Topic : 04/12 Twin Tug of War

I agree with you Dr Phil that she should not be locked up.  We adopted a beautiful child a couple of years ago and was fortunate to be in contact with the mother prior to and after the birth of our baby.   If I found out within WEEKS of getting the baby, that the mom was ill when she signed the papers and wanted the babies back, I could not live with myself, no matter how much I love the baby, if we kept the baby(s).  We know she wanted them, she went through invitro.  I have a question for her sister.  If she was talking about adoption for the twins, and you knew she wasn't well, why didn't you volunteer to take care of them for her until she got better?  Maybe she felt she didn't have any other options.  I feel sad for her and pray that the twins a returned to her soon.

I gave birth to a healthy son in January of 2007.  However, It was not an easy road for me.  I was extremly ill for the first four months of my pregnancy.  I lived on my bathroom floor and threw up all day long.  My mother didn't work and would come to take care of me every day. I lost close to thirty pounds.  My doctor never told me there was a name for what I had, he only would say that I had extreme morning sickness.  I was admitted into the hospital on several occassions due to dehydration.  Eventually I had a pick line put into my arm so that I could have 24 hour I.V.'s at home with home health nurse care.  Eventually my arm started to swell from the pick line and it had to be removed.  After two days without the I.V's I had to be admitted to the hospital again at which point they gave me surgery to put a groshan catheder in my chest.  I was pregnant so I had to have the surgery awake with no pain medication.  I had some local anisthetic, however, it was a horrifying experience.  With this cathedar they fed me TPN until I was able to eat on my own again.   Lucky for me after four months my symptoms subsided and I had a normal pregnancy from that point on.  Until I saw the Dr. Phil show I felt alone with my struggles.  It is nice to know that this illness has a name and that I am not the only one that has suffered with it.  Thank you Dr. Phil for bringing light to this illness. 

I too had this condition with my second child 21 years ago.  After 2 months of vomiting my ob-gyn put me in the hospital for an intravenous drip.  Fortunately for me and the baby, my condition improved, but I was sick every day until my pregnancy was completed.  I never realized just how horrendous this disease could be, and I was one of the fortunate ones.  Had this been my first pregnancy I probably would not have had any more children.  The curious thing was that given the fact that I was so sick, I thought I was carrying a girl, since my first delivery was a boy and I felt fabulous the whole time.  But surprise, surprise, I had another boy.

 

I cannot believe that this poor woman is sitting in jail for kidnapping her own childfren that she was coerced into giving up for adoption.  Shame on those who take advantage of a woman in  such a debilitated state , and  then take away the very thing she has tried to protect.  I thought adoption laws were  fairer than that.  You get 3 days to change your mind on purchasing a home, take out a loan etc.  What is wrong with this picture???

I had to be awake with the center line = when they put it in...  Because I was not over 20 weeks along.  It was the worst being awake in the surgery room - and being velcro down and listening  to the doctors and stuff..   And having it removed was the worst pain ever -- with it being grown into me by then and nothing to help with the pain..  I can remember being held down by the nurses as they removed it and telling them I could feel everything and crying..  I totally felt the same way as you did..  

I suffered from severe HG a few years ago - after being hospitalized for about 4 weeks I was finally sent home with "visiting nurses" coming to care for me - there was nothing more they could do at the hospital (I should mention it was a Catholic Hospital), so they finally sent me home.

 

I was on a Zofran pump 24/7 - also getting a demand bolus as often as permitted and it did nothing for me.  They tried steroids, reglan, etc. and nothing worked.  I kept getting sicker and no one knew what else to do.  There would be conference calls with other medical professionals but no answers.  My HCG levels kept climbing to numbers no one had ever seen before and I kept getting worse.  I had a pic line, TPN therapy - at the hospital I was getting heparin injections every 7 hrs to prevent blood clots b/c I was basically bed-ridden.  When I went home they added that (and lots of other meds) to my TPN bag.  It was a nightmare - my liver enzymes were bad, my heart rate was really high, my blood pressure was really low, my ketones were bad.  Every kind of test was done on me to see what else (aside from being pregnant) was wrong with me - and there was nothing else.  It was absolutely the worst time of my life.

