Tag Archives: surgery

IVF: post-egg retrieval, pre-embryo transfer, all kinds of blah

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It’s only been 5 days since the last time we chatted… and yet, three of them have been some of the roughest of my life, so it’s felt considerably longer. Can I get a wah wah?

Waaaah waah.

Wednesday morning was our egg retrieval surgery. As anxious as I was about the procedure, by Tuesday night my abdomen was in so much pain that all I wanted was to be knocked out.

egg retrieval surgery

We arrived at Generations at 7:00 am and by 8:30, I was in surgery. It was quick… especially to me as I’m quite susceptible to anesthesia… and we were back on the road headed home before 10:00.

Before the surgery, Seth, the nurse, and I made our guesses about how many eggs they would retrieve. I guessed 8, Seth 9, and Jen, RN, guessed 12 — double digits are ideal. Sadly, however, I was right. By the time I woke up, the eggies had been counted and 8 was the total. I was ok with 8 on Wednesday. We were told to expect fertilization of approximately 50%. I was even ok with 4 little embryos. (This is foreshadowing.)

Wednesday wasn’t so bad. I wasn’t in a ton of pain… a little, of course, as the only way to the ovaries is through the back wall of the vagina (oy) and the extreme ovarian swelling isn’t expected to decrease for at least a couple of weeks, but I was on good drugs and I sent most of the day in and out of sleep.

after surgery

Sometime well after midnight the headache started to creep in. And it grew and grew and grew to blinding pain. As I lay in bed Thursday morning, trying to crawl my way out form under the pillows piled on my head, my phone rang — it was the embryologist from the lab at Generations calling to update me on our embryos. Of the 8 eggs retrieved, only 6 were mature enough for fertilization. Following sperm injection, only three eggs were actually fertilized.

Three.

And my head was pounding and the room was spinning and I thought for sure I was going to vomit. I stumbled through the getting-ready-for-work motions, crying all the while… I was so sick. And I was so disappointed.

Just three.

In the end, I didn’t make it to work. Instead, I spent another day taking Percocet… in and out of sleep… with a box of tissues next to me… trying to talk myself out of disappointment, out of pain, and back to reality. To calm.

I drank a lot of gatorade, ingested a lot of salt (high levels of estrogen can make your vessels leaky, the salt helps them retain fluid– another stupid thing), laid around, and by Thursday evening, the headache had mostly subsided and I had talked myself into a state of satisfaction with my three maybe babies. Three is better than two… better than one… definitely better than zero. We still have a chance. Three chances, even. And with the lessening of the pain in my head, I became more and more able to handle the emotional toll as well.

After a good night’s sleep on Thursday, I woke up early on Friday and made it into work where I intended to spend a full day being as productive as possible. Except by 11:00 am, the headache was back with a vengeance. I wasn’t honestly certain that I could drive, but I couldn’t get a hold of Seth and I needed to get home so I stumbled to my car, the bile rising in my throat, not helped by a wicked case of hiccups, and somehow made it home to my bed where I laid like a corpse with pillow over my eyes, riding the waves of pain. By noon, it was so bad that Seth forced me to call Generations, who then forced me to go straight to urgent care over concerns about a clot…  another stupid estrogen thing. I spent a few more minutes crying over how much I did not want to go sit in urgent care with this insane headache before I set off. Long story short, I passed the tests, not a clot, took a massive dose of Aleve after talking to the nurse at Generations again (which is ok until embryo transfer), and spent yet another day on the couch in and out of sleep.

Another day wallowing in complete self pity.

I’m not strong anymore. I feel so done. Like my body and my mind have had just about enough.

But not yet.

On Thursday, in the midst of the headache and everything else, we started intramuscular progesterone injections. The progesterone is in oil and gets injected into the gluteus maximus — I can’t do it myself. Fortunately, Seth is a champ, and he’s done a really good job. I took heed of all the warnings and we’ve warmed it up in our hands first, used a sharpie to keep the targets marked, and spent a few minutes sitting on a heating pad afterward. So far so good.

