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February 8, 2001
February 8
I had a big scare last night. I started bleeding. My heart starts pounding really fast; I absolutely panic. I get my mom, call the midwife on-call, and we drive to the hospital. After a cervical exam, my midwife tells me I'm not dilated or effaced, but am bleeding a bit. I'm hooked up to monitors and they monitor me for a couple of hours to watch for contractions, and there are none and the baby is very active.
I'm to drink 64 ounces of water or juice everyday, and to eat more. I am also not supposed to lift anything over 20 pounds, which is going to be impossible since my son weighs 25. My midwife told me that was okay, especially because I can't really avoid it. Her phrase was "Well, you're a mommy!" I knew she understood there were limits to what I could do, and was comforted. But I'm supposed to take it easy. They don't know why I was bleeding, and I'm to make an appointment for Friday to be checked all over again.
So I may either be in the first stages of preterm labor, at 27 weeks, or I have some sort of infection or something. Which is unlikely because I just finished a course of strong antibiotics. My midwife says it may be one of those mysteries we have to live with. It might be nothing at all.
(big sigh)
I haven't had any bleeding today, but my feeling of safety has completely vanished. I'm a miserable wreck, wondering what could happen next. My last pregnancy was very healthy, and ran two weeks late. I don't know how to deal with my body not working. I get panicky when I get a cold; I'm so healthy. [Soon after I wrote this entry I got a migraine.]
It doesn't help that my midwives want me to stop nursing my toddler. I understand the reasons and they are perfectly logical. (So no one needs to explain them to me, please.) However, Jake is very high-needs, and nursing is often the only thing that can calm him. I'm on very hormonal-emotional ground. I'm very alone, with no friends within an hour's drive. I recently broke up with my boyfriend, the father of my children. When Jake throws a tantrum, I cry too.
I'm doing my best to cut down on the nursing, but I weep every time I tell him no, and he pats my breast and grins so hopefully. He doesn't believe me, and he doesn't understand why we can't nurse as much as we used to. I've tried to explain it to him, but he's only 2... So he keeps asking to nurse, and I can't stop crying.
And the kicker is, I may be perfectly fine after all. We don't know for sure that I'm in any danger whatsoever. I am exceedingly reluctant to wean Jake (which would lead to more longer-lasting tantrums, adding serious stress on the both of us) on a possibility. Especially since I am no longer bleeding, and never was having contractions, and wasn't dilated or effaced, and the baby is all over the place. I feel perfectly fine. I had hoped to nurse him for quite some more time, and tandem nurse.
Academically I know this is the best thing. But I am still in denial. In denial and incredibly sad. I've never had to do anything this difficult.
Jake hasn't learned to go to sleep without nursing. I don't know what I'm going to do. My midwife actually suggested I either send him to spend the night somewhere for a couple of day, or for me to go spend a few days at a friend's house, and when I came back my son would be weaned. (feeling very weepy now) But Jake has *never* spent the night away from me. I don't have any friends. And there is literally no one who could watch him during the day. My mom works, and couldn't take Jacob to work with her or anything. And paying someone is out of the question.
So my options are to possibly risk my pregnancy and continue to breastfeed my son, or to break his (and my) heart several times a day, spending the next week or so in agony. Oh, and without picking him up very much as he throws himself on the floor in tears. I feel like I'm being torn apart, in a body I can no longer trust.
I don't ever remember feeling so sad.
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