Yeah I know. This morning I woke up worrying about a couple things that I should have finished up yesterday but didn't have time to. Since it is the weekend and I won't be back in until 3:30 on Monday, I just went ahead and dialed in and did it even though I shouldn't have. I didn't want to worry about it all weekend. I'll probably get in trouble. I am still pushing my boss to see if I could work a few hours from home, but it still looks like it won't happen. My boss said she was talking with her boss about making me salaried this week, but they can't because I am on restricted hours. I'm worrying about that as well. I don't want to be salaried, I don't want to be on call. I'll try the oncall thing as part of a rotation to help out my boss and the other supervisors after I am off of restriction, but salaried scares me. My boss works at least 60 hours a week. If Kalen gets here, I can't do that. I want to work less, not more. I am really really hoping that Clay gets a good job with benefits that will break the monetary hold this job has on me. Then I will just have to work on the emotional hold.
I could ask my doctor for some different sleeping pills, but right now I am on the safest ones for pregnancy. I'd like to be knocked out at night more, but I'd rather stay on the safer pills and not sleep then possibly harm Kalen. I am sure the doctor will ask me about it on Tuesday. We'll see what she says.
Most days I am able to sleep hard, long and dream free mid mornings. That keeps me from going too crazy. In fact I think it is about time to head back to bed.
Saturday, February 23, 2013
Sunday, February 17, 2013
I am normal, but pregnancy after a loss is not.
I went to register for the new baby at a local baby store last weekend. The hours posted on google were wrong. We got there a half hour before close but it was too late. Just a normal thing that happens, right. You can always go back another day. Well, I had a doctors appointment the next day and had this overwhelming feeling that Sunday night would be my last day not on bedrest for months. When the poor registry lady told us we were too late I almost instantly broke out in tears. She felt bad and told me, "You can come back another day." I replied "Yeah I can, if I'm not on bed rest." Trying to make me feel better she said, "Well if you are on bedrest you can do it online.". I told her, "Yeah, I know that's what I had to do last time." and I hurried off. I hate crying in front of other people, especially people who don't know the whole story. She just looked at me like I was a normal run of the mill crazy preggo who was just being extra emotional because of the hormones. Clay wanted to still look around, he thought it would make me feel better so we started to. She found us a few minutes later and gave me the registry "swag bag" just in case I wasn't able to come back. That was nice of her, although it didn't make me feel any better. I apologized to her for crying in front of her, she said "don't worry I'm menopausal I cry over everything too." Ugh, I know she didn't know, but it felt like she was trivializing my emotions. In the back of my mind, I really wanted to drop the dead baby bomb on her. Make her understand why even walking into the store without panicking/having a flash back was an accomplishment in itself, never mind preparing myself to answer all the registry set up questions... Including the big one, "is this your first child." I was mentally prepared to get this done that day and couldn't. We walked a little further through the store and I started sobbing uncontrollably, we went home and it probably took me a good 2 hours to calm down. You see registering was one of those big things I was looking forward to with Kyler. I wanted to wander up and down the store aisles innocently looking at all those cute things imagining how he would look playing with them, using them. With Kyler we didn't want to start registering until we knew if he was a boy or girl, so we had planned to go the day after my 22 week appointment. As you probably know, we actually spent the next day in the hospital monitoring everything he did, preparing for surgery, wondering if he would like through the weekend. After I was released from the hospital and sent home to bedrest, the dream of being able to wander through the aisles and register was gone. Infact I didn't dare register until after he had made it past 24 weeks, the point where there was a possibility he would live. When I did register I did it online, looking at pictures, reviews, and lists of what you "should" need for the baby, rather then holding feeling and browsing through everything. I was lucky that I got to do it, but it wasn't the same by any stretch of the imagination. Despite my bad feeling, my doctor's appointment went fin the next day. Yesterday we got up early, started the registry online so didn't have answer the questions in person. Then we went in and just got a gun to "update" it. It was a lot of fun, of course not like I had imagined it would be with Kyler, and there was a little bit of sadness with it as well. We are planning on using most the stuff we got for Kyler with the new baby, so it was bitter sweet to think things like, no we don't have to register for any Newborn diapers, we have enough that the new baby can use. Or, let's go ahead and register for the high chair, we never did end up getting one for Kyler, we were going to get one later but "later" never came. Anyway we got it done. We registered for lots of fun and cut stuff and had those daydreams in the store of the new baby playing with all the toys, rolling around on the fuzzy giraffe mat, or throwing Cheerios out of his high chair to the dog.
Speaking of the "new baby", he's not "new baby" anymore. I think we've picked out his name. He is going to be Kalen Gabriel. Of course on the internet it says Kalen means lots of things, but I'm going to go with it means Mighty Warrior. His middle name, like with Kyler, we picked more for meaning. Gabriel, God is my strength. I was joking with Clay that we were setting a prescendent that if we have any more kids they will have to be K first names with biblical middle names. I don't like that there are a lot of girls named Kaylen, Kaelyn ect ect, but Kalen is a boy's name and I really like it. I told my boss the name we picked the other day, she said she liked it but she had really like Kyler, yeah, we did too.
