4

Yesterday we celebrated Liam's 4th birthday. The night before I rocked him before bedtime, hugging him close and told him how proud I was of him for surviving all he's been through and staying strong. 

I told him how his strength has taught me to be strong. How this journey has made my love for him stronger and my appreciated for waking up each morning greater. 

Then I cried a few tears. And for once, on the eve of his birthday, they were tears of joy. I cried tears of joy because we survived. Because this past year was so amazingly free, having had a total of zero hospitalizations and only two out patient surgeries.

We got a taste of what life should really be like without our little lamb and I know that this is only the start. So my tears were also for our future happiness and freedom and simply having faith that there would be happiness in the future. 

Yesterday I sang Liam happy birthday at 5 am when he woke up from a bad dream. He fell back to sleep with a smile on his face. We went and bought cake. One for his birthday party and one for the 4 of us after dinner.

Liam got the Mario party he'd been asking for. Both cakes in the Mario theme. I took him to Adventure Park where he played arcade games to his hearts desire, ate pizza, drank soda, ate cupcakes, and won prizes. 

He had a blast, exactly what he deserved. After dinner of his choice (more pizza), he opened presents. We bought him a Mario backpack and lunch pail for school. He got a Mario and a Luigu action figure. A Mario cup, Mario movie. Liam was excited. 

Sister gave him a goody gift bag filled with a Thomas movie, Thomas book, and several little toys. We also put together a minion gift bag with a reusable minion bag, two minions that light up and three pairs of minion socks. And just like a normal boy he held the socks up, made a eww noise then tossed the socks aside. We laughed. 

I may not have pulled off the big extravagant party I really wanted to throw him, but I learnt that he had everything he wanted and more with just a few friends and cake. It was perfect. 

Tears and Fears

My sweet girl is battling night terrors again tonight. Here she is holding onto her glow pillow, with her twinkle lights on and her TV. Tonight is bad. I gave her melatonin 30 minutes ago and she's still awake. I just used lavender and chamomile essential oil on her in hopes to relax and calm her. She's been battling nightmares and night terrors for weeks now, ever since school ended and they seem to be getting worse the closer to Liams birthday we get. 

I started seeing the pattern last year as Liam's birthday drew near. Same thing. As well as the year before. She just can't help it and I don't think she even realizes what's going on but it's the same thing every year. Last year it was just speculation but this year proves it. Lanie has an issue with Liam's birthday. 

It's not celebrating his birthday she has a problem with. It's the actual day of his birth. The day he was born was the day I was ripped away from her for a month. Then continuously ripped away from her the next few years. 

When I use the term "CDH hurts everyone" I truly mean it. We all have our scars that we will carry for the rest of our lives. I truly believe that Lanie ended up with PTSD as well as her dad and I did. He won't ever admit he has it but the NICU nurse said he had all the signs and so did I. I went and got officially diagnosed after Liam's discharge from NICU. It's been a hard road working through this as an adult, I can't imagine how hard it's been on Lanie to work through something so complex she doesn't even understand.

I try to help her. I can't always just bring up the subject of NICU or the pain she felt each time I had to leave her. I have to wait until she's ready to talk about it. We've had our talks when she's open and receptive. I do whatever I can to help her through it all but it's not a quick fix. 

This is another reminder of the failure I feel that I am. When Liam was born and rushed away all I could think about was getting to his side, afraid he would pass before I got to hold him and tell him how much I loved him and to fight hard. I quickly hugged and kissed her goodbye without explaining anything, without realizing how this would affect her. But we had nowhere to stay and I would be sleeping in a waiting room chair as it was so I could bring her. 

The one thing I never wanted to do was abandoned my children. I swore up and down before I became a mother that I would never do what my mother did. And now one of my biggest fears is that she feels like I abandoned her. I afraid to bring it up. I'm afraid to ask her. I spend my days trying hard to make up for the time I missed out on with her.

And now here's Liam getting ready to turn 4 years old. He shorter and smaller than Lanie was at 3 1/2 when he was born and I had to leave but he's got the same bright bubbly spirit she had and it only serves to remind me of how much I missed out on. How much she missed out on. How many cuddles we missed. How many laughs we missed. I can't ever get that back. We can't ever get this back. 

I hate what CDH has done to all of us. How it's tested our family and nearly brought us to our end. How it's kept me so stressed and tired through the years that now my body is so tired and worn how I'm sick with constant pain and headaches. Diagnosed with fibromyalgia and I can't get rid of it. I hate CDH!!

Girl talk: the uterus: a bloody mess

Rewind: the last three months have been horrible. Each day worse than the last. I've bled 3 weeks out of every month with horrible cramping. I've hardly ate anything. For a month and a half of that I couldn't keep down anything but fluids. I made an appointment with an OBGYN (her PA really) and went last Friday. 

I explained the bleeding and the pain and the bloating. I told her how I had started pushing myself to exercise with one of those big exercise balls and how I lay flat and transfer it from hands to feet and stretch out and repeat. I explained how it pulled what I first thought was muscles in my lower abdomen and stressed them but realized after the 2nd time that it was my uterus it was pulling and then bleeding would follow. She was concerned that I had ruptured my uterus where my csection scar was. It wasn't impossible for me. We knew my uterus was weak after finding out that it had torn during my pregnancy with Liam.

 We were also worried that the cyst had grown back. I have a long long history with cyst on my uterus and ovaries. It's painful and well, bloody. She ordered an ultrasound but it was a waiting game to wait for insurance to approve. Meanwhile I'm at home getting worse. The pain just continued to increase until I was taking tramadol every 6 hours around the clock and ibproffen in between. Then it became so bad that the meds didn't do a thing. I started swelling up to scary sizes:

I didn't know what to do. I laid with he heating pad on my abdomen 90% of the time and refused to move even an inch. The pain was horrid. It rivaled when I was pregnant and my uterus tore. I started having flash backs to that time because the pain was so bad. But it got worse. 

The pain and the swelling. I looked 9 months pregnant, was having spasms in my uterus to the point I and everyone around me thought I was pregnant. I was scared. 

Thursday I broke down and went to the doc. I was in so much pain and I couldn't stand it. After a being tortured all day long, they finally diagnosed me with pelvic inflammatory disease. Said I had had an infection that went undiagnosed and untreated and it spread to all my female reproductive organs in one massive infection. They gave me a shot of heavy duty antibiotics that stung worse than anything else I've ever felt and sent me home with a script for said antibiotics and norco for the pain. They also found a good sized cyst in my uterus, to the point the ultrasound looked like I was pregnant but without the baby in the sack. They also realized it was throwing off blood clots and causing the excess bleeding I've been doing. No sign of a ruptured uterus. Friday I woke up feeling much better. When I looked in the mirror half the swelling was gone. I started hurting later that day and have been hurting on and off since. The antibiotics cause a lot of pain after they get into my system because they're fighting the infection. It's painful business and glad they gave me norco, although to be honest, they don't help much. Stupid bodies response to pain! I have to call the doc and get an appt to see her and most likely discuss what we should do next with my uterus. Honestly I wish she'd give it the death sentence because all it does it cause me pain. I'm done having kids. Already had my tubes tied but that doesn't stop cyst from growing and they can turn cancerous so I just want this thing out. My grams had hers taken out when she was younger because of the same probs and worse. They were afraid it would finally turn to cancer so they took it out. I don't need the damn thing anymore. I don't need a damn period anymore either! Those are for women who still want to have kids in the future and I'm sick of bleeding all the time. It cost a small fortune every month to supply my pads! Any how, that's what's going on in my world. #deathtotheuterus