Being pregnant a second time is the hardest thing I have ever done in my life. My body just decided that this was not a state of being that it enjoyed, and it complained, constantly for 9 months. C.O.M.P.L.A.I.N.E.D.
The ViKing and I decided to have one of our own, the first spawn came from another, and we wanted to expand our family. We spoke about it intensely and decided to wait until we were married and settled before we attempted the great undertaking of another leech. (The Universe just heard "let's have a baby" the rest didn't quite requite). 2 weeks after going off the pill to swop onto another contraceptive, and VOILA! Merry Christmas we're pregnant. The pregnancy test adorned our christmas tree, best decoration ever. We were quite dazed, surprised and a little terrified.
We asked spawn no.1 if she wanted a brother or a sister. We were so curious to know and this was a serious moment for us as a family. Us parents felt so nervous for her to be excited about her new sibling, unlike my lower back, which was not. Excited. At. All.
"Hey PT," (stands for Princess Tantrum) "do you want a brother or a sister?"
"Um..." she says. The concentration on her 3year old face is epic. A Mona Lisa portrait of deliberation. A brother or a sister?
"Um..." she has all 3 of us, (The Viking, also known as SHANNON!!!!! Dad, Daddy, and hello father. Kayla, aka GodMother, barefoot waif, the fairy, hippy child and "hey you! get out the sun, you're turning into a dark coloured person" and me, aka Woman, Mom, Mommeeeeeee, mother, mom Talia, Goldilocks and I'm hungry) in absolute suspense. A brother, or a sister?
"Um..." the weight of this question is so heavy, its thick like the 100% humidity that our lungs are currently wading through, and the swarm of vampiric teenage boy mosquitos (that are so big they rape chickens and carry babies away for a midday snack), whom are determined to get more blood from us than SANBS. We are riveted to her as she mulls the question over. A brother? Or a sister?
"Um..." the tension is palpable, we are so strung out waiting for the answer, its like an episode of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit, and the murderer is on trial, the jury is in! The whole courtroom holds its breath! We the jury find the defendant... A boy??!! Or a girl??!!
"I want a milkshake"
eh?
For 6 months if I wasn't at work I was in bed. For the last 3 months, I was just in bed. It starts to make a person slightly dilly and I realized that I would forever cherish a day pain free. I would count the days in between of no pain, like they were an oasis in a never ending desert. These were very few and very far between. VERY. It took a massive toll on our relationship, and it really tested my mettle as a mom to a superbly energetic little 3 year old on red bull, with a puppy and a ball - this is her mood when she is sleeping - just take a moment of silence to think of us when she is actually awake. Our Princess is a wonderfully beautiful little girl and we are blessed to be her parentals (Ok most of the time). Being pregnant was just crap, with a capital A. It sent my body to places unimaginable to any person who hasn't had a hard one (please excuse the pun here). Of everything I could have handled the pain, but the insomnia literally sent me to the edge of insanity, and in the darkest hours of the night when the ViKing was snoring and PT was uitgepas drooling on her pillow, I would think... think... think... how soon can I get this baby out of me, so that she will survive? 28 weeks... I just need to get to 28 weeks... I was sitting at 13 weeks. 15 weeks more isn't so bad, I can handle this. I'm a terrible person. How can I even contemplate bringing a child into the world early, for my own selfishness, because of pain and a week without sleep? I'm a horrible person. Oh lord, my back, lets attempt turning over for the 19384th time, ok 376 point turn coming up. And the thoughts never stopped. I hated myself, I despised my body and I resented my baby. Pre-natal depression is an ugly snake that rears its head out of the grass, and stalks you in the night. Being pregnant isn't just for 9 months, woman are pregnant for years, thousands and thousands of long sweaty, heavy, swollen, moody days. I resented this baby and I hated myself.
