(The 3rd blog in my series about my very personal, unpleasant pregnancy experience. Please read these posts in order from Part 1 onward before reading this one, otherwise it’ll all be out of context. WARNING: These are NOT cheery posts. They are a real, authentic, warts and all account of my quite horrible pregnancy experience, while managing CFS and the Electrosensitivity that developed during the pregnancy. Please be cautious when reading these posts. What happened to me is very unlikely to happen to you. What happened to me is VERY unusual, but I need to tell the story in case it helps even one other person!)
Half Way There … And It Felt Like It Would Never End!
At that mid-point of my pregnancy we were still hopeful that my unusual electro-sensitivity was just a rare pregnancy-related symptom that would go away as soon as I gave birth (along with the heartburn, constipation hip pain, groin pain) we had heard of some people who were unable to use computers during pregnancy, so that gave us hope that it wasn’t just another weird and wacky Louise symptom manifestation, and maybe. I would go back to normal afterwards.
Due to the obvious depression/despair I was experiencing as a result of my WTF/OMG pregnancy, I sought help from a maternal health nurse for some ante-natal counselling. She was a fantastic, no B.S, pragmatic lady who I liked immediately. I had never heard of ante-natal depression, only post natal, but Libby assured me it was something a lot of women suffered from, especially when their pregnancy symptoms were severe. The mix of grief and anxiety I had around the electrosensitivity, plus the ever-present nausea and heartburn, meant I wasn’t enjoying anything (except the escape into sleep at night).
Constant nausea, in my experience, is one of the biggest causes of depression – or it was for me. It affected my physiology and psychology even more than the headache pain. I didn’t think a counsellor could help with my extreme circumstances, which were causing the depression, and I was right, but it did help to have someone to talk to (my obstetrician was very nice, but was only concerned with my baby-making vitals, which in his eyes were ‘excellent’ – never mind the low blood pressure that made me weak and dizzy, as long as I didn’t have high blood pressure, he had nothing to worry about!
Unlike most women, I lost 18 kgs during pregnancy. I started at my highest ever weight (to that point) of 63kg, and ended the pregnancy (pre-birth) at 62kg. After the birth process and all its excess fluids were gone (and bubba was out), I was a tiny and very unhealthy 45kgs.
Fatigue, Heartburn & Management
From a CFS point of view, except for the first few weeks and the last few weeks I would have to say I wasn’t any more fatigued than usual. I did not, however, have the full-on adrenal fatigue (glandular fever-type fatigue) prior to pregnancy like I had at other times. Overall, the main reason I felt very tired during pregnancy was due to the heart burn/nausea preventing me from resting during the day. If I could have rested I would have been much better, I think. I used hot showers at about 5pm to battle the fatigue and also warm me up (I was living in a house with no heating in a Ballarat winter!). I could only ever sit up in a bath (couldn’t even slouch), but it was something I used occasionally.
Despair
If you haven’t already picked up from my other blogs, I am a person who looks on the bright side most of the time or I can find a bright side in most things. What threw me during my nightmare pregnancy was my inability to find a bright side. Anne of Green Gables was my idol for a reason! 🙂 Even Pollyanna would have struggled.
I think I was so much in despair I couldn’t even enjoy things I usually loved, like reading and writing. When I look back I see there was also a little bit of tantrum throwing going on too –ie. ‘You’ve taken away my TV, my music (pre ipods folks!), my car, my heater, my phone? Stuff you if you think I’m going to enjoy anything else you have to offer (“you” being the Universe, God etc as mentioned earlier. There was a bit of “if I can’t have those things (stomp foot), I don’t want anything” (metaphorically laying on the floor, kicking and punching the carpet. (I would have actually done these things if not for the bloody heart burn and hip pain!)
Adapting – MacGyver-style (with a few Ninja tricks thrown in!) 🙂
But ever-adaptable Louise (The Get Up And Go Guru!! 😉 did find ways to adjust and get through the day. The showers, as mentioned above, helped. I’d even put the radio on while in the shower as I felt the water somehow blocked the EMR (imagined or not I got 1 or 2 songs to lift my spirit :-)).
I also bought 8DD batteries at a time for my huge boombox and found I could listen to the radio. Playing CDs (pre MP3s remember!) ran the batteries out fast, and FM radio used them up faster than AM radio, so Melbourne’s 774 ABC AM radio was my staple (and still is!). I could pick up a Melbourne sports channel – SEN– at times, and sometimes some other AM channels (but I preferred the ABC overall). Sport had long been my passion, so footy on a Friday night and on weekends was much enjoyed (Thank you David Parkin, Peter Schwab and Co!).
