Читать книгу Hope for August - Jennifer Kirsch - Страница 2

We do not remember days, We remember moments. Cesare Pavese

Sleep was my adversary. I tossed and turned in bed in my home-away-from-home. Covers on, covers off, covers on. I fluffed my pillows. I adjusted the air conditioner from cooling to fan to cooling. In anxious anticipation I finally gave up trying to sleep at 4:23 a.m. I flipped through what few mindless English-language programs I could find on my otherwise Spanish-speaking television. I paced. I journaled. I sent emails. I prayed.

Around 8:00 a.m., I finally arose from bed for the day after over three hours of failed distractions to shower and prepare myself for the most significant day of my life. I’d waited nearly forty-five years and traveled over 2100 miles to arrive at this moment.

I put on a tribal print maxi sundress that would accommodate any residual bloating from the day’s preparation and procedure. I took out my newly-purchased, intertwined heart necklace and fastened its clasp for luck and hope. This was a day of prohibited make-up, deodorant, lotion, and perfume. I was stripped down on a physical level. It paralleled my numerous months of stripped down emotions. This was a day of contemplating my darkest fears and having cautiously high hopes.

Just before 10:00, I walked downstairs to the hotel’s restaurant for breakfast, as was recommended. The day required all of my physical, psychological, and emotional strength. My usual server had prepared me that Saturday was his day off. His second-in-command knew what I wanted for breakfast, as I’d become a regular at the hotel’s restaurant in the days leading up to this. I choked down my eggs, fruit, and decaf coffee as my stomach anxiously churned. When I finished, I ambled back to my room to review my last-minute and post-procedure questions for my medical team. I sent and received a few text messages. Then, it was “show time.”

I grabbed a bottle of water, my folder of pre-procedure instructions, and my purse. My palms were damp. I perspired lightly in the coolness of my room. I stepped into the hallway, alone for potentially the last time. I locked the door behind me and slowly walked to the hotel lobby.

Jorge, my driver for the past week, arrived at 11:15 a.m. The late morning Mexican air was already oppressively hot and heavy with humidity. It was stifling and difficult to breathe. We barely spoke on the drive. I focused on keeping breakfast in my stomach. Jorge dropped me off at the clinic on the morning of November 7, 2015. I registered at 11:30 and sat in the waiting room for a few minutes. Then, I was escorted to a pre-op patient room and changed into a scratchy, stiff, one-size-fits-most hospital gown. When I caught my reflection in the mirror, I openly laughed at the waif in the oversized gown looking back at me. Anyone else would have thought I was a little crazy. At least I still had my sense of humor.

Within minutes, the nurse brought in the final medical and legal release forms for me to sign and bottled water for me to drink. She’d return to collect the forms, answer any last-minute questions, and check on the status of my slowly-filling bladder.

I slugged cold water as I reviewed the paperwork. Everything appeared in order. Let’s face it--I’d seen, revised, and approved emailed copies of the same paperwork weeks before. Despite all of the previously approved paperwork, the clinic needed my actual, not electronic, signature to proceed. I signed the official paperwork. Then, I sat alone for the next half an hour in my starkly-appointed pre-op room drinking the water the nurse brought me as well as my reserve bottle, painstakingly waiting for my bladder to fill.

I had no distractions. There were no magazines, Spanish-language or other, to leaf through. There was no television to provide white noise in the background. I was alone with my thoughts.

It was then that I realized the difference between being independent and being alone. I lived my life independently from my teenage years into my adulthood. I made my own decisions and abided by the consequences—good, bad, or indifferent. I traveled, unencumbered, when the mood struck. I took jobs and moved at various points. Essentially, my independent lifestyle allowed me to do what I wanted, when I wanted, and how I wanted. I lived on my own terms. While I was independent, I’d really never experienced true loneliness, the sense of having no one to support me, hold me, or sit quietly with me.

I’d made this trip independently and alone and was starting to reconsider that decision. That’s when the loneliness intensified. No one was there to hold my hand or calm my excited, yet anxious, nerves. I tried unsuccessfully to meditate and set my intention for what I was about to undergo. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply in an attempt to calm my nerves. When that failed, I paced in my small room, partially to alleviate my nerves and partially to accommodate my slowly-filling bladder. I prayed that God would bless the doctor and his staff. I prayed that God would allow the procedure to be a success.

