April 4, 2025 • 48 mins
In this episode, Lisa opens up about the cervical cerclage—or “stitch”—she received at 24 weeks pregnant to help prevent preterm labor. While the procedure was medically “simple” and technically successful, the emotional experience left her feeling raw, vulnerable, and deeply shaken.
Lisa shares her story to help you feel more empowered, choice-full, and autonomous—no matter what your pregnancy journey looks like.
She talks about:
- What a cervical cerclage is, and what’s considered normal (and not) for a cervix
- How she’s making peace with a medical-intervention-heavy pregnancy
- How she stayed connected to herself during moments of dissociation
- The challenge of maintaining autonomy when you're treated as just a “patient”
The Truthiest Life on Instagram: @thetruthiestlife
Host: @lisahayim
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Edited by Houston Tilley
Intro Jingle by Alyssa Chase aka @findyoursails
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
A no be.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Even when times gethard and you feel you're in the
c see just how beautiful life can be when you
saften your heart, you give Alista to live your to
(00:30):
see us life.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Hello, everybody, welcome back. It's Lisa Haim and today I'm
talking about a procedure that I had to have done
in pregnancy that I've never heard of pre having to
need it myself. And I'm sharing this episode because I
know that, First of all, I posted online and there
was a lot of what's going on, and more importantly,
(00:54):
because it's really important to educate about our bodies and
do so in a way that empowers, doesn't create fear,
and it gives us voices in instances where we lose them,
which I think we all know happens in the medical
field in general talking with doctors, even the most wonderful doctors,
we get white coat syndrome, where we even the strongest
(01:17):
of women lose our voices and have trouble advocating for ourselves,
asking questions.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
All of that.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
This is actually my second time recording this. The first
time I recorded, I think that it was just a
little bit too close to home. If you will, you
all know I'm a vulnerable person in the sense that
I do love sharing things that happen to me that
do involve some level of emotion. But I also think,
and this is like maybe a separate learning lesson for
(01:46):
self and maybe for others, it's important to emotionally process
on your own and have that maybe be a bit
of a sacred process, and then share that story with
the world. There's obviously power in both. But the older
I gets, the wiser I get, the more I want
to feel really good about what I put into the world,
and I want to make sure that I stay guided
(02:06):
in my mission here today, which is to educate, empower,
be honest, and really talk about something that was very
scary for me and surprisingly, for lack of a better
word here traumatic. I feel like I'm using that word
traumatic with great pause, because nothing terrible happened that goes
(02:30):
under that definition of traumatic, and nothing went incredibly wrong
during my procedure. Nobody did anything that was obviously grotesque,
if you will. But I ended up feeling in my
body unsafe. And maybe that's just because I'm a woman,
maybe it's a result of my own history.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Of body autonomy or not.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
But I think that This is a conversation to be
had because when we go through anything medical, whether it's
a diagnosis or procedure, or recovery or emotional processing afterwards,
there is this general sense of loneliness. I'm in this alone,
and I know from sharing other things in the past
(03:14):
that it doesn't have to be like this, and my
voice can be of support to somebody who needs it,
and I know that I've found support in other people
who have shared their experiences. So that's what I'm talking
about today from a lot less hot emotional standpoint, But
I also still want to be honest that this did
(03:34):
shake me up, and I'm not somebody who's shaken up
quite easily, but I did find myself really surprised by
the experience as a whole. So I'm going to take
you back in time of how I learned that I
needed a cervical surclauge, and why I got one, and
the whole situation around it. So, just to start, a
(03:55):
cervical surclauge is a stitch essentially at wraps around I
think it's the bottom of your cervix to prevent pre
term birth. So in a healthy pregnancy, the cervix length
or or the length of what they're measuring when they
take your ultrasound or sonogram. They're looking for the cervix
(04:18):
to be of a specific length and shape, and if
the cervix is short, less than about twenty five millimeters,
or if it has a cone shape, there is I guess,
some sort of risk for pre term labor and therefore loss,
which we you know, obviously don't really want to be having.
(04:41):
In my first pregnancy, I had no known cervical issues.
I say no known because it is possible that I
did have a short cervix, and it's possible that that's
the reason my daughter came in, you know, just a
couple of hours, as quickly as she did, as furiously
as she did. That is a theory that me and
my husband have. I'm not sold on it completely, but
(05:04):
when I share my story of how I found out
my cervix was short, it might color the picture as
to maybe this is something that I have had before.
That being said, short servixes or cervic length and shape
can vary from pregnancy to pregnancy. So just because I
do have that right now in this pregnancy, it does
(05:26):
not mean that I had it in my last From
everything that I've read about surclauges specifically not necessarily short servixes,
but if somebody has a cerclage in a prior pregnancy,
they are likely to put one in preventatively for pregnancies thereafter.
So just to kind of learn a little bit more
(05:48):
about these circlage things and what happens if you get
one one time. And this also takes into consideration people
who do have losses in their second trimester or have
any sort of cervical incompetency they call it, and which
basically means loss because of short cervix Again, I didn't
fall into any of these camps. I feel like I
(06:09):
was kind of like happenstance finding. But the short version
is is that getting here was rougher than with my
first one. My first one, I had no problems getting pregnant.
Everything with this one has been a bit bumpy or different,
requiring I don't like that word, but requiring intervention from
doctors and other people, which has really thrown me because
(06:30):
I felt super autonomous in my first pregnancy. I got
pregnant easily on my own. I had the luxury of
kind of having an ob and then also having a midwife,
but being purely choice that I wanted to really steer
towards a home birth. Whereas this pregnancy required fertility, it
required some medication, it required additional screening, and every step
(06:54):
of the way has just been a little bit more
like like hard swallows here. So I kind of had
plans to announce this pre not plans. I was like,
let me get to twenty weeks pregnant, get my anatomy scan,
get a good bill of health, everything looks good, and
then decide like how and if I want.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
To share this with the world. And as it approached, I.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Was definitely feeling a little bit of like, Okay, I'm
feeling ready to share this with the world. You know,
it's twenty weeks. It's like a long time to be
not sharing something with a community that I do show
up quite honestly to most of the time. And it's
a big part of my life. It's occupying my mind, body, spirit,
you know all of that. So my twenty week scan
(07:36):
comes and somebody gave me this piece of advice which
I'm going to modify before giving you, which was to
drink juice before the scan so that the baby moves
when you get a twenty week scan. They need all
sorts of angles of the baby. They need the heart,
they need the bottom of the heart, they need the
a order, they need the right side of the brain, the.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
Left side of the brain.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Really like a lot of things that require a baby
to move positions. If you haven't eaten enough or not
enough sugar in your body, the baby might be a
little bit more sluggish. So somebody told me drink juice.
I took this to the tenth mile here. I not
only drank like sixteen ounces of juices of juice, but
when I went to go buy the juice, there were
(08:17):
these really hot, delicious looking French fries pure carbohydrate sugar,
and I got the French fries too. Rolled into my
twenty week appointment feeling real spicy. The sugars were high
in the bloodstream, and I was feeling good. But as
soon as the tech started to try and get her images,
she was incredibly frustrated. I noticed our frustration, and at
(08:40):
that point there was really nothing that I could do.
She was saying that the baby was just moving too much.
She couldn't capture anything. He was just moving move in.
She couldn't get the angles that she needed. She tried
for an hour and couldn't successfully get it done. Typically
the twenty week. At that point, you're only looking at
the baby over the belly. She then said, okay, let
(09:01):
me take a break from looking over here, since she
couldn't find success for the specific images that she needed,
and she went through the vagina. So when she did that,
apparently this isn't something I learned until not even that
same day, she noticed that my cervical length was approaching short.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
So I don't think at.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
That point I was at the less than twenty five,
but I was just kind of above twenty five, so
it was kind of like an asterisk. So I left
that scan and met with a doctor and he basically
gave me a few pieces of information. The first was
that my placenta insertion was marginally placed. It wasn't in
the middle where a placenta chord goes. I had a
(09:43):
lot of time sitting with my own placenta after my
first birth, so I know what a placenta kind of
looks like. It's kind of like a big enclosed bag.
And then in the middle is the long chord. But
for whatever reason, my cord is off to the side.
He said, Okay, we know that you have that, and
that's basically just going to mean you need more scans
as you progress in pregnancy to make sure that the
baby's growing appropriately. Nothing to worry about, but no, just
(10:06):
something to know. He said something else, but also blah
blah blah, nothing to worry about. And he's like, because
we didn't get the images, we're going to send you
to the MFM stands for Maternal Fetal Medicine. They are
doctors that guide you through pregnancy when you are a
high risk pregnancy. So I got this referral to go
basically to the hospital to get the SCAM. I wasn't
(10:31):
too freaked out, but I didn't leave with that clean
bill of health that I was hoping for. A couple
days later, my midwife I typically see a midwife in
the same practice as my OBI called me to go
over those same results and mentioned that the cervix also
looked short and the MFM would be remeasuring. That was
the first I had heard of the cervix and it
(10:53):
was the first time that I felt shaken. I remember
we were away and I walked into a separate room
to take this call, and when I came out I
just like had the water works in my eyes, and
you know, Evan's like, what's wrong, what's wrong? You knew
I had just gotten off the phone getting results, and
I just kind of said to him, like, no, everything's
everything's okay, the baby's okay. There's like not really new information.
(11:16):
It just feels like a lot right now. You know,
I'm so used to getting that clean bill of medical health,
not just during pregnancy, but like my whole life. Just
like labs are normal, this is normal, this is normal,
and then it feels like everything. Since I've turned thirty
five pregnant, everything has just been more of an obstacle
and question marks and more testing and just exhausting things
(11:41):
that not only take up time during the day but
take up a lot of energy in your body feeling
nervous and take up a lot of worrying time.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
But whatever.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
I booked the appointment with the MFM, met with the MFM,
They got the scan, they retested my cervix, and the
cervix had shortened from where we were last time, which
was just about a week apart. The MFM said, go
back to your doctor's office. They'll tell you what they
want to do to treat this, they might want to
monitor it a little bit further, but this is, you know,
(12:12):
something that needs to be further looked at, as typically
a short cervix is caught much earlier. So I'm twenty
something weeks at this point, and a lot of the
cerclage stories that I've seen, which is pretty aggressive, but
a typical treatment for a incompetent cervix is that cerclage.
