Zofran

So after having morning all day sickness for days on end, I knew I had to call my Dr. He prescribed Zofran, which helped some, it made life tolerable. I am thankful that there was at least something that I could take to keep food down. Although I can eat is plain bagels. It works by basically preventing you from vomiting, so while you still feel mildly nauseous, you don't have the constant urge to vomit. However, I do recommend Zofran to anyone else that experiences any type of severe nausea while pregnant, and get it right away. 

***Looking back I would be sick pretty much 24 hours a day for about 3-4 months***

Morning Sickness

This was something that I didn't anticipate...I never knew how sick you could be when you were pregnant. I always thought that the people who said they had morning sickness, were just not feeling the greatest, I knew never they were paralyzed with sickness. I started out with full blast, hard core morning sickness. I literally could barley get out of bed. Walking was making me nauseous, food was making me nauseous, driving, and or  riding in a car would make me nauseous. I would got to bed nauseous and wake up nauseous. I don't know how I did it, but I managed to go to work. I would get there and throw up all day. I would eat what I could, which was not much, basically plain bread. I would come home from work and go straight to the couch, where I would may until the next day of work. I needed to call the Dr. and see what else I could possibly do because this was not good. I tried everything ginger, ginger ale, Vernors, lemon, lemon tea, peppermint  peppermint tea, nothing helped. I would say to Russ, I don't know how I can go on like this. I literally have never experienced ANYTHING like this before. The best way to describe it was like you have the flu 24/7.

Telling The Family The Big News

I had already told my Mom that I was pregnant, because I had to tell someone other than Russ. However, I had not told anyone else in my family. Russ and I were going to my parents house to celebrate my step-dad and step-sisters birthday. I had bought a grandparents book to give to my step-dad to break the news. When we got to my parents house, my step-dad wanted to open his gift right away. He opened it , read what the book said, and went crazy. He ran to show my sisters the book, so they found out and we called my brother who is in California. My step-sister came over later and and of course my step-dad showed her the book right away too. Finally we texted my step-brother who was in Virginia. My Grandpa was also living with my parents. We told him he was going to be a Great-Grandpa (he has dementia and his response was "wow you really went to town". Thanks Grandpa for the total embarrassment LOL. It was pure craziness. I think my family was pretty much in shock. They like us, kinda thought that it would never happen, so it truly was a complete surprise. They were elated too. It was a really great day, celebrating birthdays and my pregnancy.

Here is a picture of us with my family after we shared the news...

First Dr.'s Appointment and Tests

So now that I knew that I was pregnant I was freaking out because I felt cramping. I called the Dr. right away the morning after I found out I was pregnant. They wanted me to go in for blood work right away. So I went Wednesday night after work, and again on Friday after work. The tests confirmed I was pregnant and my hormone levels were where they should be. We then me with the Dr. on Saturday who confirmed that the cramping was just the uterus stretching. He told us that our due date would be April 27, 2012. Russ and I were still in shock that this was happening. We stopped by a bookstore that was closing on our way home from the Dr. We wanted to buy a grandparents book to give to my parents, to break the big news on Sunday.

Pregnant!?!?

I never thought that I would get pregnant, let's just start with that. Russ and I had been trying to get pregnant pretty much ever since we had gotten married. There would be times we tried more and time we tried less, and time we didn't try at all. Russ and I had pretty much given up hope that it would happen for us. In fact we had started planning on to have fun and keep busy just the 2 of us. Russ is a SCUBA instructor and I was learning to SCUBA dive.

I had been gaining some weight this Summer, and my clothes weren't fitting very well. I usually wore a size 2, but it just wasn't cutting it. I was also bloated since I was getting ready to start my period. On Saturday I had it, Russ and I were going out to dinner and I couldn't fit into anything. I told him that I would need to go shopping in the next week and get clothes for the Fall that would actually fit me. I put on my only pair of size 4 pants and we went to dinner.