There were my age days - today is a great day! I feel like I am in my 60's (I am actually 31years old), then there were the 74year old days, the 96 year olds and worst of all was my 113year old days where I needed crutches and a walker to get to the bathroom. The bathroom was a mythical place on the other end of the universe, and a trip there required snacks, water and regular calls to my ViKing to check in and make sure that I hadn't been kidnapped or died from dehydration. My mind was so inebriated with hormones that often it would forget the reason for being vertical and we (the watermelon and I) would venture to the kitchen or back to bed, only to realise my mistake and start the long journey back to the bathroom oasis again (and repeat, many, many times).
3 weeks before D-day, we decide it was a good time to move house. Yes, yes, we know. Stressful? No, we will be fine. I can't walk, never mind pack a box. So my mom and two amazing selfless friends packed our house for us, and we moved from a wet, mouldy forest little wooden island house, to a beautiful sunny, concrete home. We were thrilled. Bed rest didn't feel like prison anymore, and I lifted my head (and four chins) off my chest, and managed to limp-waddle through the last three weeks of incubating. We had the awful 70's inspired carpets cleaned before moving in, so that our new haven would be clean and new for the second spawn (Murphy's uncle had a good chuckle at us here).
D-day (or more aptly named Push Day) arrives. We are so ready for this. I have been pregnant for so long the dinosaurs went extinct waiting and Mugabe actually resigned. We had a beautiful, calm water birth at our warm new home planned, with music, champagne and soft lighting… It was going to be perfect (cue Murphy and his law here please). With our Princess Tantrum no. 1, the labour was 19 hours of pure hell at home, in water. So we were expecting a few hours shorter, but still a good go of it, with a doula holding my hand, coaching me to breathe and our midwife doing regular checks to ensure all is running smoothly (The Universe said, “ahem, hold my beer”).
I managed to get to 38 weeks and 6 days. This in itself was a miracle, and I deserve the Nobel Patience Prize. Down goes the castor oil and orange juice mix (don’t ever, just don’t) and the waiting begins. First round doesn’t work, so a second dose is prescribed (my insides have never been so clear, ever). I start feeling a few little pangs, you know like a monthly dose of hormones that the Red Russians prescribe every 28days to an innocent, undeserving woman. They were so slight that at some points I was convinced it was my imagination, being so desperate and all to get this darn life sentence over with now. As a precaution Gift Granny and Grand Pops came to pick up no. 1, we have pizza for dinner and climb into bed to sleep. As I lay my weary, whale sized, swimming-pool-full body down to rest, close my bloated eyes and start the laborious process of attempting sleep, my uterus goes “Yes Captain, she is in position, she has lain down, sir, and they don’t have a linen saver on their brand new bed… Yes sir we are in position, Captain SIR!!” and then, my uterus punched me! It literally punched me! And the gates of pain flooded forth. I went from sleep to 10,000 decibels of pain in 0,001seconds. The only position comfortable for me was on all fours with my head thoroughly jammed into the wall, and I kept jamming. After 10 minutes the contractions were so fast I couldn’t count them, The ViKing was rubbing my back, muttering a whole load of inaudible twittering stuff (he could have been admitting to murder for all I heard at that moment), "Call the midwife" I muttered through growls. He called the Midwife. I took 3 panado's (hysterical laughter please from the audience) thinking there would be time for it to work, and may alleviate a semblance of the utter hell I was currently living through. He was up trying to inflate the pool, lay down the plastic and get water into the pool, while I am making a rather large dent in our wall with my head, growling and pushing. (He said I didn't scream, I growled, like some inhuman thing had taken over my voice box. A sound never to have been uttered from a creatures throat before. I growled.)
