October, 1997
Warning: Lots of whining to follow...
Children
My health problems make for lots of limitations... one of the ones that bothers me most is the fact that I can probably never have kids, barring a major miracle. I could most likely get pregnant, but the strain of pregnancy would most likely be too much for my body.
I really love kids... I love being around them, I love their warm and trusting nature, and they way they like to climb all over you and curl up with you and use you as a jungle gym. Growing up, I had my nieces and nephews, and kids in the neighborhood or in my apartment complex who would come and "pester" me as their parents called it, and then when I moved back here in Missouri, I made friends with a couple who had a 1-1/2 year old and a 4 year old, and I spent lots of time with them, babysitting, playing games with them, and more or less watched them grow up for three years. Now though, their parents and I have gone separate ways, and I really miss them.
Not being able to have kids really became a big issue when Jevim and I started getting closer. He wants kids... he wanted kids who were his and mine, and not just in name. That is one thing I know I most probably couldn't give him, and ... well, it really hurt at the time because I knew it was something he wanted.
His 'sis' argued with him about it and tried to convince him that he was being stubborn and bullheaded about it, but I'm not sure if that's what changed his mind, or if it was simply time and he and I getting to know each other better. He understands now why I can't have kids, and I think (though we haven't discussed the subject lately) that maybe someday, we might adopt.
I used to have dreams about a little girl I called "Kerrie Lynn", whom I and my girl friends out in California took in as a foster child and battled with social services to keep. Kerrie was usually abused in some way and afraid of strangers and afraid of men, and it always made me wonder... why was I having those dreams? I don't know, but maybe some day Kerrie Lynn will come into my life, and Jevim and I can help her to grow physically and emotionally strong and healthy.
Other frustrations...
Another thing that has been frustrating me lately has been my health. Up until just a couple years ago, my doctors would always say my health was "stable" when I went in for my yearly (or thereabouts) checkups. Last summer (July, 1996), I had what the doctors think was a TIA -- a Transient Ischemic Attack, or mini-stroke. My vision was affected for several hours, and I had eyestrain headaches for a few days afterward. After lots of tests and doctor visits, I'm on an aspirin a day to keep my blood thinned down and hopefully prevent more TIAs.
I confess that I hadn't been to a cardiologist since I moved from California in 1994, so I was overdue, and maybe they would have seen it coming and put me on the aspirin as a preventative if I'd been having regular checkups. Anyway, once I did get into the cardiologist, she wanted to do lots of tests, and one of them landed me in the hospital. (Ick!).
My doctor was out of town, so the one who saw the results came down and said that I should be admitted for a phlebotomy. They wanted to take out 2 units of my blood (which is very thick) and replace it with plasma and saline. The procedure itself really wasn't all that bad (I'm used to being a pincushion)... cold plasma (it was "fresh frozen" ... sounds like orange juice!) going in felt strange, but tolerable. It was being in the hospital overnight that got to me. It brought back old fears and memories and made for a very rough night.
I hadn't had a chance to tell Jevim when they admitted me, so I had mom take a note to my then-friends and have them e-mail him at school. He didn't find out til late, and when he tried to call, the nurses wouldn't put it through. My light was out so they figured I was asleep... fact was, I was awake most of the night, holding tight to the bear that he'd given me and crying because I wanted to go home, and I wanted to hear his voice. Maybe I was just being a big baby, I dunno... I just didn't want to be there.
I finally got to talk to Jevim the next day after I got home, and he'd been quite upset because he was worried about me. I would have tried to call him, but I didn't have a calling card, and since he was at school, he couldn't accept a collet call. One of the first things I did after that was to get my own calling card, so at least we won't have to worry about that little problem again.
I really didn't feel any different after the "oil change" as I call it... I wasn't so grey and cyanotic because they had me on oxygen most of the time I was there (and they had talked about putting me on home oxygen, an idea I wasn't at ALL happy about), but once I got home and was off the oxygen, my coloring slowly returned to normal. Getting sick while I was in the hospital, and later getting the flu, hurried that along.