On Monday, we head back to Generations for the embryo transfer. Day 5 embryo transfer, as opposed to the ideal day 3 transfer, can supposedly increase your chances of success if everything else is basically against you. When we get their on Monday, the doctor will discuss with us how the embryos look and how many they recommend transferring and all that. Then I pop a valium to relax my uterus, they pop the maybe baby (or babies) in, and we spend another two weeks waiting.

 

I guess the point of all this woe-is-me is to say that, honestly, I’m not nearly as calm, cool, or collected as I would really like to be. As I wish I were. I feel like I’m barely holding on. I’m feeling super sorry for myself and disappointed in the way things have gone so far. Although outwardly, I tried to keep my expectations low, in my deepest heart of hearts I was hoping for so much more. For eggs in the double digits. A fertilization rate that exceeded the norm. And for a big batch of maybe babies that we could store safely in the freezer and use to grow our family one transfer at a time.

But that’s not life. Certainly not mine. If things worked out that way, I wouldn’t be here at all — taking these desperate measures to have a family in the first place. That’s reality.

 

Honestly, I’m doing a little better today. I woke up early and went for a walk with the pup. I mowed the lawn. I made some cookies and a delicious dinner for Seth and his dad (who slaved all day long working in the garage). I took myself for a pedicure… and splurged on the “deluxe,” complete with hot stone massage and paraffin treatment. Most importantly, I didn’t cry even once. That was especially nice. And tomorrow’s another day.

Thanks be to the benevolent witness.

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I’m currently listening to The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd. It’s so excellent. A million and one times better than stupid The Girl on the Train, which was in no way redeemed even after ignoring the whole “pathetic, fat Rachel” (in a British accent, even! Ray-chul…) thing that set me off initially (I finished it this morning). I knew Sue Monk Kidd wouldn’t let me down though. Not after the beautiful Bees and Mermaids. In fact, early on, I fell completely in love with this line:

“There’s no pain on earth that doesn’t crave a benevolent witness.”

And it’s so appropriate right now that I can barely find the words.

Except words are my thing, so I’ll manage something…

 

Infertility is a super painful and super personal thing. There’s not a lot I can do about it and certainly nothing that you can do for me. So why talk about it? Why share my story? Why have the conversation at all?

Lots of people have said that it’s because I’m brave and strong (which makes me feel embarrassed and super impostery). That they’re thinking of me and praying for me, sending me positive brain waves and maybe even some pixie dust or something (which makes me feel so unworthy). So many really, really nice things. Really genuine, kind, heart-felt, loving things.

It was all so nice that for a second I let it get dark… because sometimes nice makes me go there. And nice laced with hormones? Yeah…

I’m not brave or strong. I’m just honest. And wordy. And maybe people think I’m only saying it so that they’ll think I am, in fact, brave or strong. But that’s not true. I’m really, really not.

And maybe I’m soaking up too much nice, too much love, too many prayers and positive thoughts, getting high on all the pixie dust. All those things that could be better spent on someone else who really is suffering.

Maybe no one really wants to hear any of it at all and the comments and likes and texts and emails and phone calls and little IG hearts are all just gratuitous — a way of saying FINE. Talk about it enough and we’ll acknowledge you, but only because we feel like we have to. I imagine myself up on my tippy toes, fists balled up at my chest, eyes squeezed shut, screaming “acknowledge meeeeeeeeeee!”

Maybe my mom and dad resent the time, the plane tickets, the boring week of nothing but travel to and from the top of the middle to the bottom of the middle of Wisconsin, over and over again. Nothing but work and tv and movies and whining and injections in between. All without any guarantee of actual, living, breathing, human grandchildren in the end. And they’ve got some of those already. Really cute ones… wouldn’t their time be better spent with them???

God, I’m so annoying. So self-indulgent. Self-pitying. Self, self, self-ish.

