Mums Takeover: Baby Brain

I am welcoming mums with a story to tell to The PHBP blog and our first mums takeover is Kerry.

Kerry first caught my eye in the school playground for her very cool sense of style and even cooler footwear. Our boys are in the same class and after some very confusing messages about  her husband knowing my partner Dean and her mistaking a stoner for a stone mason we became friends.

I won't go into anything too emo because she will totally rip me for it but I will say she is an unbelievably funny lady who has made me realise YOLO (its way cooler when she says it) so here is Kerrys Story....

So, I was having lunch on Tuesday with a friend. In case you are wondering, charcuterie and cheese sharing board and a slice of cake (shared also. Shared cake, shared guilt). This was post walk to Marske from Saltburn and pre walk back. Totally and utterly justified. Anyway, whilst having our catch up, she told me that she no longer believed in statistics. You know like one in two of us will be affected by cancer or one in four of us will die of heart disease. That kind of thing. Fair enough, but why? She told me that she stopped believing in them when I fell ill.

Now, sure enough if that was the case I am a pretty decent example statistical flaws. I am, according to such statistics, supposed to be 6 feet under or scattered lovingly across Saltburn beach. HA! Imagine walking on the beach and wondering if it’s a grain of sand or a teeny ashen flake of little ol’ me that just flew in your mouth?! Nice eh?!

Anyhow, I’m going to try and tell you a wee bit about me and what happened. Mind you, it’s really hard to condense, which I discovered while writing this, because it’s the toughest, wait for it…..”journey” (Yep I did it. I wrote “journey”, total knobber ) of my life so far.

So, here we go in a nut shell…… a really big one…….like a coconut one…. Juicy!

In 2013 I gave birth to my beautiful son Drew, sorry, OUR beautiful son. I’m married, his name is Scott, an ace dad and pretty fantastic husband. Drew was delivered with giant salad tongs to a woman who no longer has a pelvic floor and WE (live it, learn it) were very much living in that perfect baby bubble of joy. It was totally amazing and despite being one of the many, many women who say, “I don’t think I’ll enjoy the baby stage, I’m not very maternal”. Turns out that was a crock of shit and I did in fact love it! All three and a half blissful months of being mummy to baby Drew was a dream. That was until, life went totally arse over tit.

I’d had a really crappy hangover style headache for a few days. It wasn’t a big deal I just couldn’t shake it and one morning I woke up with it to Drew having a mild complain. I stretched out like a slug creating a nice postpartum pant wedgy, and yawned making my ear pop. Then my headache got crazy worse. I picked up my phone, rang mum and told her I had a migraine and felt bloody awful so could she help with Drew. I should just mention here that Scott works off shore so he was away, not laid next to me being a lazy knacker! Of course, Ma was on her way. She’s amazing. I went downstairs unlocked the door and took some paracetamol. I met mum on the landing and by then I’d started to feel sick. Drew had gone back to sleep by now so mum came armed with mop bucket to my bedside. I retched to be sick over the side of the bed and that’s the last I remember.

Rushed to hospital it turned out I randomly had suffered a subarachnoid haemorrhage due to a ruptured brain aneurysm that had been lurking. Eh? Basically blood had pushed a weakened part of a blood vessel making it bulge like a balloon to the point where it couldn’t be stretched further. Then one day, out of the blue my ear popped, yep, not my ear, and alongside it, my precious baby bubble.

The statistics for surviving a Subarachnoid Haemorrhage are 50%. Those who do survive 66% suffer permanent neurological damage. Add into the mix a blood clot forming on my brain (bad, very bad) causing it to swell more than it already had, meant I was pretty much screwed. Personally, I like my aneurysm in a tricky place so, a portion of my skull was sawed out, they sucked off (saucy!) the clot and performed brain surgery clipping the little bastard shut. The chances of me actually surviving were now 30%. Ooof!

Now, here I am typing this almost five years on. So unless I’m a badass ghost, you have figured out that my friend has a valid point. I am indeed a flawed statistic. However, I did suffer brain damage so pushing aside my sick humour for a mo, in all seriousness the last 5 years have been incredibly difficult. Fortunately, the damage is minimal and invisible to those who don’t know me. I am so thankful for that on one hand. On the other, it can be frustrating when met with lack of understanding. That’s no one’s fault. Just the way it is and that’s cool.

After my operation I was kept in an induced coma in ICU. Scott would bring in Drew daily and place him on me for his tummy time. That always makes my heart hurt. In fact all my time in hospital hurt like hell, physically and mentally. I had to learn how to swallow, sit up and eventually walk. But absolutely, nothing could have prepared me for what it would be like when I was discharged home. This was by far the hardest part of my recovery.

