WARNING: Reader discretion advised. This post definitely will fall into the category of "Too Much Information" for some most people.
Wednesday night as I am going to bed, I notice that my post postpartum bleeding has quickly and severely increased from what is normal. Luckily, Johnny's mom, who's a nurse practitioner, is staying with us, so we call her upstairs. She seems pretty concerned and wants me to call my doctor. At this point, I feel completely fine. I get on the phone with my doctor's office, and they say to give it another thirty minutes, and if it continues to come in to the hospital. After I hang up, the bleeding picks up some more, so Johnny wants to get me up and take me to the hospital. I stand up and almost immediately feel light headed. I remember asking Johnny for some water, taking a sip, and then kneeling down on the floor.
The next thing I remember is shaking and waking up to being dragged across my bedroom floor by my husband and hearing my mother in law giving our address to somebody on the phone. Two minutes later, Johnny is throwing pants on me while a bunch of firemen and EMTs invade my bedroom. One EMT tries for a few minutes to get an IV going but can't find a vein that will work. I remember him saying, "Here we'll let [insert name here] try it. He's a nurse," and I remember thinking, "Umm and what qualifications do you have then, sir?"
Anyway, I have weird veins and apparently losing large amounts of blood makes your veins flatten out, so they aren't able to get an IV going. They roll me onto some kind of tarp and cover me up with a bunch of blankets. One guy almost put a blanket over my face, and I told him that I wasn't dead yet. Everyone gets a corner of the tarp, and they drag me down the stairs to the garage where the stretcher thingamajig is set up. They put me on that and wheel me out to the extremely embarrassing light show of ambulance and firetruck in front of my house. As we were getting in the ambulance, they complimented Johnny for being the first person all day to have shoveled the driveway. I was so proud.
The ambulance ride was fairly uneventful. I just focused on this button on the wall and kept telling myself not to pass out again. This would also be the first of many times that I ask for a drink of water and am denied it. Jerks.
We pull into this garage thing at St. Luke's, and I go straight up to the mother/baby ward where one of the doctors from my practice is waiting for me. After about fifteen minutes of trying, they finally get an IV in my arm, and I instantly feel better. They still won't give me any water, though. Jerks.
At this point, the bleeding is really bad, and they prep me for a DNC. To my understanding, a DNC is basically surgery where they clean out your uterus. You could need one if you miscarry later on in a pregnancy or if some placenta is left after delivery or for various other reasons. They scoot me into one of the freezing cold surgery rooms and transfer me to the operating table. I'm serious about this room being freezing cold. I know I was colder than the average person because of blood loss, but even my doctor was walking around with one of those warmed hospital blankets around her shoulders. I do the whole "breathe into the mask thing" and go right to sleep.
Waking up from the anesthesia was extremely difficult. I remember feeling like I was reeling and not being able to focus on anything. I just kept asking Johnny what happened, telling him I wanted to go home, declaring that I did not feel well, and crying that I wanted Olive and Lila. Johnny just kept repeating his answers to my questions, and I kept saying, "Ok. Ok. Ok." I finally calmed down and got back to reality, and the doctor came in and told me that they didn't find any placenta and that they were able to avoid damaging my uterus for future pregnancies (yeah I'm good thanks). They inserted a balloon full of fluid into my uterus to stop the bleeding and told me that they wanted to keep an eye on my hemoglobin count (red blood cells) to see if I needed a blood transfusion since I had lost about a liter of blood. And no, they still would not give me any water.
Thursday morning now passes. I am allowed to eat and drink around lunchtime, and they keep drawing blood to test my hemoglobin count. Around 3:00, my hemoglobin count has dropped to a 7 (normal is 12), so they decide that they need to give me two transfusions to get me caught up. Throughout this whole experience all the nurses and doctors keep telling me how pale I look, and at one point Johnny and I both mutter something about how this is just how I normally look.
While I'm sleeping Thursday night, I get two bags of blood. Johnny inspects the first bag they give me to see if it has the donor's name on it. Unfortunately it does not, so that's one less thank you note I'll be writing.
Finally on Friday, they unplug me from everything, and I'm allowed to get up and move around. I'm able to function fairly well, so they send me on my merry way back home.
I'm very thankful to be doing a lot better. Johnny's mom pointed out to me how fortunate I was that I was awake when the bleeding started; if I had been asleep and hadn't noticed it, I might have had a very different outcome. So thank you to everyone for all the prayers and meals and visits; we really appreciate it. Hopefully I'll be back to normal in a little while.