 

But then Sue Monk Kidd said it — said what it really was. Infertility is painful. So painful. Emotionally, spiritually, financially, physically. And when I talked about it, out loud (on the internet), I was really asking for a benevolent witness.

And I got one. I got ten. And so many more. I got so very many benevolent witnesses. I got you. My goodness, I got so lucky.

 

It’s really hard not to be super emotional right now. Every word, every comment, every like, every text, email, phone call, whatever, has been unreal. So appreciated. All I wanted was a benevolent witness and I got so much more. Benevolence in the extreme. So when my friend Erika offered to wear ugly shoes if only it would help me to be a mom… and my grandma told me that it’s at times like these that she still misses her mom and was so glad my mom was here with me… and my cousin Beth(y) offered up her house for overnight stays in Madison along with best wishes and other nice words… and my in-laws made a special trip to and from Marshfield just to shuttle my mom back to the airport… and so many other big and little things (that all feel like big things to me) in the past couple of weeks… oh the tears. So many tears. Big fat tears of thankfulness and gratitude and what-on-earth-did-I-do-to-deserve-to-be-surrounded-by-so-much-kindness-ness.

I really wish I had brought my mascara with me this morning… could definitely have used a touch up before heading straight into the office.

 

So, by way of a long and emotional outpouring of gratitude for the insanely generous support you’ve given me, seriously, even just by reading… another quick update.

Today’s appointment at Generations confirmed that my eggy little ovaries are ready for the trigger shot. Seth’s currently setting up a Dexter-style kill room (11% off at Menard’s, perfect time to stock up on plastic sheeting) and at precisely 8:30 pm, we’ll do a big injection of HCG, which will set us up for egg retrieval exactly 36 hours later on Wednesday morning. The best part of it being trigger day: one more injection tonight (as opposed to three) and a completely injection-free day tomorrow. My super sore abdomen is already trembling with relief. (Actually, that’s probably just more fluid on it’s way… but we’ll call it relief for the moment.)

I’m definitely at a peak level of insanity — a state of nervous excitement under hormonal extremes that is entirely novel. (FYI: normal pre-menopausal estradiol levels range from 30 – 400 pg/ml… mine are currently upwards of 2000 pg/ml and on the exponentially upward part of the drug-induced curve, so…) I feel so excited by the possibility, by the fact that my response so far has been “textbook” (oh how I Hermione-ly loved hearing those words come out of Dr. Stanic’s mouth this morning), and that we really are just about to be with our maybe baby. I also feel terrified that it’s only maybe and that I have to have surgery on Wednesday and that there’s nothing I can do to make anything better, but then again, also relieved that there’s nothing I can do to make it worse.

 

I keep saying “we’re almost there,” but honestly, every step of the way has been a choice. A conscious decision to do this thing, despite all the different varieties of tough, because it’s something that we think will be worth it in the end. That our end is as a family of more than two humans, one puppy girl, and several semi-sentient plants that hate me just a little bit for not being watered quite as often as they ought to be. As such, we’re never really “almost there”… we’re just there. In the thick of it. Choice or not, though, it has been painful.

For this pain, my soul has craved a benevolent witness. I so appreciated those words, that sentiment, and that I have absolutely not been disappointed. Thanks. Seriously. Thank you.

Home from Phoenix, Stories to Tell

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Phoenix City Hall
It’s a scientifically proven fact that crooked pictures are at least 47-times more artistic than straight on shots. See?

I went to Phoenix last week for the HMO Research Network (HMORN) conference. The science was fascinating, Phoenix was gorgeous, but my body gave me an awful lot of grief and it was all-in-all a pretty rough trip. I am very glad to be home.

On Saturday morning, my sister-in-law Kayla, the professional Body Pump Instructor, came over to teach my other sister-in-law, Trista, and I the newest Body Pump release. It was an awesome work out (too awesome, even, said my quads the next day), but halfway through I was pretty sure I was going to vomit. I thought maybe it was because I ate breakfast about an hour before and that may have been a mistake (go ahead, ask me if it’s because I’m pregnant, I dare you), but it turns out it wasn’t the breakfast, it wasn’t the intensity of the work out, it was a VIRUS! Or something. And it was miserable. The bathroom pretty much became my home.

