Eternally Grateful

Eternally Grateful


      From the time I was fifteen I had made it known to everyone, friends, family, and even strangers that though I loved and adored children, I did not want my own. I was adamant that I would make a terrible mother based on the role models I had had in my life. At 38 years old my position changed. I found out I was pregnant while at the emergency for abdominal pains. My fiance and I didn't get a chance to absorb the news together before I was rushed to radiology for an ultrasound.  After the results were studied by the E.R. doctor she told me there seemed to be a problem and that I needed to see an obstetrician immediately.

    My mind was whirling; my fiancé had a seven year old son and he did not want more children. On the way home, we discussed our options and agreed that if the pregnancy was viable we would keep the baby. That Monday I went to my ob/gyn and told her about the pregnancy. She took some blood and confirmed that I was indeed pregnant but my hormone levels were a little low. She had me come in again that Wednesday to take more blood. On Friday she called and asked me to come in.

      My fiancé was working so he couldn’t be with me during the visit. She sat me down, and told me that although I was pregnant, that my hormone levels were not rising or falling which meant it was an eptopic pregnancy (in the tubes). She told me she was sending me to the hospital to have an abortion/miscarriage. I called my family as I drove to the hospital to tell them what was happening. My fiancé and I spent the night and half the next day in the hospital. We spoke little of what was happening both of us drawing inward and away from the other.

      We didn’t speak of our unborn child again. Our family and friends gathered around us in the following days, each one trying to find a way to ease our pain but not really knowing how or what to say. He and I continued to pull farther and farther away from each other. In the days and months before this tragedy we had been planning our lives together, laughing at how different our idea of the perfect wedding was from our mothers’ and spending time with his son. Now we were like strangers again, the sadness of never holding our child or seeing her grow up was tearing us apart.

    During that week after I lost the baby, my uncle died after a long and terrible battle with pulmonary fibrosis. It is a hardening of the lungs that causes the patient to basically suffocate. At graveside service, a pain so terrible and intense struck me and I fainted. So, eight days later I was back in the emergency room, doubled over in pain, sweating and shivering at the same time. The E.R. doctor called my ob/gyn and she rushed to the hospital. During the ultrasound they found a mass growing on my left ovary. I was kept overnight in order to have a CT scan done first thing the next morning. My mother was home grieving the death of her brother and could not stay with me at the hospital and my fiancé had been called into work. I spent that night in the hospital, worry eating away at me, wondering if he and I could ever get over the loss of our child and move forward.

    Though I tossed and turned worried about what was causing my pain, in truth I thought that my polycystic ovarian syndrome had flared up and that the cysts were causing my pain. Never in a million years did it enter my mind that it might be something more serious.

    After the CT scan I was released from the hospital and told to go directly to my doctor’s office. My fiancé was still at work and my mother was home sick with grief. My doctor once again sat me down in her office and told me the mass on my ovary had tripled in size overnight. She told me there were large amounts of cancer cells running throughout my reproductive organs. She said she was referring me to the best gynecological oncologist in the state and had already set up an appointment for later that week at his office in Atlanta.

    On the drive home, I tried to think of a way to tell my family. My doctor had reassured me that she believed we had found the cancer quick enough that I might have a chance to fight it and survive. Yet all I could think about in that forty – five minute ride back to my parents’ house was how devastated my family was going to be. My mother had been diagnosed with breast cancer two years before and had beaten it. My seven year old niece had been diagnosed with AML leukemia the summer before and was going through intensive chemotherapy treatments. I dreaded going home and having to tell my mom and step-dad that I too, now had cancer.

      I railed, screamed, and sobbed on the side of the road and then this peace came over me, soothing and calming me. I realized that I couldn’t let this news destroy me that I had to be strong for my loved ones. I would have to hide my doubts and fears so that I could comfort and reassure them that all would be fine, that I would fight and survive this disease.

      I called my brothers and asked them to come to the house so I could give them the news in person. I called my dad and spoke with him about the diagnosis and assured him I would let him know what the oncologist in Atlanta had to say. I asked my fiancé if he and his parents would meet me for dinner that evening and also gave them the news. Through it all I never once shed a tear until I called my best friend of 20 years, Amy and told her. While I was being strong for my family, she and another friend were being strong for me. My best friend Casey and his mom opened their house up to my mother and me since they lived in a suburb of Atlanta. He took us to all of my appointments with the oncologist. Casey, not my fiancé, was holding my hand as the oncologist told me he would need to do a complete hysterectomy. Whenever he sensed that the enormity of situation was getting to me he would put in a fun movie or a comedy special to take my mind off all that was happening and would be happening to me and my body.

        My mother hovered over me with immense sadness in her eyes. My older brother went back out on the road and would call every few days to check on me. He and I never really talked about the cancer and what I might have to go through after the surgery. We discussed politics, his kids and how through all of this my faith in God was growing stronger not weaker. My younger brother wouldn't speak of it at all. He never mentioned the baby or the cancer to me. His wife, however, told me that he broke down and cried after hearing the news. He told her he was tired of cancer attacking his family and that he had had enough of this disease to last him a lifetime. My dad was much like my brothers; he would call every Sunday but he never mentioned the cancer or the baby.

      The surgery was a success but the doctor informed me afterwards that the mass had quadrupled in size in the month we had to wait for the surgery. He also informed me that getting pregnant and losing the baby had in fact saved my life, that otherwise I more than likely would have written off the pain until it was too late to save me. Just weeks into my recovery my fiancé and I broke off our engagement and ended our relationship. Our relationship hadn't been strong enough to survive the losses we sustained that fateful summer.

      Thoughts of the baby crossed my mind every day that first year. I would be going about my day and out of nowhere tears would fill my eyes and run down my face. My grief did and continues to overwhelm me leaving me feeling raw, on edge and fighting to breathe. On the year anniversary of her death (yes, I know I never knew the sex but she will always be a girl to me), my mom, my best friend and I wrote her letters. We tied those letters to balloons and let them go. My daughter saved my life by giving up hers, and for that I will be eternally grateful.