I managed to waddle, slither, and stomp into the lounge, using the wall as my pillar of life. "I can't do this, it's only been a few minutes, I can't take this anymore, please kill me. Or take me to the hospital, I want to go to the hospital. NOOOOOOWWWWWW. NNNNNGROOOOOOOOOWL" The hospital is 24minutes away. (hahahaha!!!) Leaving scratch marks on his computers desk, in between some seriously unladylike cussing I managed to request something to tie up my hair. He brings me ribbons. A very scary laugh escaped my throat and he scuttled back to the room, with “I NEED PINS!!!” ringing in his ears. Now anyone that knows my ViKing knows he lives up to his name, and “scuttle” is not a word one would associate with him…He brought me bows. “PINS!!!! SHANNON!!! I NEED TO TIE UP MY >insert choice of swear word here< HAIR!”, he brings back my hair box, and very warily hands it to me whilst standing at the far end of the room. I manage to pick up one bobby pin, a very neon pink one. And with this the serious pushing started. Here I am, holding the Bobby Pin, squeezing all life out of it, glaring at it like this was all it’s fault. There were probably laser beams coming out of my eyes piercing it’s innocent metal soul, but the bobby pin is strong. The Force is strong with this one. And I am really growling, an acting coach would have been so proud of my voice projection at this moment, "It must come from the diaphragm, darling". Shannon at this point is on his hands and knees in front of me, I throw the offending bobby pin, and grab the next offending object within reach - The ViKing’s shoulders. With a very beastly growl I conversationally mention, that this baby is coming NOW, and he needs to get my pants offfffffff….. “NNNNNNNGGGGGRRRRRRRROOOWWWWWWL”
“Oh my god” he says “I can’t do this!”
“You have to do this” says my voice of calm, not really, but give me some credit here, ok? It goes in like a banana and comes out like a pineapple on steroids.
“Where are these bloody people!!!” He replies, as we were still alone, just two people in love (well that was him, I was ready to rip his head off and eat it at this point) all alone, in a house, with an empty birth pool and a very clean patch of carpet. Slightly petrified of what was currently enveloping in our brand new lounge.
I am still wearing my pants, they were maroon. And her head is being crowned, like the little princess she is. Our Doula decides this is a perfect moment to call and say she is still on her way. The traffic cops at 00:24 decided to actually do their jobs and had a road block. Our midwife it still missing in action, like a soldier that defected at the front. Shannon's ring tone is the Imperial March from Star Wars, dum dum dum, dum da dum, dum da dum! He manages to get my pants to my knees, I am still standing on the carpet, which is not so clean anymore. DUM DUM DUM, DUM DA DUM!!! The Imperial March is ceremoniously playing away. He urgently coaxes me a few centimetres to the right so that I am on the plastic drop sheet, her head has made it's grand entrance, I'm pushing like an impatient woman into the middle of a queue at home affairs and Voillop! Our Shield Maiden is born, to the Imperial orchestra of Star Wars. My hero, my ViKing, the love of my life (don’t tell him I said that, we are not the normal romantic type) delivered our baby girl, all 4,1kgs, 55cm’s of her, after 1hour and 10 minutes of labour. He was the first person to touch her crown, and he caught our fat enormous purple slithery worm. He held her for the first time in her life, he loved her first, he kissed her first. He was the first. We were so alone. She wasn't breathing.
Our doula arrived. "You're a minute too late" he said to her as she walked in the door. He later told me that he was so angry, so furious at them for taking their sweet time to get to us. But he decided that he didn't want his daughter's first moments to be surrounded in anger. She was loved too much to have derision in her tiny ears. He already loved her more than any human could ever describe. He was her first everything.
