‘I promised to keep on going but maybe keep on going means coming back first’
Patrick Ness
Firstly, I would like to say HAPPY NEW YEAR and a big welcome to 2024.
Secondly, my most humble apologies for the disappearance act. Life got busy, hectic, complicated, and joyful at some point and dipped again. I am here to tell you all about it.
From raising my little Miracle baby to how the endometriosis journey has been going since then and another miscarriage.
Starting with baby Miracle is a big girl now. A whole 3-year-old in fact and oh what a sweetheart. What a blessing. I have learnt so much from this little human of mine. She is soft-spoken and soft-hearted. I grew up not being exposed to or experiencing as much affection as she expresses. So, I have learnt to be gentler with how I communicate, to be reassuring, to accept the hugs and kisses she gives and how she wants to be friendly with everyone. It is quite scary because we live in a world where it is not safe for a child to be friendly and loving towards strangers, therefore navigating that and trying to teach her without offending her has been a learning curve, and we will get there. She tells me randomly how she loves me and always compliments me on the smallest of things, I have learnt to then do the same as this actually builds her confidence. It is most definitely not roses all the time, but we are learning. If you all want any specifics on my experience in motherhood, let me know in the comments. e.g potty training, feeding, how I got her off breastmilk, how we manage her eczema and so forth.
I know I promised to post about the pregnancy journey and therefore I will take you through it from beginning to delivery.
For now, I just want to say I am baaaack and I can’t wait to share the journey with you all.
Thank you for the support and let’s keep it growing.
Yes, you heard right, I am with child. For a person who has been battling with endometriosis and had been told I am high risk of infertility, this all feels like a dream to me. It wasn’t sunshine and rainbows when I found out though, oh no hunny it was a nightmare.
I know I should’ve been jumping up and down for joy but the timing had just turned out to be the worst. Besides it being an unplanned and unexpected surprise, I was actually not even enjoying the experience at all. For so many years I had prayed to have a child of my own, I had prayed that endometriosis does not destroy me to the point whereby I am unable to conceive. “Just one child please. Whenever you believe I am ready God, I am asking for just one child”. See now that is where the term Be careful what you wish for played an important role. I wished for it and when it finally came, I felt different to how I thought I would have felt. (Serious side note though I had to seek help from western and traditional doctors, yes sangomas/ witch doctors, just so I could fall pregnant)
Firstly, the father did not want me to have the child. His reasons were that he had not been financially ready for us to have a child, as well as the fact that we were in 2 different cities and I refused to move in with him (yes, I did say no when he asked me to pack my bags and just go live with him. It made no sense to me at all but no worries we are okay now. He is not a deadbeat lol ). I was scared and alone. I mean we had just been put under the lockdown due to the Corona Virus and I could not go to any of my friends or family for support, my mother was in hospital and my brother was with his father, which meant I was in quarantine by myself. I could feel my mental wellness deteriorate. I was only 4 weeks pregnant at that time, with no answers on what to do or any proper guidance or support. This was emotionally draining. Yet besides the emotional drainage, came the physical one. Morning sickness was honestly no walk in the park. I had started throwing up everything I was trying to eat and started losing my appetite. I could not eat or drink anything, I could not think straight and I had become such a mess that I began to ask the universe for a miscarriage. Who in their right mind prays that they miscarry their child? Please point me to that person because I have so many questions for them …
The time for my first scan came and the reality began to settle in. I was overwhelmed with gratitude when I saw the little foetus and the expression on my mother’s face. It was a priceless moment. It was real, I am pregnant. Yet before I could even celebrate, I felt my emotions change from no longer wanting the baby to being afraid to lose the baby. You see, with my first pregnancy, I was not aware I had been carrying a child. I felt pain thinking it was my normal excruciating period pains and saw a huge clot on my pad which was later confirmed to have been a miscarriage. I was too young and immature to process the emotions or fully comprehend what was happening, yet this time around I was aware. This is what I wanted, this is what I had prayed for but then again I have endometriosis. Will I carry the baby full term or should I just prepare myself for the worst? I was anxious, I was scared. I spent most days praying that I am able to hold this baby in my arms while simultaneously making peace with the fact that endometriosis might cut that dream short. I was making peace with an unknown reality. I could not breathe from the fear that had built up.
