Upcoming Surgery!

So, it's finally been decided, over many months of lamenting, my uterus is coming out! My emotions have run the gammet and the journey has been long.

One year ago, March, I found myself, surprisingly, in a bathroom at an Ottawa conference, writhing in pain from uterine contractions. The ebb and flow of the contractions came on so suddenly, within 15 minutes, I was rocking back and forth in my chair, receiving odd glares and stares from people. Most, I'm sure, thought that I must have missed my daily meds and some people began to slowly move their chairs away from my area - worried that whatever I had was catching!! I'm quite certain I saw fear in some people's eyes, probably because they knew I was close to vomitting and they definitely did NOT want to be a part of that. Regardless of whether it was their fear or mere concern, my behaviour was freakin' people out!

At first, I ignored that there was any issue and felt that it was probably just a one-off incident but when it became a monthly occurance I decided that it was time to investigage. Had I not had a child and not gone through the eleven hours of labour, I really would not have been able to identify or describe what was going on in my body. I had never experienced pain during my menstrual cycle before, oh sure, a little back ache now and again or a bit of leg discomfort but NEVER earth-shattering pain such as this. This is where Karma is a bitch!! For all my years I would roll my eyes when I heard a woman complain of menstrual pain.....clearly all she needed was to exercise more often....obviously "she" can not tolerate pain like the rest of us strong-willed individuals.

OKAY, so I am now being struck by lightening and getting my ass kicked 'cause CLEARLY these women were in terrible pain and I can not believe that this kind of pain existed outside of giving birth!! Well, this was an eye-opening experience. I called up every woman that I had invalidated their pain over the years and apologized and begged forgiveness. Most of them laughed because now they knew I was "gettin' it".

After being poked, prodded, scanned, rescanned, repoked and for fun, a bit more prodding, the doctors diagnosed me with Adenomyosis. This condition results from the lining cells of the uterus growing directly into the muscle wall of the uterus. When the lining cells of the uterus bleed at the time of the menstrual period, these misplaced cells in the muscle bleed as well. And bleeding directly into the muscle causes pain. As the blood accumulates, the surrounding muscle swells and forms fibrous tissue in response to the irritation. After a long debate of options, the only way that this issue can go away is by removing the uterus.

As you have read in my earlier entries the desire to have another child was quite strong and as a result of this diagnosis, this option was no longer available to me. I had been wavering between adoption and birthing my own child and I was strongly going for the latter. I was months lamenting over and mourning this loss. My mind was struggling between the practical application and logic of what had to be done and the emotionality of this loss. Even with these emotional struggles, the practical won out because the pain was becoming so debilitating that my quality of life was being compromised and my daily activities were no longer becoming enjoyable for me.

It was interesting to analyse my journey as it was very similar to that of being pregnant. I was so excited to be pregnant, revelling in all it's challenges and changes that were happening to my body and to my life but by the time 9 months came around I wanted this THING OVER!! No longer did I worry about how much pain I was going to endure during the labour, no longer did I care about feeling or being in a very undignified light during the labour - I just wanted this kid to come out and for this to be over with - I was done being pregnant!

Well, it has finally come to this! I want this uterus out! I want my life back and I want the pain to go away so that I can function like a normal human-being. I want to be able to exercise the way I used be able to - full out, hardcore stuff! I want to be able to play with my son and go biking and hiking and do all of the things that we used to do - I miss that part of my life so much. I miss being intimate with my partner - I want that part back too. No longer am I mourning for the loss of my uterus because I have already lost so much beautiful time with my family and I no longer wish for this to continue.

So, on June 23rd I will be going under the knife - eeks - scary to think it, even scarier to write it - but, I am not as scared as I once was. I am really looking forward to climbing over this mountain and coming down the other side - freedom!!