Most people are getting it done around the twelve, thirteen,
(12:34):
fourteen weeks. And that's also because that's when they're doing
the intravaginal sonograms and they stop doing that as you
get later. So just again remember that the only reason
I found this out was because the sonogram tech was
struggling to get the over the belly images and went
inside and found that out to begin with. So I
(12:54):
go back to my ob they retest me, and again
that number is going down. It's kind of win not
crazy fast, but not dwindling either. And like I said,
you know that number, if it's less than twenty five,
is when you're in kind of the trouble area. So
I meet with the doctor and they say, here's what
we're going to do. We're going to put you on progesterone,
which is a suppository, but don't let that word fool you.
(13:18):
Progesterone suppositories when you're going through fertility or in my case,
during pregnancy at least how I was prescribed go in
the vagina, So it's just this like white pill that
you stick up your vagina once or twice a day.
I had to do that in fertility, so I was
no stranger to that. I said, Okay, let me go
on the progesterone, see if that helps stabilize things. Went
(13:39):
on that repeated in a week. What they had told
me was when you come back, we're going to assess
if the progesterone is enough or if you should be
getting a cerclage. And the thing with the cerclage is
we can't perform this after twenty four weeks, and by
the time you come back for your appointment, you're going
to be just at about twenty four weeks, which it
(14:00):
made me feel like I was in this like kind
of big decision making time area, and I obviously was
hoping that the progesterone would work, and I didn't give
it too much thought other than I came very quickly
to just kind of know that when I arrived at
my next appointment, if a circlause was going to be needed,
(14:20):
it was going to be the choice that I had
to make. In some ways, that's kind of nice, because
these hard choices, these new things, it can make you.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
Feel like what do I do? What do I do?
What do I do?
Speaker 1 (14:29):
But sometimes you just have this deep knowing that, like
what's best is kind of simple. It's not necessarily what
you want to be doing, but you know that you're
going to move forward with it anyway. So I took
the progesterone every day, and I came back to that appointment.
And when I came back to that appointment, you know,
they stick the ultrasound wand in me and I'm watching
them measure, and you know, I think Evan and I
(14:51):
took our guesses of like what millimeters my cervix would
be at that day, and to my not really surprise
but surprise outcome, I was about the same as pre progesterone.
So the progesterone may or may maybe not stabilized, but
nonetheless I was in this like me area, like this
(15:12):
is still a dicey area. It's not in critically low,
but it's kind of this non definitive place where I
wasn't think I was twenty four milimeters right, and it's
less than twenty five where it's problematic. So it's like,
could I roll the dice with that maybe? And I
met with my midwife and I met with the doctor,
and the doctor was the one who's going to be
performing it.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
And I have to.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Say I got incredible consultation, if you will, from both
my midwife and my doctor who came to meet with
me explain the procedure and really empowered me through education
of explaining what a cerclage is, my options if I do,
my options if I don't, which aren't really options, it was.
You know, if your cervix continues to shorten, there's really
(15:55):
nothing we can do aside from put you on bed rest.
But even with bed rest still we can't exactly control
a shortening cervix, and you are therefore at risk for
pre term labor. The cirklage gives you a sense of security.
It will hopefully help you avoid bed rest. Given again
that I was twenty four millimeters not critically low. You know,
(16:15):
the doctor said he felt certain that once I had it,
I could avoid being on bed rest, which really wasn't
an option for me mentally and with a toddler, and
that this is kind of the make or break at window,
like we have to do this now or never. And
I don't know, Like I said, it wasn't a choice.
I just kind of knew, like you know, the air
went out of me like a balloon. Like I kind
(16:36):
of thought at first my number was good, it didn't
change with the progesterone. Let's keep progesteroning and that's enough.
But as soon as he came in and really like
spelled it out for me in the way that he did,
I not only felt safe and comfortable with him as
a medical professional and his advice and the way he
treated me and everything, but I just knew that it
was the right decision. And like I said, there's some
(17:00):
kind of refreshing about hard choices when they're not really choices.
And although technically I did have a choice to do this,
it really wasn't a choice. By the time it came
to be, Evan and I looked at each other and
we oftentimes disagree or at length discuss things in medicine
that either we need, our child needs that people need
(17:21):
in general, and so we both know that things are
not always black and white, and we oftentimes can disagree
on what the best thing is, and both of us
just kind of knew, like this, this is what we
got to do. And Evan's incredibly medically conservative, so you know,
I think a lot of doctors might think like, Okay,
(17:42):
he knows what everything is and he would just kind
of usher me into that and trusting medicine. But actually
Evan is a much more conservative person. He looks at
the risks of everything. He researches everything, and when you
are like him and you're looking and shining light into
all the areas of things where they can go wrong,
you just by nature become more conservative. I'm more of
(18:02):
a jump in with two feet and trust people type
of a person. So somewhere between the two of us
is balanced. But we both kind of knew this is
what I need to do. Had the choice to either
do it that day, which thank god I didn't do
it later that day given how the procedure went, or
in a couple days on MLK Monday, the doctor would
come in for me and I would do it. So
(18:24):
we decided to do that, which I will get to
in just a second, So it was going to be
a pretty immediate surgery. Like I said, it had to
be done before twenty four weeks, so everybody was kind
of working to get that done. Evan and I had
a good conversation after deciding to do it, Before doing it,
it had a couple days between. That I think is
(18:45):
good advice to maybe offer to anyone here, which is
once you've come to a decision, and even if you haven't,
I would, at least for how I operate, avoid sharing
the details with so many people or asking people for advice.
Like I said, we both just had this deep knowing
it didn't require at length conversations about what we were
(19:07):
going to do. But we're also both very close with
our families and we share things, and I just had
this intuitive pull to be like, let's not ask them
to weigh in. His dad's a doctor, We really respect
his mom's opinion when it comes to all things women's
health and pregnancies and all of that, And you know,
it was just kind of like, I feel like, if
(19:27):
we open this can of worms, we're going to be
bringing fear into the equation, and I really can't afford that,
Like I need to go into this knowing that I'm
making the best decision for me, my health, my baby,
our future family, all of that, and that I'm doing
all that I can given all the information, and making
the soundest choice. And you know, I think that's kind
(19:48):
of translates to forking the noise, which is the phrase
and courses that I used to offer when it comes
to being able to listen, honor, and trust your own body,
But it really does apply to so much any other things. Obviously,
there's a time in the place to open discussion floors
up to family and friends that you trust, but there's
also a time to close that door and keep things
(20:09):
sacred to yourself. And I think that's just like a
good maybe something to know when you are going through
something medically, especially if you are empathetic or somebody who
is sensitive to energy like me. I am somebody that
I am not only sensitive to energy, but I also
really like the comfort of other people when I'm going
through something hard. But one thing I've learned along the
years is that when I open my doors to people
(20:31):
and invite them into my world when I'm feeling nervous
about something, I end up bleeding out a lot more
energy and not staying very contained and being contained is
a spiritual feeling philosophy. I don't know kind of the
right word there. That has become increasingly more important to
me over the last couple of years. I'm sure you've
seen that reflected in the type of content that I
(20:53):
share and how I share. As somebody who was a
previous open book and very flippant with what I share
and how I sha, I've come to learn how it
does affect me as an energetic human being, and you know,
priority one has to kind of be preservation and protect.
So the procedure, the procedure itself is usually done at
(21:22):
an ambulatory center as they call it, which I think
is like outpatient, and it's usually done with a spinal
tap versus general anesthesia or an epidural. From what I understand,
the spinal is a needle that goes in your spine
and it blocks the nerves so you don't feel anything
in your low body.
Speaker 3 (21:42):
This is something that was.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Probably the scariest part for me going in because I've
never had an epidural. I'm not against people who get epidurals,
but you know, I think I've shared in my last
pregnancy that although I knew nobody who didn't have an
epidural prior to my first pregnancy. When I started learning
about birth, I realized that it was thing that I
wanted to feel and that those feelings could help my birth.
(22:03):
So an epidural just wasn't in my vocabulary or something
that I was ever kind of playing with once I
got pregnant with my first child. Also, a needle in
the back creeps me out incredibly. I'm not like anti
needle in any way, as I can handle shots anything,
but the spine is just so fragile and there's so
much going on there.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
And I don't know.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
It kind of just gives me the hebgbies. But I
knew that I needed to have this and then typically,
again it's done at the ambulatory center, but because of
how far along I was by the time we found this,
I needed to have it done at labor delivery in
the hospital, which again just makes it a little bit
more of a thing and a to do and something
(22:44):
that for me again was also very jolting because I've
never been to labor delivery in a hospital other than
when I was working in food service in the hospital.
But like you know, I had a home birth, so
being in this medical setting with a baby in my
belly in a hospital was a bit foreign to me.
So we had an eight thirty procedure. We're told to
(23:04):
arrive at six thirty am, and we were told that
the procedure itself would take about thirty minutes or less,
or maybe like fifteen minutes but maybe when everything was prepped.
I kind of expected to be back there for thirty
minutes and that the anesthesia would wear off within an
hour or two and I would have to urinate before
leaving and then go home for the day. So we
(23:26):
were expecting to like be home by eleven o'clock.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Twelve o'clock.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Thought this was just a little morning visit to the hospital.
Jokes on us. So I'm sharing this next part, which
was the quote unquote traumatizing part for me, in some detail,
But I just want to be clear that this is
not to invoke fear, but rather share what was going
(23:52):
on in my mind and body and vulnerability as a woman,
and prepare somebody going through this or something similar, and
to not feel as a loan. Most importantly, if I
knew that I would be feeling this way, I would
have done a little bit different mental prep to stay
(24:12):
connected to myself and my voice instead of feeling a
bit blindsided by how quickly my body and mind were
overtaken by the emotions and the place that I went
to mentally. The first surprise was that Evan was not
going to be next to me for the procedure. Now,
this shouldn't have been a surprise. I was in labor
(24:33):
and delivery.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
I knew that I was.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
You know, I envisioned myself in an operating room, but
I guess I didn't really fully envision this. I've had
other procedures like where people have to go into my
vagina look at things and do things before, which were
more similar to like a PAP smerror, maybe a little
bit more invasive. During my fertility, I had to have
a what to call it an HSP stands for a
(24:57):
histor cell pingo gram, which is when they use a
dye to see if you're for loopian tubes and uterus
or open and flowing anyway.
