The Unknown

Yesterday evening, I received the paperwork and instructions for Ro’s urological tests. This as the worst symptoms are rearing their heads again, and it makes it more real and necessary. As bad as I hate to admit it, I need a doctor’s help with this one. After much thought and prayer, I’m finding myself more at peace with the necessity part of all this. What I’m still not comfortable with is the anesthesia and her being on Bactrim everyday until the procedures. The antibiotics will reverse anything I’ve done to heal her gut after having Rocephin in the hospital.

She is first having a renal ultrasound next Tuesday. Then, she will have a cystoscopy, a retrograde x-ray, and a cystogram the next week. It struck me while reading the paperwork that only today do I have the proper names for the tests they are going to be running. When I was pursuing a VBAC, I armed myself with as much medical information as I could. I felt like it was a fight. With this, I feel like the fight is already over. My baby will be put under. I have to start giving Ro the Bactrim. I have to rely on western medicine to take care of my little one.

It is hard to accept this. But, maybe I’m lame and overreacting. I have only been put under once and that as an adult to have my wisdom teeth removed. They asked me to count backwards from ten. I tried my best to stay awake, just to see if I could. I know I didn’t make it to one. I rarely went to the doctor as a child. I didn’t take many antibiotics.  I was a healthy child. I don’t see doctors now until it is absolutely necessary. Like an, I can’t take it anymore, someone please take me to a doctor type of situation.

Ro has had troubles since birth, including her birth. She’s seen several different types of doctors – pediatrician, family doctor, naturopath, chiropractor, orthopedist, allergist, and urologist. She has severe eczema, food and environmental allergies. We fought over a year and a half to find out how to control that. I did everything natural that I could think of and find doing research before seeing the allergist. Now, it is better, sometimes. She takes two medicines for that, a steroid cream and a mild nerve medicine called Atarax. I only use those when she has flare ups. I treat it naturally continuously.

Now, she will go at three where I didn’t even fathom going until adulthood. I hope that we’ll get answers like we did when we saw the allergist. I just want to know what is happening. I need a diagnosis so I’ll know how to inform myself and help her heal.

I’m preparing her as best I can through diet and supplements. She eats traditional foods as we do. She takes a multi-vitamin, DHA and Omega 3, and L. Reuteri probiotic. Those supplements really help with her eczema too. I’ve been getting her outdoors as much as I can.

It is funny how she has changed since all of this. Since, her stay in the hospital, she hasn’t been very active. She wants to watch TV (we don’t have cable, but she has some DVDs) and not eat much. She is craving sweets (which are very limited in our home), and she has become a crier. Horribly whiny. Today in the grocery store she said, “Mommy, I can’t have this (holding a huge lollipop). Sweets makes you puke.” Somehow, she started equating her nausea and vomiting with too many sweets. That’s a fine though, but at other times she begs relentlessly for it.

I lack a lot of patience, so this has been hard. She said to me today, “Mommy, you’re talking nice to me.” My heart hurt when she said that because I know I’ve quarreled too much. I want to be her foundation. Her go-to mommy. I long to get this past us so we can move on. Break bad habits, and live healthily. I want to mother her – well.