Episode 22- Pre-Term Labor

A few days before Thanksgiving I had an appointment with Schneiman. I happened to take Ethan along with me that day for the heck of it, as I sometimes did. He would usually sit on the floor in the room and tinker with some little gadgets that Schneiman had. I actually loved taking Ethan along with me.

On this particular day, I left the office and as I held Ethan on my hip I walked down five steps right outside that led to the parking lot. I lost my footing and fell forward, flat on top of Ethan. His poor head caught my fall and my entire stomach. He conked his head so hard on the pavement and he didn't make a sound at first. I was completely terrified and panicky as I scooped him back up. Finally he began to cry and I did too.

The whole thing happened so quickly and I didn't know what to do. I was very afraid that he had a concussion and rather than run back into Schneiman's office, I instinctively called Cody on my cell phone as I held my screaming toddler. Cody asked me if I was okay to drive and I said yes. He then said he would meet me the children's hospital. To this day I don't know why I didn't go back into the office and ask for help. Obviously I wasn't thinking clearly at all.

I prayed the whole way to the hospital that Ethan was okay. I was afraid he would lose consciousness on the way there, but he never did. I ran into the ER and my arm was covered in blood as I held him. The nurse grabbed him from me and started asking me questions. She then noticed a huge gash on my wrist which was the actual source of the blood. My arms must have grabbed his head right before he hit the pavement and my wrist bore the brunt of it.

As she continued questioning me, she noticed me wincing in pain. She finally asked if it was the pain from my wrist or something else. I told her I was contracting and we were quickly rushed into an exam room. The next few moments were surreal. A doctor came in to examine Ethan, who turned out to be fine. Another doctor came in to check on me and she discovered I was having regular contractions only four minutes apart. They took some blood from me and found that I had virtually no sugars in it. I then realized that I hadn't eaten all day. This was common practice for me. Between the high doses of meds I was on and the depression, I never had an appetite. It is a wonder how I gained fifty pounds during that pregnancy.

By this time Cody had arrived and he took over care of Ethan. It was so strange being treated in a children's hospital! I was hooked up to an IV and they got me to drink lots of juice and eat cookies. But the contractions kept coming and they were starting to become more painful. The nurse called Dr. Draper and he said to send me right over to Labor and Delivery at the University hospital. Luckily the two hospitals were on the same campus and were linked by an indoor bridge, so the nurse wheeled me over to the other wing.

Once I was in LD they hooked me up to a fetal monitor and sure enough, the contractions kept coming. A resident came in to check me and said that my cervix was still tight and thick, so that was great news. But for the next two hours I continued to contract despite anything I did (or didn't do). I was only 32 weeks along and I felt like I would have the baby soon. I prayed so hard that it wouldn't happen and finally around 10:00 that night, the contractions suddenly stopped!

I had been lying in a hospital bed for several hours watching dumb re-runs on TV, so I was very distracted from what had happened and worse- what could have happened. After a thorough evaluation, they decided I was in good enough shape to be discharged, so late that night I drove home with Ethan asleep in the back seat while Cody drove ahead in his car. What had started out as a two hour trip to Schneiman's office that day had turned into much more.

When I finally pulled into the garage I looked in the back seat to see my precious boy sleeping soundly, his head slightly tilted against his car seat. He looked so sweet and innocent and thoughts began racing through my mind of what could have happened. What if my wrist hadn't caught him and he'd busted his head open on the pavement. What if he'd hit it just right and he...died?

And then I thought about the baby kicking in my belly. What if something had happened to her? She had endured so much already in the seven months since I'd known her. What if something terrible had happened to her too? I tried to block the thoughts from my mind but it didn't work. I slumped down the seat and sobbed silently for several minutes and then finally I got Ethan out of the car and went inside the house. I quickly put him to bed and then raced into the kitchen to get some meds. I needed to be high and right then too. I'm not sure what I took or how much, but I was successful at getting into a deep fog and staying like that the rest of the night.

Episode 21- Dr. Newman

Dr. Draper decided to refer me out to a psychiatrist who could handle my prescription needs. He felt that the psych could better know drug interactions and possibly some more affective drugs.

I actually began seeing Dr. Newman in September shortly after the Zoloft experience. On our first few session it felt a lot like talking to Dr. Schneiman, however Newman was much more quiet and reserved. And he seemed overly willing to prescribe me anything I wanted. He had a million samples in his office and was always asking me if I wanted some. But I exhibited some self control and passed.

