We got some devastating news on Thursday evening. I don't know how I will ever live through this..
Background:
My mom is 53 and has been very ill for over 3 years with an illness called gastroparesis -basically it means that her GI system's nerve supply has stopped working, so food does not move through at all, and she gets no nourishment. If she tries to eat, she gets violently ill from the food never being digested, so she has lost a dangerous amount of weight - she's emaciated. Without a significant change in this illness her doctor feels it will prove terminal before the year's end because she will simply starve to death. There is a procedure that has just begun being done that could potentially save her life (implanting a pacemaker, like the ones for heart patients, into her stomach to stimulate nerve activity). Insurance has denied the claim and the appeal on the grounds that its experimental and thus not covered. She has a j-tube in place for feedings but her body is totally rejecting the feedings.
She's been sick before but she's begin talking like someone who is near their end. She's emaciated, down to 80lbs. She has no strength left. I see her look worse every day, and I come home and cry for hours. Now her lung doctor has found masses in her lungs as well. She also has rheumatoid arthritis. Despite all of this, she has spent her life active in the church, gardening, homeschooling, devoted to her kids and grandkids. She never complains, is never bitter. She has taken doula courses just so she can be helpful attending her daughters' childbirths.
So:
I am expecting a baby any day now and she's saying she is staying alive just to see this baby be born ( we've planned for her to catch the baby during our homebirth). My mom went in to see her doctor on thursday. Her body is totally rejecting the intestinal tube feedings, and her weight has fallen even more. Her doctor is of the opinion that there is just nothing else that can be done to keep her alive any longer, and he's advising hospice care. She can't have IV feedings (TPN) because of the almost certainty that she will contract MRSA and die of sepsis, and she cant eat, and the tube feedings are just going out as fast as they go in and causing her total agony. She's basically in the early stages of multi-organ failure. He knows about the baby, and he told her if I go overdue there's a good chance she won't be alive to see this baby be born. We're talking a matter of days or weeks.
I have no signs of impending labor. I spoke to her this morning and asked her how she was feeling, and she said she feels like I need to have this baby NOW.
I'm totally destroyed. I feel like Ground Zero. I feel like I have no physical or emotional reserves left to handle this.
Mom means the world to me, and she is the spiritual and emotional center of our family. She adores her grandbabies and is a paragon of her faith. She has taught me everything I know about being a wife, mother, friend, woman. I talk to her every day. The thought of a world without her terrifies me.
I had terrible PPD with my DS and am so scared of it coming back, especially if she is near death or gone when this baby comes or shortly after. I dont know how I can handle childbirth (we are hoping for an HBAC, after a very traumatic c-sect with DS), adjusting to having 2 kids and potential PPD without her. I am afraid that I won't know how to handle all the growing-up stages with my kids without her here to help. I'm afraid our family will fall apart without her, because she is the center of everything, and she keeps us all close. She's like the sun in our universe, and without her, the planets will all go spinning out into nothingness. I have 3 sisters ( one currently estranged), and I am afraid that I wont be able to hold everyone together when she's gone AND take care of a newborn and a 3 year old AND hold myself together. I feel so desperately alone already.
I have so many emotions attached to this that I am totally overwhelmed - fear, anger, anxiety, sadness, and ones I can't even name. People have told me that I can't mourn her before she is gone - that I need to focus on having as much good quality time as I can and save my grieving for when she's gone. But the fear is overwhelming me. I am religious and Mom is deeply religious, so I feel that when she dies she will be with Jesus, but then I feel this overwhelming anger of her being taken from us when we need her so badly. I'm praying constantly but don't know if He's listening. Terrified of my faith falling apart if God takes her away from me.
How do I deal with the smaller things? How do I explain this to my 3 year old? How do I get through postpartum depression alone? How do I not lose my milk supply? How do I keep breathing?
I'm totally terrified, and feel unable to function, much less birth a baby any day.
Background:
My mom is 53 and has been very ill for over 3 years with an illness called gastroparesis -basically it means that her GI system's nerve supply has stopped working, so food does not move through at all, and she gets no nourishment. If she tries to eat, she gets violently ill from the food never being digested, so she has lost a dangerous amount of weight - she's emaciated. Without a significant change in this illness her doctor feels it will prove terminal before the year's end because she will simply starve to death. There is a procedure that has just begun being done that could potentially save her life (implanting a pacemaker, like the ones for heart patients, into her stomach to stimulate nerve activity). Insurance has denied the claim and the appeal on the grounds that its experimental and thus not covered. She has a j-tube in place for feedings but her body is totally rejecting the feedings.
She's been sick before but she's begin talking like someone who is near their end. She's emaciated, down to 80lbs. She has no strength left. I see her look worse every day, and I come home and cry for hours. Now her lung doctor has found masses in her lungs as well. She also has rheumatoid arthritis. Despite all of this, she has spent her life active in the church, gardening, homeschooling, devoted to her kids and grandkids. She never complains, is never bitter. She has taken doula courses just so she can be helpful attending her daughters' childbirths.
So:
I am expecting a baby any day now and she's saying she is staying alive just to see this baby be born ( we've planned for her to catch the baby during our homebirth). My mom went in to see her doctor on thursday. Her body is totally rejecting the intestinal tube feedings, and her weight has fallen even more. Her doctor is of the opinion that there is just nothing else that can be done to keep her alive any longer, and he's advising hospice care. She can't have IV feedings (TPN) because of the almost certainty that she will contract MRSA and die of sepsis, and she cant eat, and the tube feedings are just going out as fast as they go in and causing her total agony. She's basically in the early stages of multi-organ failure. He knows about the baby, and he told her if I go overdue there's a good chance she won't be alive to see this baby be born. We're talking a matter of days or weeks.
I have no signs of impending labor. I spoke to her this morning and asked her how she was feeling, and she said she feels like I need to have this baby NOW.
I'm totally destroyed. I feel like Ground Zero. I feel like I have no physical or emotional reserves left to handle this.
Mom means the world to me, and she is the spiritual and emotional center of our family. She adores her grandbabies and is a paragon of her faith. She has taught me everything I know about being a wife, mother, friend, woman. I talk to her every day. The thought of a world without her terrifies me.
I had terrible PPD with my DS and am so scared of it coming back, especially if she is near death or gone when this baby comes or shortly after. I dont know how I can handle childbirth (we are hoping for an HBAC, after a very traumatic c-sect with DS), adjusting to having 2 kids and potential PPD without her. I am afraid that I won't know how to handle all the growing-up stages with my kids without her here to help. I'm afraid our family will fall apart without her, because she is the center of everything, and she keeps us all close. She's like the sun in our universe, and without her, the planets will all go spinning out into nothingness. I have 3 sisters ( one currently estranged), and I am afraid that I wont be able to hold everyone together when she's gone AND take care of a newborn and a 3 year old AND hold myself together. I feel so desperately alone already.
I have so many emotions attached to this that I am totally overwhelmed - fear, anger, anxiety, sadness, and ones I can't even name. People have told me that I can't mourn her before she is gone - that I need to focus on having as much good quality time as I can and save my grieving for when she's gone. But the fear is overwhelming me. I am religious and Mom is deeply religious, so I feel that when she dies she will be with Jesus, but then I feel this overwhelming anger of her being taken from us when we need her so badly. I'm praying constantly but don't know if He's listening. Terrified of my faith falling apart if God takes her away from me.
How do I deal with the smaller things? How do I explain this to my 3 year old? How do I get through postpartum depression alone? How do I not lose my milk supply? How do I keep breathing?
I'm totally terrified, and feel unable to function, much less birth a baby any day.
I wish there were something else I could say.
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