Just what you've all been waiting for! A summary of how sick I felt this summer! What could be more exciting? Sorry, folks, but I wasn't blogging back in the day when I was pregnant with/gave birth to/survived the early infanthood of David and Mary, and I am going to more than make up for it now!
First with the disclaimers. I am grateful for this pregnancy. Even in the moments when it felt like a curse, I never ever lost sight that it is a blessing. When I checked in at the OB clinic for the first time and they did the intake interview and one of the gazillion questions is "Was this pregnancy wanted?"--the amount of want behind my simple squeaky, nauseated "yes" could fill a universe. So I was happy and blessed and grateful... but that didn't change the fact that I felt like crap.
Fortunately, on a scale of how bad morning sickness can be, I was still pretty far from the bottom. I wasn't vomiting all the livelong day; I was able to stay hydrated enough; I was never in any danger. No trips to the hospital, no IVs. For which I was thankful. I just felt like I had the never ending flu. (Oh, and the headaches! The horror.) I think what made it worse was the fact that it was so unexpected. I don't deal well with the unexpected. I was never this sick with Mary or David. Aren't first pregnancies (not last) supposed to be the worst? (When will I learn that my kids don't follow the baby instruction manual?)
I expected this pregnancy to be much like my pregnancy with Mary, which was pretty good. Actually, I don't recall much about being pregnancy with her, which I take as a sign that it couldn't have been all that bad. I hardly remember daily life in Turkey during that time. I figure it must not have been too bad (surely helped by the fact that sweet Yelis, our housekeeper, was there several mornings a week).
The proof that my pregnancy with Mary must not have been too miserable is that we continued to travel. We visited Cyprus when I was seven or eight weeks along, and I do remember I needed to go to the hotel and take a nap one afternoon. But no other pregnancy woes or inconveniences. We also went to Cappadocia and a few Mediterranean spots, and I remember that I had originally been concerned about food cravings and aversions while we were out and about. But I had been eating Turkish food for nearly two years--so what I craved was Turkish food. So it all worked out. I even managed to find bathrooms as needed when we traveled (always a concern for a pregnant lady).
Eleven weeks with Mary was the worst of it. We flew from Turkey to Texas, and it was the kind of travel where everything goes wrong. You fly with a 20-month-old on a twelve-hour overbooked flight; you lose luggage; connecting flights are cancelled; you grow old waiting in airports; you fight with ticket agents; you eat seven hundred dollars to get you out of the nightmare. By the time David and I finally made it to Dallas (Greg had flown onto Alabama for training), I was really feeling the first trimester blues. Then, exhausted and still recovering from the journey, David ended up in the hospital for 5 days. He refused the prison-like crib, so we slept together that week on the little fold-out chair. Ugh. I was tired (exhausted!! delirious!) and nauseated and worried and stressed like no other. Worst week of a first trimester ever! (But the nurses, who knew I was pregnant, took good care of me, keeping my supply of Sprite and saltines well-stocked. David also had all four grandparents in town to lend support and keep me company. Also, David's illness had actually began in Turkey. While traveling probably hastened the worst of it, he was likely on his way to the hospital no matter what. As much as I love Turkey, I'm very grateful David ended up in an American hospital. So I can't complain too much about the whole episode.)
After our stint in the hospital, I stayed for a month at my parents' house in Texas. During that time I got the stomach flu. The stomach flu while you have morning sickness? The worst!! Should not be allowed by the laws of nature! But, overall, other than feeling a little off in the morning and craving MEAT--my dad even took me to the upscale steakhouse at the Gaylord Texan and it was sooooo good and if you know me then your jaw is on the floor--I think I felt basically okay. (Enough to take a romantic weekend getaway to Montgomery, Alabama. Because, yes, Montgomery is that romantic. Okay, so it's not AT ALL, but Greg was there. And that's all I need!)