Picking names this time was very different. It was more hurried. We have been looking at names since we found out we were pregnant, even before. We weren't even going to wait until we found out boy or girl, we were just going to pick one of each, but then we found out so early he was a boy. We needed to get him a name in case something happened. When I went into the hospital at 22 weeks with Kyler and we thought we were going to lose him I felt so guilty. I was worried he was going to die with out a name. We didn't even have any ideas at that time. Last time we thought a lot about how it would look on a school roster, if a sub would be able to pronounce it, how it would sound announced a graduation, how it would look on business cards. This time we thought about all of that again, but also had one more thing to add to the list. How will it look on a head stone. I don't think Kalen will die, but it is part of my life, babies die even for no reason. This makes me think about things sometimes. The last couple times we have gone to the cemetery I've wondered if we could get a plot adjacent to Kyler if something happened to Kalen. Some people might think that is weird or morbid, but I don't really. I just know reality is, there is no guarentee one way or another. Good things happen but so do bad things.
I've still been going to my counselor. I was going every two weeks, but last week she bumped me back up to every week. She doesn't think I am dealing well with the pregnancy. I am having a hard time with a lot of stuff, but I think a lot of it is just normal pregnancy after a loss things, like the name and grave thing, or like still having trouble going to baby stores, or not wanting to take baby classes because you don't want to be surrounded by happy oblivious preggos. She keeps telling me I need to keep positive and basically not to think about what happened with Kyler. I know that Kalen and Kyler are different but we haven't even gotten to where I started having problems last time. We still two weeks away from the "scary" weeks that we had with Kyler. I am positive about this pregnancy, but cautiously so. I just don't think that she understands the complexity. We'll see how it goes over the next couple weeks. Like I said, I have a lot of trouble when I feel like people are trivializing my feelings, chalking them up to "pregnancy hormones" or depression that can be fixed with pills. It is just complicated. Pregnancy after a loss is hard, really hard. It takes strength and courage beyond words.
I miss Kyler. We are going to start changing his room over to Kalen's in the next couple of weeks. That is exciting and hard. I know Kyler wouldn't mind sharing. The Kyler chapter of our life will never be closed, but it is kind of like we are turning to a new blank page, you have to flip back a page to see him. If I feel up to it tonight I might start taping off the baseboards for painting. We still haven't decided what we are going to do with his stuff, like the gifts people gave us for his first birthday, his hand and foot mold, the pregnancy test from him. I defiantly don't want it tucked away in a box in a closet somewhere, but I don't think it should be in Kalen's room. Maybe we will move it to our room or something. Clay has been thinking about making a shadow box for it, but hasn't gotten it done yet.
I've still been working 20 hours per week. It is good and bad. Sometimes I feel really guilty that I am not there to help out with things and I feel like I am kind of out of the loop. Sometimes I feel like it would be better to not work at all, but then I would never see or talk to anyone or really have any motivation to get out of bed every day. Clay got laid off the first of January and it has been nice to have him home, but going from two full time paychecks to one half of a paycheck and an unemployment check has been stressful. I just see these bills racking up on top of the bills we have left from Kyler. I keep telling myself that it doesn't matter, we are making minimum payments and the only "secured" debt is the house. It's not like they are going to dig up Kyler, shove him back in me and take his headstone away if we don't pay the credit card we put all of that on, but it is hard to watch that emergency savings account dwindle and the credit card debt to up. My counselor told me last week, just think in no time you will be back to work full time. UGH, the other big thing I have been struggling with. I don't know how I am going to be able to leave Kalen and go back to work full time, but the reality is, I am going to have to figure it out. Of course I worried a lot about that with Kyler, and it turned out to not be an issue. I would have dropped him in daycare 10 hours a day 5 days a week if it meant I could have him the rest of the time. I guess it will work out in the end.
Today I am 20 weeks pregnant. Usually that is a pretty big milestone in a pregnancy but I'm not feeling it this time. One of my coworkers asked me about it on Friday. "You are 20 weeks, right, how exciting." I pulled one of those ungraceful moves and told her "Not really, the big ones for me are 22 weeks, when we had problems with Kyler the first time, 24 weeks, the point at which babies are considered viable outside of the womb, and 28 weeks, when the majority of babies born early survive." I felt a little bad, but it was honest. I think she understood, she is one of the most honest people I work with.
This weekend I was able to spend two days sitting outside in the sun with out a coat on. I think that helped my "spirit" a lot. Now the sun is starting to go down and it's getting a bit chilly outside. I guess I better wrap up this long rant and head inside. Thanks for listening to me gripe. Thanks to everyone who reads. It's not always unicorns and rainbows but we are still moving forward.