Speaker 3 (25:06):
I had one of those.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
It was not fun, but it took place in an
environment more similar to I had it two different done.
One it was more like a regular room. Another ALM
was a little bit more where an X ray kind
of was involved. And anyway, long story short, I didn't
picture myself in like a cold operating room, so I
quickly learned that Evan was not going to be next
to me. He can't come to that area, and I
(25:28):
already started to feel a bit more frazzled. I think
also something that I didn't realize was important to me
is having female providers. I wouldn't have chosen a female
provider to do this procedure. I truly do trust the
doctor that I had. He has been doing this for
longer than most, which means he has the most experience.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
And it's just kind of where I landed.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
With this, But I guess I never realized how important
having female providers in the ob space is for me
to feel a sense of say that I didn't know
that I needed. But anyway, I had to say goodbye
to Evan and they roll me away into the or.
The second they roll me in there, the lights are
incredibly white and bright, and I'm in that stupid hospital gown,
(26:15):
which I hate. I hate hospital gown there. I don't
know demeaning, like lose your humanness in those things. You
almost feel like jail. But worse because you feel like
you're dying at the same time, and you're just like exposed,
can't even tell what parts of you are exposed. I
hate that thing so much. And so I'm in this
little sheet and I'm freezing, and I just feel alone
(26:39):
and scared. In the room as well, is going to
be the anesthesiologist, the main one, his assistant, who I
think is also a nurse, the resident, because I was
at a teaching hospital and at this hospital, the resident
kind of runs the show, which I get that residence
need to learn somewhere in someplace, but they generally do
(26:59):
not provide a strong sense of assuredness and safety, and
they're typically very young, and for me, I need like
a grander presence to feel safe. So I've got the
resident and then a nurse who was lovely, and then
the doctor and they're all kind of rolling in at
different times, but that's who will be with me during
the procedure. And typically when I've had any sort of
(27:20):
medical scary something done, even when Soley was sick and
we were in the hospital, you kind of find like
a female to I find a female to latch onto
and to feel safe with. And I scammed this room
and I just didn't really find that. So the first
thing that they did was they had me put my
legs on the side of the operating table together and
kind of hunch over so that they could put the
(27:41):
spinal in. And it was like the second I hunched over,
like my body language like I couldn't hold myself up.
I could physically, but like I was told to take
on the shape of hunching my back so they could
find where the spinal tap was going to go. It
was just like the floodworks opened. At the same time,
they had the residents kind of like face to face
with me, and she was holding my shoulders and something
(28:03):
about the physical touch. It's not that I felt unsettled
by her, but I just didn't feel settled.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
And she's like, oh no, what's wrong.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
And at that point I've just already started to disconnect.
I don't have the voice. I just feel scared, I
feel uncertain. I have a baby in my belly, I
have a needle going into my spine, and all of
a sudden, this decision that I was so sure of
is like, wait, what am I doing? I'm on operating
table and labor and delivery like this is like feels
really grand, and it feels scary.
Speaker 3 (28:31):
And I feel alone.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
And as soon as you put that needle in, pretty
much I felt my legs going warm and I hated it.
General anesthesia way more fun like as soon as it
gets scary, you block out. This was like I get scary,
and now I just can't feel my legs, my low
body or anything. So at this point I can't even
pick my own leg up, which is a terrible feeling.
Like not being able to run, I think, just biologically
(28:57):
is gonna mess with our brains. There's never been a
situation where I, physically, to my knowledge, couldn't get up
and run, And not that I was trying to do that,
but the fact that I couldn't do that sent a
message to my brain of okay, like you need to
be here.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
You need to figure out you know, do you trust
these people? Yes?
Speaker 1 (29:15):
I do, so you need to figure out how to
surrender to this experience. They lied me down on my back,
the needle doesn't stay, and they put the needle in.
The medicine works, and then you lie on your back
and I guess again, I was expecting like stirrup similar
to a pap smear where your legs are kind of
like over there and whatever. But this, they tilt me
(29:35):
back on the table and my legs come all the
way up put towards the ceiling, so my shins are
parallel with the ceiling above my head, and I am
like fully exposed, which I am not a private shy person.
I had male doctors before. I don't know why this
(29:58):
was so jolted and violating for me. At one point
they turned the lights on even brighter, and I am
just feeling like so disconnected literally physically, I couldn't feel
my low body, and I'm feeling crazy. I know that
they're touching me. I can feel some level of pressure
in my inner thighs as they're sanitizing or whatever they
do to prep you for a procedure, but I don't
(30:20):
know who's touching me. I don't know where they're touching me.
I don't know how hard they're touching me.
Speaker 3 (30:23):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
How visible I am because I don't have feeling in
my vagina or around it. And I have no choice
but to surrender, and so the last thing I also
want to do. They put a sheet up so I
can't see the doctor or anything, and I'm kind of again,
my head's over here, my body's over there, and I
think it's actually worth mentioning that from this experience, I've
(30:45):
learned how much power we hold in our pelvis. Tracy,
who I host retreats with, I think she has a
yoga class on Yoga Shati where I practice yoga, called
power in the Pelvis. I think we themed a class
for our camp metreat back last year all about this
female empowerment and it was called power in the Pelvis.
And at the time it was more kitchy, and yes,
I felt it during the yoga practice. But from this experience,
(31:07):
I think it's important to recognize how much intuition, power,
groundedness actually arises from our pelvic region and rises up
towards our brain as women, and how we need that
deep connection to our pelvic region, call it the chakra,
call it whatever you want to call it, but there's
something happening in our bodies men, and at least I
(31:30):
can speak for women. I don't know about men, but
a lot of who we are and our power does
arise from there. And I lost all of my power
in that moment. So the sheet goes up and technically
I could not feel any pain, but I felt a
lot of tugging and discomfort. I'm not discomfort, just tugging
that I know would cause discomfort if I could feel.
(31:51):
And I just kind of lied back and I disconnected,
And during that time, a lot of things came through
my mind.
Speaker 3 (31:58):
Number one was.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Like this feeling of somebody who I don't have any
known sexual trauma. Thank god, you know, no overt obvious
things in my life happened. But it was almost like, wait,
and this is like very weird to say, admit, share
those types of thoughts with you, But it was almost
like do I, because why does this feel so scary
for me? And I think the truth is you don't
(32:19):
need to necessarily have trauma sexually to as a woman
feel really vulnerable and scared. I think that you know,
as a woman, we also go through life and maybe
experience things and don't necessarily classify them as trauma, but
we look back and Okay, that wasn't right type of thing.
But I think it's important for me to caution this
for anybody who has known sexual trauma and finds themselves
(32:42):
in this situation to be prepared that it might bring
up some memories, emotions, feelings, powerlessness, all of that. I did, however,
speak to one of my best friends after this, who
has gone experienced unfortunately rape, and I asked her about
a same situation she had to be in medically, and
she's like, oh, I just dissociate. So I also think
(33:03):
that people that do have extreme trauma develop really strong
coping mechanisms to being in positions where they do feel
vulnerable worth mentioning. So as I'm lying back there, you know,
I know that I'm there. I need to trust, I
need to just be there, and my head is just
spinning with is this the right decision? And then it's like,
oh my god, I forgot to even tell my baby
verbally in my belly that this is what I'm like doing.
(33:26):
And I'm somebody that part of my philosophy is to
communicate everything with my daughter solely. She's three and a
half now, but starting when she was about two, it
kind of I realized how detrimental it was to treat
babies in utero out of utero, like.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
They can't understand.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
And I realized, all of a sudden, there's this fear
pulsating through our bodies and babies feel what we're feeling.
And I didn't prep the baby, and so first I'm
trying to just kind of let the baby know we're safe.
Speaker 3 (33:53):
I'm here, Mommy's here. And then I.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
Find myself really overwhelmed in a beautiful way, whelmed by
the presence of all of the females in my life,
my good friends, a lot of the women who come
on my MEA treats, Tracy who I collied them with,
like I've had really strong sisterhood moments by way of
the meat treats, the retreats that I host, and I
felt the presence of these women who haven't necessarily gone
(34:18):
through this at all, but I felt the power of
them behind me, and that honestly carried me through. I
found myself humming, which is a very natural way to
soothe the nervous system. But it wasn't something I was like, Oh,
what tools do I have? You know, it's how I
work on soothing solely, and it's also how I get myself,
I guess, through hard times. And the one thing that
(34:40):
I also didn't want to do was kind of let
them know that I was scared. I don't know why,
but I didn't want them to know that I was
so upset and so scared because it almost felt like
my reaction that was happening to me, this big sense
of being scared, was displaying itself bigger than it was.
And maybe that's my own fear right now of just
being like I was scared shitless period that I have
(35:02):
to kind of be like, no, it wasn't really that scared.
I was just presenting scared, But it did feel like
my emotions were kind of this like runaway horse, and
I inside knew that I was safe, but I was
there for myself, and although I was disconnected from my
low body, I was able to retend to myself in
that scary moment. The procedure finished and they rolled me
(35:26):
back to Evan again. I couldn't use my legs at all,
and the second I saw him after I had just
kind of stopped crying, I just started crying again.
Speaker 3 (35:33):
He's like, what's wrong, and I was like, no, just
like it was just it was just a lot.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
It was a lot more than I was expecting, and
he was super, super, super supportive and understanding. I think
a lot of times we don't think like men can
be when we go through these female experiences. He wasn't
in the room, but he was incredibly empathetic, and I
really appreciated that versus downplaying what I had experienced, because,
like I said, everything went well with the procedure, Like
(35:57):
there's the note from the doctor and the sign of
everything is going to say everything went well, so why
is she crying so hard? But two things can be true.
Things can go really well and they can still be
really hard emotionally. And then the fun part really began because,
like I said, we were expecting to leave like eleven
thirty twelve, and as soon as they wheeled me back
to Evan, I knew, like the way I couldn't feel
(36:19):
my body and like this feeling isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
Speaker 3 (36:32):
Because I've had this procedure.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
A nurse is going to come check on me every
fifteen minutes to check on how much blood is coming out.
