Part 4…

Since the HSG test, July had gone.  I had hit the road in the craziness of August for my job, traveling every day of the month.  In August, I rarely have time to sleep, eat and check my email, let alone worry about my health or having a baby.  Our life is literally on hold – every year – for the month of August.  So in September, when I looked up from my travel chaos and saw that August had come and gone without pain or incident (health-wise anyway), I was relieved.

September travel was a little lighter and I actually got to be home now and then.  Which allowed my to focus on building a family.  I felt good.  I felt optimistic.  I felt happy.

On September 14th, I am speaking to a chapter at the University of Rhode Island.  It’s a good day.  The weather is warm, the sun is shining, and I always enjoy working with this group.  Mid-day we take a lunch break and me and some of the chapter women walk about two blocks off campus to get some sushi during the lunch break.

I love sushi.  I would eat it every day.  We have a special relationship.  My closest friends know that when they go to sushi with me all they have to do is worry about what they’re going to drink: They just let me order.  I usually reserve sushi for special meals with people who are important to me – there’s something about sharing food (and shoving large pieces of raw fish in your mouth) that makes me feel more connected to people – but I was CRAVING sushi.  So we get sushi to-go, head back to the training room and chow down.

Bad idea.

College sushi from some little place 2 blocks of campus is NOT high quality sushi, nor is it fresh in any way.  It doesn’t taste very good and I am worried about what it might do to me later in the day.  Nonetheless, we carry on with the training.  When we finish, I pack up my things and head to the airport in Providence, RI.  I have a flight to get on so that I could make it to Nashville tonight for a program at MTSU tomorrow.

I get to the airport, return my car, check in, go through security and sit down at my gate.  Still with plenty of time – about two hours.  As I sit there, I start to feel a little ill – actually really ill.  I go to the bathroom and just sit there, in a stall, for 15 minutes.  Nothing.

I fell like I am going to puke.  I feel dizzy.  I am having abdominal pain.  I’m not sure if I need to poop or puke, but I just feel sick.  I realize I can’t sit in a stall forever – that’s weird.  So I get up and walk out of the stall, feeling worse than when I stepped in.

I leave that bathroom and sit in a row of seats outside the bathroom – just in case.  The last thing I want to do was be that girl who puked in a garbage can in the terminal.

As the moments wore on, the pain becomes more and more real.  My stomach starts to balloon and at that moment I knew what was happening to me.  It wasn’t the bad sushi earlier in the day.

Another cyst had burst. 

(or what we had been told was a cyst bursting).

I don’t know what to do.  Do I get on a flight home?  Do I go to the ER here in Providence?  Do I know where the ER is?  What do I do?????!?!

As this is all happening, my plane is beginning to board.  So I do the only thing I know.  I pop a few Advil and get on the plane.  On the plane, I feel the pain growing and my stomach distending.  I’m uncomfortable and in agony.  I can’t stand it anymore.  I reach back behind my head and unzip the back of my dress (I had a jacket on over it) to let some of the pressure out.  It was like a great release.  I’m still in pain, but way less pressure.  We land at the Dulles airport and I immediately call my husband.

“Babe, another cyst just burst on my ovary.  I feel like I am dying again.  I don’t know what to do.  What do I do?”

After I talk to Ben, I decide to stay the night in Nashville and see how I am doing in the morning. I would make an assessment then.  There wasn’t any other option.  By the time I get to Nashville it would be too late to drive back to Indy, too late to call the doctor, too late to do anything.  I get to Nashville and all I can think about was getting that damn dress off, putting on pajamas, popping a few more Advil, and crawling into bed.  I go to my rental car, drive faster than recommended to my hotel, and do just that.  Faster than the door to my hotel room is closed behind me, my dress is off and I am slipping on a pair of Nike shorts and an oversized t-shirt (I spend way too much time with sorority women, can you tell?).  I crawl immediately into bed and think to myself, “Screw brushing my teeth.  I’d take a cavity over this…”

I wake up every 4-6 hours to take more Advil through the night (I didn’t bring any pain medication with me on the road – dummy).