Even though after my first trimester I was told that my chances of miscarrying were now close to none, I have been anxious throughout my entire pregnancy. I have had less endometriosis symptoms with pregnancy due to the increase in progesterone in my body (yaaaay a little break) and I may be in the clear for miscarriages but for the fact that I have not yet delivered, I am still high risk of preterm labor or a placenta Previa (a ruptured placenta during labor which will put both baby and I at risk as this causes severe blood loss).
I currently still suffer from lots of anxiety and stress but not quite depressed and I do think the chronic fatigue from endometriosis does play a role in how heightened my fatigue is during pregnancy but I am coping much better than I was in the beginning of this journey. I know there’s no cure for endometriosis but for the fact that I am pregnant with my little miracle baby and no longer in remorseless pain, I will forever be grateful. Nothing beats the feeling of having your little human moving around in your belly. In a womb that was thought to have been damaged, now carrying a life… I will be sure to return with an update of how delivery went as baby Miracle is due end of November 2020.
(if possible, kindly please leave a comment below and let me know if my next post should be a vlog with a video of how labor and delivery was or should I stick to writing? your opinion matters to me and thank you for your time and support)
Has someone ever asked you ‘how are you today?’ and you have no answer for them? You cannot tell them whether you are fantastic, coping or sad because you have no clue as well. And so you just say ‘I am okay, thank you’ and move on…
You see over the past year I have come to find myself searching for the real meaning of ‘I am okay’. Dictionary wise, okay means satisfactory but not especially good. Not elaborative enough for one to fully comprehend, I asked two of my closest friends to define their understanding of what one means when they say that they are ‘okay’. The first friend said it to be ‘I am not hundred, nor am I zero. I am not happy, nor am I sad. I am just thankful to be alive and that is all’, that is an intense yet comprehendable definition, is it not? I then asked my second friend, who herself suffers from her own chronic illness known as Fibromyalgia, she said “To some people they would just not understand it… If I asked you how you were feeling and you said ‘okay’, to me in means ‘well I could possibly have a better day. It doesn’t hurt so much but I still want to pull out my uterus, yet I am coping better than other days”, she described to me how her roommate who suffers from endometriosis would paint out her okay as being alive, able to pee properly with bearable pain, fatigued yet able to do some house chores -and to her that is the okay she can relate to despite the fact of having a different condition.
So what has my ‘okay’ come to be? I mean from the responses I have gathered; the most common thing is that you are just scrapping by. You have accepted where life is, you have accepted what you cannot change. You are wishing for some light at the end of the tunnel yet you are ‘okay’ with it never shining through… actually being okay sounds like one has given up. It sounds like one has accepted the fact that they are still breathing without so much a desire to be doing so. Being okay is the same as being numb. You feel nothing. You have accepted defeat.
Therefore, here I am asking myself this question again, why is it that I keep saying I am okay whenever I am asked how I feel? I am numb. I am angry. I am fatigued. I am stressed. I smile while being seconds from crying. I feel myself crumbling under the pressure. The pressure of school, the pressure of succeeding, the pressure of being happy when I am not, the pressure of keeping it together when it is falling apart, the constant pressure I put on myself to be perfect. I feel the lump in my throat when I think about my future. I feel the ache in my heart when I think about my health and the infertility. I feel the disappointment within me whenever I have failed. I feel the weight on my chest when no one around me is happy and I know I played a role in it. The constant pressure of life… I FEEL IT- I feel it all. I notice how I am triggered by the smallest of things. I cry to Disney movies more often than before, I am angered easily, I get emotional over things that make me happy, I am isolating myself even within a crowd. I feel everything and all those things that I feel keep pointing out to the fact that I am not okay… I am not okay because I do not feel okay. Hence the next time you ask me how I am, just be prepared for the answer…
Don’t spend your adult years trying to heal from your childhood years
Unknown
I went from being sad to being suicidal to being depressed to now not even knowing if I am still alive or not. How do I begin to explain that I am not ok? That this is years of built up hurt and anger that is ruining me now? Where do I seek for help if no one close to me will even understand? How do I heal from the past?
