Katie S. 28

As of the last few days my good moments seem to be far outweighing my bad. Some of the practical implications of this sudden upswing in health are that I’m back to only needing the Zofran at night, my mother has actually been able to spend a few hours focusing on her own responsibilities, and today for the first time in three weeks I drove a car. Yheaaaa!! As a family we are praising God for these incredible blessings, but as a neurotic pregnant woman I am trying not to worry that a decrease in my sickness carries negative implications for the baby. That is ridiculously pessimistic and dangerously ungrateful in light of the fact that I have asked countless people to pray for exactly this. All I can say for myself is that I am a woman in possession of an abhorrently lacking measure of faith when it comes to praying for my own needs. I often ask God for healing because on some religious level I think that is what you are supposed to do, but in my sinful and misguided heart I become convinced that I couldn’t possibly receive a touch of healing from my creator, because I haven’t done anything to deserve it. This is obviously deceived logic as I have done exactly nothing to deserve any of the gifts that my heavenly father has lavished upon me, the greatest of which is my very salvation. I am also a woman who has always been pretty comfortable carrying the full weight of even my most superficial troubles on my own shoulders. If anything bad could possibly happen in any given situation, I want to make sure that God knows that I have not only considered it but have actually been expecting it all along. This is a far cry from the childlike faith that I know I am called to. One of the hardest verses in the Bible for me to grab a hold of is Philippians 4:6 where it says, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.” I’m thinking about having that tattooed on my forehead.

We just got back from our first doctor’s appointment and I am overjoyed to say that Fetus Junior II has a strong healthy heart beat. My doctor confirmed that I am 8 weeks along, and so far everything is looking good (except for that whole constant debilitating nausea thing). She feels very strongly that I need to be on the Zofran around the clock in order to keep the hyperemesis under control, and hopefully between she and Chris’ HR contact we can get the insurance company to cover the full prescription. The good news is that I haven’t lost any weight and I still haven’t had to go to the hospital. The advantage of experiencing all of this for the second time is that now we have something to reference. We know what worked last time and what didn’t, and in spite of how bad I am feeling I know that this is nowhere near as bad as it was. While some of the credit can go to early medical intervention, and some should certainly go to my loving and supportive husband, the lion’s share of the credit rests firmly on the shoulders of one Diane Barlow. She has been retired for all of two hours and she is already carrying the responsibility of two households, two hungry husbands, an active eighteen month old boy, a rather high maintenance Yorkie, and a completely helpless and occasionally hopeless 25 year old daughter who will apparently never stop needing her Mommy! I’m telling you the woman is amazing. If we were Catholic we’d be nominating her for sainthood right now. If we could scrape some money together we’d send her on a Celebrity cruise to the destination of her choice. If this baby is a girl we’re for sure naming her Diane….In-fact, if this baby is a boy we’re naming him Diane anyway! I literally cannot say enough to convey my gratitude, and I can only hope that one day I have the opportunity to serve my family in even the tiniest fraction of the way that she has served hers.

This is a request for prayer. As of right now my insurance is refusing to cover more than 12 Zofran pills per month. I am supposed to be taking one every six hours which means that I need closer to 112 pills per month. Zofran costs around $39 a pill so there is really no way that we can afford it if insurance denies our claim. Due to a change in insurance I am with a new doctor with whom I have no established relationship. This is disconcerting because she is the only one who can plead my case to the insurance company. This is a familiar road we are finding ourselves on, but no less terrifying than it was the first time around. Even with these drugs that I hate having to take, I am hardly able to get out of bed, so I can’t see me being able to avoid repeated hospitalization without them. I’m feeling a little hopeless because if last time is any indication, then this is just the beginning. Please just pray that God will hold us together through this time and that however these circumstances unfold it would be to His glory.

Well it has started. The constant nausea, chronic acid reflux and disheartening exhaustion have officially settled in. The familiarity of the way I am now feeling is forcing me to acknowledge how much wishful thinking I’ve been doing lately. I’ve imagined that I had already been to the hospital once by this time with Corbin. I’ve tried to believe that it was just the kind of vitamins I was taking last time that made me so sick or that I will be better able to handle the nausea this time because I’ve been through it once before. I’ve even gone so far as to convince myself that Corbin is sufficient enough motivation for me to simply will myself out of throwing up. But of course, I am wrong. Over the course of the last 24 hours I have felt it settling in, and while my physical reaction is to vomit at the mere mention of food, my emotional reaction is to give in to fear and despair. Its amazing what you can forget after a little time goes by. But now, being pregnant once again and wondering what is in store for me, it all comes flooding back. There was a point last time where even light and sound made me nauseated. I can remember lying in bed and moaning, writhing around in agony because there was nothing I could do to make the room stop spinning. I could not stand up, I could not lie down. I couldn’t handle the sight or smell of other people, but I was terrified to be alone. I couldn’t eat or drink or even swallow my own saliva and not throw up. There were honestly moments when I thought that both the baby and I would die, and I was so dehydrated and sleep deprived that I wasn’t entirely sure that it wouldn’t be for the best if we did. I’m ashamed to say that now. I look at Corbin, and I know it was worth the struggle. And yet I honestly don’t know if I can do it again. I know that countless other women have dealt with hyperemesis, but they must have been stronger more stoic people than I. I am weak and ill equipped. I hear a still small voice telling me that my weakness is not the end of the story, that He is able, but I’m struggling to listen to anything but the fear right now. Its very hard for me not to let the way that I feel physically not color the way that I process things emotionally. I have often allowed sickness to make me edgy, and pain to make me bitter. And yet how ungrateful am I? I am not alone. I have more than I could ask for. I have a family who loves me, who cares for me and prays for me. I have friends who are the hands and feet of God in my life. All I have to do is call and there is nothing they won’t do for Corbin and I. And that is what I need to hold onto as I begin to do battle with this fear. I am not alone. God is with me, and even though he doesn’t have to, he is proving it to me every day. Without the hope of his promise, I would truly wither and die.