But on one visit that fall I told him I wanted to try the new Ambien CR sleep aid that I'd seen heavily advertised all over TV. He was eager to prescribe it for me. That is what I learned about those doctors. They are in the drug business and are alwasy excited to push a new drug on you.

So I started the Ambien CR and continued to see Newman twice a month. He never really counseled me on anything. It was always a drug re-evaluation to see how things were working for me and what I wanted to change. This seemed to help with my Ativan problem because I told him I needed a higher dose and he was all for it, never questioning my level of addiction. So I upped that and I upped the Trazodone too. I was high as a kite. What a cocktail I swallowed every evening!

Episode 20- Working the System

As time went on, my dependecy on my meds only worsened. I remembered how upon discharge from the hospital during the summer, the psychs said I should be off all drugs within thirty days. Months had passed and not only was I not off of them, my dosages on everything had increased and I was highly addicted. It was a physical addiction for sure, but morover it was a psychological addiction.

There were nights when I would be sitting there alone in the darkness and wonder what it would be like to dump all my pills down the disposal. What if I was to never take them again? I would entertain the idea for a moment, then I would panic at the thought and I couldn't get those pills down my throat fast enough. I was aware that I would be hooked on pills for the rest of my life. It was something I had come to accept.

During this time Cody's mind and sainity began to suffer as well. You've heard of sympathy weight, referring to the weight a man gains during his wife's pregnancy. Well Cody was experiencing sympathy insainty and sympathy insomnia. He wasn't sleeping well amd I convinced him to go to the doctor to get started on some meds too. We would be one happy pill popping family! Our family practitioner prescribed him ATIVAN!!! I was so thrilled, and this is why-

Ativan is a controlled substance and I was only able to fill it once every thirty days. I would go in to see Dr. Draper but I was never fully honest with him. He would ask me how I was doing and how the meds were working for me. I always wanted to tell him that I wasn't surviving on 2 mg of Ativan a day. I really needed at least 4 mg. I was afraid that he would see that my addiction was out of hand and by some turn of events I would end up hospitalized again. So I would lie to him and.

For thirty days I would only have sixty mg of Ativan, but I would always use it up by about day fifteen. Do the math and you'll see that I was out of the stuff long before the end of the month. No way no how could I refill it before then. So when Cody came home with his prescription for Ativan I was ellated because I knew I could steal his. Even if he needed it, I didn't care. All I cared about was having more at my disposal. If he noticed his pills were being depeleted, I would figure out some way to cover it up or make up some lie about how they got dumped. At the moment I didn't care about the consequences. All I cared about was my next fix.

So as soon as my thirty day supply was gone, I began to dig into Cody's. Luckily for me, the Trazodone was not as highly controlled so I always had more of that on hand. If for somre reason I ever ran short on Ativan, I would double up on Trazodone and get my fix that way. Or if I didn't have enough of those, I would take anything else in the medicine cabinet that had a similar effect. Nyquil, benadryl, cough syrup, Xanex, codine or percocet (left over from a back injury)...anything to make myself feel high.

Watching Your Child Cry

It's often times so hard to sit back and watch your baby suffer. There is so much that they go through during the first year alone that is necessary pain. Necessary or not, it kills me to watch them hurt.

I remember when Ethan cut his first teeth and he was miserable. I did my best to soothe his aches and calm his fussiness, but there wasn't really anything I could do to make the hurt stop. When Hailey cut her first molars it was hell for all of us. I remember one day when she was fifteen months old I did nothing all day but hold her against me and cry along with her. She would scream and scream, then quiet down and finally fall asleep. Then the pain would start again and she would scream some more.

I rocked miles with her in that rocking chair during that month. Then one day Cody was brushing her teeth and he yelled excitedly "Get in here and feel this! Those suckers finally popped through!" Sure enough, we could feel sharp points on the back of her gums. Things were a lot better after that and I know she enjoyed her new found chompers because it made eating crunching things much easier. She was much happier from then on, until the next set of teeth came in.

I have often thought about that night when I sat in my car in the Targert parking lot and had that "discussion" with Heavenly Father. Looking back on it, I wonder how it made him feel. I wonder if he sat by me that night and held my hand and cried with me. I wonder if, in someway, he too tried to rock me to sleep and hurt as I hurt. How many miles did he calmly rock me during that time.

