"January was a tough year but we made it"

I feel like I need to give a bit of a life update. And just as a disclaimer, if this information is new to you and we didn’t tell you directly, please don’t take it personally. Nickolai and I really felt like we needed to give ourselves space to process and figure things out before we opened up to everyone about it. We honestly were hesitant to share it openly at all, but then I thought about how the only reason I was as calm and prepared for this situation as I was, was because someone on my friends list had a similar experience months ago and shared about it on Facebook. So, I think it’s important to raise some awareness around this topic just in case I can help someone else! Nickolai agreed that being armed with knowledge of my particular medical issue made things much smoother for him.

We have a chalkboard in our living room that I write quotes on from time to time. At the beginning of the new year, I changed it to a Corrie ten Boom quote that I love and that I felt was appropriate for a new year: “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.” Talk about foreshadowing.

On January 8^th I found out very unexpectedly that I was pregnant. On the 10^th I was told I would most likely miscarry because my bloodwork didn’t look good. We felt mostly at peace with this, with a certain disappointment mixed in. It was so unexpected and I didn’t really have a chance to fully process being pregnant in the first place. Nickolai and I began processing it all and trying to come to terms with it. By January 21^st, MLK Day and still fresh with the news of my miscarriage, I was convinced it was over. But my bloodwork had strangely improved, so I was sent for an ultrasound. It seemed like there was a chance that by some miracle I had a viable pregnancy. The ultrasound tech we visited later that day said she saw nothing and confirmed for us that I had had a miscarriage. This was again disappointing, but not necessarily shocking. I continued bloodwork just to verify that my hormones were going down like they should.

On Tuesday, January 29^th, I received a text that said my hormones were going down and everything looked normal. About 10 minutes later, I started feeling a stabbing pain in my lower abdomen. Somehow I immediately knew what was happening. It was the Lord allowing me to see what was ahead for me. I called my doctor and she confirmed my suspicion that I needed to go straight to the emergency room. I drove myself to the hospital and checked in at the ER, nervous and scared and with the pain steadily increasing (and cursing Denton’s terrible, bumpy roads). I was told to wait.

Over the next hour or so, the pain got more intense, I started feeling lightheaded and dizzy and nauseous, and was shaking and sweating profusely. I tried to communicate this to the person at the desk and was told to sit down and wait for the triage doctor to call me. I nearly passed out, and then started feeling better by the time the doctor called me back to check me in. I explained my symptoms and he said there were no beds open for me but to wait right outside so he could keep an eye on me. Over the next hour or so (yes, another hour), it got bad again, the pain spread into my shoulders (which I knew was a sign of internal bleeding). I was rocking back and forth in my chair and begging God to let a bed open up for me, and I watched one person after another with more serious symptoms than mine get taken back right away. I tried to advocate for myself at least two more times and was told to wait.

Finally, I was taken back and given a room and a bed. From this point on, every doctor, nurse, etc was amazing and wonderful. I explained my symptoms to the doctor and he ordered a blood test to check my hormone levels and an ultrasound. The ultrasound tech said there was a lot of “fluid” that kept her from being able to see what was going on inside. The doctor later told me it was blood. They sent me into the bathroom for a urine sample and I passed out on the way in. The doctor came back and told me he was very concerned and suspected a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. The diagnosis I’d been saying in my head over and over again was finally confirmed. My response was simply, “That’s what I was afraid of.” I called Nickolai and asked him to come (I told him to stay at work until I knew it was worth him leaving). He arrived at the same time as my surgeon, and we started preparing for emergency surgery.

As an aside, for about a month prior to this, I had convinced myself I had an ectopic pregnancy, even before I knew I was pregnant. I took the pregnancy test because of this suspicion. I just had this feeling. Nickolai and I had talked about it, and how it was impossible because I couldn’t be pregnant and I didn’t have any of the risk factors. We had asked the ultrasound tech point blank the week before if she saw any signs of an ectopic pregnancy and she said “no”. I felt crazy at the time, but all that turned out to be so helpful because Nickolai and I both knew exactly what we were facing as soon as the diagnosis was given. It was so scary, but not unknown, and we were as ready as we could have been.

At around 4:00, about 6 hours after the pain started, I went in for emergency surgery and they removed my right fallopian tube and dealt with all the internal bleeding. It only took a little over an hour. Everything went well, and they were able to do it laparoscopically as opposed to making a large incision, so I would only have to spend one night in the hospital. My mom made it to the hospital from shopping at a Walmart in Lubbock in like 3 hours, which is so impressive, and my mother-in-law immediately came as well. We were given so much support so quickly and that made everything much more manageable.

As soon as I was settled in my hospital room, one of my favorite verses popped into my head: “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” (Lamentations 3:22-23). I immediately found an iPhone wallpaper of that verse (shouts out to She Reads Truth) and set it as my wallpaper because I knew I would need it.

Hospital fashion for taking a walk down the halls!

I didn’t so much sleep that night as rest with my eyes closed, but the Lord was so good to me in that he kept my mind from wandering to all the awful things that happened that day. Instead, he led me to reflect on each doctor, nurse, friend, family member, etc that had helped me and thank God for them and pray that he would bless them and sustain them. It was some sweet time with the Lord that night.

I was discharged the next day, and since then I’ve been trying my hardest to rest and recover. It’s happening a lot more slowly than I expected and wanted, and I keep being surprised by what I’m not able to do (i.e. anything that’s not laying on the couch or bed or occasionally walking to the bathroom). I’m processing the fact that having one ectopic pregnancy means I’m more likely to have another one, and that along with that my chances of getting pregnant at all have gone down (although not as drastically as you might expect) because I only have one fallopian tube. I’m also processing how quickly I went from 100% totally fine to almost passing out in the ER waiting room and then emergency surgery, and the fear that it could happen again. As well as the loss of a baby, which is the strangest thing to process because I thought I had already lost it. Nickolai keeps reminding me that life is such a mercy anyways, and that it’s a miracle anyone is born ever. He says that because God is the one over it all, getting pregnant or not is in God’s hands. The percentages really haven’t changed, because it’s still 100% in the Lord’s control.

 For now, I have a lot of recovering to do, physically and mentally, and I’m so thankful for my family (regular family and church family) and friends and their support and love. I’m thankful for my life and that I didn’t wait to go the emergency room like I felt so tempted to do. I’m thankful for the opportunity to rest. I’m thankful that I went to church today even though I’ve literally barely moved since I got home because it took so much out of me.

But most of all I’m thankful that I know my God and that he knows me - and my future.