 

My husband suffers from "male factor" infertility - which after 3yrs of trying - resulted in us having to do IVF.  To be 100% honest - and I know this is WRONG - I do have some resentment over the fact that "his" problem lead us to IVF and ultimately severe HG.  I don't have any reproductive issues - I'm fine - so on our first try with IVF I became pregnant with triplets.  When I first became ill I hoped that I wouldn't continue being pregnant with triplets, since with lots of triplet pregnancies all three don't always survive - but in my case it was a very healthy pregnancy and all three babies were thriving.

 

Finally after 11 weeks of pregnancy - it became clear that I was losing my battle with HG;  my condition started to deteriorate more rapidly, I was getting weaker, my heart rate/blood pressure were getting to the point where the nurses thought I would start going into shock.  I started not to care if I died because I just wanted it all to end.  I still remember having fantasies about drinking something - I hadn't been able to drink anything in well over a month.  I would dream about just drinking something because each time I tried I immediately vomitted.  But all through the illness I never stopped trying to eat - as sick as I felt, I did keep trying and I always vomitted.  But it didn't matter, b/c I was vomitting even when I ate nothing so it was as if trying to eat didn't really make me any sicker anyway.  We finally realized that we had a choice - to terminate the pregnancy and lose three lives or keep going and lose four lives.  We did the math - went to a different non-Catholic hospital where they immediately terminated the pregnancy.  I was so sick I had to go under General Anesthesia (thankfully - I couldn't have been awake for that);  when I woke up in the recovery room the nurses asked me if I wanted ice chips to help soothe my throat (where the ventilator had been).  I told her that I always throw up ice chips and she said 'honey, if you haven't vomitted by now, you aren't going to.'  I remember eating those ice chips - and not vomitting, even after hours went by and it was like a miracle to me.  My husband says that when I came out of the recovery room it was like someone just 'flipped a switch' - like one minute I was about to fall off the edge of a cliff and the next I was suddenly back on solid ground again.  I was hard to believe that after vomitting 24/7 for weeks upon weeks it could end so suddenly and it did.  It actually took another 2.5 months for me to get my strength back and for my bloodwork to go back to normal.  I couldn't stand up for long periods of time - my heart would always start racing and I would get dizzy.  When I took a shower I would have to rest before I stood up to get dressed.  My skin was like sandpaper from the dehydration, my hair was falling out from both the pregnancy and malnutrition.  Although I lost over 10% of my body weight during the illness my clothes still didn't fit because my stomach was 'large' from carrying triplets. 

 

SO - it was a nightmare to say the least.  I had moments where I thought I would never in my life be happy again after losing my babies - after making that choice;  I had moments where I truly believed that I should have died along with my babies, b/c then we'd at least be together.  Both the hospital and our priest recommended I go see the same therapist - so we went.  She gave us some great tools to work with and thanks to her support (and my priest as well) - I never got bogged down in the guilt of what I chose to do in terminating my pregnancy.  Although my priest is 100% against abortion - he even said that in my circumstances I had to realize that my life was precious too.  I'll never forget the big hug he gave me at a time when I was trying to put my life back together - it was a huge help to have his support.

 

Now I have to fast forward to TODAY - and tell you that I have the most beautiful son sleeping in the next room!!  He is adopted and just today I thought to myself as I watched him taking his nap - that he is just a little piece of Heaven here on earth!!  We took one entire year "OFF" after the HG before we began thinking about adoption.  I wanted to try and be happy again with my life "just the way it was" before we brought a baby into it.  And it took a little while, but my husband and I were/are happy and hopeful again, even after all we had been through. 

 

God Bless You all.

 

 I to suffered from hyperemesis with both my boys. Lack of understanding played a BIG role in my emotional well being. While compared to some women my journey with hyperemesis was lite. Unless you video tape everyday. No one will truly grasp the severity of this disease. I waited till after my first trimester to even mention that something was wrong, cuz i thought it was normal morning sickness. I waited so long to have children I would go thru anything to have one. My story does not differ though from the lack of understanding of employers, insurance and disability. even family memebers were often cruel. I was accused of anorexia, and other horrible things. I have forgiven them, but i have not forgotten. We are strong women brought to our knees dr phil, just by trying to be the one ting that every girl dreams of a mother. Nothing is more precious then a child. I feel that Allison should have been given a psychological exam, when she first considered adoption. If someone was not of sound mind to make a grave decision then help should have been provided. I think also the adoptive parents should be given some slack..sometimes it is hard to do the right thing when your heart has been given to a child. I do understand her grave situation and all . I do not quite understand why she kept going back and forth  with the adoption. Why did her family try not to help her more. You can tell by the pictures she was definitly ill. She does not deserve to be in jail. I think that the adoptive parents story should be told in order to get an accurate potrayal of this case. I am however glad that Hyperemesis was brought up,because the emotional as well as physical toll is devestating. I tell people to imagine having the flu 24/7 but no one believing you have the flu. You know you are sick, but no one gives you medicine or you can not afford it. Pretty soon you start thinking you are crazy, because if you actually were sick health care professionals would at least try to help you, but in actuality you are alone.

