Hospital – The World As I See It

8 Years Ago Today. . .

July 9, 2013

As I have sat here the past few weeks leading up to this week I decided instead of writing a letter to my daughter or just another post on how I am feeling about everything since it has been 8 years. This year I am going to write about the day I signed the papers and left the hospital. I haven’t written this post yet because out of the whole experience this was and still is the hardest part of the situation.

I find this day as the hardest because it was the day that I had to admit that I couldn’t do it and that she was going to better with the family I chose for her than she would be with me. I am pretty sure that unless you know who I am personally you don’t know that I hate to admit that I can’t do something. So for me the hardest part was signing the papers and handing her off to her family.

While I was pregnant I didn’t think I wanted to even see her and I thought there was no way that I could do what they call a “direct placement”. All that means is that I hand her off her to her family and then I leave instead of what some people do where they just leave the baby in the bassinet and walk away.

I am not going to go into much detail about the days that let up to the 9th but I am sure in time I will talk about those as well. I remember like it was yesterday my social working coming into my hospital room on the 9th bright and early and asking me if I was ready to sign the papers. I told her yes and she went out and grabbed two nurses because there had to be two witnesses and I started signing the papers. I remember getting to the final papers where I relinquish my rights and thinking to hurry and sign it because if I didn’t I didn’t know if I would be able to.

After I signed the paper the brought in my daughter and I held her for about an hour before the family came into my room to see her and talk to us. I remember we were all talking and then the mood changed for me. I am not sure why it changed but I realized that my time was coming to an end and I just started crying. My worker then knew it was time for the placement to happen so I handed her off her adoptive dad and just cried. At that point my social worker had them leave the room and I left the hospital about 30 mins or so later.

Even as I type this I am tearing up because my heart is still broken and I know there is no way to fix it. That being said I don’t regret the choices I made because I know without a doubt that she was meant to be in their family and not meant for me. The emotions are still raw when it comes to placement day and it is something I never want to go through again. That is all there is to this post because this post was more for me than anyone else.

Things That Drive Me Insane-Nurses

June 11, 2013

This time for things that drive me insane I am going to talk about my latest infusion and how bad one of the nurses there was. The thing that made me the maddest about the whole situation was the fact that she was a supervisor. Anyway lets get onto the story. I am sure you all know that I have Multiple Sclerosis and that I take Tysabri once a month to keep me stable.

So once a month I go to the hospital and get an IV in my arm so I can get the medication. The best way to describe how the give it is to say they give it like they do Chemo or when you have a blood transfusion. So usually they get the IV started with just one poke but this time it took 3 times.

Now if the only problem was that I took three times to get the IV started I wouldn’t be so pissed about it but the second time they poked me it hurt like hell and here I will show you a picture of the bruise that formed:

Things That Drive Me Insane-Idiot Nurses — This was taken 5 minutes or so after I got home from getting my infusion done.

This bruise was already forming before she pulled out the needle because she couldn’t find the vein. I don’t think I have ever had a nurse dig around so much trying to get the vein. She was digging around for a good 2 to 3 minutes and still couldn’t get it. She then had to poke me for the 3rd time and thank god she got me then because if she hadn’t I wouldn’t have let her poke me again.

Here is what the bruise looked about 4 or 5 days latter:

IMG_0286[1] — What the hell is up with the straight lines????

Let me just tell you I have never once seen a bruise like this. The fact that there are straight lines is so weird and everyone that see’s it says the same thing. I ended up having to go to the hospital and get blood drawn because she messed up and my blood test came back weird so they want to make sure that it everything was okay. Oh and this bruise still hurts and I bet even when the bruise goes away I will still have pain because I believe she went into the muscle and did some damage.

I pray to god that when I go back for my next infusion that she won’t be there because I hate making scenes but there is no way in hell that she is ever going to get another needle anywhere near me. I have another Idiot Drivers coming up next week.

Has this ever happened to you???

Healing

June 5, 2012

My best friend, okay she is more like a sister, had her baby on May 25. I haven’t set foot in labor and delivery since I had and placed my daughter for adoption almost 7 years ago. I that being there for her was going to be hard and it was going to bring emotions to the top that I hadn’t dealt with. What I didn’t realize at the time was how healing it was going to be for me to be there with her and the baby.

After I got off of work I headed to the hospital and right when I pulled into the parking lot I broke down and started to cry. I had to sit in my cry for a few minutes because the last thing she needed was to see me crying when see was in labor. After I few minutes I got it together and I went into the hospital. I didn’t really know where to be so I just stayed in the hall right outside the room she was in.

After she had him and we all came in the room and they asked me if I wanted to hold him all I could do was shake my head no. My eyes filled up with tears and it was all I could do to keep from leaving the room. To be honest in that minute I didn’t know if I would even hold him while he was in the hospital. Every time I thought about holding him it brought all the emotions I had pushed to the background and hadn’t dealt with.

After they got her up to her postpartum room and her boyfriend left so he could run home and do a few things I stayed so that she wouldn’t have to be alone. I didn’t want her to be alone because I know when I had my daughter it was hard to be in the hospital all alone. After it was just the 3 of us I knew it was time to hold him and start to deal with the emotions.

After I held him for a little bit I realized that he did something for me that I didn’t know he could. I can’t put into words what he did but he healed a part of me that I thought would always be broken. He is so special to me because he will never know what he did for me and that is okay but he will always be a huge part of my life.