June 1998 to March 2000

When I moved to Tennessee in June of 98 my health was pretty stable. I had just got done getting methotrexate injections for about 4 months. I found a good GI doctor in Knoxville, Tennessee. As usual I had to tell him my complete history, and all the medicines I had taken before. He kept me on the basics- Prednisone, Asacol and Prilosec. When all of my symptoms went away I stopped taking the prednisone because I could no longer stand the side effects any more. I did pretty well on just Asacol and Prilosec for a while. I did not require any hospitalizations for Crohns disease. Sometime around October 98 I started having stomach problems before. After a few months of extra anti-acids my GI doctor ordered an endoscopy to make sure I didn't have an ulcer, and to make sure that the Crohns disease didn't return back to my stomach. The endoscopy was a breeze, and all it showed was some irritation, but nothing to be worried about.

June 15, 1999 I was already 1 week late on my period. I never missed a period in my life! I had been feeling different too. My emotions were playing tricks on me. One day I was happy, the next day I'de be sad, and so on. June 26, 1999 I decided to find out for myself If I was pregnant so my boyfriend and I went to the store and got a pregnancy test. As soon as we returned home I went to the bathroom to perform the test. The next 3 minutes were nerve wrecking. When I went to look at the test sure enough there was a pink line, which meant, "Yes you are pregnant!" My boyfriend and I were astonished. I thought that I'de never be able to have children because of all the medications I had taken before. I know alot of the medicines are almost like poisons to your body and can harm things, like your reproductive organs. We were very amused, and happy. My boyfriend wanted me to call my mom right away to tell her. I didn't want to until after I got to see a gynecologist just to make sure I really was pregnant. The next thing my boyfriend said about the pregnancy test was... (and I quote) "Those things aren't very accurate anyway". I then got the instruction pamplet and began reading to find that it said the pregnancy test was over 99.9% accurate. That shut him up pretty fast!

I called and made an appointment . I seen the doctor July 8, 1999. He estimated that I was 6 1/2 weeks along. My weight was 138- a far cry from the usual 155-160. I had been having ALOT of morning sickness all day long. I read in a baby book that they call it "morning sickness", but it can happen at any time of the day. Why don't they just call it "anytime sickness" or something??? I didn't know you could be nauseated like that anytime of the day during pregnancy. I just always assumed it was in the morning, hence the term "morning sickness". The doctor confirmed that I was indeed pregnant. So far I had over come a great obstacle. Now the next big hurdle was telling my boss I was pregnant. I remained silent for a few days while I was at work. The nausea was getting even more intense. I grew up my courage to tell him. Right after I told him I got really nauseated, probably because I was nervous! I had to grab the trash can and run to the back of the air brush booth. I bet everyone on that side of Wal*mart could hear me barfing. My boss was very good to me. He got on the phone and called his wife to come in and help out because I was going to have to go home. My boss even called his brother (who also owns and runs the airbrush booth) and told him that I would need to have the night shift because mornings were the worst for me. Things were working out great, but I kept loosing weight, Finally I decided that it was the best interest for me and my baby that I stop working. My boss also wanted me to stop working. July 14, 1999 was my last day of work. 1 week later my cat had her kittens. I had my blood checked regularly and I had anemia. I was really getting nauseated, which finally led up to me getting dehydrated.

September 7, 1999 my OBGYN put me in the hospital for dehydration. I finally got to see my baby for the first time on an ultrasound. It was a boy! They also discovered that I was 4 more weeks along than first thought. Now I was 20 1/2 weeks along. I was only kept in the hospital for 1 day. I was released on September 8, 1999. My due date was February 7, 2000

October 1999 I went to Pennsylvania to visit with my family. My OBGYN said that it was ok for me to travel, just not past the 7 or 8 month of pregnancy. I was having a great time. On October 17, 1999 I started feeling these weird pains in my abdomen. My mom was concerned that I was going into premature labor so she took me to the ER, where they hooked up all of these machines so that they could monitor the baby. A few hours later I was released because the machine said It wasn't labor. October 20, 1999 I started having the belly pains again. I called the hospital and they told me to go to the ER. Again I had to wear the monitors for a while. They turned up nothing. I was sent home a few hours later. The next time I went to the ER, on October 24, 1999, I was admitted. I had an ultrasound done, and the doctors also did a test on me to see if I was anemic. Everything came back good. The doctors knew I was returning home to Tennessee on October 29, 1999 so they kept me in the hospital till Octobrt 27, 1999. We drove back to Tennessee.

I had a regular check up with my OBGYN on November 1, 1999. My mom left that morning for Pennsylvania. I went to my appointment at 4PM. My doctor used the doppler thing to listen to the heartbeat of the baby. He couldn't hear anything, so he said we'd go over to the ultrasound machine since sometimes the doppler's batteries get low and they don't work right. I watched the screen as he placed the ultrasound thing on my belly. I seen the picture of my baby , but I didn't see his heart beating. The doctor asked me how far along I was, and I told him. He walked over to the counter and was looking on my chart. Then he came back to the machine. I asked him if anything was wrong, then he said "oh we have to put your name in here". And he asked me to spell my last name. I asked him again Whats wrong??? .. He kept avoiding the question then finally he said "Well ..apparently the baby has died." My heart jumped out of my chest, and I had horrible pains as a wave of heat flashed through my body. Did I just hear what I think I heard?? OH MY GOD! This can't be true!! One of the nurses went and got my boyfriend. We stood together in the ultrasound room as I cried and screamed for 2 hours. The doctor wanted me to go down stairs and get a more high tech ultra sound that could estimate the baby's size, and position. He was 14.5 inches long, and 1.5 pounds. November 3, 1999 I would be admitted to the hospital to have a normal delivery. It took me nearly 20 hours of labor, but thankfully the doctors kept me comfortable. We had a small funeral to bury my baby. That will be the saddest day for the rest of my life. My sons name was Zachery Daniel

December 1999-March 2000

After the death of my son I really didn't care what happened to me. I was starting to have another flare up and I didn't even go to my GI doctors. I let the flare go on for 3 months until it was no longer tolerable. It was March 2000 when I finally went to see my GI doctor. He started me back on all my medicines Asacol, Prilosec, and a few others. He also put me on pain medication. One time I had to go to the ER and get anti biotics and fluid. When I didn't start improving he ordered a CT scan of my abdomen and pelvis to see how bad it was. I had a large segment of bowel that was inflammed and ulcerated. A few more weeks passed and still no improvement. I called my doctor up and asked him if I could get bowel rest in the hospital. He agreed to it, and it was arranged for me to get admitted on April 20, 2000.

Start reading about April 2000

Back to my personal info

Hosted by www.Geocities.ws