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Friday, October 4, 2013

My Pregnancy: A Poignant Memory

Lakshya, my son was expected to arrive on 14th Sep 2008 instead he arrived on 15th July to be our wedding anniversary treat. Here is a story about how I gave birth to my love.
Pregnancy is the movement of life inside a woman and there is no better feeling. But I have a completely different experience. My pregnancy was a roller-coaster ride.
One morning I confirmed my pregnancy and was super excited to know that there is a new life that is taking shape inside my body. I did every possible thing that I could to make my pregnancy healthy and memorable, below are a few lines that can describe my feelings very well.

Running errands and talking on the phone,
I am pleasantly reminded that I'm not alone.
Little tiny hands and a precious rounded knee,
pushing and twisting that no one can see.
Oh sweet child kicking up your heels,
It is our little secret that only I can feel.
I look forward to your birth,
when I can kiss your skin.
but for now I'll just smile,
as I feel you play within.
                                     -Unknown
    
Okay now ends the happy part of my pregnancy. By the end of the first trimester I already had experienced so many things that are called 'normal' during pregnancy, from bad morning sickness to nausea and vomiting, from heartburn to palpitation, from an altered sense of smell to metallic taste in the mouth and to make it even worse spotting were there to put me on bed rest for a few weeks. It was heartbreaking but I continued to enjoy every bit of it and the thing that still I cherish and love to think about is my baby's kicks. They were amazing, they were very strong and very frequent and they always reminded me that someone is growing inside me every day. I happily felt them, sometimes baby's kicks made me smile and even laugh too.

At the end of the second trimester, I missed my antenatal appointment and suddenly I started to experience swelling, first on my feet then on my fingers and hands and then slowly on my face too. At first, I thought I am putting on a lot of weight and even I had to take off my engagement ring because it started hurting a lot due to swelling. Every day I woke up to some new complication. I thought this must be part of pregnancy. We visited the nearest physician and I was given some medicines and was assured that everything is fine. At 30 weeks of gestation, I noticed swelling on my eyelids that got worse the next day which almost closed my eyes. My husband was going on a business trip the very next day and wanted me to be with him as he didn't want to leave me alone in such a situation. As my antenatal appointment was scheduled for the next month and we didn't want to take any risk so we decided to visit the nearest gynaecologist who can give me go ahead to travel with my husband.

We drove to the nearest hospital it was around 6:30 PM and it was getting darker due to the cloudy weather. There was a gynaecologist who went through all my prescriptions and reports and then she measured my blood pressure. Her eyes popped out and she frantically said that she has to be admitted RIGHT NOW. My husband and I were in shock. She then explained to my husband that "she has developed a fatal condition called 'Pre-eclampsia' and her blood pressure has shot up to a dangerous level". She was not ready to let us go just like that. She advised us to go straight to our previous hospital where I had all my antenatal checkups. By this time my husband and I became extremely anxious. He then drove me to the hospital and to make the situation even worse it started pouring down heavily. While he was parking the car I reached the emergency section of the hospital and got myself admitted there. I was in an emergency ward and was being checked up by a team of doctors who then told my husband to terminate my pregnancy. Hearing that I broke down like never before. It was heartbreaking.......I can't explain how upset I was. It was my worst nightmare. I was crying endlessly. Because of hypertension, I had severe headaches and seizures. I was shifted to a ward where I was on complete bed rest. I wasn't allowed to lie on my sides I had to lie only on my back. Though the team of doctors were monitoring me closely and I had been given all the medication to lower my blood pressure but my condition was worsening by the day. I became rounded and my neck disappeared between my spherical face and totally rounded body because of swelling. I had a severe headache, severe like never before I felt like veins and arteries in my head will going to burst now and I started feeling like this is the end of my life. I was worried for my husband and for a new life that was still there inside me. The only best thing was that baby's heartbeats were normal and I wanted to live only for him. I kept praying for my baby's life, mustered the courage to keep calm, started telling myself that all is going to turn out well and filled myself with a lot of optimism.

Here I'll take a pause for a week and I'll continue this post after a week. In my next post, I'll share my postpartum experience and believe me that is even more horrific.
If anyone among you has had any such bad experience during your pregnancy please share it here. Would love to hear from you :) One more thing if you find mistakes in my writing then please just forgive me I am very new to it, and just wanted to share my feelings :)