She was a fat little chunky girl (and forgive me for saying this) but really an ugly baby! We were smitten though. I was mostly relieved to not be pregnant anymore, but hey, let’s not get too technical here. Our little girl had arrived, and she had chosen her moment, she wanted her father's hands to cradle her. She was beautiful, she was perfect, she slept so much and drank me dry. She was an angel, she had a little voice that would sing for us. On her first night she sang in her sleep, it was just once and she has never done it again. If one ever imagined what it would be like to hear angels sing, we heard it from our daughter, the most harmonic sound... However I felt something inside of me that I couldn't quite explain, it was a weariness, a watchfulness, a feeling inside. She didn't feel quite right. We took her to the chiropractor at 3 days old. She went to the doctor for a check up at a week. How can you explain to a medical practitioner that there is something wrong with your brand new baby, even though she is happy, content, feeding well and sleeping through the night? People thought I was being a paranoid mom, she's fine! Just look at her, the epitome of a healthy chunky baby with 3 chins and thunder thighs. We started supplementing her with formula because I thought she wasn't getting enough nutrition. My doctor was not impressed with me, because I had milk, she gave me "The Lecture" and said we had to choose, boobs or bottle. The feeling never left us. We watched her, we loved her and we held her constantly. It felt as if she wasn't long for our world and so we cherished each precious moment, there was an impermanence to her that we couldn't explain... The ViKing and I lived our new lives and we cherished a few perfect weeks with our two beautiful children. Alexandria (Princess Tantrum) was smitten with her little sister. Larke never cried, she never moaned, she didn't want to be out of my arms, she didn’t put on weight, she never pooped, she never stopped feeding and then she didn’t stop vomiting. On the pitch black night that our lives changed irrevocably, we were sleeping, all 3 of us in the bed, PT (Princess Tantrum) decided on day 1 of Larke's life that our bedroom was too noisy for her sensitive ears, and retired back to her sanctuary. Our newborn baby girl started vomiting, she projectile vomited so hard it hit the wall and splashed her back in her face. She vomited on me, all over our bed that we ran out of sheets, she vomited on The ViKing from across our King Size bed. She was feeding like a starved prisoner at my breast, and seconds after, it just all came back up, everywhere, over everyone. This was not reflux... We called for backup to watch Spawn no.1, so we could get to the hospital. My Mother in Law and back up (Wonder-Super-Hero-Mom-Lady who raised 5 children and 3 sisters on her own) told us as we were rushing out the door at 3:27am to the hospital that we should ask the doctors to check for Pyloric Stenosis. What on earth is that? It sounded like something that could re-ignite a dead person back to life. Pyloric Stenosis - It was the first time I had heard these 2 words. And they would become an evil mantra in my head over the next 2 weeks. At 23 days old, our beautiful little angel girl was admitted to hospital for observation, I was terrified and couldn't stop crying. The spewing of her insides calmed down and we were discharged the next day, they said it was reflux. I knew it wasn't. Have you ever seen a new born projectile vomit?
Two days later at 4:38am after a night of changing blankies and continuous feeding in between wiping up vomit we went to a different hospital, our doctor had called ahead so that the paediatrician on call knew we were coming. She was marked VERY URGENT. I hated myself for waiting even a minute longer, but I hoped and prayed the vomiting would pass, I didn't think I had the strength to handle a sick child, my body wasn't even nearly recovered from it's 9 month (and 10,657.339,64 day ordeal). The vomiting didn't abate, we packed our bags and sped to hospital. For the second time in 4 days my baby's veins were raped for her pure innocent blood. And she was put on the first drip. For the second time in 4 days we heard our little songbird scream a scream that no parent should ever hear from their child. The Viking and I broke inside. I sang her songs and told her we loved her and her daddy held her hand so she couldn't scratch her face even more, she was completely hysterical. They couldn't find her veins, they had collapsed from the first round of tests done previously. She looked at us desperately, asking why we were hurting her? Our peaceful little miracle who never cried, screamed so hard that a lady left her dying husbands bed and came to us, hugged us and said "I am praying for your baby.". Thank you lady, whoever you are, you gave us a little bit of strength to get through this. I broke and I couldn't stop the tears even though I was trying so hard to be strong for our tiny little girl, she was so thin. My Hero, Shannon, was stoic and strong for both of us. He was not ok inside, but he showed strength for our tiny baby, at 28 days old. He held her, he held me. It was day one.