I wake up at 6 a.m. – to the worst alarm ever.  The last thing I want to do is get out of bed, but if I am going to MTSU today, I have to get ready.  I get out of bed and I felt pretty okay.  In that brief moment, I make the last minute call to tough it out and do my program that day.  I’m tired.  I’m worn out from a long, tough August.  I think to myself, “You’re already here.  You can suck it up for 5 hours or you can go home and have to come back later.”  Toughing it out and going home tonight seems like a much better option.   So I get in the shower and commit to making today happen.

When I get out of the shower, I am in agony.  I end up in a soggy, towel-wrapped ball on my hotel bed in tears.  I’m in so much pain.  Advil takes the bite off, but it doesn’t get rid of the actual pain.  I pick up the phone, and dial Delta Airlines to see if there are even any options to go home today.

Nothing available until the flight I am already on tonight.  Crap.

I sit up, wipe the tears from my eyes, and walk to the bathroom to blow dry my hair.  I have no choice.  Make today happen.  Suck it up.  Deal with it.  Power through.  You’re not going to die.  You can handle this.

I finish getting ready, get in my rental car and make the 40 minute drive from Nashville to Murfreesboro with a short stop by Starbucks for a latte and some coffee cake – I need a little comfort food.  When I get to campus, I park, slowly pour myself out of the car and walk a few hundred yards to the building we’ll be in.  It’s locked.  At that point, I can’t bear to stand there with my 15lb bag in hand, so I sit down on the steps, sip my latte, and marvel at the sunny, cool September day.  I’m am grateful for a little peace before the chapter women start arriving.  I tell myself, “You can do this Jessica.  It’s just 5 hours.  You’ve worked with this chapter before, they know you, you’ll be fine.”

I pray for enough strength to get through the day and as I open my eyes the chapter president is walking up.

Once the chapter women get there, we dig in.  At lunch time, we take a break and then have to meet back at the new student center for a “mock” recruitment with the Panhellenic.  Three of the chapter women immediately grab me and we head to Cici’s Pizza.

Yes.  I did eat a $5 pizza buffet and I loved every minute of it.

At lunch, I tell the chapter women (they are seniors and I have known them since they were new members) that I had a cyst burst last night and that I am in a ton of pain – that I’ll be okay – but that I appreciate them taking me somewhere in a car for lunch.  They immediately switch into care-taker mode.  I am grateful.

We finish lunch, I pop two more Advil, and we head to the student union for an hour and then the seniors drive me back to the other building – the rest of the chapter has to walk.  Again – very grateful for them today.  I power through for 2 more hours and we’re done – and it’s the happiest moment of my life (maybe not the happiest, but at this point, I’m pretty happy).  It’s extremely challenging to be “on” when you’re in agony.  I am grateful to be leaving and “turning off”.

I get back into my car and head for the airport.  On the drive, I start doing math.  I land at home at 10:30 p.m.  I’ll be home by 11:30 and plan on immediately taking pain medication – not Advil.   But I can’t take any more Advil within 6 hours of taking it.  I do math to see if I can squeeze in one more dose of Advil and I realize that I can’t.  This last dose is going to have to last me almost 9 hours.

Oy.  It’s going to be a long night.

The plane rides are agony.  However, I’m grateful for a short layover in Atlanta and close gates.  As I pull into the driveway back at home, the clock reads 11:11 p.m.  I make a wish (why not right?).  I wish for everything to be okay and the pain to go away.  I turn off the car in the garage, close the garage door, and leave everything in the car.  I walk up to our bedroom, change my cloths, pop a Norco and a Toradol and melt into bed.

The next morning I wake up in a drug-induced pain-free state and call Dr. Bean.  I talk to his nurse and she tells me that Dr. Bean will call me this afternoon.  When Dr. Bean finally calls me back at 3 p.m. I tell him what happened.  He spends 20 minutes on the phone with me asking questions, listening.  Then he says,

“Jessica, unfortunately I need to do an ultrasound as the pain is starting to happen.  Since this happened over two days ago, I am afraid I won’t be able to see much.  I need you to call me if this happens again – immediately – and I will get you in right away for an ultrasound so I can get a good look at what’s really going on.  Do you have enough pain medication to get you through the next day or two?  If the pain isn’t gone by then, call me.”

I have plenty of pain meds, but zero answers.

I pop another dose of pain meds and crawl back into bed.

Until next time I guess…