Well here’s my story…
For the longest of time I can conclude that I have not been okay. I try so hard to mask the pain and trauma but none of it goes away. Im at the age of 22 right now still trying to heal from the pain of my childhood. I mean I never speak of it but it haunts me every day that the trauma still builds on it.
Before my teen years I experienced sexual violation from a cousin of mine. Every time I went to go visit, at night when we slept together on my grandmother’s floor, she would put her hands in my genital area and rub my vagina. I was young and didn’t understand what she was doing. She made it seem like it was a normal thing to do even though she would beg me not to tell the family and yes it’s a SHE. I remember the time she put my hand on herself and proceeded to tell me as to what I should do. How do you do that to a child who is there to visit her grandmother and other cousins? You then grow up to start your own family while forgetting that you took advantage of your own blood ? Now every time I see her face I’m triggered but hey family secrets right…
Another thing that I am still trying to heal from is all the domestic abuse I witnessed. The father of my younger brother use to physically and emotionally abuse my mother ,as to why, I will never know. On many occasions my brother was lucky enough to not have seem anything but the one time he did he came into my room and said “papa doesn’t love us ” , (honestly just typing that made me cry). There was that one time he attacked her at his family function and she had to be rushed off to the hospital and while I was crying in the car he kept shouting at me to shut up. His sisters were there for all of this in my mom’s Verso… There are many other incidents that occurred that I can never erase from my mind. I mean the man ruined the entire festive season for me when he fought with my mom on Christmas day while our extended family was there. I had to open up to my one cousin and tell her that this has beeeeen happening and till this day I dread Christmas. To be honest I still get triggered by the flashbacks and I pray the Lord heals my heart so that I am able to forgive him because even today, I hate to have to admit that I loathe his presence.
One other dark story that I have never told was how a brother of my friend raped me… I’m actually not even ready to speak on that. I’m choking on my tears right now…
This blog is here for me to tell my truth, my journey and my fears. I apologize if this is not the way to do it but I am healing and this is the only way I know how.
Thank you and please remember to follow the page ❤️
“I never thought I would go from pregnancy scares to infertility scares”- Mbali Ngwenya
(not own property)
It’s really hard preparing a room for a person who might never come. It haunts me every single day knowing that you are able to take that away from me. Haven’t you taken enough already ? You basically control a huge part of my life at this point. From what I eat, to what I wear and how I sleep . I’m tired of being sick, I’m tired of having to face you every single day and I’m tired of the judgement.
They look at me thinking I’m faking it all. Thinking I’m using you as an excuse to get time off from work or school but I’m not. I’m really not. You drain me physically and mentally. If it’s not you attacking my organs and immune system, causing me so much pain that I can’t move then you simply shut my brain off. My thoughts, my reasoning, my entire thinking process you mendle with it all. I have accepted it though but now, now you’ve honestly gone too far.
How do you think my mom felt when she was told that her own daughter might never give her grandchildren? I never wanted to believe all the information I got from researching about you. Taking one’s fertility is a bit cruel and so I chose not to think of you as such a monster, but then again you are one. I had just woken up from the surgery in attempts to rid myself of you, my beautiful mom was right there by my side – like she’s always been. The doctor came in, asked how I was then spared no time in delivering the news that would cause me sleepless nights. He asked how old I was and told me I should start working on getting pregnant, “oh so you know about the infertility? yes then you should be trying to concieve now” haha . What? How? Why? My whole life I was afraid of falling pregnant at a young age because of how I would be such a disappointment to my mom (despite the fact that I probably already am a disappointment) and thought that when the time is right then I’ll be blessed with the gift of being a mother. No, not when you’re around. You will work on making sure I work three times as hard to do what comes so naturally to a woman.