I remember feeling so utterly bereft for my old self in the early stages. Brain injury has a nasty habit of making you angry quickly as sensory overload takes over and cracks appear in your personality. I remember, very guiltily, of a time I was holding Drew and he started to cry. I couldn’t comfort him and I felt so cross. This rage erupted from no-where and I practically rugby passed Drew to my mum saying “here you take him, I can’t do this mother shit now”. Another time I was trying to feed Drew some his tea. He was making it difficult and I lost my shit in an instant. I remember that bowl of pasta ended up on the floor. I was so angry. Drew started to cry and Scott was cross. I crumpled and that night I told Scott that I felt so useless that it would have been better if I hadn’t survived. I felt completely defeated.

I was desperately clawing my way back to being a mummy. I always say I passed out to a baby and woke up to a toddler. I feel robbed of the first year of Drew’s life while I fought to overcome all my deficits. A lot of that time I watched on with sadness while other people did my job till I was able to do it myself. By God, did I battle my way through frustration, headaches, chronic fatigue and fear. I just don’t remember that precious time very well. Recovery wasn’t always about me either. What happened caused a mini ripple effect and my army suffered. Scott faced his battle against depression a year later and my mum refused to go on holiday if he wasn’t around for at least three years. Turns out my fear of it happening again wasn’t just mine.

On appositive note, I do remember what Scott and I call my recovery milestones. The massive highs of being able to sit up independently in hospital or finally being able to lay Drew in his cot, to braving a bath on my own after having a seizure in one and more incredibly running a half marathon two years on. These little epic moments spurred me on to keep picking up the pieces.

As for Drew, he will never realise how special he is and what positive impact he had on us all at the time. You have this gorgeous baby so you have to carry on. This little chap isn’t gonna knock himself up full English and crack on learning to roll over. You have to make the bottles, change the nappies, play, make silly faces and how can you not smile back at him and seek joy and happiness in that every single day? Even through the toughest of times he was the welcomed refuge for my family. A big, squidgy bundle of happiness, sick and poo, keeping everyone’s spirits up. For me, Drew was the ultimate goal and kept me accountable. He will never realise just how he saved us all. How he showed us that life goes on, whether you like it or not. What our amazing little legend!

One of the coolest things about me now is the spanking titanium plate that’s in my head that replaced part of my skull. But isn’t it great when someone points something out that’s pretty cool about you that you never even realised? When I saw my Neurosurgeon, which by the way is like meeting a total rock star, he told me that I am” very resilient. Very resilient indeed” and I really like that. I am. I am very resilient. Hell yeah!

There are so many parts to my story that what I have written here barely grazes the surface. I haven’t even touched on that seizure, spasticity, facial palsy, the plastic surgery and the way the left side of my body feels now. Relationships, mental limitations or reclaiming my physical strength too. Hey, that’s quite an impressive list eh?

Alongside those I find I’m facing new challenges five years on. Just a few hours ago I sat at the top of my stairs and cried because I felt so totally lost and overwhelmed with everything. With Drew in school his needs have subsided alongside some of those mummy duties I fought so hard to achieve. So now I’m stuck with myself during the day trying to figure out what the fuck I’m gonna do. Discovering what I want and how to get it is so very emotional. I’m not there yet and I admit I’m really struggling. Err, did I say just say discovering? Shite! The realisation of my limitations now means facing a different version of me and its tough enough trying to recover yourself after having a baby isn’t it? I just don’t know what it is I want. What can my new brain cope with? I have a suspicion that most of what I’m feeling is how many mums feel at some point so I’m not the only one. I guess that’s just life. So that’s fine. I’ll get there.

I have to remind myself that there is (luckily for me) no rush. Even though people’s eyes glaze over and I feel small when they ask what I “Do” and I whisper “I’m a full time mummy” most don’t know my background and my struggle to become one. I am so much more than that. Even though I do, look “normal” or appear to be “back to my old self” to some, I will never be the same and who wants to be normal anyway? Pah! I am so fortunate to have a tremendous family and some pretty inspiring folks surrounding me who know my history and are still cheering me on quietly, just the way I like it. I don’t think I would be where I am today if it wasn’t for them. My fans rule!

As for those statistics, in the end I believe that I am one very, very, unbelievably freakin’ lucky lady. Just like I am the only person in my family who doesn’t need glasses maybe I am an exception to the rule? And that my friend, suits me just fine because I like to prove people wrong. There’s hope even in unlikely probability.

Please give Kerry a follow @kescot  and support her in writing down her story in the brilliant way she does!

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