Eighteen Years Ago.......

Eighteen years ago tomorrow... and it could have been just yesterday. I sat in Dualla National School, a sixth class pupil... had just completed the weekly spelling test that we had every Friday. 20 out of 20. of course I did... that's the score I got every week... but this week was different. The nineteenth of January 1996, exactly a month after my 12th birthday at 12:25 in the middle of the day. My friend's Mother came to the classroom and spoke with the teacher. The whole class was instructed to go outside and I was told to pack up my things as I was going home early. I don't know why I didn't figure out at that point what was going on. My friend's Mother had just gotten a new car and we talked about this on the 5 minute journey home. Even when we got home and there were so many cars there and so many people in the kitchen as we entered the house, people putting their hand on my shoulder as I walked past them.... and I still didn't figure it out.
I went upstairs to my room, took off my coat and was hanging it up in my wardrobe when my Mother and a nurse entered my room and five words were spoken, five words that would change everything, five words that I remember to this day... 'Anne-Marie, Daddy's gone to heaven'. I froze. My Dad had been sick. He had lung cancer and after having one of his lungs removed and receiving the 'all clear', we found out that the cancer had spread to his brain and 'there was nothing more they could do'.

We'd known for 5 months that he was going to die, but somehow it never seemed real... how could it? I remember being 'helpful' for that 5 months. I would meet the hospice nurses when they called every day. I became very close to them, they became members of my family. The would hand me the batteries of the machine that they used, for the life of me I cannot remember what that machine was for, but I remember that my job was to use the battery tester and make sure that the batteries were working. I remember that they gave him this orange coloured liquid to help his bowels to move. He hated this liquid, said it tasted awful. As I look to the table to my right, I realise that orange liquid was probably 'Codalax', the same as I was given after my most recent surgery... and he was right... it does taste awful...!!!
In the last 2 weeks or so before he died, he was very very bad. I remember laying in bed one night and pleading with God to just take him because I couldn't watch him suffer anymore. How can a 12 year old little girl watch her Dad scream in pain and become completely helpless, watch him have to be carried everywhere like a small child because his legs are too weak to support him. This man who fought monsters from my bedroom when I was too scared of the dark, the man who held me on his shoulders so I could see over the crowd, the man who lifted me over fences and gates when we went on adventures through forests and fields, the man who jumped in front of my brother's horse to stop her because she got out of control when I was riding her, the man who suffered countless bruises on his ankles from helping me to improve my camogie skills, the man who carried me to bed and tucked me in when I fell asleep on the couch, the man who was my hero..... and I watch as they wheel his cold dead body into the back room of the funeral parlour... knowing that they will put the lid on his coffin and I will never see my Dad again.

My Dad died at 12:15 that day and I remember promising his still-warm body that he would always be a part of my life and that someday when I have a son, I would name him after my Dad. This became a bit of a joke with my oldest brother who shares the same name as our Dad. About 30 minutes ago, my Dad's youngest sister (My Godmother and beautiful lady that I was named after) posted a lovely poem on Facebook to recognise the 18th Anniversary of his passing and suddenly I realise that I made a promise to my Dad all of those years ago and this is the first time it has struck me... that is a promise I may not be able to keep. 

As I sit here and cry, I am reminded of something my Dad used to say 'You can do anything if you put your mind to it... and if you can't find a way, find a way to make one' 

I inherited a lot of things from my Dad... his blue/green eyes, his dark hair, his messed up sense of humour, his ability to write (my Dad was an amazing writer and poet and we spent many, many hours together just writing and putting stories together, and when we weren't doing that... we were singing and dancing or solving some crossword or puzzle), but probably the most useful things I got from my Dad were his sense of fairness, his problem-solving ability and his downright stubbornness. 

He fought til the very last second, he never gave up... right until he took his last breath, I hope that I can find the strength that he had and can find some way to keep the last promise that I ever made to my Dad.xx.

Happy Birthday Noah Bear.xx.

It's been a while since I've posted on here, not for any particular reason but I just haven't felt the urge to write or post anything on here recently.

Life has been pretty routine lately and I am very happy about that. We have decided not to even think about any more treatment til sometime next year at the very earliest, so this has been the first time in quite a number of years that I haven't been either preparing for treatment, going through some kind of treatment or recovering from some procedure or operation and I have to admit.... it is nice to just 'be' for a while.

I'd been suffering with some horrible headaches for about 6 weeks, I thought they were migraines but they were different to the migraines that I usually get and a lot more frequent. My Dr. has diagnosed them as cluster headaches and prescribed some sumatriptan nasal sprays and some preventative medication for me to take. The nasal sprays worked very well but they can only be taken twice a day and I was getting these headaches three or four times a day, so my Dr. thought it might be a good idea to try a preventative medication to try and keep the headaches away altogether.  I haven't tried this medication yet, but its now looking like I wont need to.