So every fifteen minutes, the nurse comes over checks. At
one point they're like, okay, it's been a while, you've
had ivy full of fluid.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
It's time to.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Now urinate, and once you urinate, you can leave. But
like I said, I still could not feel my body,
and therefore I didn't know how to pee, Like never
in my life have I not known how to pee,
But here I was like being like, I don't know
if I can do that, which is a very strange
way to find yourself at thirty six years old. So
(37:08):
the nurse is like, okay, we got to get you
to go pee. They help me kind of swing my
legs back around the table and try and walk to
the bathroom. I have some feeling in but when I
eventually stand up, well, actually, as I'm sitting it, let
me just tell you, it felt like I was sitting
on like a blown up balloon, Like I felt four
feet above the actual thing that I was sitting on.
Like my whole little body just completely numb, which is
(37:31):
felt very strange to not have proper proprioception with the
surfaces that I was touching.
Speaker 3 (37:37):
So they stand me up.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
I'm kind of holding on to them, and I just
feel liquid going down my leg and I'm like, oh
f Like, the only time I've ever had liquid going
down my leg is when I had my period when
you can't control bleeding, and I'm like, okay, I must
be bleeding, and she looks and she's like, you are
urinating on yourself. I'm like, okay, great, off to a great,
non humiliating start. Here walks me over to the bathroom
(38:01):
because they need to catch and measure two hundred ce
seeds of fluid before they can discharge me. I walk
over and I get one hundred ccs out, and again
I can't feel anything. I don't even know if I'm peeing,
and Evan's in the bathroom with me, and I literally
just feel like I'm one hundred and fifty years old.
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Like it is a crash course in what it's like
to get.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Old and be humiliated and be dependent on people that
you don't know and people that you do know and
have no control over it and just surrender to the
whole thing. But as I'm sitting on the toilet, I
just feel myself vageling is kind of the term that
evenueses where I just feel lightheaded and almost like I'm
gonna throw up. I felt my body temperature change. I
(38:42):
was a normal temperature before, and I felt myself getting
really hot and I kind of just had to like
lean over to the right. I'm like doing it right now,
and I'm like, no, I'm not good, and they just
start like pumping me with sugar again. They're like, here,
have some apple juice. Meanwhile, I just had a juice
before I knew that it wasn't sugar related. But my
body is just not adjusting properly to anything. I'm like, okay,
(39:04):
I need to go lie back down. So they lie
me back down, they put ice packs on me, all
of that. Another thing I forgot to mention is that
when I did come back from the anesthesia, I was
very itchy all over. No visible rashes, but just itchy.
It was like my chief complaint, and in hindsight it
was the anesthesia in my body. But the nurses were
(39:25):
a little bit like perplexed, and Evan wasn't like, yeah,
that's a very normal sign of anesthesia. So just mentioning
again for anybody that has anesthesia spinal in general, that
this general sense of itchiness nowhere near the location of
where they placed it might happen to you. So they're like,
we're going to give you more fluids and you will
have to again Sti'll p two hundred CC's in full.
(39:46):
So my hundred ccs from before I'm going to count
before we can discharge you. I'm feeling terrible. I'm in
no rush to go. I haven't thought we were packing
the bag up, and I'm like, we're we're not going
anywhere for a very long time. Eventually I go to
the bathroom again. This is probably a couple hours later
at this point, maybe twelve thirty, one thirty and ipe
(40:08):
again and one hundred come out.
Speaker 3 (40:09):
But again I'm not peeing. It's just like coming out
of my body.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
And they're like, okay, this doesn't even make sense, like
you have to have more fluid in you than this.
We need to know if you are forgetting the word
right now. But something that can happen after anesthesia as
you withhold the urine, and that can be problematic and
they need to put in a catheter, which I was
grossly opposed to. But they're like, let us see what.
Speaker 3 (40:34):
We have to do here.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
So they come over with a bladder scan or scan
my bladder. They're okay, you have seven hundred and eighty
c season there you're just withholding. I'm like, okay, I
think I can do it. Just give me more time.
Before we know it, it's like four o'clock and I
still can't feel my body again. My procedure was at
eight thirty was supposed to last one hour the medication,
(40:56):
and here I was many hours later, still not being
able to feel my body properly, and still not able
to urinate on my own and kind of afraid to
stand up. Everything felt very intense, and all of a sudden,
I find myself in deep pain, like crippling over pain,
and I'm like, okay, you know, I know that there's
urine in my body, but like, let me try and
(41:16):
get up and walk. So I need assistance walking and
I'm walking terribly. I'm like keeled over, can barely take
a step. And I see the worry in Evan's face,
like what's wrong? And I could see what's flashing through
his eyes, which is like are you in labor right now?
And I felt in my own body am I in
labor right now? Like this is such intense feelings. Now,
please keep in mind there's still medicine in my body,
(41:36):
so I can't discern anything other than extreme cramp pain
that I'm having. I take like three or four steps,
you know, heavy breathing, really not doing well, and I
sit down on the toilet. Still can't urinate as I
normally would, but liquid comes out of me, and as
soon as it does, I feel the release of the
cramp and okay, I'm not in labor. I just had
(41:58):
to pee really bad. After that, everything kind of smooths
out and I'm able to get discharged. I think it's
like four thirty five at this point, definitely not feeling
like myself, but feeling a little bit better. Still a
little numb, but it's definitely wearing off.
Speaker 3 (42:14):
And honestly, it was one of.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
Those days that just kind of surprise rocked me, and
I took to my Instagram and shared that I was
in the hospital, which I wouldn't normally do because I
wasn't sharing that I was pregnant, and it opened up
a box of worms of questions and concerns which I
didn't mean to concern or worry people. But in that moment,
when I was feeling super vulnerable post procedure I came out,
(42:36):
I kind of took to Instagram the same way that
I used to, where I share things in real time
with that heavy emotion. And like I said in the beginning,
there's pros to that and cons to that, depending on
the situation and who you are, But in that moment,
it just kind of felt right to me to share
that really.
Speaker 3 (42:52):
Vulnerable moment and it was just a lot.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
It was just a lot that day, and again I
feel like I'm having a really hard time. I'm really
like believing that it was a lot because everything medically
went right.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
Nothing went wrong they could have.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
I've read some surclage scarier stories since then, but things
have gone well so far during the procedure and from
my post visits now where we continue to measure my
cervix and I kind of truck through that week very slowly,
and by the time Saturday came, which was almost a
week later, I found myself with a bout of insomnia
(43:27):
Friday into Saturday, so like five days later, and the
next day, in my exhaustive state, I found myself breaking
down even further. But it was kind of the necessary
breakdown that I needed. And sometimes for me exhaustion which
I hate. I hate being exhausted, I hate insomnia, but
sometimes exhaustion is the doorway to my truth and what
(43:49):
needs to come out because all of my barriers that
I keep up to keep guarded to not break down,
that I have in place during regular life, like they
come down when I'm tired to think. For most people
is probably true. And it was in this day that
I again just like the emotions of the day just
came over me. You know, I really appreciate the medical
(44:11):
attention that I got, but also during the procedure in
an operating room, nobody did anything wrong. I really feel
like I lost my humanness. Doctor's talking over me, the
doctor talking to the anesthesiologist saying, you know, put in
blah blah blah antibiotic. I was never even like, Lisa, Okay,
we're going to be giving you this antibiotic, not that
(44:33):
I would have opposed it, like at that point I
was in the doctor's trusting hands. But once the anesthesia
kicked in, although I was fully mentally there, it felt
like everybody stopped.
Speaker 3 (44:42):
Talking to me.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
And from there I really sunk down into this really deep,
lonely place. And with my daughter when she's going through
anything medical, whether it's even just visiting a doctor, I'm
always like, okay, and the doctor's gonna come over and
put the stethoscope on your chest and I warn her
where this was like, once the medication kicked in, the
doctors were laser focused on the procedure and no longer
(45:05):
treated me as if I was in the room until
it was over, and it's not a knock to them,
you know. I think running this by Evan, it's he's like, yeah,
once we like zero in on the procedure, we're going
in on the procedure. It is really hard for a
human brain, which is like, this is not a complaint
of how I was treated, It's just something that happened
that I would have benefited if I was spoken to
(45:26):
a little bit differently from the nurse or the resident
or someone else in the room kind of like telling
me what was going on. But it does make you
feel like you're not even there and things are happening
to your body, and that's a very scary feeling experience
all of that, and when medications are being thrown in.
I think in the beginning I did say, like, can
you just let me know what you're doing what you're
(45:48):
doing as you're doing it, and I think the resident
said okay. But again as they like zeroed in, it
was kind of radio silence, and that left me feeling
really alone and scared and not aught atonomous, Like that's
that's the word. That was kind of what I was
really wrangling with the day when my guard came down
and this feeling of although nothing happened, just feeling very
(46:10):
violated and feeling out of control and not being able
to make choices. And I don't know, all this stuff
just like came up for me and it was just
important for me to process. And here we are now
two weeks out from the procedure exactly, and I am
feeling a lot better. I don't love having a foreign
object in my uterus. Like I said, I did not
(46:33):
do a lot of pre research before. Since the procedure,
I've done a little bit more. I've googled what a
cerclage looks like. It totally freaks me out and I
don't love having this, but I am, I guess grateful
for it because hopefully it is keeping me and the
baby safe and put and you know, avoiding devastating consequences
(46:54):
on the other hand, And that's why, you know, medical
stuff can be really complex. I think a lot of
people in the health and wellness space are very.
Speaker 3 (47:01):
Quick to.
Speaker 1 (47:03):
Black and white medical things, and they're not black and white.
It really needs to be assessed on a need be situation,
on an individual basis, and it is something that I
do struggle with having medical intervention and as somebody who's
not even religious, just knowing that, like this is man
interfering with God's plan. This maybe could be its own
separate podcast, which I don't think I want to dive
(47:25):
into today, but it is something that I really do
struggle with. But at the same time, I'm grateful for
the option and clearly one that I took. So here
we are, twenty six weeks. I think now things are
looking good. Doctor has given me, you know, clearance to
travel with this. I'm not on bedrest. It's still like
take it easy, don't lift heavy, don't do too much,
(47:47):
which I'm definitely not. I'm having pelvic pain regardless of
the cervix anyway, and I'm kind of just in my
season of really slowing down, learning how to take care
of my body without movement as I know it, and
connecting to this baby in all sorts of ways because
not gonna lie. It's also really hard to connect to
(48:09):
this baby when there have been so many obstacles to
get here and during it, and sometimes I feel like
I forget that.