Pregnancy numero dos wasn't so bad. And it's what I was expecting with third time around. But, instead, this time was even worse than my first pregnancy. Bleh. With David, my first, I had more "classic" morning sickness. Getting up in the morning was torture. I'd eat two or three saltine crackers, get out of bed, possibly throw up, and drag myself myself to work. I was teaching 10th grade that fall, and during first period I would sit carefully at my desk, nibbling crackers and sipping ginger tea, almost not daring to breath, lest I throw up. (Fortunately, 16-year-olds are a pretty low-energy bunch that early in the morning. We were a good match.) But as the first few hours of the day progressed, I perked up. Only mornings were rough. I even had enough energy for graduate school classes and homework in the evenings. (Not that I wasn't tired. I always went to bed as early as possible, totally worn out. Poor Greg spent many a Friday night alone, his wife having gone to bed at 7:30!)
This time was more the opposite. I was very (very!) lucky in that I got a few good hours in the morning. (Yes, the morning. Isn't that weird? Having two or even three decent hours in the morning was truly a blessing, and, trust me, I thanked God every day for those precious minutes. But it really made me examine my time. If you know you only have two hours a day to "live," how do you use that time? I think I'll write about this in a separate post.) By lunchtime things started to go downhill--and fast. By late afternoon I was incapacitated (and groaning and moaning) in bed. A mom who was completely checked out. Good thing my kids can operate the TV remote control on their own.
Thankfully, puking my guts out wasn't a major issue this time around. But I felt like I had the stomach flu. And that I'd been run over by a truck. You know how sometimes you feel too sick to even watch TV or read a book? All you can do is lie there and hope you fall asleep. I spent many, many a mind-numbing afternoon in a kind of semi-conscious state. Ugh. Again, thank goodness my kids are capable of watching TV for hours on end. They also learned how to raid the top shelf of the pantry on their own. Another blessing.
The worst though became the severe headaches. They were totally, completely incapacitating. The pain! The horror! By the time the kids were out of school for the summer, the headaches would come every few days--and last for two days. This was the first time I'd experienced having a severe headache that would last for more than 24 hours. Miserable. (I've had a handful of true blue migraines in my life. But they were few and far between. And would only last half a day. Oh my goodness, to those of you who cope with frequent migraines, how do you do it??!!!)
Ultimately, my doctor prescribed a safe (but still pretty wimpy) painkiller. And most importantly, she convinced me to try the latest and greatest nausea medication. She suspected I was in a terrible cycle of nausea giving me headaches which made me nauseated which triggered more headaches which gave me nausea and so on. She (rightly) suspected that if I could eat more normally and drink more regularly, the headaches would go away. Up until that point I had refused anything for the nausea besides B-12 vitamins and ginger tea (which, by the way, were doin' nothin'.) Way back in the kidney infection days, I'd taken medication for nausea--and the side effects were HORRIBLE. Last thing I wanted. But my doctor assured me this was good stuff, nearly side-effect free. And it was good stuff--thank you, cancer research. (I realize now that every pregnant woman and her dog knows about this medication and asks for it. But I haven't been pregnant for half a decade, people. I didn't know there was something to do about terrible morning sickness!) Anyway, the medication didn't make a huge difference. But it definitely took an edge off the nausea. Enough that I could eat and drink more normally. Which, for the most part, chased away the headaches. Phew. And, while I still spent afternoons and evenings in bed, sometimes I could even read a book.
I have wondered if maybe this pregnancy only seems worse than my first. Maybe having to get up and get dressed and go to work and worry about graduate classes forced me to just get over it and push through? Perhaps...But the proof to me that the my first first trimester couldn't have been this bad is that I traveled. When I was pregnant with David, Greg and I flew to Utah for Christmas. On an airplane. And I didn't die. Then a couple of weeks later we went to Germany and Paris. On a military airplane. And I didn't die. So I threw up in a German airport and pooped out at the Eiffel Tower and the flight home may have been one of the most miserable experiences of my life. But I WILLINGLY flew across the Atlantic. There is NO WAY you have gotten me on an airplane this summer. Nothing would have been worth the misery. NOTHING! I lay in bed all of July thinking about it, in fact. A trip to Europe? No. A million dollars? Nope. A death? Sad, but no. Cafe Rio? Not even Cafe Rio. Nothing could have gotten me on an airplane. And that is how I know this was the suckiest first trimester.
(But now it's over. Woo hoo!!)
