Heartbeat and Forgiving a Doctor
The first and best part of the week was that we got to hear our baby's heartbeat! It was very surreal but special. It only took a little while to find and when the doctor did it was amazing. I've heard that a baby's heartbeat goes fast but I was surprised. Afterward Riley kept saying that our baby was going to be a track star. Apparently it doesn't matter that all babies heartbeats go that fast at first.
The downside to that day is that I found out my blood type. You see, Riley is O+. I found out that I am A-. Because of that, if the baby is a positive blood type my antibodies will attack it if our blood mixes. So to prevent that I need to have a shot in my hip that tricks my immune system at 28 weeks. It's called a RhoGam shot. If I get a hard hit in the stomach, in a car accident or have any type of vaginal bleeding I need the shot within 24 hours.
Part of me is grateful that we have that shot because it will save my baby. Thank you modern medicine. The other part of me is super terrified because I LOATHE needles. I've accepted the fact that I need them, especially during labor, but I still have anxiety about it sometimes. Regardless, it will save my baby so it is more than worth it.
I also went to the Baby Expo in Provo yesterday with my mother-in-law. It was a lot of fun. She was very nice and got me some books for the baby. We also saw some really cute baby clothes and received information on breast feeding, health insurance, prenatal vitamins and of course natural birth. It really was a great experience.
Now on a more seemingly random topic, I need to give you some background information on why I need to forgive a doctor.
When I was born I had urethral re-flux disease. It's a disease where before the urine leaves the bladder it goes back up to your kidneys. That's not a good thing because now all the toxins that were just filtered go back to your kidneys in a concentrated form.
There are a few ways you can tell that a child has it. They tend to wet the bed a lot (more than normal) and have many urine infections. The only way to tell for sure though is to have an operation where they insert a catheter, fill the bladder up with a special liquid and x-ray you as you urinate to see where it goes in your body. Most children grow out of it but it's good to make sure so they can start taking anti bodies.
Now the operation really isn't that bad. Catheters aren't fun to deal with (for those of you who don't know what a catheter is it's a little tube that you insert where you pee from) but they aren't painful.
I was four years old when I got the operation. However, the doctor who was doing it decided to try to insert an adult catheter instead of a child sized one. According to my mom it was a really bad experience that took 45 minutes when it should only take maybe 20 at the most.
Since I didn't grow out of it I had to get the operation every year until I had surgery at 13-years-old. Every time I got the operation I had super high anxiety and it was a traumatic experience for me and my parents.
To describe just how bad the anxiety was we would set the appointment for August but I would wake up in the middle of the night in March freaking out and praying like crazy that the operation wouldn't scare me anymore or that it wouldn't hurt. All this because the stupid doctor wouldn't get a child sized catheter.
Now as you can understand I don't exactly enjoy hospitals or trust doctors very much. The idea of the RhoGam shot and labor does scare me a ton. I'm a wuss when it comes to pain and I'm genuinely afraid that the doctors at the hospital will do something stupid.
A couple nights ago I woke up Riley at 4:00 am because I was having anxiety about it. That doesn't usually happen but for some reason it did. I talked to him about it and he said something that surprised me because I had never thought about it before. "Kaili, you need to forgive the doctor that did the operation."
I was surprised. Not only because I had never thought about it before but because I really didn't want to. I don't know the name of the man that did it. I don't even remember the hospital. However I knew that I blamed this man for the trauma over the operations and with the trauma of even going to the hospital.
After talking about it a little more I realized that Riley was right. I had been very bitter for years over this and I was just too blind to see it. It was hurting me. There is no benefit to being upset and in all honesty it's probably a big part of the reason why I don't trust the hospital.
It's going to be a process but I know it's what I'm supposed to do. I don't want to know who the doctor was and it doesn't matter if I do. Sometimes the hardest thing is to forgive someone who has caused you so much pain but is a nameless faceless person. Regardless, it's the right thing to do.
Even if it doesn't remove my fear of needles or hospitals, it will teach me more about forgiveness. By extension I hope it allows me to teach my children about it as well.
The downside to that day is that I found out my blood type. You see, Riley is O+. I found out that I am A-. Because of that, if the baby is a positive blood type my antibodies will attack it if our blood mixes. So to prevent that I need to have a shot in my hip that tricks my immune system at 28 weeks. It's called a RhoGam shot. If I get a hard hit in the stomach, in a car accident or have any type of vaginal bleeding I need the shot within 24 hours.
Part of me is grateful that we have that shot because it will save my baby. Thank you modern medicine. The other part of me is super terrified because I LOATHE needles. I've accepted the fact that I need them, especially during labor, but I still have anxiety about it sometimes. Regardless, it will save my baby so it is more than worth it.
I also went to the Baby Expo in Provo yesterday with my mother-in-law. It was a lot of fun. She was very nice and got me some books for the baby. We also saw some really cute baby clothes and received information on breast feeding, health insurance, prenatal vitamins and of course natural birth. It really was a great experience.
Now on a more seemingly random topic, I need to give you some background information on why I need to forgive a doctor.
When I was born I had urethral re-flux disease. It's a disease where before the urine leaves the bladder it goes back up to your kidneys. That's not a good thing because now all the toxins that were just filtered go back to your kidneys in a concentrated form.
There are a few ways you can tell that a child has it. They tend to wet the bed a lot (more than normal) and have many urine infections. The only way to tell for sure though is to have an operation where they insert a catheter, fill the bladder up with a special liquid and x-ray you as you urinate to see where it goes in your body. Most children grow out of it but it's good to make sure so they can start taking anti bodies.
Now the operation really isn't that bad. Catheters aren't fun to deal with (for those of you who don't know what a catheter is it's a little tube that you insert where you pee from) but they aren't painful.
I was four years old when I got the operation. However, the doctor who was doing it decided to try to insert an adult catheter instead of a child sized one. According to my mom it was a really bad experience that took 45 minutes when it should only take maybe 20 at the most.
Since I didn't grow out of it I had to get the operation every year until I had surgery at 13-years-old. Every time I got the operation I had super high anxiety and it was a traumatic experience for me and my parents.
To describe just how bad the anxiety was we would set the appointment for August but I would wake up in the middle of the night in March freaking out and praying like crazy that the operation wouldn't scare me anymore or that it wouldn't hurt. All this because the stupid doctor wouldn't get a child sized catheter.
Now as you can understand I don't exactly enjoy hospitals or trust doctors very much. The idea of the RhoGam shot and labor does scare me a ton. I'm a wuss when it comes to pain and I'm genuinely afraid that the doctors at the hospital will do something stupid.
A couple nights ago I woke up Riley at 4:00 am because I was having anxiety about it. That doesn't usually happen but for some reason it did. I talked to him about it and he said something that surprised me because I had never thought about it before. "Kaili, you need to forgive the doctor that did the operation."
I was surprised. Not only because I had never thought about it before but because I really didn't want to. I don't know the name of the man that did it. I don't even remember the hospital. However I knew that I blamed this man for the trauma over the operations and with the trauma of even going to the hospital.
After talking about it a little more I realized that Riley was right. I had been very bitter for years over this and I was just too blind to see it. It was hurting me. There is no benefit to being upset and in all honesty it's probably a big part of the reason why I don't trust the hospital.
It's going to be a process but I know it's what I'm supposed to do. I don't want to know who the doctor was and it doesn't matter if I do. Sometimes the hardest thing is to forgive someone who has caused you so much pain but is a nameless faceless person. Regardless, it's the right thing to do.
Even if it doesn't remove my fear of needles or hospitals, it will teach me more about forgiveness. By extension I hope it allows me to teach my children about it as well.
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