Speaker 3 (48:15):
I'm not alone.
Speaker 1 (48:16):
I'm not alone, not alone in any way, shape or form,
and that's kind of where my focus is right now,
A no be.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Even when times gethard and you feel you're in the
c see just how beautiful life can be when you
saften your heart, you give Alista to live your to
(00:30):
see us life.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Hello, everybody, welcome back. It's Lisa Haim and today I'm
talking about a procedure that I had to have done
in pregnancy that I've never heard of pre having to
need it myself. And I'm sharing this episode because I
know that, First of all, I posted online and there
was a lot of what's going on, and more importantly,
(00:54):
because it's really important to educate about our bodies and
do so in a way that empowers, doesn't create fear,
and it gives us voices in instances where we lose them,
which I think we all know happens in the medical
field in general talking with doctors, even the most wonderful doctors,
we get white coat syndrome, where we even the strongest
(01:17):
of women lose our voices and have trouble advocating for ourselves,
asking questions.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
All of that.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
This is actually my second time recording this. The first
time I recorded, I think that it was just a
little bit too close to home. If you will, you
all know I'm a vulnerable person in the sense that
I do love sharing things that happen to me that
do involve some level of emotion. But I also think,
and this is like maybe a separate learning lesson for
(01:46):
self and maybe for others, it's important to emotionally process
on your own and have that maybe be a bit
of a sacred process, and then share that story with
the world. There's obviously power in both. But the older
I gets, the wiser I get, the more I want
to feel really good about what I put into the world,
and I want to make sure that I stay guided
(02:06):
in my mission here today, which is to educate, empower,
be honest, and really talk about something that was very
scary for me and surprisingly, for lack of a better
word here traumatic. I feel like I'm using that word
traumatic with great pause, because nothing terrible happened that goes
(02:30):
under that definition of traumatic, and nothing went incredibly wrong
during my procedure. Nobody did anything that was obviously grotesque,
if you will. But I ended up feeling in my
body unsafe. And maybe that's just because I'm a woman,
maybe it's a result of my own history.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Of body autonomy or not.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
But I think that This is a conversation to be
had because when we go through anything medical, whether it's
a diagnosis or procedure, or recovery or emotional processing afterwards,
there is this general sense of loneliness. I'm in this alone,
and I know from sharing other things in the past
(03:14):
that it doesn't have to be like this, and my
voice can be of support to somebody who needs it,
and I know that I've found support in other people
who have shared their experiences. So that's what I'm talking
about today from a lot less hot emotional standpoint, But
I also still want to be honest that this did
(03:34):
shake me up, and I'm not somebody who's shaken up
quite easily, but I did find myself really surprised by
the experience as a whole. So I'm going to take
you back in time of how I learned that I
needed a cervical surclauge, and why I got one, and
the whole situation around it. So, just to start, a
(03:55):
cervical surclauge is a stitch essentially at wraps around I
think it's the bottom of your cervix to prevent pre
term birth. So in a healthy pregnancy, the cervix length
or or the length of what they're measuring when they
take your ultrasound or sonogram. They're looking for the cervix
(04:18):
to be of a specific length and shape, and if
the cervix is short, less than about twenty five millimeters,
or if it has a cone shape, there is I guess,
some sort of risk for pre term labor and therefore loss,
which we you know, obviously don't really want to be having.
(04:41):
In my first pregnancy, I had no known cervical issues.
I say no known because it is possible that I
did have a short cervix, and it's possible that that's
the reason my daughter came in, you know, just a
couple of hours, as quickly as she did, as furiously
as she did. That is a theory that me and
my husband have. I'm not sold on it completely, but
(05:04):
when I share my story of how I found out
my cervix was short, it might color the picture as
to maybe this is something that I have had before.
That being said, short servixes or cervic length and shape
can vary from pregnancy to pregnancy. So just because I
do have that right now in this pregnancy, it does
(05:26):
not mean that I had it in my last From
everything that I've read about surclauges specifically not necessarily short servixes,
but if somebody has a cerclage in a prior pregnancy,
they are likely to put one in preventatively for pregnancies thereafter.
So just to kind of learn a little bit more
(05:48):
about these circlage things and what happens if you get
one one time. And this also takes into consideration people
who do have losses in their second trimester or have
any sort of cervical incompetency they call it, and which
basically means loss because of short cervix Again, I didn't
fall into any of these camps. I feel like I
(06:09):
was kind of like happenstance finding. But the short version
is is that getting here was rougher than with my
first one. My first one, I had no problems getting pregnant.
Everything with this one has been a bit bumpy or different,
requiring I don't like that word, but requiring intervention from
doctors and other people, which has really thrown me because
(06:30):
I felt super autonomous in my first pregnancy. I got
pregnant easily on my own. I had the luxury of
kind of having an ob and then also having a midwife,
but being purely choice that I wanted to really steer
towards a home birth. Whereas this pregnancy required fertility, it
required some medication, it required additional screening, and every step
(06:54):
of the way has just been a little bit more
like like hard swallows here. So I kind of had
plans to announce this pre not plans. I was like,
let me get to twenty weeks pregnant, get my anatomy scan,
get a good bill of health, everything looks good, and
then decide like how and if I want.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
To share this with the world. And as it approached, I.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Was definitely feeling a little bit of like, Okay, I'm
feeling ready to share this with the world. You know,
it's twenty weeks. It's like a long time to be
not sharing something with a community that I do show
up quite honestly to most of the time. And it's
a big part of my life. It's occupying my mind, body, spirit,
you know all of that. So my twenty week scan
(07:36):
comes and somebody gave me this piece of advice which
I'm going to modify before giving you, which was to
drink juice before the scan so that the baby moves
when you get a twenty week scan. They need all
sorts of angles of the baby. They need the heart,
they need the bottom of the heart, they need the
a order, they need the right side of the brain, the.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
Left side of the brain.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Really like a lot of things that require a baby
to move positions. If you haven't eaten enough or not
enough sugar in your body, the baby might be a
little bit more sluggish. So somebody told me drink juice.
I took this to the tenth mile here. I not
only drank like sixteen ounces of juices of juice, but
when I went to go buy the juice, there were
(08:17):
these really hot, delicious looking French fries pure carbohydrate sugar,
and I got the French fries too. Rolled into my
twenty week appointment feeling real spicy. The sugars were high
in the bloodstream, and I was feeling good. But as
soon as the tech started to try and get her images,
she was incredibly frustrated. I noticed our frustration, and at
(08:40):
that point there was really nothing that I could do.
She was saying that the baby was just moving too much.
She couldn't capture anything. He was just moving move in.
She couldn't get the angles that she needed. She tried
for an hour and couldn't successfully get it done. Typically
the twenty week. At that point, you're only looking at
the baby over the belly. She then said, okay, let
(09:01):
me take a break from looking over here, since she
couldn't find success for the specific images that she needed,
and she went through the vagina. So when she did that,
apparently this isn't something I learned until not even that
same day, she noticed that my cervical length was approaching short.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
So I don't think at.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
That point I was at the less than twenty five,
but I was just kind of above twenty five, so
it was kind of like an asterisk. So I left
that scan and met with a doctor and he basically
gave me a few pieces of information. The first was
that my placenta insertion was marginally placed. It wasn't in
the middle where a placenta chord goes. I had a
(09:43):
lot of time sitting with my own placenta after my
first birth, so I know what a placenta kind of
looks like. It's kind of like a big enclosed bag.
And then in the middle is the long chord. But
for whatever reason, my cord is off to the side.
He said, Okay, we know that you have that, and
that's basically just going to mean you need more scans
as you progress in pregnancy to make sure that the
baby's growing appropriately. Nothing to worry about, but no, just
(10:06):
something to know. He said something else, but also blah
blah blah, nothing to worry about. And he's like, because
we didn't get the images, we're going to send you
to the MFM stands for Maternal Fetal Medicine. They are
doctors that guide you through pregnancy when you are a
high risk pregnancy. So I got this referral to go
basically to the hospital to get the SCAM. I wasn't
(10:31):
too freaked out, but I didn't leave with that clean
bill of health that I was hoping for. A couple
days later, my midwife I typically see a midwife in
the same practice as my OBI called me to go
over those same results and mentioned that the cervix also
looked short and the MFM would be remeasuring. That was
the first I had heard of the cervix and it
(10:53):
was the first time that I felt shaken. I remember
we were away and I walked into a separate room
to take this call, and when I came out I
just like had the water works in my eyes, and
you know, Evan's like, what's wrong, what's wrong? You knew
I had just gotten off the phone getting results, and
I just kind of said to him, like, no, everything's
everything's okay, the baby's okay. There's like not really new information.
(11:16):
It just feels like a lot right now. You know,
I'm so used to getting that clean bill of medical health,
not just during pregnancy, but like my whole life. Just
like labs are normal, this is normal, this is normal,
and then it feels like everything. Since I've turned thirty
five pregnant, everything has just been more of an obstacle
and question marks and more testing and just exhausting things
(11:41):
that not only take up time during the day but
take up a lot of energy in your body feeling
nervous and take up a lot of worrying time.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
But whatever.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
I booked the appointment with the MFM, met with the MFM,
They got the scan, they retested my cervix, and the
cervix had shortened from where we were last time, which
was just about a week apart. The MFM said, go
back to your doctor's office. They'll tell you what they
want to do to treat this, they might want to
monitor it a little bit further, but this is, you know,
(12:12):
something that needs to be further looked at, as typically
a short cervix is caught much earlier. So I'm twenty
something weeks at this point, and a lot of the
cerclage stories that I've seen, which is pretty aggressive, but
a typical treatment for a incompetent cervix is that cerclage.
Most people are getting it done around the twelve, thirteen,
(12:34):
fourteen weeks. And that's also because that's when they're doing
the intravaginal sonograms and they stop doing that as you
get later. So just again remember that the only reason
I found this out was because the sonogram tech was
struggling to get the over the belly images and went
inside and found that out to begin with. So I
(12:54):
go back to my ob they retest me, and again
that number is going down. It's kind of win not
crazy fast, but not dwindling either. And like I said,
you know that number, if it's less than twenty five,
is when you're in kind of the trouble area. So
I meet with the doctor and they say, here's what
we're going to do. We're going to put you on progesterone,
which is a suppository, but don't let that word fool you.