As much as I love my own children, I know that Heavenly Father loves me even more. He was my first father and I am his little girl. He saw the bigger picture and knew that I had to endure that terrible trial. He had a purpose and I'm sure he wanted to badly to be able to show it to me. But instead, I had to learn to trust him. He knew that it was for my own good that I go through it. But just like a loving parent, I'm sure he would have done alomst anything to make the hurt stop.

If I walked away from this experience having learned only one thing, it is that Heavenly Father knows me so personally. He knows who I am and he loves me more than I'll ever understand in this life. He gives me challenges so that I can grow, but he is always there wanting to help me along the way. He doesn't intend for me to suffer alone. He suffers right along with me and wipes my tears away. I can call on him any time that I need to and he is so quick to listen. I don't know if I could have developed a testimony of this on such a level any other way. And for that alone, I am thankful.

Episode 19- Target

It was a cold and wet evening in mid October when Cody sent me out to run an errand. This particular day had been exceptionally bad for me and for no real reason at all I had spent most of the day in and out of tears. I wouldn’t be surprised if I’d gone the entire day with out food and water. Whenever I tried to pull myself together, something would remind me of the nightmare I was living and the feeling of hopelessness would consume me all over again. Each time I felt the baby move I would be overcome with feelings of guilt. Guilt for not wanting the baby, guilt for despising her for what she was doing to me, and guilt for being such a dreadful mother. For days I had been fantasizing about what it would be like not to exist anymore. I don’t think I necessarily wanted to end my life, I simply didn’t want to be alive at all…not ever.

Cody could tell by the condition of the house and the expression on my face when he walked through the door that evening that something was very wrong and I needed to get away. The house was in total disarray. Dirty dishes were piled high in the sink, laundry was scattered through out the entire house, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Ethan was still in his pajamas covered in his breakfast. Truth be told, I didn’t even shower that day.

It didn’t take a genius to realize that I needed help, so my dear husband told me to get away for a while so he could take care of Ethan. We had been doing some organizing in the basement and had run out of plastic storage bins, so that seemed to be the ideal thing for me to go fetch from the store. I didn’t hesitate when he said I should go. I was in such a fog from all the crying I had done that day, and I don’t remember grabbing my car keys and heading out the door. I just remember that I suddenly found myself driving down the highway, and from the surrounding landmarks I gathered that I must be heading toward Target. At this point my whole body felt numb and I didn’t think in a million years that my tear ducts had anything left to give. So I pulled in to the Target parking lot, took a deep breath, and headed through the front doors.

Once inside the store, I felt the world spinning around me. I looked up at the fluorescent lights and I saw a jillion little spots dancing on the ceiling. For a few moments, I couldn’t even remember where I was or how I got there. I grabbed a shopping cart and began to push it. I knew I was there for a specific purpose and I figured if I wandered long enough I would remember what that purpose was.

And then I smelled it. It was the familiar scent of popcorn making its way from the snack center and suddenly I was taken back two decades to a little league game in Texas. There I was, six years old standing in the ball park complex where my brothers played ball each season. The smell of popcorn lingered in the air and I never failed to beg my mom to buy me a bag of my own. Popcorn and cherry flavored Jolly Ranchers which where always sold at the concession stand seemed to be staples of little league for me.

But there I stood in what seemed to be a million miles from the security of childhood. There in that Target store I stood with my hair still damp from the rain outside, breathing in ever so deeply that familiar scent of innocence. The simple smell of popcorn instantaneously reminded me of what it was like to be naive, small, and unattached. I kept my eyes closed tightly as not to let in the reality of what lay beyond the safe feeling of the Bear Creek Baseball Complex in Houston, Texas.

My body felt completely weak and I didn’t think I had the strength to face yet again the despair that was encompassing me. As long as I kept my eyes closed I could feel my dad’s warm embrace around my tiny six year old body. I could even detect hints of Old Spice aftershave on his skin. And I knew that if I stayed like that long enough, the soothing sound of my mother’s voice reading to me could be heard above the ringing cries of help in my head.

I’m sure I looked like a moron standing there like I was. Then I heard a voice come over the PA system and I suddenly jerked back to reality. That flicker of happiness was gone in a second and I realized I was still standing there holding on to the cart. Oh that’s right. I had come to the store for something. I still couldn’t remember what it was, but somehow my feet obeyed the message sent from my brain and I began to walk. My empty shopping cart felt as if it had one thousand pounds in it and it seemed impossible to push.

