Speaking at the OB Challenges Conference

So as many of you know, I was asked to guest speak in a medical conference. This conference was about preterm labor and birth as a whole. I was asked by one of the ladies in the hospital staff before I was discharged after having Rosella if I was interested. I said sure that sounds like fun.

So we now fast forward a bunch of months and now we are before the holidays. She asks again if I’m still interested. Of course I would love too. I told her I would and I will keep my promise. The beginning of the year I tell her I was able to get the day off work and we are good to go. As the day drew near, and we are about 6-10 weeks away I’m starting to have doubts. Starting to have anxiety about reliving this all over again, see some of the staff that took care of me.

I get the email with what she wants me to talk about. Ok that seems simple, just four things. Why I was there and how long with a bit of backstory, positive things I liked and what I wish would have been done differently. So I procrastinate and a few days before the conference I get my paper done.

I go shopping the morning before I have to be there and get my head straight. I can do this. I can do anything after what I went through. My heart is pounding and I’m finally at the conference. I meet with the lady who I am speaking with. She was one of the coordinators at the hospital so I had seen her a few times. It is lunch time, where we see my doctor and one of my nurses. Here come the tears. I tried not to be emotional but seeing them was hard. Seeing them made all this that has happened that I pushed to the side of my head, the constant thoughts of what’s going to happen, how long will I be pregnant, how is my baby going to be, will she be healthy, these all came out of the hiding spot I shoved them into. Even though I was a mess, they were so happy to see me. They asked about Rosella and the family. I told them how healthy she was and how we were doing. Of course they requested to see pictures.

After lunch, there is one presenter ahead of us. As she talks about the different ways to transport patients and all the fun stuff, I grow more and more nervous. I have a paper with everything written out, like I cannot remember my own traumatic experience without it. As she is just about to the end of her presentation, we walk over to get our mics. My hands are sweating and my heart is racing! Good thing its a medical conference. Haha. We walk to the table and sit down and wait. The first presenter is done and the lady who is presenting about the stay right before me, she walks up and begins. I feel so many eyes looking back and forth between us.

It feels like eternity before she is done and welcomes me onto the stage. I walk nervously up there with her and give her a hug. I set my paper down and take a breath. I have a pretty dang good memory but at this moment, everything is a blur. I am not sure how I introduced myself, but I am thinking it was something along the lines of "Hello, I am Melissa. My water broke at 18 weeks and 4 days." And all I hear is everyone gasp, the normal reaction I get from anyone who knows the slightest bit about pregnancy. I continue on "I was admitted into the antepartum ward at 24 weeks." I had to choke back tears and excuse myself before I continued. "That morning, I gave my son a hug and I left." I did not use my paper since at that moment, I felt like it was more real as I spoke from the memories. From there I talked about my schedule I kept, Monday's were ultrasounds, Tuesday was when my parents got dinner and we ate it together, Wednesday my mom brought Logan to visit for a bit with dinner, Thursday my husband usually came by, Friday was nothing really and the weekend was when my mom and sister and maybe Steven and Logan came. I hit on about how considerate the staff was for the fact they woke me up at 9am, got my vitals before my visitors came.

Once I was done, I felt like I was rambling on and repeating the same things, in which its 6 months later I am typing some of it but I still feel like I did. But they all know that it was not that easy for me to come and speak about it since obviously they all saw me trying to not cry. We then had Q&A and after that, it was snack and dessert time! They had my favorite, CHURROS!!!!

I had quite a few people come up tell me how powerful it was to hear about the experience from a patient. I was introduced to the dude who runs the group itself. He said thank you for coming out and speaking, he was glad everything turned out well for us and how it was great to hear that my experience was good with his staff.

Rosella is 18 months just a few days ago when I am typing this, I still have to hold back tears trying to recall everything that has happened and all. Hoping soon this will get better and wont always lead to tears.