(13:18):
Progesterone suppositories when you're going through fertility or in my case,
during pregnancy at least how I was prescribed go in
the vagina, So it's just this like white pill that
you stick up your vagina once or twice a day.
I had to do that in fertility, so I was
no stranger to that. I said, Okay, let me go
on the progesterone, see if that helps stabilize things. Went
(13:39):
on that repeated in a week. What they had told
me was when you come back, we're going to assess
if the progesterone is enough or if you should be
getting a cerclage. And the thing with the cerclage is
we can't perform this after twenty four weeks, and by
the time you come back for your appointment, you're going
to be just at about twenty four weeks, which it
(14:00):
made me feel like I was in this like kind
of big decision making time area, and I obviously was
hoping that the progesterone would work, and I didn't give
it too much thought other than I came very quickly
to just kind of know that when I arrived at
my next appointment, if a circlause was going to be needed,
(14:20):
it was going to be the choice that I had
to make. In some ways, that's kind of nice, because
these hard choices, these new things, it can make you.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
Feel like what do I do? What do I do?
What do I do?
Speaker 1 (14:29):
But sometimes you just have this deep knowing that, like
what's best is kind of simple. It's not necessarily what
you want to be doing, but you know that you're
going to move forward with it anyway. So I took
the progesterone every day, and I came back to that appointment.
And when I came back to that appointment, you know,
they stick the ultrasound wand in me and I'm watching
them measure, and you know, I think Evan and I
(14:51):
took our guesses of like what millimeters my cervix would
be at that day, and to my not really surprise
but surprise outcome, I was about the same as pre progesterone.
So the progesterone may or may maybe not stabilized, but
nonetheless I was in this like me area, like this
(15:12):
is still a dicey area. It's not in critically low,
but it's kind of this non definitive place where I
wasn't think I was twenty four milimeters right, and it's
less than twenty five where it's problematic. So it's like,
could I roll the dice with that maybe? And I
met with my midwife and I met with the doctor,
and the doctor was the one who's going to be
performing it.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
And I have to.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Say I got incredible consultation, if you will, from both
my midwife and my doctor who came to meet with
me explain the procedure and really empowered me through education
of explaining what a cerclage is, my options if I do,
my options if I don't, which aren't really options, it was.
You know, if your cervix continues to shorten, there's really
(15:55):
nothing we can do aside from put you on bed rest.
But even with bed rest still we can't exactly control
a shortening cervix, and you are therefore at risk for
pre term labor. The cirklage gives you a sense of security.
It will hopefully help you avoid bed rest. Given again
that I was twenty four millimeters not critically low. You know,
(16:15):
the doctor said he felt certain that once I had it,
I could avoid being on bed rest, which really wasn't
an option for me mentally and with a toddler, and
that this is kind of the make or break at window,
like we have to do this now or never. And
I don't know, Like I said, it wasn't a choice.
I just kind of knew, like you know, the air
went out of me like a balloon. Like I kind
(16:36):
of thought at first my number was good, it didn't
change with the progesterone. Let's keep progesteroning and that's enough.
But as soon as he came in and really like
spelled it out for me in the way that he did,
I not only felt safe and comfortable with him as
a medical professional and his advice and the way he
treated me and everything, but I just knew that it
was the right decision. And like I said, there's some
(17:00):
kind of refreshing about hard choices when they're not really choices.
And although technically I did have a choice to do this,
it really wasn't a choice. By the time it came
to be, Evan and I looked at each other and
we oftentimes disagree or at length discuss things in medicine
that either we need, our child needs that people need
(17:21):
in general, and so we both know that things are
not always black and white, and we oftentimes can disagree
on what the best thing is, and both of us
just kind of knew, like this, this is what we
got to do. And Evan's incredibly medically conservative, so you know,
I think a lot of doctors might think like, Okay,
(17:42):
he knows what everything is and he would just kind
of usher me into that and trusting medicine. But actually
Evan is a much more conservative person. He looks at
the risks of everything. He researches everything, and when you
are like him and you're looking and shining light into
all the areas of things where they can go wrong,
you just by nature become more conservative. I'm more of
(18:02):
a jump in with two feet and trust people type
of a person. So somewhere between the two of us
is balanced. But we both kind of knew this is
what I need to do. Had the choice to either
do it that day, which thank god I didn't do
it later that day given how the procedure went, or
in a couple days on MLK Monday, the doctor would
come in for me and I would do it. So
(18:24):
we decided to do that, which I will get to
in just a second, So it was going to be
a pretty immediate surgery. Like I said, it had to
be done before twenty four weeks, so everybody was kind
of working to get that done. Evan and I had
a good conversation after deciding to do it, Before doing it,
it had a couple days between. That I think is
(18:45):
good advice to maybe offer to anyone here, which is
once you've come to a decision, and even if you haven't,
I would, at least for how I operate, avoid sharing
the details with so many people or asking people for advice.
Like I said, we both just had this deep knowing
it didn't require at length conversations about what we were
(19:07):
going to do. But we're also both very close with
our families and we share things, and I just had
this intuitive pull to be like, let's not ask them
to weigh in. His dad's a doctor, We really respect
his mom's opinion when it comes to all things women's
health and pregnancies and all of that, And you know,
it was just kind of like, I feel like, if
(19:27):
we open this can of worms, we're going to be
bringing fear into the equation, and I really can't afford that,
Like I need to go into this knowing that I'm
making the best decision for me, my health, my baby,
our future family, all of that, and that I'm doing
all that I can given all the information, and making
the soundest choice. And you know, I think that's kind
(19:48):
of translates to forking the noise, which is the phrase
and courses that I used to offer when it comes
to being able to listen, honor, and trust your own body,
But it really does apply to so much any other things. Obviously,
there's a time in the place to open discussion floors
up to family and friends that you trust, but there's
also a time to close that door and keep things
(20:09):
sacred to yourself. And I think that's just like a
good maybe something to know when you are going through
something medically, especially if you are empathetic or somebody who
is sensitive to energy like me. I am somebody that
I am not only sensitive to energy, but I also
really like the comfort of other people when I'm going
through something hard. But one thing I've learned along the
years is that when I open my doors to people
(20:31):
and invite them into my world when I'm feeling nervous
about something, I end up bleeding out a lot more
energy and not staying very contained and being contained is
a spiritual feeling philosophy. I don't know kind of the
right word there. That has become increasingly more important to
me over the last couple of years. I'm sure you've
seen that reflected in the type of content that I
(20:53):
share and how I share. As somebody who was a
previous open book and very flippant with what I share
and how I sha, I've come to learn how it
does affect me as an energetic human being, and you know,
priority one has to kind of be preservation and protect.
So the procedure, the procedure itself is usually done at
(21:22):
an ambulatory center as they call it, which I think
is like outpatient, and it's usually done with a spinal
tap versus general anesthesia or an epidural. From what I understand,
the spinal is a needle that goes in your spine
and it blocks the nerves so you don't feel anything
in your low body.
Speaker 3 (21:42):
This is something that was.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Probably the scariest part for me going in because I've
never had an epidural. I'm not against people who get epidurals,
but you know, I think I've shared in my last
pregnancy that although I knew nobody who didn't have an
epidural prior to my first pregnancy. When I started learning
about birth, I realized that it was thing that I
wanted to feel and that those feelings could help my birth.
(22:03):
So an epidural just wasn't in my vocabulary or something
that I was ever kind of playing with once I
got pregnant with my first child. Also, a needle in
the back creeps me out incredibly. I'm not like anti
needle in any way, as I can handle shots anything,
but the spine is just so fragile and there's so
much going on there.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
And I don't know.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
It kind of just gives me the hebgbies. But I
knew that I needed to have this and then typically,
again it's done at the ambulatory center, but because of
how far along I was by the time we found this,
I needed to have it done at labor delivery in
the hospital, which again just makes it a little bit
more of a thing and a to do and something
(22:44):
that for me again was also very jolting because I've
never been to labor delivery in a hospital other than
when I was working in food service in the hospital.
But like you know, I had a home birth, so
being in this medical setting with a baby in my
belly in a hospital was a bit foreign to me.
So we had an eight thirty procedure. We're told to
(23:04):
arrive at six thirty am, and we were told that
the procedure itself would take about thirty minutes or less,
or maybe like fifteen minutes but maybe when everything was prepped.
I kind of expected to be back there for thirty
minutes and that the anesthesia would wear off within an
hour or two and I would have to urinate before
leaving and then go home for the day. So we
(23:26):
were expecting to like be home by eleven o'clock.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Twelve o'clock.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Thought this was just a little morning visit to the hospital.
Jokes on us. So I'm sharing this next part, which
was the quote unquote traumatizing part for me, in some detail,
But I just want to be clear that this is
not to invoke fear, but rather share what was going
(23:52):
on in my mind and body and vulnerability as a woman,
and prepare somebody going through this or something similar, and
to not feel as a loan. Most importantly, if I
knew that I would be feeling this way, I would
have done a little bit different mental prep to stay
(24:12):
connected to myself and my voice instead of feeling a
bit blindsided by how quickly my body and mind were
overtaken by the emotions and the place that I went
to mentally. The first surprise was that Evan was not
going to be next to me for the procedure. Now,
this shouldn't have been a surprise. I was in labor
(24:33):
and delivery.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
I knew that I was.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
You know, I envisioned myself in an operating room, but
I guess I didn't really fully envision this. I've had
other procedures like where people have to go into my
vagina look at things and do things before, which were
more similar to like a PAP smerror, maybe a little
bit more invasive. During my fertility, I had to have
a what to call it an HSP stands for a
(24:57):
histor cell pingo gram, which is when they use a
dye to see if you're for loopian tubes and uterus
or open and flowing anyway.
Speaker 3 (25:06):
I had one of those.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
It was not fun, but it took place in an
environment more similar to I had it two different done.