As I started down one of the main aisles, I looked straight ahead of me and even though it was probably only two hundred feet to the back of the store, it looked as if it was an endless trek to reach it. My perception of everything was utterly blurred. Everything continued to spin around me, but I kept on walking. I could hear noises around me. People were talking, music overhead was playing, even the wheels on the cart were squeaking. But it was all an empty echo in my head. All life around me was being played in slow motion.

I guess I decided to wander until I recognized what I had come to the store to get. I have no idea how long I wandered for, but at one point I rounded a corner to see a display of neon orange and black storage bins. Who on earth would pick such hideous colors to keep in their house? And then I remembered it was nearing Halloween and above the display was a sign that read “For your Halloween décor needs”. I thought for a minute about whether or not to buy storage bins in such dramatic colors. I thought about it and thought about it. Looking back, it was a very trivial decision. One might say to themselves “Who cares about the color. They will be stored out of sight in the basement anyway.” But to me, as I stood there weighing out the pros and cons in my mind it seemed astronomical.

My body began to tremble and I could feel the hot sting of tears welling up in my eyes. Why couldn’t I get my head on straight enough to make such a simple decision? If I chose not to get them in that color, I could easily find some others in another department of the store. It really wasn’t a big deal at all. But at that moment I couldn’t think rationally about anything, and I suppose this was the final straw for me.

I buried my face in my hands as to control my sobbing. I wasn’t going to let this monster take a hold of me again, not right there in the middle of the store and give strangers the opportunity to gawk at this crazy lady. Somehow I got a hold of myself, wiped the tears from my eyes, and began pulling bins from the shelf to load into the cart.

For some reason I had the impulse to take off one of the black lids, perhaps because I thought something scary might be lurking inside. After all it was Halloween. I unsnapped the lid and peeked inside and of course found nothing but the potent smell of plastic hit me. Satisfied with the emptiness, I went to snap it back on. And then I saw it. On the underside of the lid was a bright yellow warning sticker with a horrific sketch of a baby being locked inside. In huge black letters it read “Warning- may cause suffocation.”

I can barely describe what I felt next. My heart began to beat so fast that it felt as though I was having a heart attack. It was as if I was living that experience with the Zoloft from September all over again. The pit of my stomach came right up to my mouth and I could taste vomit. I quickly clasped a hand over my mouth and luckily swallowed whatever had made its way back up my esophagus. This time there was no possible way to control the tears and they poured like faucets from my eyes.

I dropped the lid I was still holding on to as all strength left me and I sank to the floor. Something inside of me began to scream and I longed to let it out for all to hear. Instead, I sat there and sobbed silent tears into my jacket sleeve. I clenched my eyes closed and all I could see was Ethan’s little body lying lifelessly inside that bin. It wasn’t real by any means, but it didn’t matter to me. In my mind it had already come to pass. Part of me really thought that when I went back home that night I would be met by paramedics and neighbors telling me that Ethan had been found dead inside a storage bin. All logic was totally gone and I sat there and cried for my loss.

I don’t know how long I was there on the floor, but it was probably somewhere around five minutes. I wonder how many people passed by me asking themselves what in the world could be wrong. At one point I felt a hand on my shoulder and I looked up through blurry eyes to see a man in a red shirt kneeling beside me. “Are you okay, Mam?” I could hear fuzzy voices coming from his walkie talkie and I could see his nametag which read “Chris”.

I looked at him blankly for several seconds, wiped my eyes and told him I was fine- I was just having a bad day. Normally I would have been humiliated by what had just taken place. But in my state of mind I don’t know if I was fully aware of anything that was going on. Chris then asked me my name and it was as if everything inside of my brain was gone. I didn’t know how I had gotten to the store, what day it was, or even my own name! I knew I had to tell him something, and I think I told him my name was Jennifer or Janet or something like that.

All I wanted right then was to be exiled away from all life. I wanted no one around me and after a moment, Chris walked away. Somehow I convinced him that things were okay. Again I’m sure I did a great job of lying, something I’d become a pro at in the last few months. I gathered all of my lost marbles from the floor and gained some composure and decided to finish what I had set out to do when coming to the store. I loaded up my shopping cart and attempted desperately to push the image of Ethan’s lifeless body out of my mind.