Bitty little fever to go with the nausea and diarrhea. Joy.
Bitty little fever to go with the nausea and diarrhea. Joy.

Except… we had to go down to Madison to pick up Curly after surgery and there’s no way Seth could have picked her up on his own. I had to go. Thank goodness for rest stops, Immodium, and Pepto. It was just enough to get me down and back, although it was certainly pleasant for no one. And I’m sure I was not the most uncomfortable person in the car. You see, the ultimate outcome of Curly’s surgery was good, but repair requires use of an external fixator for at least four weeks. (At least— we’re hoping for more like 6 – 8.)

Love when she sits like a person. Not loving the incisions and pins and pain killers and all that.
Love when she sits like a person. Not loving the incisions and pins and pain killers and all that.

Poor baby is having a rough time, of course, but is doing incredibly well. Leaving for Phoenix was particularly stressful on account of leaving Seth on his own to take care of her. I know she’s a dog and normally that means food, water, potty, but not this time. It means 7 different drugs 4 times a day, cleaning of the entrance sites of the pins, and all of the effort required to keep this “high energy” dog extremely calm and as comfortable as possible. No easy task.

The good news, though, is that Seth did exceptionally well. We had Curls into our local vet to check everything over yesterday morning and she was thrilled with how it all looks. I’m particularly pleased with the incisions. She has a big long incision down the outside of both of her legs (on the right to repair the damaged knee, on the left to harvest muscle fascia for the repair) and the difference between this surgery and the last three is truly night and day– clean, dry, beautiful stitches running neatly down each leg. No oozing, no gapping, no swelling, no redness. Definitely a good sign.

Looking cozy, eh?
Looking cozy, eh?

Meanwhile, in Phoenix, I was busy subsisting on the blandest food I could find (lots and lots of dry cereal and bananas, seasoned with the pink stuff, of course) and locating (and destroying) the nearest bathroom until 4 am on Wednesday morning. Bad enough, right? Except on Tuesday night, during a viewing of The Grand Budapest Hotel (which was absolute Wes Anderson brilliance, by the way) I noticed that my hands started to feel kind of bad. Swollen. Puffy. By Wednesday morning, the virus had subsided, but my hands no longer even looked human and finding an urgent care became priority number one.

After presenting our posters in the morning and listening to a few talks, I could no longer bare the spreading and the throbbing (and the concern that my wedding ring may end up resulting in auto-amputation of my finger) and I sought out medical care. Fortunately, there was a walk-in clinic a mere two blocks from the hotel and I headed there for a prescription of oral steroids and some ice packs… three people, ice, and lots of petroleum jelly also helped to get my ring off and my finger was saved. Whew.

I cannot even tell you how kind the clinic staff were. It was amazing. Minnerva, the lovely NP who treated me, has even been in contact since I left because she wanted to 1) make sure I was doing ok (I was under strict orders to seek emergency care should I develop shortness of breath– immediately) and 2) to find out if I’d gotten a diagnosis (medical curiosity– love it). And I did! After a visit first to family practice and then to dermatology yesterday, I was diagnosed with dyshyidrotic eczema and was prescribed a big, fat steroid “blast and taper” to deal with this flare up and a steroid cream to be used at the first sign of blistering in the future.

Done in time to make it to the Desert Botanical Garden-- whew! Itchy hands, but lots of cacti for scratching. (I kid.)
Done in time to make it to the Desert Botanical Garden– whew! Itchy hands, but lots of cacti for scratching. (I kid.)

If you’ve known me a while, you know that this hand rash business is not new. It started happening back in 2009 after I had the swine flu (or, as Seth and I like to call it, the piggy pigs) and didn’t stop happening until I graduated and moved to Wisconsin in 2011. But since then– nothing. Not even once. Sweet relief. So you can imagine my panic when it came back in Phoenix– with a vengeance.

