My Miracle Magnolia
“You must be so happy and relieved to have two beautiful miracle babies,” my doctor told me as I said goodbye at my last endocrinologist check up. What a great reminder and reality check his words were. I may struggle from time to time, but I have so much to be grateful for.
If you haven’t read my Endocrine Health and Postpartum Recovery blog post, here is a recap:
After delivering my first child, we discovered a brain tumor that is located on my pituitary gland. It prohibits my ovaries from working. I was told that I was extremely lucky to have even gotten pregnant with my first child. I was told that I would have trouble conceiving again, if at all. I was told that I had to take medication to shrink the tumor and hope that it is successful. A few more weeks went by and I started my period. I called my OB office and told them, and the response was “you’re shitting me...?! You don’t have a period with these tumors and we didn’t even start your treatment!” Thanks, God.
A few months later I had my annual check up at my OBGYN. I asked if it were safe to get pregnant since my levels were stable and all of my other endocrine issues were managed. I got the go ahead, and got pregnant within the next few days. Literally. Thanks, God.
Fast forward 3 months into my pregnancy with Magnolia, I started having nightmares. Horrible nightmares that showed terrible fate for my daughter and me. Many times I woke up my husband in the middle of the night to pray with me. I had an overwhelming feeling of fear for this pregnancy. I told Rob, my husband, more times than I can count that something was wrong. Something wasn’t right and we needed to pray every chance we could for our girl. Aside from these feelings, everything looked perfect! Until it wasn’t.
I started hurting in my joints and bones, not just pregnancy aches, but pain. I was freezing in the middle of the summer in south, La! I was dizzy and often had to catch myself before hitting the floor. I had horrible headaches. My heart was beating at 150 beats per minute half of the time. And the strangest thing of all, I was drinking 3.5 gallons of water A DAY. Obviously that means I had to pee...literally every 2 minutes.
I called my doctor more than once. Left messages voicing my concerns. I was told that pregnancy can make you thirsty and want to pee a lot. Especially at night. And to not drink more than 2 liters of water. I cried. Cried because that was impossible. I had to drink. It was like an obsession. I would shake and shiver if I wasn’t drinking.
It was a Friday evening and I stood over my kitchen counter and cried to my husband that I was so thirsty and scared. He told me to call the hospital and tell them. I was way too embarrassed. What will I tell them? “Hi. Yeah, I’m drinking a lot and I’m really thirsty...?” No. I refused. So, my husband locked himself in our bathroom and called the on-call physician and they told him, “Well, if she thinks she needs to come in, then come.” They even asked, “are you sure she didn’t drink 6 bottles of water, and not 6 liters today? That’s very hard to do.” I decided not to go, because it felt silly. Until my dad, who is also a doctor, called and said , “Baby, I think you have Diabetes Insipidus, go to the hospital now.” Reluctantly, we went to the hospital around 8 pm.
After many hours of being at the hospital and tons of blood tests later, a doctor came in to tell me to get comfortable because I was being admitted. I had Diabetes Insipidus. (Thanks, Dad.) This was caused by the tumor on my pituitary gland. We didn’t know exactly what the change was, since we decided not to do imaging while I was pregnant. Either it grew, I had a stroke, and the tumor bled, or it shifted.
I stayed in the hospital for a week because I was so severely dehydrated and my daughter didn’t have enough amniotic fluid.
I should mention that my nightmares of something going wrong was me bleeding out during a c-section. Well, in the hospital after blood draws, my blood wouldn’t clot as fast as it should. Then one day, I was alone in the hospital and a nurse came in and told me that I needed to call my husband because we would have to do an emergency c-section if Magnolia did not start responding well. OH my goodness, I felt like this was it. I know it sounds silly, but I was so terrified my nightmare was going to come true. I even went as far as to write a quick goodbye letter to my family in case I never got to speak to them again.
After a lot of trial and error, 1 accidental overdose causing swelling in my brain, and a LOT of blood test, we found a dose of medicine to stabilize me. I was discharged from the hospital a week later, with Mags still in my stomach. After that, I had 3-4 appointments a week to monitor the both of us.
We scheduled an induction at 39 weeks. The sooner we could safely deliver her, the sooner we could better understand my condition. The night before my induction, I went into labor. I delivered a beautiful HEALTHY baby girl shortly after. Thanks, God.
I never told anyone else, other than my husband about my fears during my pregnancy, until one day my dad came over and told me something shocking. At around 3 months into my pregnancy, he had an overwhelming feeling that he needed to pray for Magnolia and me. He told me that he had a reoccurring dream that I died giving birth to Magnolia because I bled out during a c-section. I started crying and cut him off. He tried to comfort me and I said, “Dad, you don’t understand..I had the same dream. The exact same fear. Since I was 3 months pregnant. I woke Rob up nearly every night to pray with me. I prayed so hard against this every day.” Tears came to his eyes. What I didn’t know was that when I called him from the hospital saying I may need a c-section, my dad had already reached out to my extended family and friends while I was in the hospital. He asked them to pray against this. I truly believe the Holy Spirit came to us to start praying against Satan. Thanks, God.
Pray, and pray hard. God is listening, and if you listen, He is talking back. He gives us warnings and hints. Our instincts are not coincidental, it’s God whispering in our ear telling us what to do. He tells us how to prepare. Trust Him.
ps. We can’t thank you all enough for the prayers.
