I have a lot of faith and I believe in miracles. I believe in miracles because I have experiences them. The greatest miracle I received was having a baby after being told that I couldn’t conceive because of massive fibroid tumors. That baby is almost 12 years old.
I believed anything was possible after the miracle of conceiving and giving birth to my son. All I need to do is have faith and God would grant me the desires of my heart. What I desired most was to be married and have another child. My doctor even believed I could have another child. She believed this because she believes in God and in miracles just like I do. So I continued to pray, have faith and believe that I would have my miracle.
In 2011 by body started to change. My periods got heavier and I felt like I had cramps all the time. In January 2012 I finally went to see my doctor. She told me that the fibroids were out of control and that they were most likely causing the problems I was having. In February I had a D&C to help my periods not to be so heavy. It worked for a while and then I was back to square one. In July I had another D&C. This time it didn't help. In, addition my doctor found a large fibroid tumor inside my uterus that she didn't see before. This tumor was the cause of my heavy periods. In all of this I still had faith that I would have my miracle.
In October I had a myomectomy to remove the tumor. The surgery was unsuccessful. The tumor was calcified and the instruments being used were not powerful enough to cut through the tumor. I also started having complications during the surgery and it had to be stopped. At my followed up appointment my doctor to told me that the tumor inside my uterus significantly reduced my chances of conceiving. She went on to say that if I became pregnant it would be disastrous because the tumor continued to grow and literally crush the fetus resulting in a miscarriage. Even with all of this I held on to my faith and believed that God still had a miracle for me. I asked my doctor to try again. She agreed and ended my appointment with a prayer for the next surgery to be successful.
At the end of November I had another myomectomy to remove the rest of the tumor. I went into this surgery with high faith and belief that it would be successful this time. I woke up in recovery to my doctor standing by bed. She held my hands and told me that the surgery wasn't successful. I immediately burst into tears. My doctor dried my tears and said she was so sorry that she couldn’t do more. Then she prayed for me.
A week later I was at work (an hour away from home) and I started to hemorrhage. I called my doctor and she told me that I needed to get the ER in Milwaukee so she could see me personally. She asked me a lot of questions to ensure that I could drive. The drive back to Milwaukee seemed like it took forever. When I got to the hospital I couldn't se my doctor because she was called into an emergency surgery. I saw the on call OBGYN and resident instead.
After not one but two pelvic exams I was told that I needed an emergency hysterectomy. I immediately refused and gave my reasons why. My reasons were valid so the doctor made a deal with me. The deal was that if my labs came back normal she would treat my hemorrhaging with medication and let me go home and if the labs weren't normal I was headed to surgery. I agreed. My labs came back at the very lowest end of the normal range, but it was good enough to avoid having an emergency hysterectomy.
The doctor had a very serious conversation with me. She told me that had I not come to the ER that I would have hemorrhaged and died. She went on to say that keeping my uterus was threatening my life. She told me that if hemorrhaged again there was no guarantee that enough could be done to save my uterus or my life and that I needed to give what she was saying some serious thought.
To slow down the bleeding I was given the equivalent five birth control pills through an IV. I was also given a prescription for birth control pills. I had to take the entire pack of birth control pills over the next seven days stop the bleeding altogether. With all of this I still had faith that I would have another child. I just had to continue to have pray and have faith.
The following week I saw my regular doctor. She told me that she read the ER report and said that I was in a very life threatening situation. She also told me that I most certainly would have died had not gone to the hospital. My doctor empathized with my desire to have another child and understood that I was operating from a place of faith. She went on to say that she didn‘t think God’s plan for me was to risk my life this way.
In that moment I realized that I allowed my faith and belief in miracles to supersede the common sense that God had given me. I Realized that my faith almost cost me life and almost left my son without a mother. In that moment I knew that I wanted to live more than I wanted to have a baby or anything else for that matter. I understood that I had to have a hysterectomy if I wanted to live. I scheduled my hysterectomy for January 17, 2013. The trick was going to be avoiding an emergency surgery and keeping me alive until then.
Over the next several weeks I did a lot of soul searching. I needed to know why having another baby was so important to me. I had an epiphany. I wanted to have another baby because I needed a do over. In my mind I needed a do over because I had had a child out of wedlock. Some how I thought that getting married and then having a child would absolve me of my sins and guilt. It sounds so irrational and delusional to me now. I finally had some clarity. Clarity is a beautiful and priceless gift that I enjoy receiving. Even though I was clear that I needed a hysterectomy, the reality and necessity of it deeply saddened me. That sadness disappeared after I woke up from an amazing dream.
In my dream I am in a beautiful tropical place and I'm standing on a cliff overlooking the ocean. I appear to be a few years older than I am now and I am wearing a wedding ring. In this dream I am in this beautiful place with my HUSBAND. I know he is my husband because his wedding ring matches mine. I couldn't see his face in the dream so I have no idea who he is. In the dream there were no children with us and I was incredibly happy. When I woke up I was smiling and felt so much joy in my heart. I knew then everything would be alright and was finally at peace with having a hysterectomy.
The biggest lesson I learned in all of this is that I need to balance my faith with my common sense. They don’t operate in extremes. The other lesson learned is that my common sense is a gift from God that I need to make good use of.
