Conversations with Lisa, Part I

Hello, everyone!!! Well, Phoenix summer has officially set in!! Aack!! Ah well, we have great weather for at least 6 months out of the year!!

Before we get started, here's the life lesson for the day: One should never put one's cheese-making experiments ANYWHERE where a toddler can remotely reach them unless one wishes to spend an hour cleaning up a cheesy-smelling mess having the consistency of infant spit-up off of one's counters and appliances. Enough said.

Anyhow, I have had the honor of conversing with another HG mum, Lisa from Michigan, whose story is quite like mine - moderate HG two years ago and thinking of trying to conceive again sometime in the next year. She was so kind to email me her HG story, and has given me permission to post it here! Thanks, Lisa!!

In other HG news, I will be meeting with two local HG mums, Sarah and Jenna, this month to talk HG. I'm so excited!! I will post all about our conversation after the meeting. Sarah is the girl who has had hyperemesis twice, once moderate and once life-threatening, and I have posted her first HG story in this blog (second story coming soon). Jenna had life-threatening HG once, and she has written a book about it, "Body Mutiny: Surviving Nine Months of Extreme Morning Sickness," which I hope to read very soon. Here is her website:

http://extrememorningsickness.com/home_021.htm

And now, on to Lisa's story!!

"Here is a little of my background (some relevant to the story, some not so relevant) :)

"I was diagnosed with endometriosis when I was a freshman in high school. Over the course of the following 8 years I had 3 laparoscopies to remove the endometriosis and try to save my reproductive organs, so that someday I would be able to have children. During that time my
doctor also put me on birth control pills. I would take the first 3 weeks and skip the last week- immediately going to the next pack. Apparently this prescription was to prevent the endometriosis from growing more.

"During high school I met my husband. We were best friends throughout high school and started dating our senior year. We dated throughout college and married 2 years after we graduated college.

"We knew we wanted to start a family sooner than later- because the doctor warned that with my endometriosis, conceiving might be difficult. A little over 1 year after we were married (we were married August 2004) we started trying to get pregnant. I believe we conceived around the middle of Feb. 2006. I found out I was pg. the first week of March. I was doing great for several weeks. Then started getting nauseous. I figured it was normal and did the best I could. Pretty soon I was vomiting 6 + times a day- and could not eat, and whatever I did eat- would not stay down. I finally called my OB (I think this was around the end of March- so I was probably 8 weeks or so along). He gave me some *M/S* cures (ginger, sea bands, etc). Also told me about Benadryl and (not sure if it was B6 or Unisom)- at this point it did not touch the HG- I was probably too sick for it to kick in?!

"April 1st, I had thrown up over 10 times by noon, and could not walk. I called OB and he said to go to the ER. I received an IV (not sure what was in it. I was SO weak, I could barely talk). They gave me Reglan to start taking- and diagnosed me with HG. I took the Reglan for 2 weeks, and it did not help, if anything I was worse. I should have called my OB during that time, but I just thought this was somewhat normal. I didn't think there was anything he could do for
me.

"At this point I was around 13 weeks. I was down about 10% of my body weight. I finally called my OB and he had me come in. Fortunately, no ketones- but severely dehydrated.

"He then tried Tigan- nothing. I had DH do some research online and he learned about Zofran ODT. At this point I was down about 15% of my total body weight. We asked my OB for the Zofran ODT- and he wrote out an Rx right away. It worked miracles. Finally, by the beginning
on May I was headed on the right path. My insurance company was impossible to deal
with- the would not let me have any more Zofran ODT, and I started vomiting again. It took 2 days for my OB to convince them to let me have it. I took it until 37 weeks.

"I never tried phenegran. I took 2-3 (8 mg doses) of Zofran at my worst. Around 5 months, I went down to 4mg in the morning and 4 mg before dinner, then by 6 or 7 months I took about 2 mg first thing in the morning and that was it.

"In retrospect. I should have spoken up sooner, we should have been more proactive. I don't think I or my OB realized how severe it was. I should have said more, but I thought it was normal. DH and I have a meeting with my OB next week to discuss TTC, and how it would be
handled, we also have a meeting with an adoption agency tomorrow. We really want to weigh all of our options fully.

"If we TTC again, my MIL said she would come and take care of our daughter, take care of me, cook, clean, etc. She lives 10 min away and she and I are very close. DH said he would obviously be willing to do whatever is needed- he was great last time. Again, I am going to have MIL read your (Ashli McCall's) book- to make sure she truly understands what she could be *getting herself into*. I don't think she realized how bad it is/can be. I worry about my daughter though. IF we TTC, it will be this time next year when DD is around 2 or 2.5."