At 20, I was blessed with my daughter, I thought she was a pure miracle since I was told I would never have any children at all. She was the light of my life! She was perfect in everyway. Even though she was perfect I suffered a barbaric delivery and to say the least had 122 stitches to prove it! A lot went wrong that day but a lot went right to.
After a year I got pregnant again and was so excited that maybe those doctors were wrong all along and I would have the family I always wanted. Little did I know it was going to be a long, brutal road ahead. Miscarriage after miscarriage my hope dwindled. Surgery after surgery my pain grew and I suffered in silence. My husband worked offshore and was never around and he defiantly did not understand the magnitude of pain I was suffering physically and mentally. I can remember plenty of times driving myself to the er in the middle of the night because there was no one to call. I remember laying in a hospital room waiting for emergency surgeries and in the recovery room with no one around. It was maddening feeling the way I did. I would have false pregnancies, which I never could have imagined they were real. Its basically like your body thinks its pregnant and in all sense IS pregnant but there is no baby in the womb. Its crazy to think about but it really does happen.
I endured a lot during those years and it mentally broke me down. I lost two at 6months…that was the worst, that was my breaking point. I will save that tale for another day though.
After 14 miscarriages (that I knew of) I finally met a doctor that gave me some hope. He ran some genetic testing and found I had a genetic blood clotting disorder and quickly started me on heparin injections to keep the pregnancy. IT WORKED FINALLY!! I was finally pregnant and going to make it through. I delivered a healthy baby girl, I was ecstatic that after all I went through something good came out of all my pain. So with my girls eight years apart we finally had our little family. Quickly after she was born I got pregnant again. This time was different though. Within the second week of pregnancy I was ill, very ill. I was hospitalized and told I had hyperemesis gravidarum. Here you can learn more: http://www.helpher.org/
My journey with this I to will save for another time, but to summarize it was worse than death itself. In the end though I had my son and everything was complete to me. My complications from this birth had lasting effects on my life and caused me to have an emergency hysterectomy and my gallbladder removed with months of delivery.
I was always getting sick and it was never going away, it was becoming my end. I have had bladder and kidney infections since I was 16 and they have been with me throughout. I would get pneumonia A LOT! My family thought I was a hypochondriac, I swear all I wanted was validation of what was going on with my body. For all the doctors that said in not so many words I was crazy to all my family that thought I was screaming for attention….it was all real…it still is.
Two years ago after moving back to Louisiana with my family a band of red welts appeared around my upper arm on both sides and my lymph nodes became abnormally swollen. Since that time my nodes are still swollen. Till a few months ago I had no answers at all. Endless doctors and no answers. I had one doctor get so mad at me he walked out and refused to talk with me anymore. It was humiliating, frustrating and enraging all at the same time. All I wanted was answers, a word to define it all. During this process I found out I had three auto-immune diseases. One was a blood clotting disorder on top of my genetic one (Odds not in my favor there). Some things were starting to make sense but not everything. No one thing ever explained it all never quite covered everything I was going through. I finally was able to meet with a doctor that gave me some resolution, he biopsied the welts, it was lupus. So, I finally had a diagnosis, you would think I would have been overjoyed to finally be validated…it was short lived. http://www.lupus.org/
Even though I had Lupus (The great Imitator) I was still plagued by other symptoms that did not fit lupus or the other things I had been diagnosed with. So as a cop out they diagnosed me with fibromyalgia. I am still seeking my answers as here recently my symptoms have increased desperately to a point that my every day is crippling. I can not function normally and everything and everyone is suffering because of it.
I mentioned my friend Astrid before and this is were she comes in. She opened my eyes from her own experience to shed some light on something that maybe plaguing me as well. It all seems to fit, but now to find a doctor to listen. I think everyone with ailing symptoms as I have had should take the time to watch this video and maybe find some answers for yourself. Its called “Under Our Skin” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JgR_Jfbhv8
So I will leave you with that for now…until next time.