Speaking of the "new baby", he's not "new baby" anymore. I think we've picked out his name. He is going to be Kalen Gabriel. Of course on the internet it says Kalen means lots of things, but I'm going to go with it means Mighty Warrior. His middle name, like with Kyler, we picked more for meaning. Gabriel, God is my strength. I was joking with Clay that we were setting a prescendent that if we have any more kids they will have to be K first names with biblical middle names. I don't like that there are a lot of girls named Kaylen, Kaelyn ect ect, but Kalen is a boy's name and I really like it. I told my boss the name we picked the other day, she said she liked it but she had really like Kyler, yeah, we did too.
Picking names this time was very different. It was more hurried. We have been looking at names since we found out we were pregnant, even before. We weren't even going to wait until we found out boy or girl, we were just going to pick one of each, but then we found out so early he was a boy. We needed to get him a name in case something happened. When I went into the hospital at 22 weeks with Kyler and we thought we were going to lose him I felt so guilty. I was worried he was going to die with out a name. We didn't even have any ideas at that time. Last time we thought a lot about how it would look on a school roster, if a sub would be able to pronounce it, how it would sound announced a graduation, how it would look on business cards. This time we thought about all of that again, but also had one more thing to add to the list. How will it look on a head stone. I don't think Kalen will die, but it is part of my life, babies die even for no reason. This makes me think about things sometimes. The last couple times we have gone to the cemetery I've wondered if we could get a plot adjacent to Kyler if something happened to Kalen. Some people might think that is weird or morbid, but I don't really. I just know reality is, there is no guarentee one way or another. Good things happen but so do bad things.
I've still been going to my counselor. I was going every two weeks, but last week she bumped me back up to every week. She doesn't think I am dealing well with the pregnancy. I am having a hard time with a lot of stuff, but I think a lot of it is just normal pregnancy after a loss things, like the name and grave thing, or like still having trouble going to baby stores, or not wanting to take baby classes because you don't want to be surrounded by happy oblivious preggos. She keeps telling me I need to keep positive and basically not to think about what happened with Kyler. I know that Kalen and Kyler are different but we haven't even gotten to where I started having problems last time. We still two weeks away from the "scary" weeks that we had with Kyler. I am positive about this pregnancy, but cautiously so. I just don't think that she understands the complexity. We'll see how it goes over the next couple weeks. Like I said, I have a lot of trouble when I feel like people are trivializing my feelings, chalking them up to "pregnancy hormones" or depression that can be fixed with pills. It is just complicated. Pregnancy after a loss is hard, really hard. It takes strength and courage beyond words.
I miss Kyler. We are going to start changing his room over to Kalen's in the next couple of weeks. That is exciting and hard. I know Kyler wouldn't mind sharing. The Kyler chapter of our life will never be closed, but it is kind of like we are turning to a new blank page, you have to flip back a page to see him. If I feel up to it tonight I might start taping off the baseboards for painting. We still haven't decided what we are going to do with his stuff, like the gifts people gave us for his first birthday, his hand and foot mold, the pregnancy test from him. I defiantly don't want it tucked away in a box in a closet somewhere, but I don't think it should be in Kalen's room. Maybe we will move it to our room or something. Clay has been thinking about making a shadow box for it, but hasn't gotten it done yet.
I've still been working 20 hours per week. It is good and bad. Sometimes I feel really guilty that I am not there to help out with things and I feel like I am kind of out of the loop. Sometimes I feel like it would be better to not work at all, but then I would never see or talk to anyone or really have any motivation to get out of bed every day. Clay got laid off the first of January and it has been nice to have him home, but going from two full time paychecks to one half of a paycheck and an unemployment check has been stressful. I just see these bills racking up on top of the bills we have left from Kyler. I keep telling myself that it doesn't matter, we are making minimum payments and the only "secured" debt is the house. It's not like they are going to dig up Kyler, shove him back in me and take his headstone away if we don't pay the credit card we put all of that on, but it is hard to watch that emergency savings account dwindle and the credit card debt to up. My counselor told me last week, just think in no time you will be back to work full time. UGH, the other big thing I have been struggling with. I don't know how I am going to be able to leave Kalen and go back to work full time, but the reality is, I am going to have to figure it out. Of course I worried a lot about that with Kyler, and it turned out to not be an issue. I would have dropped him in daycare 10 hours a day 5 days a week if it meant I could have him the rest of the time. I guess it will work out in the end.
Today I am 20 weeks pregnant. Usually that is a pretty big milestone in a pregnancy but I'm not feeling it this time. One of my coworkers asked me about it on Friday. "You are 20 weeks, right, how exciting." I pulled one of those ungraceful moves and told her "Not really, the big ones for me are 22 weeks, when we had problems with Kyler the first time, 24 weeks, the point at which babies are considered viable outside of the womb, and 28 weeks, when the majority of babies born early survive." I felt a little bad, but it was honest. I think she understood, she is one of the most honest people I work with.
This weekend I was able to spend two days sitting outside in the sun with out a coat on. I think that helped my "spirit" a lot. Now the sun is starting to go down and it's getting a bit chilly outside. I guess I better wrap up this long rant and head inside. Thanks for listening to me gripe. Thanks to everyone who reads. It's not always unicorns and rainbows but we are still moving forward.
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