 I was so surprised to hear there was a name for such an illness like that.  It makes me go back 41 years ago when I was pregnant with my second daughter.  I was so sick the whole nine months and weighed 119 pounds when I delivered her and I'm 5 foot 6 in. tall.  My two daughters are 11 months apart .  I had an awful time trying to care for my first daughter with being so sick.  So I'm suspecting after watching your show, I may have had " Hyperemesis"  and maybe they didn't know anything about it back then.  I remember it took me a good ten years to start feeling human again after the birth of my last daughter.  I did very well with my first pregnancy but my second one was like living in hell.

Please educate yourself about HG. Women's lives are in danger with this illness if they are not taken seriously and do not recieve effective treatment. They fear for their life and their baby's life. These women are often traumatized from their experience. Many women do develop PTSS and PTSD from this illness. This is a very real and severe disease. Please do not diminish what its full effects can be without knowing what you are talking about.

 

Here is a great link for your reference so that you can better understand.

 

http://www.helpher.org/hyperemesis-gravidarum/complications/post-traumatic-stress.php

 

 

Here are a few quotes from this link :

 

People with histories of hyperemesis are at risk for PTSD. The physical and mental stress of having a potentially life-threatening disease (threatening them or their unborn child), not being believed by health professionals, receiving treatment for hyperemesis, and living with unexpected and possibly uncontrolled threats to one's body and life (and one's unborn child) during pregnancy are traumatic experiences for many hyperemetic women.

 

Hyperemetic women experience pain, distress, extreme fatigue, muscle weakness, incessant nausea and/or vomiting. The sensation of suffocation that accompanies forceful, unrelenting retching or vomiting can be quite traumatic. In fact, inducing that sensation is a torture technique that is documented to cause psychological trauma.

 

 For hyperemesis women, the stressful incident may be related to frequent episodes of vomiting, many relapses with a worsening of symptoms, painful or stressful procedures, fear of death, loss of unborn child, complications such as severe infection or convulsions, scary scenes such as vomiting blood, treatment delays or insufficient treatment, and not being taken seriously. Some women may also experience abandonment and abuse, causing further trauma.

 

 

Here is one more quote:

 

PTSD is defined as the development of certain symptoms following a mentally stressful event that involved actual death or the threat of death, serious injury, or a threat to oneself or others. These events may include being diagnosed with a potentially life-threatening illness. In the case of hyperemesis, the illness threatens the baby and mother if left untreated or inadequately treated. Many hyperemetic women fear death, especially those with more severe symptoms that do not respond to prescribed treatment.

 

 

 

 

Thank you, I'm not the only one who thought this way.

I've read many of these posts and my heart does go out to those who have suffered or who are currently suffering from this dibilitating disease, I'm not sure if I did or not I heard everything else from my Doctor, and yet the rest went through with the pregnancies, and I wonder how many would've signed the adoption papers? Not once but TWICE?

Like I said before, I want to delve more into it, because I think there is more to it.

Usually I am very sympathetic to adoptive parents who find themselves in a custody battle with biological parents. In this case however, the whole time they have been bonding, she has been crying for her babies. If they had given the babies back to her in the beginning they wouldn't be facing the eventual heartbreak they will face when, God willing, these babies go back to their mother, as they should.

Secondly, this law that does not allow for reconsideration of adoption is absurd and needs changed NOW! No mother should ever be faced with not having time to be able to clear her head and think ,once the pressures off. Most states allow something like 6 months. I believe that is what we faced when my parents adopted my little brother. We all knew the birth mother had a six month window and we celebrated when we knew her time was gone. But  this situation is just wrong on many levels.