I missed a week on this feature, and for that, I apologize. We threw the poutine party last weekend, and it kept us pretty busy, so we’ve been a bit slow on the content lately.
But enough about that. Let’s talk babies.
But enough about that. Let’s talk babies.
There isn’t a whole lot of news with our little guy. He’s creeping up on 4 months, but he’s still a little peanut. The biggest change in the past couple of weeks has been his reaction to tickles. Since he can’t giggle yet, he holds his breath and lets out some kind of weird grunt, and it’s absolutely hilarious (and maybe a little bit mean).
So, in lieu of baby news, I wanted to talk about our strange and nightmarish path that led to little “Babby Spanch’s” birth. As pregnancies go, Jenny’s was one of the worst ones that I’ve ever heard of. Now, I am absolutely not saying that any pregnancy is easy. Quite the contrary, it’s incredible to me that any woman would willingly put their bodies through that kind of torture, often more than once. Making it through even a normal, boring pregnancy is a true testament to the strength of womankind, and anyone who says otherwise must not have witnessed it for themselves.
So, in the beginning, we thought it was just severe morning sickness. After the first few weeks, jenny had unbearable nausea, and it would last longer and longer with each passing day. She would have to walk out of the kitchen at work several times a day, sometimes for 20 minutes or more. Naturally, being the awesome husband that I am, I would do everything in my power to cover for her, but it was getting pretty bad. She eventually had to leave work entirely, and about 4 months earlier than she intended.
The condition is called hyperemesis gravidarum. The wikipedia page for this condition defines it as follows:
Hyperemesis gravidarum (HG) is a complication of pregnancy that is characterized by severe nausea and vomiting such that weight loss and dehydration occur.[1] Signs and symptoms may include vomiting several times a day and feeling faint. It is more severe than morning sickness. Often symptoms get better after the 20th week of pregnancy but may last the entire pregnancy.
This is a very broad definition, and the condition varies in severity VERY significantly. In our case, the severity was well into the extreme side of the spectrum. For weeks, it was nothing but doctor visits, new prescriptions, and rolling the dice that this next protein shake actually stays down, because she hasn’t held down anything of substance in two days. To say that it was hard would qualify for the understatement of the century. And all I could do was watch it happen.
 Just me, learning all about IV's. | Eventually, we managed to get partnered up with a home health care company, who provided us with all kinds of fun medical supplies. We now had a pump, which fed into injection sites that we had to change twice a day. This meant that I got to stab my pregnant wife with a chubby (and often slightly dull) little needle to feed a small catheter under her skin, and a slow drip of reglan would be administered subdermally. This went ok for a little while. The sticks were painful, there were always bruised whelps at the injection sites, and the medicine made her very sleepy, but at least she was able to keep some food down (at least most of the time). But then the negative side effects of reglan started to take hold in the form of severe depression. Luckily, Jenny is good at spotting that kind of thing, so we went back to the doctor and got ourselves a new prescription. Zofran was the next step up, medicinally speaking. It worked a little bit better, and the side effects of the reglan started to wear off. The problem with zofran, however, was that it left much larger, and more painful whelps where the injection sites were. We would have to alternate areas of her body, because areas would become extremely bruised and painful after only a couple of day’s worth of injections. Also, her condition became more and more severe as time went on, which led up to her being administered the highest dose that people are allowed to receive, as well as regular IV hydration. |
As the weeks crawled by, the condition worsened. Eventually, her only choice was to be hospitalized and fed through a PICC line. We changed home health providers, and went home to administer the TPN (the white bags of IV nutrition) ourselves. This came with a whole new set of challenges, like keeping her PICC line flushed, clean, and bacteria free. But, since we were faced with new sets of challenges every three or four weeks, even this went south. We were back in the hospital, except this time it was sepsis. The only thing that was providing her and the baby the nutrition that they needed was literally killing her.
The first day of the PICC line. That thing went south in a hurry.
The rest of the pregnancy was a blur of hospital stays, and terms like transverse, gestational hypertension, preeclampsia, cesarean, and more. After all of the insanity, neither of us could keep up with exactly what was going on. And then, finally, our doctor gave us a 1 day heads up on the emergency c-section. She was at 37 weeks to the day.
These are just the most basic bullet points of how the pregnancy went down. It’s the in-between moments that contain the real story.
The whole experience was probably one of the most difficult trials that our family will ever face. Obviously, Jenny had the worst of it, because all of those horrible things were going on in her own body. But for me, sitting back and helplessly watching the woman that I love suffer every day for 8 ½ months was torturous. Being so afraid for my wife’s health, it was enormously difficult to stay positive. But I had to, because if I were to falter, there wouldn’t be any more support for her to lean on.
Sometimes, staying positive means taking pictures of your wife, who seems to have gotten herself stuck in a hoodie.
I read stories all the time about some men who just don’t have what it takes to stick through trials such as these. And for those men, I feel incredibly sorry. I didn’t know that I would have the mental fortitude to stay supportive of my wife through our ordeal. In fact, I didn’t even know that I would need it. But, I know now that overcoming that struggle has made both of us better, stronger people. The patience that I learned, motivational skills, the problem solving, the odd medical technique, all of these things add up to me being a better father to our son. Now, I would loved to have practiced these skills in a less traumatic setting, but we don’t get to choose the cards we’re dealt. If you are a father-to-be, and you find yourself dealing with a complicated pregnancy, just remember that you aren’t alone.
Sometimes, you have to become a father before your baby is even born. If you find yourself faltering, think about how your partner must be feeling. As difficult as it may be for you, your partner is feeling it ten-fold. Be patient, and learn some empathy. Your life stopped being all about you the instant your unborn child was conceived, so act accordingly.
-MC