Likely, this is something I’m going to have to deal with on and off forever, but having a diagnosis, knowing some of the triggers (female gender (not much I can do about that), stress (such as traveling on the heels of my dog’s fourth surgery… a surgery that took 9 hours and two faculty surgeons to complete), extreme weather conditions (Wisconsin to Phoenix? that’ll do it), other illnesses (like the piggy pigs or an intestinal virus), and frequent hand washing/transitions from wet to dry), and having a plan for how to deal with it makes a world of difference. At least I feel pretty relieved.

So, lots to whine about, as the 1,000+ words above demonstrate… but also lots to be happy for. Seth did so great with Curly (seriously, he’s going to be such a great dad someday– but again, not preggo, I promise) and it was really nice to travel with Trista. She and I had lots to talk about and I think we’ve come to an important conclusion about some important things to say– lots and lots more to say about all of that at a later date. A series even. Additionally, my poster spurred a lot of really interesting debate. It presented evidence in direct contradiction to the 2009 United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) guidelines for mammography screening and someone who came up for the purpose of discussion worked for the USPSTF at that time. Yikes! We had a spirited and interesting debate and I was really pleased with my capacity to have nerve-wracking scientific discourse (with crazy hands) without getting worked up or personally offended or anything. Lots of other poster traffic and I was pretty pleased with the outcome– I’m really looking forward to sharing some of the suggestions and comments with the docs I worked with on the project. Lots of good stuff to think about. Trista and I got to have dinner with she and Seth’s cousin Ginni and her little boy Keegan. The restaurant was a hole in the wall, but an absolutely gem, and then we went for drinks in the spinning Compass Room overlooking the entire city. And finally, last but not least, I came home with four mini cacti from the botanical garden for planting! Pretty dang excited about that!

St. Mary's Basilica in Phoenix. Gorgeous. And look at that sky?!
St. Mary’s Basilica in Phoenix. Gorgeous. And look at that sky?!

I hope you’ll stick with me… and that Trista and others will join me in the upcoming series we’ll talk about tomorrow. It’s important and I’m really looking forward to the discussion. See you then!!!

She made it to Madison!!

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Guys! I’m so crazy sad about my sweet puppy girl right now. I mean, I’m happy that she finally made it to Madison and is first up on the schedule for surgery tomorrow morning. That’s a good thing– this is necessary and if there’s even a chance it could fix my Curly girl’s leg, it’ll be totally worth it. But then I think about her down there in Madison without us, not understanding why we left her, and it breaks my heart. I can’t stand the thought of her being sad!

At least we did everything we could to make her last couple days before surgery awesome. She had three extra long walks yesterday (with a sling, of course) and got to play in some fresh snow (thanks, Wisconsin). Plus, Seth brought her down and picked up a surprise guest in Mosinee on the way down to Madison– his dad. And Curly loves her grandpa more than anyone else, so I’m sure she was absolutely thrilled about that. (Plus, I was super glad Seth had company for the drive.) I was so sad to leave her and go to work this morning, though. I made her hug me for like 10 minutes. (She hugs on command, btw, it’s so cute.) I’m pretty sure she thought we were having a battle, but I’m ok with that. Felt like a hug with growling to me 😉

No one was here to greet me at the door when I came home, there was no little nose fiercely sniffing up at my bowl of chili as I carried it to the table, and my house is so so quiet– so squeaking, no chewing, no pitter pattering, just me. My Curly girl is gone for now, but when she returns this weekend, she’ll basically be a robot. At least that’s what I envision the fixator is going to look like. I like robots… and I love Curly, so I can only imagine that this is going to be awesome. Just a couple of days.

Sigh. I can’t even imagine having to do all of this with a human child. There are some really amazing parents in this world! Parents to humans, I mean. Like my friend Aimie, but we’ve talked about that before.

