Thursday, September 5, 2013

Behind the scenes

I know I have some of you wanting to read about our first hospital stay and what's to come, but I thought it would be appropriate to share how this mama was handling things so far in this journey. 

My first blog post I talked about how excited I was to find out we were pregnant.  I got to experience the pregnancy thing when I was 17 and still in high school with my first born, but that was different.  I was single, still in high school, living with my parents and was not planning on spending half my senior year planning for a baby.  My first born was the greatest blessing to me.  He saved me and made me so much better than I ever would have been without him, but he wasn't planned.

This time, I was married, we were trying, it was a plan.  I was so very excited to take that first test with my husband by my side (instead of alone in my parents bathroom scared shitless on how I was going to tell anyone).  When it was positive we did the typical stuff....we hugged, gave each other a kiss, I might have gotten some tears in my eyes (doubtful, but maybe), and started to talk about our future.  (I should probably clarify that I didn't take just 1, but about 6 pregnancy tests before I was positive I was pregnant).  When we knew for sure (after the 6 tests) we talked about telling the kids in a certain way.  We wanted everything to be perfect and exciting. 

I thought of all the things I would get to do that I didn't before.  I was going to decorate a nursery, tell my parents without extreme anxiety and fear, watch people respond in a positive light, afford to buy new things and make every decision WITH someone.  I not only had support from my husband, but I was sharing this experience with my very best friend, someone I love more than anything! I had big dreams.....THIS was going to be perfect. 

I don't know if I mentioned this, in fact I don't think I did, but I'm a horrible pregnant person.  I am paranoid, worried, hormonal, a big cry baby, tired, lazy and if I didn't say this earlier PARANOID!!!!  I bought a fetal heart Doppler to make sure this babies heart was beating when I was about 15 weeks pregnant,  I worried every time I went to the doctor that something was wrong and the night before my 20 week ultra sound, I had so much anxiety I could barely sleep.  I mentioned the level 2 ultra sounds and all that jazz, but when that all came back fine I had no reason to think anything serious was wrong.  I could finally relax (a little anyway) and enjoy it.  I told myself numerous times.....I am so very blessed and lucky to even get to be pregnant.  Not everyone gets this opportunity and I was given 2!!!  I would beat myself up for not liking it, but I couldn't lie to myself or anyone else, it wasn't my favorite thing. No matter how hard I tried to enjoy it, I was a mess!!!! 

I remember telling my boss how nervous I was about being pregnant.  I remember her response..."Ashley, this is the safest they will ever be."  WOW!  Slap in the face.  So very true, but now I have to worry about my older son too :)  GREAT!  Never thought about how unsafe he is out here in the world. 

Now, I don't know how many of you are moms, but if you have never had children I need to tell you.....the feelings you have for these little people is unexplainable.  Someone you barely know makes such a huge impact on your heart that the minute I see my babies I know there is NOTHING I wouldn't do to protect them.  I would sacrifice everything and anything to make sure my children are okay.  I can' honestly say that I love them so much it hurts.  I can't imagine my life without them. 

So, when Mr. Keean was born, just like when my first born greeted me, I fell in love!  I got anxiety thinking about leaving him in the nursery at the hospital while I was supposed to get sleep.  I just wanted to hold him, stare at him, learn everything about him and tell him that I would be his biggest advocate and fan. 

I need everyone to understand that I am just like every other mom I know.  I love my kids with everything I have.  Sometimes I think it's hard to realize that other people love their kids just as much as I love mine.  When you see something happen to someone else it can be hard to put into perspective that they feel the same way about their babies as I do mine. 

When it became more apparent that Keean was sick, I immediately started to question myself.  Was I paranoid? being a worry wart? did I do something wrong when I was pregnant? was it the well water I was drinking? was it because I didn't breast feed?  I drove myself crazy thinking about every little thing I could have done to cause him to be so sick.  Was it the food I ate? the vitamins I took?  the anti-depressant I was taking?  I could go on with all the things I thought could have caused it. 

To be honest, it was so hard for me.  I cried a lot.  I knew a lot of people who were pregnant at the same time as me and I would see all their babies thriving, gaining weight, meeting milestones and it made it all so much more real to me that something was wrong with my baby.  I would be lying if I said I didn't get angry sometimes.  I always had the talk with myself that I needed to be thankful that I had him with me and we have hope that everything will be fine, but I couldn't fight the feelings of anger and jealousy at times watching all the other moms complain about simple things.  Things like how they didn't get to wear their 3 month clothes more than once because they were growing too fast, they were gassy or how they get squirmy in their car seat.  I would sit back and bite my tongue.  I wanted to remind them how much worse it could be, but I always had to remind myself that it could be worse for me too.

To sum it up, I felt like a failure.  I started to seclude myself from people because my conversations were always based on Keean and what was going on with him.  People who were trying to be helpful, but would say things like, "Is it because you didn't breastfeed" "Do you want to try giving him my breast milk" "Do you think it's just allergies", "My cousins friends uncles baby had something similar have you checked for reflux?", it goes on and on.  Now, I know people weren't trying to offend me or hurt me, but I was beating myself up daily (and nightly) and the last thing I wanted to hear was anything about breastfeeding or if I had him tested for the obvious.  (I should probably inform everyone, I asked our GI doctor if breastfeeding would have made a difference.....she said absolutely not.....we would have ended up in the same place on the same formula, in fact, it would have just pro longed the process because they would have cut everything out of my diet before realizing that it wasn't me or what I was eating it was something with him).  I didn't want to hear any suggestions or anyone tell me how to feed him to make it all better.  I was with him 24/7.  We tried EVERYTHING.  EVERY method, EVERYTHING.  We researched, we doctored, we did all we could.  So, when people would act like we were just parenting wrong.... we didn't feed him slow enough or thick enough formula or get him to not puke by holding him a certain way took everything I had not to scream. 

I apologize, I am being honest.  The advice got old.  I appreciated people caring and all their concern, but I was doing everything I could to not blame myself and to figure out answers and some comments just put me back to questioning things I did wrong.  And the only way I could not feel that way is if I just quit talking to everyone.  I cut myself off from most of the world.  My kids, my husband and my parents were about the only people I let in.  They understood me.  They knew what I needed and didn't need and that was all I could handle.  Like I said before, I would do anything and everything to protect my kids and I felt like there was nothing I could do to help him.  It made me sick to my stomach.  Just when I thought something would work, it wouldn't and just when I thought we could live a normal life with him something would happen so I quit getting my hopes up.  I was told I needed to be positive, I needed to quit looking at the negative.  Nothing is worse when you are depressed and feel alone when people you care about and are supposed to care about you tell you how to feel and how to act.  I know there are lots of people out there who can look at every situation with a smile on their face and tromp through it like it's no big thing.....that wasn't me.  It wasn't happening.  I was going to go about our lives with the people who let me act exactly how I wanted to and at the time it was angry, sad and isolated.  Was this healthy?  NOPE.  Not at all.  And if I could do it again, I'd like to say I'd do it different, but I was sad.  I wasn't going to hide that.  Please don't picture me walking around with my head down crying myself to sleep every night.  We had a lot of happy times and smiles too, but my heart hurt and if you know me there is no faking how I really truly feel inside.  It's just how I am.  Some people see this as weakness, some see it as strength.  I don't really care what it was.  It was real.

1 comment:

  1. I can understand how people's advice gets to a person. My son was very fussy for the first 2 months and I had everyone trying to tell me what I should do. I also did not breast feed for personal reasons and that seemed to be a big issue for most. All that matters is we as mothers did what we had to and everything we could do for our child.

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