Fun stuff, hmm? Well, after that everything seemed to be better, until Jevim and I started getting intimate (believe me, this is not a bad thing! *wink*), and Mom asked me if I had thought about birth control, and if I thought it was a good idea. Knowing that I couldn't afford to get pregnant, I said yes. That led to a whole new round of frustration.
Mom called the local health center, and told them that I wanted to get on birth control, and told them about my heart condition. They said we should talk to my cardiologist first. Mom called my cardiologist, and she said I probably shouldn't take the pill, I should take depro-provera shots instead, as they wouldn't be as likely to cause problems with the thickness of my blood. Called the health center back and they needed a doctor's order. Called the doctor back and she wanted me to go in to a gynecologist for reproductive counseling. Couldn't get in for an appointment before my trip to Maryland (which was just a couple days down the road) so the cardiologist made an appointment for me for after I got back.
Of course, I'm uncomfortable around men anyway, and the only gynecologists in the medical group I go to who will take new patients that aren't pregnant are men. *sigh* So, I was NOT looking forward to that. But, I went in, escaped the pap smear for that day (my stomach was quite unhappy (nerves, mostly) and I didn't want to be stuck if I had to run to the restroom), but he gave me the shot even though I wasn't on my period at the time.
I don't know if it was because the shot was early, or that my body simply does not like depro-provera, but my period was about 2 weeks late, and then it started and wouldn't stop. It tapered off to a light flow, but here it is October when I had the shot in July and there hasn't been a day when I haven't had to wear a pad. Talk about frustrating!!! Especially since I spent another four weeks with Jevim after that. ARGH!!
Needless to say, I didn't go back to the gynecologist for my next shot, and I cancelled out of the pap smear. Like I said, I'm a big baby. Oh well... Jevim and I are adults; we know how to be careful. My body finally seems to be getting back to normal, although it's taking its own sweet time about it.
As if that wasn't enough though, Mom asked the gynecologist to do a urine culture and, sure enough, I had a urinary tract infection. He put me on antibiotics, and as I finished them off, I started getting a weird sensation in my kidney are (I only have one kidney). Mom called the gynecologist, and he said go to my family doctor. I did, he put me on more antibiotics, and the feeling didn't go away, so he said I should see a urologist.
Went to the urologist, and she suspected a kidney stone, so she had me go for an IVP (intraveinous pyelogram -- they put dye into your veins and x-ray your kidneys, etc). That wasn't fun, and it really through my (already sensitive) stomach out of whack, but sure enough, there appeared to be a kidney stone stuck just above my bladder.
That was in August. The doctor did a cystoscopy a few weeks ago (that was BAD... the only thing I could compare the way I felt afterward to is what I imagine it feels like to have been raped), two days after I got back from my last trip to see Jevim... let me tell you, I didn't want to come back, 'cause I was sure it was coming back to surgery! Anyway, she tried to get the stone out herself, because I don't really handle anasthetic well to have the surgical retrieval done. She couldn't get it out, but she thought she loosened it up and it didn't show up on the IVP she had done a week later, but I can still feel it every now and again.
Mom's convinced the doctor doesn't know what she's doing, and is trying to talk me into seeing another doctor. I just don't want anything more to do with it. The feeling is annoying, but the stone isn't really causing me any pain. Of course since I only have one kidney, the doctor is afraid of infection and wants that stone out last month. *sigh*
The other real frustration right now is that all this medical stuff is really interfering with my spending time with Jevim and mostly with the planning part of it. I had to practially beg the doctor to let me go see him for September (for my birthday), and when she finally said yes, I had to buy tickets for a flight the very next day, which cost quite a bit more than they would have if I'd been able to buy them in advance like I normally do.
I have the chance to see Jevim one more time before he has to go back to school, but we still can't make plans because we don't know what the stone is going to do or what the doctor is going to want to do. It's bad enough that I miss Jevim so much, without all this going on too.
Wow, you're still here? Thanks for listening to me whine and complain a bit... *hug*
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