 

Crazy news: Seth just got home. Apparently, the surgeons practiced Curly’s surgery last week on a cadaver. I guess that extra week may have actually been a good thing. You can never have enough practice. Especially when it’s my pup in your hands. Always a silver lining.

New thought: silver linings are kind of like brief glimpses at the top side of the tapestry, don’t you think? I truly believe that everything, even the things that seem super duper crappy at the time, has a silver lining. Recognizing the silver lining is like getting a brief and amazing glimpse at the way the threads all come together to make that tapestry I named this blog after. Remember that? Am I mixing too many metaphors here?

Silver Linings

 

And if not a silver lining, a silver platter at the very least, eh, Chim Lee???

 

Surgery #4 — Postponed. Again.

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My pup. Seriously. If it can go wrong, it will.

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Seth was in Miami on a business trip (not to be pissy about it, but it did snow here THREE times while he was there. Just saying.) and it was my job today to get Curls to the vet in Madison by 4 pm. No problem. I took a half day off of work and made plans to get together with my cousin and her little family (meeting a new baby, yay!) for dinner.

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Except I made it almost to Coloma, which is truly the middle of n-o-w-h-e-r-e Wisconsin, when the vet’s office called to cancel Curly’s surgery.

Nothing like a 4 hour road trip to nowhere!

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We’re rescheduled for next Thursday. Thursdays are better than Fridays because if emergencies happen on Thursdays, Thursday surgeries get pushed to Friday and Friday surgeries are canceled. Now we know.

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I was a little ticked, of course, definitely frustrated, but I’ve got to admit– there were a lot of oks about the day after all.

It was absolutely gorgeous out– warm and sunny. A good day for a drive, even if it ended up getting me nowhere.

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I’ll have another road trip in the near future to finish listening to the excellent Dean Koontz audio book I checked out at the library. (Fear Nothing– really good so far, but I’m a huge DK fan. Huge.)

I got home around 3:30, which gave me enough time before Seth got home to finish up some work I’ve been promising to get done all week (sorry, Sassy!).

And last, but definitely the best, Curly was home when her dad got home and she couldn’t have been any happier. Not only that, but her pup cousin Zoe came to stay with us too and Curls is beside herself with excitement.

Sadly, I had to cancel my dinner with Beth and co, but next time, maybe Seth can come too! Even better!

For now, we’re all home, safe and sound, everyone with at least 2 (if not 3!) good legs for walking on. Not too shabby, really. And Curls will still get her surgery… we just have to wait a little while longer. A week isn’t going to hurt anything. Perhaps by then all the snow will be melted. Maybe.

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In other news, my brother talked me into downloading snapchat on my phone. I’ve never felt so old in my entire life. Ever. But he coerced me with promises of pictures of my niece next weekend. How could I resist that?!!

 

I hope you all have wonderful, wonderful weekends!

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Sweet potatoes– she loves them!

 

PS: Did you see that I tagged this as a recurring theme?! Clever, right?! Because Curly has surgery a lot and bad things always happen. Ha ha ha!

Curly Lambeau, my sweet, silver-lined, puppy girl.

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At this point it’s pretty safe to assume that when I miss big chunks of blog time it’s for one of two reasons. (1) Work got crazy and life got insane or (2) something happened to my dog. Since work finally calmed down a bit, this absence can be attributed to reason number 2.

As you’re likely aware, I have not yet been blessed with any babies of the human variety (ugh, we should really chat about that at some point). But I do have a dog.

If you have any human children or find yourself lacking in love for all things puppy, you’re probably going to hate me a bit for saying this right now, but that’s ok… my dog is my baby, and I totally treat her like one.

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I absolutely adore my Curly girl and love her more than I love myself. I’m pretty sure that if a car were careening toward my Curls, I’d jump in front of it to save her without a second thought.

Curly came into our home in October 2012, the same weekend my friends Ellen and Rob got married (such a happy weekend!), and my husband and I have been absolutely in love with her ever since. She’s a high-energy, super happy, double doodle (her parents were a golden doodle and a labradoodle) with cream colored curls befitting of her name (although she’s actually named for Curly Lambeau, the founder of the Packers).