We were admitted to neonatal. I will never love the colour yellow ever again. This ward is going to make me crazy, I said to Shannon, I didn’t know how I would last another minute there, listening to tiny children screaming for their moms as they got a lumber puncture. A child died and we listened to his mother wailing for her lost baby. My little bird was in a plastic cot, and NPM, nothing past mouth. My breasts ached with milk. And she was hysterical for me and I couldn’t feed her. I was leaking. And she was screaming. Our soft quiet tiny child, was purple in the face wailing for the food that was so near, that she couldn't have. How do you explain to a new born babe that they can’t have food, or their comfort, that the needles and blood tests are going to make her better. Shannon was my rock. He held me as the water poured from my eyes. My soul broke. His heart was shattered. We tried to hold each other up, to take the next step, to do the next test. We just kept wiping up her vomit and singing to our little girl. It just kept coming, she was empty in her tiny little tummy, but she kept retching. And retching. My god, she was so thin. She was wasting away before our eyes, each minute she just got thinner. She had lost 900grams.
The hospital doesn't supply beds for the moms, so my tired and aching body held my child in my arms the first night and for a week after that, sitting on a chair I took my night vigil over her life. There was bruises on the backs of my arms where they had been jammed into the arm rests so as not to drop her when the oblivion of sleep crashed down over me. I would sleep for a few minutes until my head hit my chest. My eyes would fly open and my heart skipped, how could anyone be so selfish as to sleep. I was alone, my ViKing was not allowed to stay. The nights were the worst. Ghosts of children past came to haunt us, they sang their sad songs of a short life gone before they had really lived, and screamed over my shoulder, they tried to touch us with their ghostly malformed hands and they just needed some love. I had none to give. I was cradled over my tiny newborn holding her safe, monitoring her breath, protecting her from these spirits that were jealous and in need. Larke screamed so hard her voice broke, she was starving, she couldn't understand why she was being tortured like this. We were trying to save her life. She just kept spewing her insides. I kept wiping it up. Changing clothes, I ran out of things for us to wear. We sat in puke drenched clothes. The semi darkness and beep...beep...beep... BEEP!BEEP! beep...beep...beep... the only lullaby that sang to us. I begged her with my heart tears pouring down my face for her to please sleep. Go to sleep my darling, this world is too cruel for your innocent little body. Just go to sleep, find a better place where there is no hunger. Please sleep my little bird. Please. please, please. Just sleep. Find a better place in your dreams. Sleep. I rocked her. And I cried so hard with her broken little voice singing in pain. I was not human anymore. There was nothing left inside of me. The ghosts haunted us and I held her begging, begging for them to leave us in peace. There is no peace there.
The morning broke scattered through the frosted windows, The ViKing came to save me from the demons of the night. He was like all the sunshine and warmth, the love left at home and the only thing that could hold me up. He hugged me and told me it would be ok. He gave me life to live through the next hour. The next minute. The next moment. The next breath. The doctor came, she said Larke will 90% need surgery. Surgery! My tiny little child needs to be put under anesthesia and butchered to save her life. How could we deal with this? My ViKing held me, I collapsed in his embrace. He was the mountain holding my emotion, he held me together. I felt like a porcelain teacup that had been flung across the room and patched back together with sugar water. The surgeons have been summoned to come with their lifesaving sickles to examine my tiny angel. And to tell us how they are going to cut through my daughters virgin skin to save her life. Surgery. Pyloric Stenosis. Pyloric Stenosis. Pyloric Stenosis. Hate. I knew pure hate. Hate. HATE!!
After 3 days in this yellow hell, they confirmed her diagnosis, which we knew it was. She had a 0,06% chance of inheriting this disorder. She had it. She was too weak to operate on. They couldn’t save her life until she had stabilised. They kept ravaging her tiny veins for her life's liquid. She screamed. I cried and sang her songs. The long wait began, she was never left alone, not even for a second, my family would tag team with me so I could brush my teeth and pee, every second day I would venture out of the hospital to a sanctuary nearby where I could have a glorious shower. A hug, and a coffee. Every third day we managed to get Alexandria to George and I would leave my little girls bedside to spend an hour with my 3 year old, we would have picnics and look at the sky in the hospital playground. She tried so hard to understand what was happening, and she was such a brave girl. These stolen hours felt like a dream, a solace from the nightmare. I was desperate to go back to the nightmare, I couldn't be away from my little bird. She needs me, even though I can't offer her anything. I just wanted to be back in those yellow four walls. I was like a prisoner. For 2 days Larke was not allowed to eat, she had a drip in her head. The only consolation I could offer was a dummy covered in sugary glycerin. She looked at me with tears in her eyes and cheek bones showing through her face, why? Mommy, why? I could only hold her and beg her to find a better place. I would sit in this hell and protect her tiny body from the horrors around us. I counted the hours, the minutes, the seconds.