One it was more like a regular room. Another ALM
was a little bit more where an X ray kind
of was involved. And anyway, long story short, I didn't
picture myself in like a cold operating room, so I
quickly learned that Evan was not going to be next
to me. He can't come to that area, and I
(25:28):
already started to feel a bit more frazzled. I think
also something that I didn't realize was important to me
is having female providers. I wouldn't have chosen a female
provider to do this procedure. I truly do trust the
doctor that I had. He has been doing this for
longer than most, which means he has the most experience.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
And it's just kind of where I landed.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
With this, But I guess I never realized how important
having female providers in the ob space is for me
to feel a sense of say that I didn't know
that I needed. But anyway, I had to say goodbye
to Evan and they roll me away into the or.
The second they roll me in there, the lights are
incredibly white and bright, and I'm in that stupid hospital gown,
(26:15):
which I hate. I hate hospital gown there. I don't
know demeaning, like lose your humanness in those things. You
almost feel like jail. But worse because you feel like
you're dying at the same time, and you're just like exposed,
can't even tell what parts of you are exposed. I
hate that thing so much. And so I'm in this
little sheet and I'm freezing, and I just feel alone
(26:39):
and scared. In the room as well, is going to
be the anesthesiologist, the main one, his assistant, who I
think is also a nurse, the resident, because I was
at a teaching hospital and at this hospital, the resident
kind of runs the show, which I get that residence
need to learn somewhere in someplace, but they generally do
(26:59):
not provide a strong sense of assuredness and safety, and
they're typically very young, and for me, I need like
a grander presence to feel safe. So I've got the
resident and then a nurse who was lovely, and then
the doctor and they're all kind of rolling in at
different times, but that's who will be with me during
the procedure. And typically when I've had any sort of
(27:20):
medical scary something done, even when Soley was sick and
we were in the hospital, you kind of find like
a female to I find a female to latch onto
and to feel safe with. And I scammed this room
and I just didn't really find that. So the first
thing that they did was they had me put my
legs on the side of the operating table together and
kind of hunch over so that they could put the
(27:41):
spinal in. And it was like the second I hunched over,
like my body language like I couldn't hold myself up.
I could physically, but like I was told to take
on the shape of hunching my back so they could
find where the spinal tap was going to go. It
was just like the floodworks opened. At the same time,
they had the residents kind of like face to face
with me, and she was holding my shoulders and something
(28:03):
about the physical touch. It's not that I felt unsettled
by her, but I just didn't feel settled.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
And she's like, oh no, what's wrong.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
And at that point I've just already started to disconnect.
I don't have the voice. I just feel scared, I
feel uncertain. I have a baby in my belly, I
have a needle going into my spine, and all of
a sudden, this decision that I was so sure of
is like, wait, what am I doing? I'm on operating
table and labor and delivery like this is like feels
really grand, and it feels scary.
Speaker 3 (28:31):
And I feel alone.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
And as soon as you put that needle in, pretty
much I felt my legs going warm and I hated it.
General anesthesia way more fun like as soon as it
gets scary, you block out. This was like I get scary,
and now I just can't feel my legs, my low
body or anything. So at this point I can't even
pick my own leg up, which is a terrible feeling.
Like not being able to run, I think, just biologically
(28:57):
is gonna mess with our brains. There's never been a
situation where I, physically, to my knowledge, couldn't get up
and run, And not that I was trying to do that,
but the fact that I couldn't do that sent a
message to my brain of okay, like you need to
be here.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
You need to figure out you know, do you trust
these people? Yes?
Speaker 1 (29:15):
I do, so you need to figure out how to
surrender to this experience. They lied me down on my back,
the needle doesn't stay, and they put the needle in.
The medicine works, and then you lie on your back
and I guess again, I was expecting like stirrup similar
to a pap smear where your legs are kind of
like over there and whatever. But this, they tilt me
(29:35):
back on the table and my legs come all the
way up put towards the ceiling, so my shins are
parallel with the ceiling above my head, and I am
like fully exposed, which I am not a private shy person.
I had male doctors before. I don't know why this
(29:58):
was so jolted and violating for me. At one point
they turned the lights on even brighter, and I am
just feeling like so disconnected literally physically, I couldn't feel
my low body, and I'm feeling crazy. I know that
they're touching me. I can feel some level of pressure
in my inner thighs as they're sanitizing or whatever they
do to prep you for a procedure, but I don't
(30:20):
know who's touching me. I don't know where they're touching me.
I don't know how hard they're touching me.
Speaker 3 (30:23):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
How visible I am because I don't have feeling in
my vagina or around it. And I have no choice
but to surrender, and so the last thing I also
want to do. They put a sheet up so I
can't see the doctor or anything, and I'm kind of again,
my head's over here, my body's over there, and I
think it's actually worth mentioning that from this experience, I've
(30:45):
learned how much power we hold in our pelvis. Tracy,
who I host retreats with, I think she has a
yoga class on Yoga Shati where I practice yoga, called
power in the Pelvis. I think we themed a class
for our camp metreat back last year all about this
female empowerment and it was called power in the Pelvis.
And at the time it was more kitchy, and yes,
I felt it during the yoga practice. But from this experience,
(31:07):
I think it's important to recognize how much intuition, power,
groundedness actually arises from our pelvic region and rises up
towards our brain as women, and how we need that
deep connection to our pelvic region, call it the chakra,
call it whatever you want to call it, but there's
something happening in our bodies men, and at least I
(31:30):
can speak for women. I don't know about men, but
a lot of who we are and our power does
arise from there. And I lost all of my power
in that moment. So the sheet goes up and technically
I could not feel any pain, but I felt a
lot of tugging and discomfort. I'm not discomfort, just tugging
that I know would cause discomfort if I could feel.
(31:51):
And I just kind of lied back and I disconnected,
And during that time, a lot of things came through
my mind.
Speaker 3 (31:58):
Number one was.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Like this feeling of somebody who I don't have any
known sexual trauma. Thank god, you know, no overt obvious
things in my life happened. But it was almost like, wait,
and this is like very weird to say, admit, share
those types of thoughts with you, But it was almost
like do I, because why does this feel so scary
for me? And I think the truth is you don't
(32:19):
need to necessarily have trauma sexually to as a woman
feel really vulnerable and scared. I think that you know,
as a woman, we also go through life and maybe
experience things and don't necessarily classify them as trauma, but
we look back and Okay, that wasn't right type of thing.
But I think it's important for me to caution this
for anybody who has known sexual trauma and finds themselves
(32:42):
in this situation to be prepared that it might bring
up some memories, emotions, feelings, powerlessness, all of that. I did, however,
speak to one of my best friends after this, who
has gone experienced unfortunately rape, and I asked her about
a same situation she had to be in medically, and
she's like, oh, I just dissociate. So I also think
(33:03):
that people that do have extreme trauma develop really strong
coping mechanisms to being in positions where they do feel
vulnerable worth mentioning. So as I'm lying back there, you know,
I know that I'm there. I need to trust, I
need to just be there, and my head is just
spinning with is this the right decision? And then it's like,
oh my god, I forgot to even tell my baby
verbally in my belly that this is what I'm like doing.
(33:26):
And I'm somebody that part of my philosophy is to
communicate everything with my daughter solely. She's three and a
half now, but starting when she was about two, it
kind of I realized how detrimental it was to treat
babies in utero out of utero, like.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
They can't understand.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
And I realized, all of a sudden, there's this fear
pulsating through our bodies and babies feel what we're feeling.
And I didn't prep the baby, and so first I'm
trying to just kind of let the baby know we're safe.
Speaker 3 (33:53):
I'm here, Mommy's here. And then I.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
Find myself really overwhelmed in a beautiful way, whelmed by
the presence of all of the females in my life,
my good friends, a lot of the women who come
on my MEA treats, Tracy who I collied them with,
like I've had really strong sisterhood moments by way of
the meat treats, the retreats that I host, and I
felt the presence of these women who haven't necessarily gone
(34:18):
through this at all, but I felt the power of
them behind me, and that honestly carried me through. I
found myself humming, which is a very natural way to
soothe the nervous system. But it wasn't something I was like, Oh,
what tools do I have? You know, it's how I
work on soothing solely, and it's also how I get myself,
I guess, through hard times. And the one thing that
(34:40):
I also didn't want to do was kind of let
them know that I was scared. I don't know why,
but I didn't want them to know that I was
so upset and so scared because it almost felt like
my reaction that was happening to me, this big sense
of being scared, was displaying itself bigger than it was.
And maybe that's my own fear right now of just
being like I was scared shitless period that I have
(35:02):
to kind of be like, no, it wasn't really that scared.
I was just presenting scared, But it did feel like
my emotions were kind of this like runaway horse, and
I inside knew that I was safe, but I was
there for myself, and although I was disconnected from my
low body, I was able to retend to myself in
that scary moment. The procedure finished and they rolled me
(35:26):
back to Evan again. I couldn't use my legs at all,
and the second I saw him after I had just
kind of stopped crying, I just started crying again.
Speaker 3 (35:33):
He's like, what's wrong, and I was like, no, just
like it was just it was just a lot.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
It was a lot more than I was expecting, and
he was super, super, super supportive and understanding. I think
a lot of times we don't think like men can
be when we go through these female experiences. He wasn't
in the room, but he was incredibly empathetic, and I
really appreciated that versus downplaying what I had experienced, because,
like I said, everything went well with the procedure, Like
(35:57):
there's the note from the doctor and the sign of
everything is going to say everything went well, so why
is she crying so hard? But two things can be true.
Things can go really well and they can still be
really hard emotionally. And then the fun part really began because,
like I said, we were expecting to leave like eleven
thirty twelve, and as soon as they wheeled me back
to Evan, I knew, like the way I couldn't feel
(36:19):
my body and like this feeling isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
Speaker 3 (36:32):
Because I've had this procedure.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
A nurse is going to come check on me every
fifteen minutes to check on how much blood is coming out.
So every fifteen minutes, the nurse comes over checks. At
one point they're like, okay, it's been a while, you've
had ivy full of fluid.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
It's time to.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Now urinate, and once you urinate, you can leave. But
like I said, I still could not feel my body,
and therefore I didn't know how to pee, Like never
in my life have I not known how to pee,
But here I was like being like, I don't know
if I can do that, which is a very strange
way to find yourself at thirty six years old. So
(37:08):
the nurse is like, okay, we got to get you
to go pee. They help me kind of swing my
legs back around the table and try and walk to
the bathroom. I have some feeling in but when I
eventually stand up, well, actually, as I'm sitting it, let
me just tell you, it felt like I was sitting
on like a blown up balloon, Like I felt four
feet above the actual thing that I was sitting on.