Last fall, we started noting problems with Curly’s knees and our local vet recommended surgery to repair patellar subluxation (her knee cap is not where it should be). Doing what we thought was best for our sweet girl, we took Curls to an orthopedic surgeon in Appleton where she had her first surgery in October 2013.

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It failed.

And so did the next.

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And the damage got worse after the second failure, necessitating a more extensive third surgery.

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Which also failed.

Last Thursday, I took Curly back to the surgeon noting a decrease in her willingness to use that leg and the x-ray painted a rather grim picture, worsted only by the picture the surgeon painted me. Essentially, I left with two options, including doing nothing and hoping for some sort of adaptation to the new anatomy that would allow Curls some function in that leg or… amputation.

Ugh, my stomach.

The surgeon was apologetic, but resigned. Those were our options as far as he was concerned and that was that.

I had to call Seth and tell him the news. And then I had to drive the 2 hours home from Appleton, mulling it over in my head and nursing a nagging stomachache. I called my sister on the way home and, forgetting she’s preggo, ended up making her cry (hormones and all…), but she really is the best pup-auntie (or p-auntie– read it out loud, ha!) ever and it really helped to chat with her. Later on I talked to the incredibly kind and generous animal-loving folks I work with who were super encouraging and suggested we seek a second opinion at the University of Wisconsin – Madison vet school.

And that’s where we spent our day yesterday. So glad we did! We don’t necessarily have good news, per se. But we do have a new found cautious optimism based on the extensive examination and imaging studies they performed, the shocking amount of time the orthopedic surgeon was willing to spend with us talking and drawing diagrams and showing us 3D models and such, and the willingness of the folks in Madison to collaborate with the previous surgeon in Appleton as well as others to really think this through and come up with some better options (better than amputation, anyway) for our girl.

It was a long and exhausting day, but it was definitely worth it. And while I’m constantly worrying about the decisions we have made (Curls is essentially worse off at this point than if we’d never done surgery at all all– did we make the right choice?! should we have gone to Madison sooner? would they have done anything differently if we had???), I had a long car ride last night on the way home to think about what this has taught us, Seth and me, as future parents to more fur babies (pleeeeease, Sethy?!), human babies (hopefully), and as leaders of our family unit (said in my dad’s alien/robot voice, usually reserved for comments such as “hello, daughter unit…”).

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  • Second opinions are a good thing, medically or otherwise. It never hurts to get someone else’s take on something. Especially something big and important. (Like a career change and cross country move.) But even sometimes things that aren’t. (Like whether or not you should include a funding statement on a poster if there was no funding.) Knowing what we know now, I think we would definitely have had an additional medical consultation for Curly earlier. But when I think about it, it’s the same thing for my GI woes– it wasn’t getting better, so I kept pursuing alternatives until finally I found someone who did the right tests and asked the right questions and got to a diagnosis. When I have questions, or am afraid that the doctor might have questions of his or her own, from now on, I’ll be more willing to seek alternative advice, opinions, or just general thoughts. It never hurts to ask.
  • Collaboration is so worthwhile. Oy, this is ironic. Seriously. Group work? I’ve never liked it. Never. I begged and pleaded my way out of it through elementary school, I stressed and worried my way through it in middle school and high school, I just did all the group work myself in college, and made sure I had a very solitary, dependent-on-no-one kind of thesis project in grad school. And then, I entered the real world and figured out why all those teachers had been trying so very, very hard to get me to participate in a team setting for all those years– because it’s necessary and it produces better results. Every project I work on now is a team effort and cultivating good team relationships has become a key aspect of my daily life– and thank goodness for it! I’d be l-o-s-t without the biostatisticians and programmers and budgeting folks who can do all those crazy things that just hurt my head to even think about. And I suppose it’s truly no different in medicine, human or veterinary. I’m sure Curly’s first surgeon is top notch and used to success. He should probably have consulted someone else or suggested that we do ourselves, if not after the first revision, than definitely after problems arose with the second. That’s what they’re doing for Curly down in Madison, because that’s what’s going to result in the best care. An introvert’s nightmare, true, but there’s definitely some merit to this whole collaborative practice thing.
  • You don’t need much to be truly happy. Curly has been through a lot. Her first surgery was October 16th and she’s spent the past 5 months cut open, stapled and stitched closed, bandaged up, wearing a cone, confined to her kennel, limited to short leash walks with a sling, and pretty much continuously drugged. I’ve pulled at mats in her fur and cut her hair myself (and even accidentally nicked her once! it was the worst!!! I felt so horrible!!), I’ve spent an entire night wiping her backside and washing her blankets, I’ve sprayed her with stuff that stings and fed her stuff that’s bitter. Yet, through all of that, Curly still loves us and she’s still ridiculously and unreasonably happy. She goes crazy and tries hard to sit still despite her frantically wagging tail every time we walk in the door. She brings us toys and blankets to play. She bounds through the snow stopping to eat a bite here and there. She gives kisses and nuzzles my hand when it falls over the edge of the bed at night. She’s just such a happy girl. And that’s what every veterinary employee we’ve seen in the past couple of months has been amazed by– she should, by all accounts, not be this resilient. But she is. And thank goodness! We love, love, love our happy girl!

