Venom

Saturday morning I woke up knowing exactly where I was, exactly what had happened and exactly what I needed to do.  You know how some people say they were all disoriented and they wondered if it was all a dream?  Not me.  I knew this was all super real.


I knew I had to do the shots.  On the off chance that somehow my body hadn't killed my baby I had to do the right thing.  They found the problem, they gave me the solution, I couldn't not do it.  Except that meant sticking needles into my stomach.


Trypanophobia - fear of needles


Suddenly, I had to hurry and do the shot as quickly as possible.  It was seven am and I had already lost a lot of time.  If there was any chance that I could keep my body from harming my baby, I had to do it.  That's what moms do right?


Except I had no way of knowing it wasn't already dead.  And I still had to stick a needle into my stomach.  By myself, with no help.  I was very dizzy as I walked to the dining room where I had dropped the bag with the medicine and the syringes the night before.  I walked to the bathroom, pep-talking myself the whole way.


You can do this, you got this.  You are going to do this.  You can do this.  You saw her do it, you can do it to yourself.  You can do this.  You can do this.


I took the syringe out of the packaging and studied it.  I'd seen syringes on tv before, I'd seen how they flick the tube to get the bubbles out, how they push the plunger and the medicine squirts out of the needle but I'd never held one and I sure as hell had never given myself an injection.  It was small.  The needle was small - so small and thin that if you turned it a certain way in the light, you couldn't even see it.  It was a short needle, only half an inch.  Unfortunately, these things did nothing to comfort me and I started to lose focus again.  I took my shirt off, swabbed my stomach with alcohol, swabbed the top of the heparin bottle and drew up the syringe just like they showed me.  It took a couple of tries to get all the air bubbles out but I finally did it.  So far so good.  I swabbed my stomach again, knowing that I was stalling.


Okay, you can do this.  Throw it in, like a dart, push the plunger for a count of five, hold for a count of five, pull it out.  You got this.  Easy.  Just breathe.  You can do this.


.........


Okay, just do it.  You have the syringe, your belly is clean, just do it.  Just throw it in, push for five, hold for five and you're done.  You can do this.


.........


Okay okay okay.  Come on, you can do this.  Push for five, hold for five, done.  Just do it.  You can do this.  You have to do this.  Do it for your baby.  


.........


Fuck, shit, shit, shit shit.  I can't fucking do this.  How the fuck am I supposed to stick a fucking needle into my fucking belly.  Shit.  Shit.


........sitting on the toilet, crying


I can't do this.  This isn't going to work.  It's already dead, what's the point.  Seriously, God?  Of all the things?  Needles?  Come on, please?  I can't do this.  Okay look, you gave this to me, you need to give me the strength to do this.  Okay?  Okay?  Any time.


.........drying the tears


All right, that is enough.  Either do this or don't!  No more messing around.  Stick that stupid needle in your stupid belly.  It's a teeny tiny bitch needle.  Are you going to let a bitch needle get the best of you?  Shit!


........ shaking and crying on the toilet


Yes, a bitch needle is going to get the best of me.  I cannot do this.  What am I going to do?  How the hell am I supposed to do this for 36 weeks?


I needed help.  I needed support.  But it was 8am on a Saturday.  I only knew of one person who would be up at that hour.


Hi Dad.  So um, guess what?


Replay all of the above, minus the cursing and interspersed with periodic 'Did you do it?  Noooooooooo.'


Over an hour after I started, I finally was able to stick the needle in and discovered my next problem.  I am 5'5", 122 pounds.  I do yoga regularly and have virtually no belly fat as a result.  Certainly not half an inch worth!  Feeling the needle hit my muscle nearly made me vomit on the spot.  However, I didn't know better and stuck it in the rest of the way.  Into my muscle.


HOLY SHIT, never do that!  I nearly fell over from the pain.  My dad was on speaker and I was full-out crying as I plunged that medicine into my stomach.  My hand was shaking so much I knew the needle was going to break off inside me.  


The medicine BURNS.  It what I imagine being bitten by a snake or spider would feel like - if snakes or spiders had just one fang.  It felt like poison, which wasn't helping my Captain Heparin mental image.  I choked, cried, held it for five and pulled that horrible needle out.  That spot hurt for almost a week.


And I had to do it all again that night.