What’s the point of even being in a relationship? I have never felt less of a woman than I do now .You know how much I love the littles ones, so why take that from me? Why would you want to destroy me further ? My mom is expecting grandchildren soon, the doctor told me to try but I have never been so afraid. The women who are suffering from you have expressed how they tried hundreds of times, had multiple miscarriages and by a small chance eventually could carry a full term pregnancy (that is only a few lucky ones) but I’m afraid. Yes I want nothing more than to be a mother ,yet the trauma I have to be faced with before that dream can come true is just not fair.
(not own property)
I am honestly against the thought of abortion and only believe that it should be allowed based on certain circumstances. I mean if you had consented to having sexual intercourse with someone, then chances of you falling pregnant are standard. Children are a blessing and not a ‘mistake’, a blessing because same way as you were blessed to wake up today while someone else didn’t, you were blessed to be a mother while others struggle. That is just my personal opinion,that is not intended on offending anyone… On the other hand though I am envious of my friends who have had the luck of conceiving. They look so amazing. So beautiful. I want that too. I want to watch my baby grow inside me every month. I want to feel the little kicks and him/her moving around looking for space in mommy’s tummy. Then when they finally arrive, I want to feel their little warm breath when they fall asleep on my chest and be there when they grow and lose their first tooth …
…I want a reason to feel alive again .
P.S: You’ve already got a place in my heart, I cannot wait until you are in my arms.
“The kind of letters I write are the ones you read in your bed, curled up under the sheets with tears running down your face” – Mbali Ngwenya
(not own property)
Endo. What a beautiful name you have. It sounds like a young-lady’s nickname, one who is filled with nothing but joy and happiness. But that’s not the case is it? She is filled with nothing. That’s it. Nothing. Is it because you aren’t happy with yourself and so you choose to victimize 1 in 10 women just so they can feel what you going through? 1 in 10! That is a lot, don’t you think? But I guess it’s true when they say “hurt people, hurt people”. The agony and shame that you put them through, that’s what gives your life and keeps you thriving. You refuse to be cured, you refuse to let go of your puppets and so you slowly pull them down into a comforting emptiness. ‘It’s okay not to be okay. I am your new normal’ ,and that’s true it is okay to not be okay but that should not be ones everyday normal life and I guess that’s where the problem is, you want lifelong misery to be ‘normal’ .
You’re really sneaky at first though, not as loud and treacherous as you are now. I mean pain during menstruation is unquestioned. Nausea, headaches, mood swings, fatigue and some, they are all acknowledged and so just because you share these qualities with what is the norm you go on unnoticed. Yet this angers you, does is not? You want to be heard, you seek to be known and so you take the ordinary and use it to aggrandize your presence. I know those who are hankering to know your story don’t know you at all but still consider themselves doctors and yet I as a patient can tell your fairy-tale story from beginning to… Well there is no end.
My dear friend, you remember how you snuck up on me when I was still only in my childhood. No? Well I remember it like it was yesterday. It was 11 years ago though, I was just 10 years old when you came to pay me a visit which I never knew would turn into a permanent stay. I was in the kitchen helping my grandmother cook and suddenly my vision went blurry, my temperature shot up and I couldn’t even think clearly no more. Thought I was just dizzy and went to the bathroom and there it was, that little drop of blood on my underwear that said “You are now a woman”- oh how exciting! You were quiet at first, a little sleeping beauty who had nothing much but a little baby kick to her. The years went by and you grew and so did I but I guess you wanted us to grow as one and how dare I not notice that. You grew anxious and irritable and so you began to demand attention. Considering that your time to be noticed was only once a month, you used everything in your power to dim my light so that you may shine with every cycle that I had. When I tried to ignore you, you would stab me in the guts until I was curled up on the floor. You didn’t like the idea of me trying to silent you with painkillers and so you would go from poking me with a toothpick to motor-racing around my whole pelvic floor with cars that had hacksaws for wheels.
