The beginning of... an end?

[fealubryne]

Because life can never just be "normal" complicated for me. I recover from my second brain surgery and decide to go back to school. Yay college! But that's too easy, right? So six months after starting I find out I'm pregnant. Okay. That's manageable. I can be a stay-at-home mom and a full-time college student. One day at a time. Easy does it. We'

Comments

[firebyrd]

Ugh. Ugh ugh ugh. This seriously blows.

As far as the breastfeeding goes, I'd say it depends. What were you looking at taking? I took tramadol through my entire pregnancy and breastfeeding with Bea with not a single problem, so if you're looking at something fairly mild like that, I'd say go for it. Regardless, you do need to be taking something until things get sorted out. The pain will only get worse as she gets bigger (and no, it's not normal to be in pain just from hauling your baby around). Keep in mind that a lot of the drugs they warn you about being restricted or whatever just honestly haven't been studied with pregnancy and breastfeeding. The suggestions to avoid them come from lack of info, not proof of harm. You'll have to evaluate the possible risks for yourself, of course. Again, I had no issues at all. Doctor suggested I taper off before the birth because of a risk of withdrawal symptoms in Bea once she was born. I didn't (kind of couldn't function with an 18 month old without it) and she was fine.

You need to talk to your dean or whatever and see what kind of accommodations can be made for you, whether it's lightning your class load, getting extensions and such because of your health, or taking some sort of break as your symptoms get worse. Hopefully the radiation itself won't be too bad. My mom started feeling crappy the last week or two of hers, but I have no idea how the circumstances or dosages compare.

Lots of hugs!

[fealubryne]

Okay, so... I'll admit, I was anxiously hoping you'd reply, because I had a hunch you might have some valuable input on the subject of painkillers. I've been researching as much as I can - I can hold off on stuff for the time being, but things have been going downhill faster than I care to think about, and I want to know what I can before it gets to the breaking point. Been using http://www.kellymom.com/health/meds/pain-meds.html as sort a reference/jumping-off point as far as what to look up as far as safety goes. I really don't need anything strong, just something so I can... y'know, function. You probably know how that goes better than anybody, at this point. When I was in at the doctor he did a brief look at Vicodin and it was listed under "not recommended" so he sort of just bunched everything else together with that, I guess. Thing is, I can't take Vicodin anyway... it makes me sick. The stuff I've been on before is Tylenol #3 (Tylenol with Codeine) and Percocet, with the Percocet the better of the two. They're both listed as "moderately safe" and from the research I've done the two safest things are, interestingly, Morphine and Codeine. The latter of the two is slightly less so, apparently, due to the fact that when metabolized it becomes Morphine, and depending on the mother's metabolism it can (though rare) be metabolized weirdly and result in a high, or lethal dose of Morphine in the milk. But again, there's very, very few cases (like, countable on one hand) even documented of this.

I'm in such a tizzy over the whole bloody thing. Some days I can barely move, and end up sitting and crying. But at the same time I desperately don't want to give up breastfeeding so soon. When she decides to quit, sure, I'll be sad and all but... that's different, y'know? I'll remember Tramadol. That's one that hasn't been reviewed, according to the list that I found, but I did a brief look on it and it definitely seems like a possibility as far as safety goes. Gonna put that one on the list of things to bring up to the doctor. Thank you so much!

As far as school goes... I'm not really sure what to do on that. Because of the way it's structured I can't really get the load lightened, and taking a break is tricky. If/when I need to really be in and out of the hospital I can see about extensions, I think that's a definite possibility (they gave me an extension on the week's work when Kassie was born) so I've got that, at least. I'm hoping that with some painkiller to make me feel less shitty on a day to day basis I'll be able to keep up a little better. That whole "constant pain" thing really saps your energy, so maybe fixing that will help for now. *sighs* We'll see how this goes...

[firebyrd]

The fact that you feel so strongly about this makes me think that if you can find one of the safer pain killers that will help you, you should continue breastfeeding. You will feel regret later if you don't, especially since this is probably your one and only time doing it. I don't want another kid, but lately I've definitely been feeling a little longing for the sweet cuddling of an infant and the special connection that breastfeeding provides, and I was somewhat ambivalent about the whole thing after the nightmare it was with Enoch. So, do what you can to continue for as long as both you and Kassie desire. It's a unique experience in parenting. Obviously you'll have to re-evaluate if you can't find one that will work that's on the safer side (I have my doubts you're going to get your hands on morphine, for example, they're too worried about addictions), but for now, keep going! It's not like stopping is a walk in the park anyway if it's not a gradual slowing down like Bea did. Engorgement sucks!

Your school should have some sort of students with disabilities office that advocates and helps mediate for students with various issues. Look into that now and start working with them. There's going to be paperwork involved for sure, so better that you get on it now before things go further downhill. By law, the school has to be willing to make some reasonable concessions for people with disabilities (and I'm betting the presence of a freaking tumor on your brain is concrete enough that qualifying shouldn't be an issue). If you work out some things that turn out to be overkill, that's cool, but it's better to have the net in place asap, because you're probably going to start making me look energetic in a few months.

I hear you on the constant pain being an energy drain. People who've never lived with chronic pain just have no real comprehension of how all consuming it is.