On Sunday Russ and I went to Six Flags (our local amusement park). I was feeling crampy because I was supposed to start my period any day, it was 1 day late but no biggie. We went on roller coasters and water slides, as I was feeling tired and nauseous, but that is to be expected at an amusement park. There was a feeling thought that it was weird I was 1 day late, but didn't think too much about it.

On Monday, I my period still hadn't started. I said to Russ, "Do you think I am pregnant"? He didn't think it was possible, and said that I would probably start my period at any time, but deep down inside, I thought that it could be possible, I was hoping that it was possible, but I was scared.

This morning Russ, asked me if I had started my period, I told him no. He said "Holy cow, I may be a Dad!" Russ really wanted to hold off on buying pregnancy tests for a while, but I couldn't take it. We went to Target and got 1 regular +/- pregnancy test and 2 digital tests. Of course as soon as we walked in the door I had to take the test. I took the regular +/- test first and within 15 seconds there was a very faint + sign. I was so happy and scared all at once. Of course I called my Mom and told her right away because I just couldn't believe it. Both she and Russ thought that I should make sure the digital tests also said pregnant because the + sign was so faint. I started drinking tons of water, just so I could take the digital test right away and this is what I got...

Leaving My Job

After my surgery in January and being out of work while I was recovering, I knew that I couldn't commute 120 miles a day any longer. The commute was taking its toll on my mentally and physically and it was affecting our marriage. It is hard to have a relationship with someone, when you never see them. I also knew that we wanted to have a baby and that it would be impossible under the current circumstances. So on April 2, 2010, I left my job. I had a part-time job lined up closer to home, until I could find something full time.

We decided to undergo more fertility tests and just work on our relationship. We wanted to get closer to each other and get to know each other again. I am so thankful that Russ could see what commuting every day was doing to me and that he let me leave my job, not knowing what the future would hold.

Fertility Struggles

FAIR WARNING THIS COULD BE CONSIDERED A GRAPHIC POST TO SOME

***This involves a discussion of the menstrual cycle and surgery, if you don't want to know about it, don't read it.***

Fast forward to 2010. Russ and I were living up in Northern Illinois. He was doing well at his job, I was still commuting my 120 miles a day round trip to my job. This were going well, except for 1 small problem I was not getting pregnant. I was also having horrible menstrual cycles, with major cramping and heavy bleeding. I was tired to just dealing with it. I had tried everything else you could imagine and nothing had been working, so I had just given up.

My mom and sister had very similar problems and found a wonderful Dr. that was willing to help. My sister had undergone surgery to help her, and they discovered she had endometriosis. The surgery was going to hopefully help her with fertility in the future. I fear that I probably had something similar going on, so I made an appointment to see him in early January. He took my family history, ran a ton of tests, and performed an ultrasound. What he found led him to believe that I needed surgery as well, and soon. He thought he found a few cysts. So the surgery was scheduled for January 26, 2010. It was to be an outpatient procedure, just like my sisters.

I went in for surgery expecting to go home that day (like my sister did), but that did not happen. After the surgery I was admitted to the hospital for observation for a few days. What the Dr. had discovered was that I appeared to have chronic appendicitis as a child (which had gone un-diagnosed) that had wreaked havoc on my body. I had many adhesions, my right ovary and right fallopian tube were missing, either from the appendicitis or being born without it. I also had cysts on my left fallopian tube that had to be removed. Lastly, there was a huge (orange sized) cyst on my left ovary that had to be removed as well. He performed a D and C in hopes that all of these things would help my heavy and painful menstrual cycles and preserve my fertility. The Dr. did not find any signs of endometriosis, but my fertility was still in question.

I was in a ton of pain and had a long recovery ahead of me. I would be out of work for about 6 weeks, and Russ would have to do almost everything for me for at least a few weeks. I needed to heal and I needed to recover. We couldn't think about having a baby at that point. We were going to have to look into those options and explore it more at a later time.