I presume you must have gotten lonely and because you knew what was going on at home, you used that as an opportunity to introduce me to one of your many friends, Depression. Or should I say Depro? That is what you called her to make her sound so cheerful, I thought that was cute. I recall how sad she was but not the kind of sadness that washes away after having chocolate and a good cry. No. She was the kind that was compassionate. It was aggravating yet freeing at the same time- somewhat silent but sure-as-hell deadly. I wanted to help her, save her from drowning but instead she convinced me to jump in and said that if I can’t teach her how to swim then we will comfortably float. I craved for the shore (joy) yet whenever I tried to swim towards it she would softly whisper “Breathe. Keep your head above the water and let the waves pull you back to nothing”. Did I mention that they want to take her away from me by making me see a doctor who is going to tell me how she’s not ‘good’ for me. Can you imagine trying to take the element to one’s personality? The lump in my throat gives me a voice to speak up, the ache in heart taught me how to love others so hard that they never feel the same aching numbness and the flood of thoughts in my mind are the birth of my art, so what am I without the pain? Yes maybe she hurt me by allowing me to take a razor to my skin in hope that the dysphoria would ooze out those cuts, but Endo is that not what you wanted? You wanted me to see what is it you were doing to me internally and so I did. But how is it that when those self-inflicted wounds healed you chose not to heal with them?
I know this is a lot to take in and so I will leave it here for now. You did say you were chronic so that means you are ceaseless, right? You are so deeply-rooted within me that I will not be in a hurry to write to you again but just know that I will not cry on your next flare-up as I now have ink for tears.
“It never occured to me that one day Iwould wake up sick and never get better again” – thoughts of anyone living with a chronic illness
I remember the first time I started experiencing excruciating
pains. I was told it was normal and that I should ‘woman-up’ because this is
what normal women go through. As the years went by, I got older and the pain
got worse. In high school I had a boyfriend who knew my cycle and would always
bring me painkillers and comfort food (at this time I was banned from having
pills at home as they thought I was an addict). Every single month was just
extreme torture but hey I had to push through it, I am a ‘woman’ after all,
right? Wrong! I knew something was not right when I started having migraines,
backaches and joint pains a week before my cycle, why must I have so much pain
before, during and after? Why am I sleeping so much? Why am I crying so much?
Why is it that I have to be picked up from school because the pain is too much?
Why do I have to get to the counter and ask for the strongest pill they have
because all the ones I have tried are not helping? Why me?!?
The first time I found myself in the ER was when I had to
stop my netball game because I was dizzy and had a migraine, it got so bad
later that night that I was rushed off to hospital. But ‘nothing’ was wrong,
just a migraine. Next I found myself in the doctors’ room because my back and
pelvic muscles were inflamed and I was finding it hard to even get out of bed,
but once again, nothing a little injection and pain meds can’t fix, right?
Finally the year after completion of my Matric, I found myself once again in
the ER because of pain after my periods that made it impossible for me to move.
I never cry but that night it was all I could do (and trust me it hurt so so
much that breathing was a nightmare as every inch in me ached). I stayed in
hospital for a week, saw every doctor I could while there only to be discharged
with a mere ‘WE DO NOT KNOW WHAT WAS WRONG’. How do doctors let you go without
knowing the cause of your pain and just pump you with painkillers? How?
In 2016, after being in and out of countless doctors offices, after popping pills like it is Astros, after being in pain and being told ‘it is nothing’ for almost 6 years did I hear a decent explanation from a gynae, ” sounds like you have endometriosis” …Okay whatever that means sis, as long as I am not dying then I am good. Lol little did I know that this was just the beginning of my journey to feeling like a living corpse.
A Golden Womb 