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  • Pets are a great source for giving and getting unconditional love. I love my pup. I love her like crazy. I know she’s not a human (seriously, I do know that) even though I often treat her like one. My mind is on her constantly and even if she ends up with no back legs, I’ll feel bad only at the thought that it could be somehow my fault, never about her condition. Because it truly doesn’t matter to me. She’s perfect, exactly as she is, no matter how ultimately functional or irreparable her leg ends up being. Taking care of her after surgery can be hard, but it’s worth it. Even the tough cares (seriously, the diarrhea after surgery #2 was not a joke) are totally worth it and done without a second thought because they’re done for her and I love her. Curly has taught me, for certain, that Seth and I are capable of great love– both for one another and for our family, whether fur or flesh. It’s a reassuring thought!

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This has been a tough few months, for no one more so than Curly, I’m sure. But she’s just done so ridiculously well. We can’t explain it, but it seems like she knows we’re only trying to help her and that trust is amazing. (The only thing she doesn’t trust is that the treat your holding doesn’t have a pill inside of it– that still requires some trickery. Trickery or salami.) I’m certainly not glad for any of this, but I am grateful for the small reminders day in and day out that our household is a happy one, bum legs and all!

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Coming up in the near future (in no particular order):

  • A second look at STEMinity
  • A more inclusive definition of family
  • The adult version of “If You’re Happy and You Know it Clap Your Hands”
  • A book club quarterly review

 

 

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When snowflakes fall…

Seriously, , , , ,

A rough couple of days around these parts.  My sweet puppy girl had surgery on her knee again today (her first knee surgery was back in October) and we’re in for another 4 weeks of recovery.  She’s a very high energy, snow loving puppy… so keeping her calm for four more weeks with snow on the ground is going to be a huge challenge.  And my heart breaks for the pain I know she’s going to have to endure all over again. I just feel so bummed out for her.

Snowy Pup

But while I was out shoveling four fresh inches of snow off our driveway, Frank Sinatra’s I Wish You Love kept running through my head:

I wish you shelter from the storm, a cozy fire to keep you warm,

But, most of all, when snowflakes fall, I wish you love.

My Curly girl is going to be bummed about all the snow and her inability to run, frolic, and burrow in it like she loves to do, but she will have all the love in the world, that’s for sure! Hopefully some snuggling, a sedative or two (this time around, we’re getting smart about this!), and a couple weeks of R&R will have Curly all fixed up.  And I suppose we can take her out for a snowy little snack every once in a while– the world is Curly’s snow cone!

Snowflakes