The night before her surgery at 23:32 a blood test came back inconclusive, she had to be tortured again. They would not operate until her results were stable enough. She had just fallen asleep after hours of torturous screaming and me begging her to sleep. We had to poke her blue arms and feet so many times just to get a tiny semblance of her red life liquid. She screamed. My soul perished inside. There were no more tears left for me to cry. I just died inside, standing there holding her as she screamed, I felt nothing. My emotions had vacated this shell, and I just stood holding her, feeling deader than a rock. Nothing. I finally knew what it must have felt like to stand at the front of the war, a soldier with nothing left in him, no more emotions, just dead, ready to die. I was so broken, so dead. There was nothing left inside of me to give her. I hated myself. Shannon tried to get into the hospital, to the ward, he knew I couldn't cope anymore on my own. I needed him so badly, I was far gone from insanity, I was had fallen off the edge of life into a very dark abyss. I needed him so badly to save me, they denied him access. I just kept falling. I sat at the door of the ward with my hand on the cold locked door and let my heart soar to him. My soul walked away from my body and found solace in his arms. My body was left on the ice cold floor of the hospital, sitting at the prison gate, cold, lifeless and desperate for his loving embrace.
The next morning, still not knowing what would happen, if she was stable enough to operate on, she was prepped for surgery. Shannon had slept in the car in the parking lot so he could be near to us. We were led to the theatre ward. I could barely walk. Her dad held her as I climbed into scrubs. He was sent away, I was led like a meek new virgin to the harem, to wait outside the sliding white doors. The whole hospital knew who she was, they all came to pray for her, and touch her blanket like she was a saint that would offer a miracle. We just needed a miracle for our tiny baby. She was so thin. Her arms were just bones, her face was blue from the circles under her eyes. We were led into theatre (not the stage, with lights, an audience and fancy costumes, but a clinical white room with a panel of surgeons and nurses, big lights and sharp objects). I talked to her constantly. The biggest load of codswollop spewed forth from my mouth, and regularly there was a snigger from a white mask, as I described to my 32 day old baby how we would boob all over Sedgefield when this was over, how we would take her on holiday, and what her sister was doing at school. I promised her we would play her our song, “Faithfully” by Journey, and how, above all else, she would grow up to be a chunky shield maiden, our songbird. She would be ok. She screamed, and I just talked while holding her pinned to the table. They inserted the feeding tube she screamed through a broken throat. Finally, mercifully, they put her to sleep, thankfully. I was ushered out of theatre and broke down into tears. The head of surgery at George Provincial Hospital operated on our baby. At 4 weeks and 3 days she was teaching a whole panel of surgeons about a condition that none of them had ever seen. Shannon held me and we waited. I would never ever wish for any parent to sit through those 2 hours…
She is out of theatre. I get the message while pouring milk down the toilet in the ICU bathroom. I ran, boobs out and flapping to the waiting room. We were led like little lambs, terrified, having survived the slaughterhouse to see our tiny little Larke, hooked up to tubes and a drip, sleeping in an incubator. We held her bony hand, and cooed our love for her. She slept, and woke up occasionally to cry through a raw throat, and then blissful sleep crashed down upon her again. For the first time in days, we left her alone to the charge of a bull nurse with a soft heart, whose only charge was her care, her safety, and her wellbeing. I left her side and went to sleep in my chair for a glorious hour.
We are broken parents. I never thought I would ever have to deal with an ill child. Never again will I take a day of health for granted for any of us. For my 2 children, my ViKing and I. I thought being pregnant a second time was the hardest thing I have ever done. It wasn’t.