Every day just before dusk I’d go for a 10-15 min shuffle (to call it a walk would be a disservice to walkers!) and put the gas heater on full bore so that for about 15-30 mins after I got back the house was warm. After that I wrapped myself up in layers of clothes, dressing gown, beanie, gloves etc, covered my legs with a rug and sat bolt upright at my kitchen table. I’d eat my very healthy soup, vegie frittata or chicken fillet and baked vegies, still feeling ill, but not as ill as when I tried to skip a meal (little Sophie obviously objected to having no food! Still does! ;-)). And at around 8:30pm I’d finally be able to go to bed with my heat pack, propped up on 3 pillows (to ease the heartburn), and escape the misery of the day into blissful sleep
At about 5-5:30am I’d wake and the heartburn/nausea would start so I’d be up for the day. Oh joy! Late in pregnancy I discovered sipping watered-down liquid magnesium – milk of magnesia – would usually settle my heartburn enough to get me back to sleep for a few hours longer. Around the same time I also found eating a nashi (a newly discovered fruit in my repertoire that was gentle on my tummy) and then going back to bed was another way to get back to sleep – it was enough to ease the nausea but not too heavy to keep me awake.
I developed some routines to help my days go a bit faster (though they still seemed to drag!). On Wednesday I’d sit at my kitchen table and chop up veggies for my veggie soup while listening to the radio. I’d then cook the soup and put some in the fridge for the rest of the week and some in the freezer for when I didn’t want to cook. I did similar on Thursday with a vegie frittata. These were my lunches when D wasn’t home (he always worked day shift Wednesday and Thursday).
It doesn’t seem much now, but those simple dishes would help give me some direction in my day/week, and also ensure I had healthy meals when I needed them. I truly couldn’t have cared less if I ate 2 minute noodles every day if they didn’t make me nauseated, but if I ate anything but the healthiest, simplest food my body (or my baby) would create even worse nausea and heartburn than I already had. Ditto if I skipped a meal.
One night a week I’d have a great friend from my Honours class come over for dinner and cards, and another night I’d have another good friend over for dinner (D worked 4 days of evening shift – 3-11pm). This forced me to cook a decent meal and also forced me to socialise. Most of all it provided a distraction from my own internal misery.
Another high school friend dropped around most Sundays demanding I brew her some herbal tea (in her bouncy, bright, bossy way that made me step out of my misery for a few moments and get in action – which was what she intended! :-)). The same friend turned up most Friday nights to play cards or board games and even got me singing some nights – both of us loud and out of tune, but providing lots of laughs. (Those friends were priceless in their contribution to my life at that time. You can’t buy that sort of generosity, and I will be ever grateful to them all).
Cards, Trivial Pursuit, Othello … More Cards, Trivial Pursuit, Othello 🙂
Cards, Trival Pursuit and Othello became the mainstays of entertainment in our household, with my dinner guests learning to love Othello especially (and beating me in it regularly!). (Othello – also known as Reversi – was a game a friend had given us one Christmas that we’d never opened. It turned into a great favourite and still is to this day with my daughter and I). D and I played card game after card game – 500 with 2 dummy hands, Canasta, and another one that was great, but I forget – still managing a lot of laughs despite my melancholy demeanor and the chilly house. We knew the Trivial Pursuit questions almost by heart as we went through the boxes several times.
So with the radio, card games, board games, and cooking, I got through my seemingly-endless days.
Family Support
Having company kept me boosted, though sometimes the depression had such a grip I couldn’t fully enjoy my friends or my gorgeous husband. I didn’t have family living close by, but I had lots of visits, although mainly on the weekend. I dreaded when it came time for them to leave and felt a sort of anxiety as I waved them off. Another week to endure!
My in-laws were amazing, especially after I’d had Sophie, but also while I was pregnant. Unfortunately my mother-in-law was fighting her own health battle – one she finally lost to cancer when Sophie was 9 months old. To this day, my former father-in-law is a wonderful support to both myself and Sophie.
Read Part 4 of this CFS and Pregnancy Blog Series (Due To Be Published on 22 April 2014)
Read Part 1 Here & Part 2 Here
PS. Related links: “Allergic To Electricity”: My Story With Electrosensitivity, Trapped In My Body: CFS, Pregnancy and Electrosensitivity, The Dilemma of Pain: An Unusual Choice, CFS and Pain: A Silent War On An Internal Battlefield