The Nightmare continued

Remember me? Lol, Lawd have mercy. Now I had written a story about my nightmare health experience that I went through last year. I was feeling better and feeling like I could get my life back on track. And for a month or two, everything was fine. Let’s recap: In November of 2021, I had two fibroids removed that were on top of my uterus. Combined, they were the size of a football. I had given the doctors consent to remove my uterus if they found more fibroids. After surgery was performed, they told me everything else was benign and my uterus was clean. Great news. But the thing about fibroids, is like bad news, they come back and boy did they come back.

For about two months I had a sporadic menstrual cycle. Light flow to no flow at all and I was feeling pretty great. But then one morning, that all changed. I got my usual cramps and they have always been disrespectful since I first started having a cycle. Motrin, ice packs and a heating pad were my go tos. I woke up to a crime scene in my bed. There was blood everywhere. I was bewildered…and cramping, so I had to get off my bed and this next part isn’t for the faint of heart…blood clots started dropping out of me. I’m not talking about dime sized either. Like the size of golf balls and sometimes tennis balls.

I ran to the bathroom and disaster ensued. I hopped into the shower, threw my bloody draws and sheets away (this would become a regular occurrence during this time) and sat there stunned. I emailed my doctor right away and said “Things have gone sideways.” Over the next couple of weeks, she and I went back and forth about what to do. The bleeding was so bad that I had to miss multiple days of work. I couldn’t go out in public because of fear of an accident. Finally, my doctor and I had a face to face meeting and right away she discussed a hysterectomy. Now we’re in March of 2022 at this time and my previous operation was in November or 2021. I was like “What happened? Cutting me open again not even six months later, y’all?”

I asked for other options. My main issue was the loss of blood. I had lost so much of it that I had become chronically anemic. As the menstrual cycles went on, I would get multiple periods during the same month. I had gone in for a regular check up one day and the nurse checked my hemoglobin levels. I was at a 8.7. For the minimum for it not to be alarming for a woman, the levels should be at 12. The nurse looked at me and repeatedly asked if I was okay. I said I felt fine. She said I may need to go to the emergency room if I started to feel bad.

I was then sent to the lab where they drew my blood. I was told I would be called to let me know the results. I had left work early that day for the appointment and so I went to lunch with my mother. I then started to feel a little weird. Like, super tired all of a sudden and had to sit down. My mom and I went to run errands when I got a call from my doctor that she was removing me from work for the rest of the week. My levels had dropped to under 7 and I was ordered to go in for a blood transfusion the next morning. I didn’t even make it to the morning.

As time went on during the day, I began feeling worse and worse. I was becoming weaker by the minute. I almost passed out inside the grocery store I was in. I remembered what the nurse said about going to the emergency room if I started to feel bad. I asked my mom to take me there. They see you pretty quickly if you say you’re low on blood, I found. As they were checking me in, I got all the flashbacks of being in this same emergency room

just five months prior. The same questions, the same poking me for blood, urine samples, covid questions, et al. My anxiety kicked in. This is unbelievable.

I received a transfusion (they take about three hours) and then was told I still didn’t have enough in my system for them to allow me to leave. I then had to receive another pint of blood which took another three hours. I really couldn’t do much but listen to the nurses gossip and listen to the other patients coming in and what they had going on. Right away, I felt the weakness leaving my body.

Fast forward a couple of days and I’m once again talking to my doctor about how to stop the bleeding. I asked about birth control or the ring. She said my blood pressure was too high to consider birth control and my uterine wall, at this point, was too thick for the ring. She set me up for iron infusions to combat the blood loss. I was then put on a hormone that would help curb the bleeding. It was so bad. I was now double, sometimes triple padded, with period panties, double draws, shorts and then my pants just to make it through the day. I brought a change of clothes and kept them at work in case things went south. This thing is wreaking havoc on my life.

The hormone worked for a little while and there was light only spotting and that brought some relief. But things like that are merely a band-aid and eventually it will stop working. And…it stopped working. I was sent to a gynecologist and she walked in the room and basically said at this point and time in your life, the only option left is to remove my uterus. She said you have multiple fibroids in there and that’s what’s causing these problems. It’s not going to go away. And my quality of life is suffering. She and I talked for an hour about what I should do. I’m in my early 40s and having kids just never appealed to me. I’m a great auntie but a mom? Maybe not. But now I could never have them but like the doc and I talked about, this would be my third abdominal area surgery so to carry a child at this stage would be risky at best.

These fibroids must have heard the doc and I talking because after that, they started to act a damn fool. I started bleeding worse than ever. I actually bled through five layers of protection while at work during the summer. Five layers of protection, y’all. These fibroids had me in a chokehold. I said it’s time to launch this thing to the moon. I was luckily able to get my same surgeon from my operation back in November or 2021. I got a pre op appointment to see her and she said “I remember you specifically. You were in bad shape.” Damn y’all. That’s pretty awful if a surgeon who does these things all the time remembers you specifically.

She did put my mind at ease when she said it could be done laparoscopically which would quicken recovery time. Well lemme tell y’all something, that month before surgery, these fibroids let me have it! I was once again bleeding through multiple layers of clothing, the hormone no longer worked and the iron I was taking three times a day can only do so much. I had to, once again, miss multiple days of work because the cramping and bleeding was so severe, I could barely get up. Multiple mental breakdowns and anxiety attacks occurred throughout all of this. Finally, surgery day came. I’m a hard stick so I had three nurses fussing over me. I had to have two separate IVs for the surgery. So we were late to the surgery room because it was taking so long to find a vein on me.

The main nurse said “I remember you from last year.” If there was a camera here, I’d look dead at it because why? Lord. I was in a bad way November of 2021. Now y’all know who I’m looking for right? The anesthesiologist. He came over and said “you ready for that cocktail?” I said heck yeah. The last thing I remember was being wheeled into the room and looking at the robotic machine that would assist in kicking my uterus to the curb. Next thing I know, I wake up in the recovery room. The post op nurses just look at you. Lol. They’re like “We need you to get up and walk to the bathroom to see if you can pee. If you can do that, you will go home today. “ I was able to do that and about an hour and a half later, I was discharged. It is always best to recover at home.

I saw my doctor for a checkup after one week. And they said everything was good. I no longer have a uterus, a cervix or fallopian tubes. I do still have my ovaries, however. I asked the doctor how many fibroids were inside. She said that they don’t count how many, they just want ti make sure everything is benign. That’s a nice answer, I thought. That also means there was a lot of them. I’m currently in recovery and things are going pretty well. I’m still having valance issues which happened after last surgery but those will go away with time.

To my ladies suffering out there with this: I have heard from so many women from all ethnic and racial backgrounds. They said it was the best decision they ever made. Unfortunately at this time I history, this seems to be the only solution to permanently stop uterine bleeding. If you know you don’t want to birth children in the future and you’re suffering, if you have the resources and a support system, I would go ahead and do it. It’s been such a relief to look down at my draws and see nothing. Peace be still.