It seemed like a never ending walk from that aisle up to the check out stands, and it seemed like an even farther distance from there to my car. After I made my purchase I said to myself “Okay, now all you have to do is make it to the car and then you can explode again.” As I stepped outside I could feel the rain falling down all over me. The air was frigid and I thought for a moment that it was far too cold to be July. Why was it so cold if it was summer time?

I looked around me, so confused and alone. “No wait a second,” I thought silently. “Halloween decorations were out in the store. It must be October. The cold makes sense then.” Even though I was freezing and wet, I was in no hurry to get to the car. I walked sluggishly through the parking lot, taking in the chilled, damp air. It so perfectly mirrored my every thought and it was like the weather itself was the only thing on the face of the earth that understood how I felt. So in some twisted way, I took comfort in it.

I loaded the storage bins into the car and slumped down in the front seat. I sat there for quite a while, starring vacantly into the night. I didn’t care that I was soaking wet from head to toe or that my hands were so cold that I could barely feel them. And then from out of no where, a sound ruptured from deep within my soul. It came out in such a violent way that it almost scared me to hear it. I began to scream and scream, and then scream some more. It was like everything that had been bottled up, everything that I was afraid to tell anyone, every bit of anxiety, anger, and fear came bursting out of me. I felt like a three year old child throwing the tantrum of the century. The tears gushed freely and I clutched my abdomen as I felt the baby begin to kick vigorously. I’m sure that this outburst was quite alarming for her. I was crying in heaves so hard that I thought my lungs would burst. I could imagine the baby saying “Mommy, why are you so sad?”

“I don’t know!!!” I yelled out. I started banging on the steering wheel with my fist. “I don’t know why this is happening to me! I don’t know what’s wrong with me! Why me?! Why, God?! Why?!”

For the next several minutes I had a very intense conversation with God. Well, it wasn’t really a conversation so much as I was simply letting God have it. Then the fear and anxiety changed to pure rage. I was so angry with God and I wanted Him to know exactly what He had done to me. I felt like He had taken this perfectly capable, sane, happy, thriving human being and broken her. And for no reason at all! “Is this some kind of joke to you? Do you get a kick out of seeing me like this?” I felt so powerless and the only way to combat it was to scream. Here was God, this gigantic and powerful being, totally in control of my life and everything that happened to me. And here I was, an insignificant pawn in His little game. I was being tossed around, moved this way and that, all for His pleasure.

And so I yelled, and cried, and beat my fist so hard that one of my knuckles began to bleed. “Why won’t you just take this from me?” I pleaded over and over. “I know you can. You can do anything, and yet you won’t do such a simple thing for me. Make me sane again! Let me sleep again! Make me want to live! Take these terrible thoughts from me! Just give me back the person I once was!”

I caught my breath and sank back into the seat. That episode had completely exhausted me and I had no more voice to yell. “Okay, God,” I sighed “You win.” I sat there in the dark for a long time and cried for the better part of an hour. And then by some miracle, an ounce of logic entered my mind and I had the brilliant idea to listen to the silence. I bowed my head and humbly prayed “Dear Lord, please help me. Help me.”

I don’t fully understand what took place next. All I know is that I was suddenly calm and the foreign feeling of tranquility overtook my body. It had been so long since I’d felt anything like it, but I sat there and tried to absorb it. Then it was as if I saw a flicker of light before me. I know it wasn’t a real light, but in my mind I saw hope. I was encompassed by this deep, dark tunnel, and at the end there was a pinhole sized light shining through. I think that when we are going through a trial, God does allow us a little breathing time. Wave upon wave crashes down on you, but in between each one you get a second to take a breath of air before the next one crashes. And as I sat there in my car on that cold and rainy night, I was allowed a small breath of air. I was completely aware that the calmness I was feeling was fleeting and that I would likely feel the despair and confusion again.

But for a tiny moment, I was calm.

Episode 18- The Move

The big day finally arrived. We closed on our house and moved in on September 24, 2005. That first night in our new home was crazy and a little unerving, but I made it through okay. I had been looking forward to the moved because it meant a fresh start for us. No one new of my condition and I was going to do everything I could to keep people from finding out. Even if that meant that I was a hermit, I would keep it a secret as best I could.

Everything surrounding our new house was a stresser for Cody and me. It had taken a toll on our marriage, even before my illness began. We had been house hunting for months and we couldn't agree on anything. There were days when divorce seemed like the only option for us! Not really, but it was very stressful. Then I found this new dvelopment and I was excited about it. Cody, however, hated it and was against it from the start. But in the end I won and he resented me for it.