I mentioned it to Gordon in an email on Thursday and he responded telling me that he is fairly confident that he could help with these headaches at my appointment the following day.
When I got to Gordon's clinic on Friday, he asked me to lay on the table and he placed needles in both of my feet and then in both of my hands. The needles in my hands really hurt, he was moving them about and they were really uncomfortable. After a few minutes Gordon asked how my headache was and I told him that I could no longer feel any pain in my head. I had a sensation of there being perhaps a black shadow over my left eye, but definitely could not feel any pain. He explained to me that the headaches I was getting were related to a liver deficiency and the points he used in my feet were connected to my liver. He then told me that the points he used in my hands were anaesthetic points and so the combination of all of these points helped to make the pain go away.
Gordon left the room for about 15 minutes and when he returned, he took out those needles and asked me to lay face down on the table. He explained that he would be placing two needles in the back of my neck, right at the base of my skull. I wasn't at all comfortable with this idea. The needles didn't hurt at all, I barely felt them but I just couldn't relax knowing that I had needles in the back of my neck. Gordon said that he could tell that it was very much out of my comfort zone and he stayed in the room with me for the whole time that I had those needles in. He eventually removed those needles and I got up. The pain and sensations in my head had completely gone and I was feeling fine.
We chatted for a bit and then I left to go back to work. When I was about half way up the motorway, the pain in my head started to return. I pulled over the car with the intention of taking one of the nasal sprays. For whatever reason I started rubbing the back of my neck and placed my thumbs on the spots where the needles had been, instantly the pain went away. Any time I have felt twinges of headaches since then, I have put pressure on these points and it has killed the headaches straight away.

I knew today was going to be a tough day for me. Today would have been Noah's third birthday. It doesn't get any easier as the years pass by. I think of all the three year olds that I know (there's quite a few) and I think about the things that he should be doing now.
Patrick and I went to Switzerland when Noah was due, we just didn't want to be at home thinking about what should have been, we wanted to be able to have some good memories of that day. We went to this lovely silver store in the Old Town at Lucerne and got a beautiful silver bracelet engraved with Noah on the front and 23.6.10 on the back. We then bought a 'Name a star' gift set, which was just perfect because it came with a blue teddy bear. The teddy became 'Noah Bear' and he wears the bracelet around his neck all the time. He is just perfect.
Today has been hard, I've cried a bit, I've wondered a lot. I kinda regret not doing anything special today but in a way, I did what I needed to do for me... and that was absolutely nothing.
It will be an evening of serious cuddles with Noah Bear and shedding some tears and then tomorrow Noah Bear will once again sit beside our bed and represent our beautiful baby, until the next time I'm feeling a bit sad and needing some Noah Bear cuddles.

Guinness Book Of Records...???

My babies from the September transfer/October disaster would have been due yesterday and I genuinely thought I was doing ok about it. I did get a bit upset yesterday but wasnt anywhere near as bad as I thought it was going to be............... Until today.............

I bounced into Gordon's Clinic today, feeling really good, the sun was shining and I was really looking forward to the appointment. Gordon commented that he felt I was finally back to myself and said he was really proud of me for getting there. I then told him of the significance of yesterday and how I was doing surprisingly well about it... but it was at this point I found myself unable to make eye contact with him. It was only then that I realised that I really, really wasnt doing so well about it... and I knew that he could see it. It didnt take me long to get to the point of being so choked up I was unable to speak, I have no idea how long I lay there in silence, but at some point Gordon put three needles in my right wrist and forearm, he later informed me that these points are for grief and loss. I eventually began to open up and talk about what I was feeling, although I'm not entirely certain he heard most of what I was saying as I was crying a lot, not openly crying but crying from deep inside me, crying that kept getting caught in my throat and the tears just freely flowed.

I really don't know how long I was lying there, at some point Gordon left the room, when he returned we talked some more about what was going on and I made the comment jokingly that I should probably contact the Guinness Book of Records because I bet there aren't too many people who have lost six babies in the space of nine months.... I then made the comment that most women get to hold one baby inside them for the whole nine months... and of course that set me off again.

Gordon talked about how we are closer to reaching the point of carrying a pregnancy to full term than we ever have been, he said we are just one step away, he said that we have never had the answers that we have now and he reminded me of the progress we have made in the past 11 months.... from dealing with Clinical Intervention and frozen embryos to actually managing to get pregnant naturally, he told me that is a huge step and reminded me that being able to make that amount of progress while going through everything we have been through in that time is just amazing. Of course he is right (but don't tell him I said that ;-) ), we are more informed than we have ever been and the progress has been phenomenol.

At the end of the session, he reminded me of a promise he had made to me a long time ago, he said that he truly believes that I can and will have a healthy pregnancy and carry my baby to full term and he promised me that he would do everything in his power to help me achieve this. He also told me that he would never stop wanting to help me for as long as I was on this journey because that is how strong his belief is that I can have a healthy pregnancy and have a healthy baby at the end of the pregnancy.

I left there feeling a bit confused about how I was feeling and how quickly he was able to bring out my true feelings, I think he sprinkles the room with truth serum or something before I arrive because I never leave there with any feelings hidden and I always do feel better afterwards, usually straight away but I think I need to take a few days this time and allow myself to grieve for those two little angels, one which I lost to ectopic pregnancy and the other which I had to terminate two days later with low dose chemotherapy. I also need to get my head around the thought that this really is the end of an era, the IVF era of our lives. The transfer of those embryos was the last time we set foot inside the Fertility Clinic and now it truly feels like we can close that chapter in our lives. He has asked me to email him on Monday and let him know how I am doing then.

We are going to do this naturally, Gordon believes we can, we believe we can... so the only thing left to do is get fully better and then do it (no pun intended) !