Migraine, Angry, and Tired of the Wizard

It’s probably not a good mom thing to say, but I’m a little bit tired of the Wizard of Oz at the moment. I’m glad we have three days off. I watched the whole show again tonight and I came home with a migraine, complete with auras and shooting light issues. I’m going to be upfront and say I just took an Ambien, so I have about 10 minutes to write a halfway decent blog before I lost all sense of reality.

I have written two blogs and not published them over the past two days. Yesterday’s blog was a complete angry overshare. I’m pissed at my husband. The problem is not only am I pissed at him for crap he’s doing now, I’m pissed at him for something he did 7 years ago and I realized that I just can’t let it go. That’s not good or healthy. It’s not that it’s something on my mind 24/7, but when we sat down to talk about why I feel like I’m last on his list behind his mom, sisters, work, etc. and I started to give examples it just hit me. There was no greater example and perhaps that’s something that I just can’t forgive.

I was hesitant about writing about it, even in an anonymous blog because it’s an issue I don’t discuss much; not with friends or family. I have a few select friends who know the story, but most know bits and pieces that I’ve allowed them to know. I always say I’m not a people person and I get mocked for that because I come across friendly and nice. It’s not that I’m not nice, it’s more that I don’t know how to let people in or let them get to know me. I’m not special or cool, and I certainly wouldn’t let most people see my pain. But then today I thought it might be therapeutic in some ways to write it, so I will. If I regret it tomorrow…I’ll just never discuss this blog post again and we can’t forget it ever happened.

I had a terrible time getting pregnant. I had several miscarriages before I eventually found a fertility specialist that allowed me to tell him what I wanted to do to get pregnant. I was a crazy person…a true maniac on the subject. I researched everything to the point that I couldn’t stop. I knew so much that when we met with the new reproductive endocrinologist and I discussed everything with him, he asked me what type of physician I was. My husband nearly burst out laughing.

Anyway, my new doctor was wonderful and I had three successful pregnancies on the first try each time I tried with him. When we tried for the third baby, however, things didn’t go smooth. Well, I had horrid pregnancies with hyperemesis and IVs at home, but that’s a story for another day. My third pregnancy was a triplet pregnancy. When you hear you are pregnant with triplets and you have a 2-year-old and a 1-year-old at home, I can assure you the reaction is not one of joy…it’s terror.

We lost one baby very early on, and came to terms with the fact that we were going to have four children under the age of 4. I was a mess. I was scared. I’m 5-feet-tall and at the time I weighed about 105. I was already high risk because of the hyperemesis, but now I was in a whole new category of high risk. They were worried I wouldn’t physically be able to carry the babies to term and would need bed rest, but whatever, I’d do what I need to do.

At 16 weeks I went for an ultrasound and one of the babies had died. I don’t remember the details of that day very well. I insisted on going in to work and didn’t discuss it with anyone there. In fact, I didn’t tell them for about a week, and when I did I just blurted it out because I didn’t know how to tell them. There were so many things that happened all at once but the main concern was for the baby that was still alive. It was looking like she had severe issues. They did a higher level ultrasound and diagnosed her with clubbed feet. I was told that a lot of people in the past chose to abort babies with clubbed feet because of potential other issues. I’ll never forget that sentence as long as I live.

Because I’m a maniac, I then researched every possible thing on clubbed feet. I knew what kind of treatment my daughter would have and that it needed to begin within three days of birth. It involved full leg casting that changed weekly and then bracing for years. I was prepared.

I gave birth to my baby on February 12, 2007 and I was afraid to look at her at first. There’s that innate fear of, “omg, what if it’s so bad they can’t fix it.” I didn’t look. I let her latch on and breast feed and I snuggled her tight and promised her I’d never let her go and I’d never let anything bad happen to her. From that moment on, I became the most protective mom you’ve ever seen. I’m an overprotective mom in general, but I can’t even put into words what it felt like. I just knew I had to protect her from the world.

She got cast on a three days old and we were told that her feet and legs “weren’t that bad.” I forgot to mention that my sister-in-law (husband’s sister) and I were due 7 days apart. She had an easy pregnancy. So there I was with my three week old baby in casts (she was born 5 weeks early) and I felt something happening to me. I had intense cramping like labor. Minutes later, I passed a large mass of tissue. When I looked closer (as gross as that sounds) I could see that it was the remains of a partially formed baby. It was small, very small…maybe 4 inches. I called the doctor and they told me to bring it in to the ER to be analyzed to be sure, but why? What for?

So that brings me to the part of the story where I get mad at my husband. About an hour before that happened we got the call that his sister was in labor. His family does everything together. The fact that I wanted no one at the hospital until after the baby was born was almost world ending for them. They called the house and wanted my husband to come to the hospital. It didn’t matter that we had two toddlers and a newborn. But then this happened. And he still went…

And I don’t forgive for that. I’m not looking for anyone to make any nasty comments about him please. I actually do really care for him. We had a long talk today and I really went off about this. He said that he’s apologized a million times, but to be honest I think today was the first time he’s apologized and said if he had to do it again he would never have made that choice again. But it is done and I can’t let it go. And that’s when things fell apart because nothing anyone can say or do will ever convince me that I’m more of a priority that his family. If I wasn’t a priority on one of the hardest days of my life, I never will be.

Ok, well this blog is a complete downer and I really try not to do that, but if you’re still reading it, thank you for letting me ramble this out. Sometimes you just need to get your feelings out, and for me, this isn’t a story that I tell, and it certainly isn’t an easy one, so thank you for listening.

On a MUCH lighter note. The Breakfast Club is on tv and I haven’t seen this movie in YEARS. What a great movie. You young people that haven’t seen it need to watch it! I remember when this came out, and it’s still hilarious. I got talked into watching The Notebook last night. I’m not much of a movie person, but it was sweet. I’m not sure what all the hype was about, but it was a sweet story. I might try and read the book in all my spare time now that my son is starting football practice. Oh yes Monday through Thursday 5:30-8:30, because I have nothing else to do!

At least for the first few weeks it’s at the high school and I can walk the track. Maybe I’ll lose more weight.