Then I got sick and our marriage suffered terribly. Looking back on it, I don't know how we survived as a couple. I guess the test of true love is when things get really bad, are you willing to stick it out and make things work? Or will you hit the road. There were times when we wanted to hit the road. Cody began going to see Schneiman with me every once in a while and it never went well. I would talk and he would clam up. Then we would leave there and he would say he had been "attacked" by Schneiman and me.

His resentment toward me about the house got so bad and we fought about it all the time. I often wondered if it was really about the house, or was it something else. I felt like he really resented me about the illness, as if it was my fault. Or maybe it was too much for him to deal with and he wished he'd never married me. I thought he wished he had married a more sane woman; a woman who would never get sick like I had. He didn't deserve this. He deserved someone better, somone stronger, someone who could be a better wife and mom.

I hoped and prayed that was we settled into our new home, both Cody and I would feel better about the situation. But at one point I called our realtor and asked him what he thought of us trying to sell the place. I wanted to know if we could break even on what we'd bought it for. I was desperate to fix things between Cody and me. I prayed that time would heal it.

Despite my best efforts to stay hidden from the neighbors, I met Becky one day while I was unpacking the garage. She mosied over across the street and introduced herself to me. I did my best to be friendly and polite, but on the inside I felt like a small child on the first day of kindergarten and I was scared. I was scared of being found out! But I would later realize that Becky truely was one of my greatest allies during this ordeal and I would grow to rely on her very much. I thank God for sending Becky into my life to be my friend when I needed someone like her.

Episode 17- Zoloft

Dr. Draper and I had discussed me going on an antidepressant, but I was not in favor of adding another drug to the mix and I wanted to see how I did without it. And since things had been going a little better, I thought I could manage on my own just fine with out it.

Then things took a turns for the worse and the attacks started coming frequently and I was crying all day long. Again I began having irrational thoughts that the baby was harmed and that I was a terrible mother. There were days when I couldn't even get out of bed. Then on a Sunday afternoon I was reading in Parents magazine (I loathe that magazine, BTW) and there was an article about prenatal depression. It talked about how the placenta can actually be damaged if the mother is depressed. There were other things mentioned in teh article that scared me beyond belief, so I decided to try the Zoloft.

The doctor had given me a sample pack at a previous appointment and I had it on hand, so that evening I took my first pill. I was aware that it would take about two weeks to work so I wasn't expecting a quick fix. But I also wasn't expecting that I would experience every side effect listed on the label.

The next day was pure hell. I was dizzy, I threw up a lot, my mouth dried up, I shook like a leaf, I was more anxious than normal, and my heart rate was accelerated. I decided to give it one more day so I took another dose Monday evening. Tuesday was even wrose, if you can believe that. I could not function at all and Brandi came over to babysit me during the day while Cody was gone.

I called my mom that afternoon (she happens to be a PharmD) and asked her if what I was feeling was normal. She went down the list of drugs I was on and said that Trazodone is actually an antidepressant in itself and I was taking 100-150 mg a day, so I could actually be overdosing when combining that with the Zoloft. I decided the side effects were worse than the depression and anxiety so I decided to throw the pills away.

That evening Brandi, her little boy, Ethan, and I went to get dinner and then to see the development on our new house. It was all but done and we walked through it and sat in the empty living room and talked. We would be closing in one week and I tried to feel happy about it, but I couldn't get past how awful I was feeling at the moment. I was trying to distract myself from my misery but it wasn't working.

We drove home, but on the way there I noticed I was breathing very hard and my heart rate had accelerated even more. Brandi helped me back into our apartment and I sat down on the couch. Cody was home by this time and Brandi told him what had happened on the way home. It was like all of the ill side effects I had experienced were now ten fold. I ran to the bathroom and started throwing up again, then I laid down on the bathroom floor and had what I thought was a heart attack. My chest hurt beyond words and I could not breathe.

Cody paged my doctor and when he called back he said to get me up to the hospital for an EKG. What I was experiencing was not normal. On the way out the door I grabbed my Ativan and Trazodone and downed a few pills in the car. Brandi was so sweet to stay at our apartment with Ethan. By the time we made the twenty minute drive to the hospital, I had calmed down immensely and and I was in a state of euphoria. The EKG came back normal and they chalked it up to a massive panic attack. Who knows what had really happened though. We drove back home and I crashed very hard when I hit the pillow.