Flashback: April 9th 2010. The day it all began. That is when my life in the fast lane took off and nothing was ever the same. Often times I found myself looking back though...begging for the simple days of the past and wondering whether or not it was normal to feel I needed a secretary (and a SWAT team of medical personnel) to raise my child.
Fast forward to now: Life is good. Doing 65 in the middle lane and I have to say I love it.
So, how did we go from THAT to THAT? It all starts with an awesome husband. In order to explain the rest I will have to back it up to about March 2010. At this point I started to get to that point of pregnancy where it hurt. I was uncomfortable ALL the time and I felt like I was going to burst. I thought this was strange because I was not due until May 13th and the doctors just smiled at me and said "Sorry hon, that's the way all women feel". And what did I know, I had never done this before. Within a week or so though they were even scratching their heads because I was BIG. It was soon found out that I had waaaaay too much fluid going on in the belly area and ultrasound showed that there may be some sort of blockage in Grace's nose/mouth area. During the next few weeks my stomach grew and grew and I was told that I was measuring out to be a woman that was carrying triplets. Yes you read that right...triplets! Jump to April 8th....around 2:30 I am at work and I call my doctor's office in terrible pain. I explain that I am so very miserable and I began to cry. They ask if I am having contractions. No. They ask if my water has broken. No. They ask a million questions. No. No. No. They gently try to tell me that there is nothing they can do but they finally book an appointment for me the next morning when I insist. Two hours later...Cheryl is trying to calm me down because my water has broken at our local Jimmy Johns sandwich shop. Oh and by the way, I am still upset about the fact that I never got to eat that delicious sub sandwich! And if you are looking for a way to get out of a teacher required night such as your school's literacy night you should make sure that your water breaks five weeks early....works like a CHARM! lol Remember how I mentioned that I had excessive fluid going on? Well, you should have seen the looks on the teenagers faces that worked at Jimmy Johns when my water broke. I think I would have quit my job if I worked there when that happened! Now that I have given you a great visual, lets move on.
Or not. I can't really go into the next 12 hours because it all really is a blur to me. Here it is in a nutshell. Hospital, doctor, pain, family, friends, pain meds, more pain meds, epidural, c-section. A lot of crazy business happened in there and I could tell you about it but it really is just bits and pieces and I do not remember quite a bit. So lets go to 4:55 a.m. on April 9th 2010. I can remember this moment like it is yesterday, my beautiful baby is here. They bring her over to me so I can kiss her and Jeff and I fall in love. When they take her away my doctor is smiling and tells Jeff to go to Grace to take pictures, but I knew something was wrong because everyone else in the room was quiet and moving very quickly.
She was not breathing. The ultrasound that I had mentioned was right, there was some sort of blockage in Grace's nose that was obstructing her airway. She was immediately put on a ventilator and we were left wondering what was happening. The next five weeks were the scariest time of my life. We were brand new parents and we were in a land where they were speaking a different language. I was fortunate enough to have people around me that were well versed in the medical world so they were able to help me understand what was happening. The hospital where Grace was born only has a level 2 NICU, so two days after she was born she was transferred to Summerlin Hospital so surgery could be performed on her bony bi-lateral choanal atresia. Catch that? Yeah basically those are the fancy words for bone blockage in her nose. It is pretty rare, and it is often times a tell tale sign of C.H.A.R.G.E. Syndrome. In the next few weeks Grace had two surgeries to remove this blockage and she also had a fundoplication and g-tube placement surgery because she was refluxing fluid to her lungs. And in the middle of all of this I was admitted to a different hosptial because of a blood clot. We had gone to the hospital closest to my house because I had really thought that it was only a pulled muscle and that I would be out of there within hours. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. I ended up staying for a week and I was not able to see Grace at all. Getting too deprssing for you? Sorry! It will pick up soon, I promise!
Five weeks later, on May 17th (4 days after my original due date) we took her home! (See thats better). I was lucky because my maternity leave bumped right into summer vacation, so I did not go back to work until Grace was almost 5 months old. That summer was filled with doctors appointments, therapy sessions, tube feedings, doctor shopping, learning about C.H.A.R.G.E., and all the other stuff new parents have to learn. Between my and Grace's medical issues we seriously had an appointment everyday that summer and then everyday after school once the school year began. I imagine that is what happens when your kid has 17 doctors and therapists. Grace also had 3 more surgeries: April: ear tube placement, June: cochlear implant, and August: removal of tonsils and adnoids (sp). We were going a hundred miles an hour and we really did wonder whether or not life would ever calm down.
Well, it did. Ok, big collective sigh of relief. Ready, in, and out. That is so much better. I only have to go to the doctor every 3 months and they finally took me off my blood thinner, Coumadin. Yaaaaaay!And a lot of Grace's appointments are check-ups that happen every 6 months to a year except for the big ones....ENT, gastro, audiology, but even those only happen every 2 months or so. And she still gets therapy 3 times a week (used to be twice a week but we are upping it to get her walking), but they have become so much a part of our routine that it would confuse me to NOT go because I would not know what to do with myself lol.
And there you have it. A glimpse into the past 2 years of our life. It was not always pretty and we are still learning as we go, but I couldn't be happier. It may sound crazy but I would not trade these past years for anything. I take that back, I would like to take away all the pain Grace had to feel to get to where she is today. It brings me to tears to think about it. Such a little baby had to go through so very much. You want to talk about strength, look at my daughter. Back to the happy...steps are being taken, words are being spoken, food is being eaten (I will post about this later). I don't torture myself into the wee hours of the night anymore to research C.H.A.R.G.E. and hearing loss, now I torture myself into the wee hours of the night blogging and reading my kindle! It was all worth it. I mean come on, I heard the word "mama" for the first time the other day! Granted, she was looking at the dog when she said it, but hey, I'll take it.
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