After downing a third bottle of water, when my bladder was finally full, I alerted the nurse. I’d waited all my life for this moment, and it was finally time. My nurse arrived with a wheelchair, and I moved myself into it, so my nurse could chauffeur me into a vast, sparse surgical room.

I lifted myself to the surgical table and asked for a blanket. When the nurse left for a few minutes, I took inventory of my surroundings. I felt like I was in a black-and-white movie; the room was void of color. There were sterile, medical instruments at the foot of the table, black-and-white, flat-screen monitors on the wall, and not much else. And it was cold--so very cold.

Then it truly hit me. The panic of being alone washed over me. My heart raced. My palms sweated more. I nauseously salivated. Was I having an anxiety attack? What if something went wrong? Only a handful of people even knew where I was, and they couldn’t get to me if something went awry. No one, not even Jorge, was waiting on-site for an update on my condition. No one was waiting in the recovery room to sit with me while I rested. No one was back at my hotel to take care of me or lift anything heavier than my purse. No one was there to tell me things would be okay, that I would be okay. What was I thinking?

Just as I was about to move from the table to leave the surgical room, like there was anywhere for me to run, a second nurse entered for me to sign one last consent form. When she exited, Dr. Ortiz and my original nurse for the day entered.

I was prepped, feet put in stirrups, and told to relax. Sure, I’ll relax. How do you relax when you’re having a life-changing medical procedure done in a foreign country? How do you relax when your bladder is full, and someone presses an ultrasound wand on your abdomen? How do you relax when someone inserts a catheter through your cervix and into your uterus without numbing you? How do you relax when you’re panicking and utterly alone? How do you relax when you know your life will be forever changed--regardless of the outcome of the procedure?

Despite my increasing panic, I focused on the ceiling and tried to fall into a pattern of deep breathing, but that was difficult because of the pressure on and inside my abdomen. I closed my eyes in an attempt to shut out Dr. Ortiz’s Spanish instructions to my nurse. At that point, I just wanted it to be over.

I tried to remain physically relaxed through the discomfort and pressure. Imagine a painful Pap smear done through your cervix. There was a momentary pinch and a few minutes of pressure, both internal and external. Then, it was over.

I know the procedure took mere minutes, but it felt like eons. Dr. Ortiz moved to my left side and told me the transfer was complete. I was slightly shocked that the transfer was over in a significantly shorter time than it took me to fill my bladder.

Dr. Ortiz gently touched my left shoulder and pointed to the far wall of the surgical suite. I turned my attention to the monitors and really looked. It was right there on the monitor, the magnified pinprick of a white speck in a sea of blackness. There he was, my embryo, my future baby boy inside of me. The potential of his new life was inside of me. Was I already a mother? In a mere ten days, I would learn the outcome.

I don’t know when I started to cry. At some point, I realized that my cheeks and chin were wet. That’s when I felt tears slowly running down my cheeks. Dr. Ortiz touched my arm and told me everything went well; he told me not to cry. I explained as best I could that I was crying “happy tears.” He left the surgical room as I continued to stare at the monitor.

My crying turned to weeping. I wept with joy and hope for the potential of my son and wept with sadness for the realization that no one was with me to share this miraculous moment--to see what I saw on that monitor.

My nurse resurfaced to wheel the surgical table and me back to my room to rest. She recommended that I not transfer from the surgical table to a gurney or the bed; rather, I should lie flat. After fifteen minutes of lying prone, my nurse returned to tell me to use the bathroom.

I have a teacher’s bladder, but having a full bladder with people pushing on it from the inside and outside had done me in. I sighed with physical and emotional release as I voided my bladder. I returned to my resting spot on the surgical table and awaited the next phase of my protocol.

This time, it came in the form of hormones in a long needle that was administered intramuscularly in my upper right butt cheek. The medication burned as my nurse slowly depressed the plunger. I instantly bruised. It was by far the deepest and most painful shot I’ve ever had. It didn’t matter if I stood, lay down, walked, or sat. The discomfort and bruising lingered for days.

I rested a while longer, then asked the nurse to call my driver while I dressed. It was time for me to leave the clinic. The rest was up to my body and my embryo. After all I had endured, I never could have imagined that I could have received the gift of life--and certainly not in this way. Just like that. In the matter of a few minutes, my life was forever changed regardless of the outcome. For the first time in the last eighteen months, I felt hopeful and cautiously optimistic.

I hoped and prayed for the best. I prepared for the worst. So the excruciating ten-day waiting period began.