Like my whole little body just completely numb, which is
(37:31):
felt very strange to not have proper proprioception with the
surfaces that I was touching.
Speaker 3 (37:37):
So they stand me up.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
I'm kind of holding on to them, and I just
feel liquid going down my leg and I'm like, oh
f Like, the only time I've ever had liquid going
down my leg is when I had my period when
you can't control bleeding, and I'm like, okay, I must
be bleeding, and she looks and she's like, you are
urinating on yourself. I'm like, okay, great, off to a great,
non humiliating start. Here walks me over to the bathroom
(38:01):
because they need to catch and measure two hundred ce
seeds of fluid before they can discharge me. I walk
over and I get one hundred ccs out, and again
I can't feel anything. I don't even know if I'm peeing,
and Evan's in the bathroom with me, and I literally
just feel like I'm one hundred and fifty years old.
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Like it is a crash course in what it's like
to get.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Old and be humiliated and be dependent on people that
you don't know and people that you do know and
have no control over it and just surrender to the
whole thing. But as I'm sitting on the toilet, I
just feel myself vageling is kind of the term that
evenueses where I just feel lightheaded and almost like I'm
gonna throw up. I felt my body temperature change. I
(38:42):
was a normal temperature before, and I felt myself getting
really hot and I kind of just had to like
lean over to the right. I'm like doing it right now,
and I'm like, no, I'm not good, and they just
start like pumping me with sugar again. They're like, here,
have some apple juice. Meanwhile, I just had a juice
before I knew that it wasn't sugar related. But my
body is just not adjusting properly to anything. I'm like, okay,
(39:04):
I need to go lie back down. So they lie
me back down, they put ice packs on me, all
of that. Another thing I forgot to mention is that
when I did come back from the anesthesia, I was
very itchy all over. No visible rashes, but just itchy.
It was like my chief complaint, and in hindsight it
was the anesthesia in my body. But the nurses were
(39:25):
a little bit like perplexed, and Evan wasn't like, yeah,
that's a very normal sign of anesthesia. So just mentioning
again for anybody that has anesthesia spinal in general, that
this general sense of itchiness nowhere near the location of
where they placed it might happen to you. So they're like,
we're going to give you more fluids and you will
have to again Sti'll p two hundred CC's in full.
(39:46):
So my hundred ccs from before I'm going to count
before we can discharge you. I'm feeling terrible. I'm in
no rush to go. I haven't thought we were packing
the bag up, and I'm like, we're we're not going
anywhere for a very long time. Eventually I go to
the bathroom again. This is probably a couple hours later
at this point, maybe twelve thirty, one thirty and ipe
(40:08):
again and one hundred come out.
Speaker 3 (40:09):
But again I'm not peeing. It's just like coming out
of my body.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
And they're like, okay, this doesn't even make sense, like
you have to have more fluid in you than this.
We need to know if you are forgetting the word
right now. But something that can happen after anesthesia as
you withhold the urine, and that can be problematic and
they need to put in a catheter, which I was
grossly opposed to. But they're like, let us see what.
Speaker 3 (40:34):
We have to do here.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
So they come over with a bladder scan or scan
my bladder. They're okay, you have seven hundred and eighty
c season there you're just withholding. I'm like, okay, I
think I can do it. Just give me more time.
Before we know it, it's like four o'clock and I
still can't feel my body again. My procedure was at
eight thirty was supposed to last one hour the medication,
(40:56):
and here I was many hours later, still not being
able to feel my body properly, and still not able
to urinate on my own and kind of afraid to
stand up. Everything felt very intense, and all of a sudden,
I find myself in deep pain, like crippling over pain,
and I'm like, okay, you know, I know that there's
urine in my body, but like, let me try and
(41:16):
get up and walk. So I need assistance walking and
I'm walking terribly. I'm like keeled over, can barely take
a step. And I see the worry in Evan's face,
like what's wrong? And I could see what's flashing through
his eyes, which is like are you in labor right now?
And I felt in my own body am I in
labor right now? Like this is such intense feelings. Now,
please keep in mind there's still medicine in my body,
(41:36):
so I can't discern anything other than extreme cramp pain
that I'm having. I take like three or four steps,
you know, heavy breathing, really not doing well, and I
sit down on the toilet. Still can't urinate as I
normally would, but liquid comes out of me, and as
soon as it does, I feel the release of the
cramp and okay, I'm not in labor. I just had
(41:58):
to pee really bad. After that, everything kind of smooths
out and I'm able to get discharged. I think it's
like four thirty five at this point, definitely not feeling
like myself, but feeling a little bit better. Still a
little numb, but it's definitely wearing off.
Speaker 3 (42:14):
And honestly, it was one of.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
Those days that just kind of surprise rocked me, and
I took to my Instagram and shared that I was
in the hospital, which I wouldn't normally do because I
wasn't sharing that I was pregnant, and it opened up
a box of worms of questions and concerns which I
didn't mean to concern or worry people. But in that moment,
when I was feeling super vulnerable post procedure I came out,
(42:36):
I kind of took to Instagram the same way that
I used to, where I share things in real time
with that heavy emotion. And like I said in the beginning,
there's pros to that and cons to that, depending on
the situation and who you are, But in that moment,
it just kind of felt right to me to share
that really.
Speaker 3 (42:52):
Vulnerable moment and it was just a lot.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
It was just a lot that day, and again I
feel like I'm having a really hard time. I'm really
like believing that it was a lot because everything medically
went right.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
Nothing went wrong they could have.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
I've read some surclage scarier stories since then, but things
have gone well so far during the procedure and from
my post visits now where we continue to measure my
cervix and I kind of truck through that week very slowly,
and by the time Saturday came, which was almost a
week later, I found myself with a bout of insomnia
(43:27):
Friday into Saturday, so like five days later, and the
next day, in my exhaustive state, I found myself breaking
down even further. But it was kind of the necessary
breakdown that I needed. And sometimes for me exhaustion which
I hate. I hate being exhausted, I hate insomnia, but
sometimes exhaustion is the doorway to my truth and what
(43:49):
needs to come out because all of my barriers that
I keep up to keep guarded to not break down,
that I have in place during regular life, like they
come down when I'm tired to think. For most people
is probably true. And it was in this day that
I again just like the emotions of the day just
came over me. You know, I really appreciate the medical
(44:11):
attention that I got, but also during the procedure in
an operating room, nobody did anything wrong. I really feel
like I lost my humanness. Doctor's talking over me, the
doctor talking to the anesthesiologist saying, you know, put in
blah blah blah antibiotic. I was never even like, Lisa, Okay,
we're going to be giving you this antibiotic, not that
(44:33):
I would have opposed it, like at that point I
was in the doctor's trusting hands. But once the anesthesia
kicked in, although I was fully mentally there, it felt
like everybody stopped.
Speaker 3 (44:42):
Talking to me.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
And from there I really sunk down into this really deep,
lonely place. And with my daughter when she's going through
anything medical, whether it's even just visiting a doctor, I'm
always like, okay, and the doctor's gonna come over and
put the stethoscope on your chest and I warn her
where this was like, once the medication kicked in, the
doctors were laser focused on the procedure and no longer
(45:05):
treated me as if I was in the room until
it was over, and it's not a knock to them,
you know. I think running this by Evan, it's he's like, yeah,
once we like zero in on the procedure, we're going
in on the procedure. It is really hard for a
human brain, which is like, this is not a complaint
of how I was treated, It's just something that happened
that I would have benefited if I was spoken to
(45:26):
a little bit differently from the nurse or the resident
or someone else in the room kind of like telling
me what was going on. But it does make you
feel like you're not even there and things are happening
to your body, and that's a very scary feeling experience
all of that, and when medications are being thrown in.
I think in the beginning I did say, like, can
you just let me know what you're doing what you're
(45:48):
doing as you're doing it, and I think the resident
said okay. But again as they like zeroed in, it
was kind of radio silence, and that left me feeling
really alone and scared and not aught atonomous, Like that's
that's the word. That was kind of what I was
really wrangling with the day when my guard came down
and this feeling of although nothing happened, just feeling very
(46:10):
violated and feeling out of control and not being able
to make choices. And I don't know, all this stuff
just like came up for me and it was just
important for me to process. And here we are now
two weeks out from the procedure exactly, and I am
feeling a lot better. I don't love having a foreign
object in my uterus. Like I said, I did not
(46:33):
do a lot of pre research before. Since the procedure,
I've done a little bit more. I've googled what a
cerclage looks like. It totally freaks me out and I
don't love having this, but I am, I guess grateful
for it because hopefully it is keeping me and the
baby safe and put and you know, avoiding devastating consequences
(46:54):
on the other hand, And that's why, you know, medical
stuff can be really complex. I think a lot of
people in the health and wellness space are very.
Speaker 3 (47:01):
Quick to.
Speaker 1 (47:03):
Black and white medical things, and they're not black and white.
It really needs to be assessed on a need be situation,
on an individual basis, and it is something that I
do struggle with having medical intervention and as somebody who's
not even religious, just knowing that, like this is man
interfering with God's plan. This maybe could be its own
separate podcast, which I don't think I want to dive
(47:25):
into today, but it is something that I really do
struggle with. But at the same time, I'm grateful for
the option and clearly one that I took. So here
we are, twenty six weeks. I think now things are
looking good. Doctor has given me, you know, clearance to
travel with this. I'm not on bedrest. It's still like
take it easy, don't lift heavy, don't do too much,
(47:47):
which I'm definitely not. I'm having pelvic pain regardless of
the cervix anyway, and I'm kind of just in my
season of really slowing down, learning how to take care
of my body without movement as I know it, and
connecting to this baby in all sorts of ways because
not gonna lie. It's also really hard to connect to
(48:09):
this baby when there have been so many obstacles to
get here and during it, and sometimes I feel like
I forget that.
Speaker 3 (48:15):
I'm not alone.
Speaker 1 (48:16):
I'm not alone, not alone in any way, shape or form,
and that's kind of where my focus is right now,
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