The First Shot:
"I've totally got this," I thought as the nurse withdrew the needle. If I'd said it aloud, it would have come with a scoff. "That's all? That wasn't so bad," I said to the nurse as I pulled up my underwear and pants. Not bad at all.
I reached for Timmy's hand and we walked to the reception area to make next week's appointment. As we headed to the van, the cold weather nipped at our faces. I buckled Timmy and we drove to a sandwich shop. I was dying for a burger, but it was Friday during Lent. Rather than take my chances with bursting into flames, a tuna wrap would have to suffice.
We climbed out of the van and I immediately felt the stinging set in. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Everyone had said the shots were painful. They'd said they were painful going in. I wasn't prepared for the pain once the needle was withdrawn.
Two hours into the stinging, I called Tom. "Be thankful that you didn't give this shot to me. I would hate you right now." I hung up the phone as the shot brought me to tears.
Eighteen hours later, the site still stung, but now it also itched. The site was red and swollen to the size of a quarter. My whole hip was sore to the point that I didn't walk. I hobbled.
On Sunday, I was hormonal. Okay, that's a massive understatement. Pregnant women are hormonal. I was a wreck. A mean wreck. At one point, I took a deep breath. This was the shot talking, not me. I had to force myself to snap out of it.
Monday, I could actually walk, but it still hurt. My nausea was back, especially when I was lucky enough to smell hand sanitizer in a twelve-mile radius.
The Second Shot:
Different nurse, alternate hip, same miserable shot. This time, the nurse stuck me twice to inject the progesterone. It was slow and it hurt like hell. Twice. It stung before I even left the office.
My eyes glazed over as I tried to manage the pain. I decided that my best route was cheesecake. If I was going to feel awful, I wanted, no—I needed—a reward.
This time, the stinging stopped on Saturday at about noon. The site itched throughout the week, but it was a little better. Whatever that nurse did, it was better than what the first nurse did.
The Third Shot
Back to the first hip. The stinging was immediate and it was awful. The injection site swelled, but it was a little different. The best way to describe it is like having a roll of dimes inserted under the skin. Of course, this was right on my butt. I couldn't sit comfortably, couldn't walk comfortably, couldn't stand. It was awful. Once it started itching, I scratched and scratched, wanting nothing more than to remove that roll of dimes from under my skin. The nausea was horrible. My mood was sour at best.
And I had company coming into town just after my next injection. As a matter of fact, I had lots of company coming to visit over the next four weeks. Twenty overnight guests, primarily on the weekends when I was guaranteed to feel awful.
I wanted to stop the godforsaken things.
The Fourth Shot:
Alternating again. This time was far worse. The swelling was comparable to a roll of quarters under my skin. The injection site's redness was the size of my hand. I was nauseated. I was dizzy. If I stood up quickly, I had to have something to hold onto, otherwise, I took the chance of falling down.
I wanted to see the sights with our company, my husband's sister and her family, but I couldn't walk. I would just slow them down. I stayed home and tried to relax.
On Monday, still in a ton of pain, I called my OB. It felt like I was having some sort of allergic reaction. They assured me that what I was experiencing was normal and that my body would probably chill out toward the shot in the next couple of weeks.
The Fifth Shot:
"You haven't gained any weight between last appointment and this one," the nurse practitioner said.
I wasn't surprised. I'd been rewarding myself with cheesecake on the weekends, but the hormone had cut my appetite as well. It wasn't easy forcing myself to eat when I felt sick after eating.
"How are you doing with the shots? Still having problems?" the nurse practitioner asked.
"They hurt. I don't want to do them any longer, but I will keep going until thirty-four weeks. I'm not sure how much more I can take." I really wanted to call it quits now. I was four shots past over them.
"It'll be better by then, and we will be here to cheer you on the rest of the way. You can do this."
I wasn't so sure.
"I'd like to have your iron checked, also," she said.
I frowned. I'd just had the glucose test, this time without extreme worry of vomiting it up, I was given a rhogam injection, and the progesterone. I didn't want a fourth stick and said as much.
"We'll check your iron in two weeks," she said as a compromise.
That night, I had ten overnight guests in my house. Fortunately it was all family so they understood that I wasn't feeling well. I loved getting to visit with everyone, but I was also wearing out. The fifth shot hurt as badly as the others, but it didn't swell up quite to roll-of-quarters-under-the skin size. It was bigger than a roll of dimes, and the redness was the size of my hand again, but this was a slight improvement. It still stung and itched, and made walking a challenge. Throw in a bunch of extra laundry because of all the company, and I was miserable.
I have a large-capacity washer that I had trouble reaching the bottom of when we bought it a little over a year ago. Now that my belly was huge, unless I wanted to press hard against the washer, I had to use a stepladder. I easily washed fifteen extra loads of laundry, not including our family's clothing. Stretching the sheets over the mattresses felt like labor pains as I washed sheet after sheet after sheet.
And I still had one more round of company to go. This time, it was a friend of my husband's and his family who were coming to visit, but fortunately that was two weeks away.
Heh heh heh.
