Pain, Memories & Motherhood

Good Morning!

Last night was… something.

Anthony and I went for a walk, came home, showered, and got into bed. I turned on a show to unwind when all of a sudden I got this horrible, gut-wrenching pain in my lower abdomen. The sharpest pain imaginable. The kind where you literally freeze because moving makes it worse. It came completely out of nowhere, and I had NO idea what was happening.

I couldn’t move. I just laid there putting pressure on my stomach trying to survive it.

Honestly, for a few minutes I thought I was dying. Then this little voice in my head said, “It’s an ovarian cyst.”

So naturally, I had Anthony start Googling ovarian cysts while I laid there trying not to panic. I needed to know if I should go to the hospital immediately, if I could use a heating pad, or if I just had to suffer through it. Everything basically said: pain meds, rest, and as long as there’s no bleeding, you’re probably okay.

Okay… good. No blood.

But the whole thing instantly brought me back to high school.

When I was 17, Anthony and I were on one of our “breaks.” I was still in high school, and he was the big college student feeling like he needed freedom and “college experiences.” It honestly wasn’t the easiest season of my life.

During that time, I went on one date with a guy from work. We literally just went to the movies and then I went home. That night, I had the exact same pain happen. My grandmother ended up taking me to the ER because I had never experienced anything like it before.

At the hospital they did an ultrasound and immediately asked if I was pregnant. I remember saying, “No,” because I had just finished my period, and Anthony and I hadn’t been together in a while.

The next day I called into work because I still felt awful. Then the following day, while I was working in the dressing room at TJ Maxx, the loss prevention guy started calling me nonstop over the store phone and sexually harassing me.

He had always had a crush on me, but he was much older — probably around 24. I don’t remember the exact age gap, but I do remember going to the movies with him once and feeling completely uncomfortable because he couldn’t keep his hands to himself. I never went out with him again. I was young and naive and didn’t always know how to handle situations like that.

After my ER visit, he started insinuating that I had slept with the guy I went to the movies with and was saying all kinds of disgusting things to me over the phone.

I ended up talking to another coworker — another teenage girl from my high school — and found out he had been doing the same thing to her too. Saying inappropriate things, trying to touch her, making both of us uncomfortable.

And this was the guy whose job was literally to protect the store.

I was furious. He would not stop calling me, so finally I told management.

And guess what happened?

Nothing.

They didn’t fire him. They just transferred him to another store so he could continue behaving the same way somewhere else.

Sadly, this kind of thing still happens.

Ava experienced something very similar while working at a restaurant when she was 16. One night while taking out the trash, she ended up cornered outside by an older man and another younger boy, both employee's while they touched her inappropriately and made disgusting comments to her. We ended up involving the police.

And again, instead of the restaurant taking accountability, they quietly moved the older man to another location.

That part makes me so angry as a mother.

Why are young girls so often expected to just deal with these situations while grown men are protected?

Thankfully, Ava left that job and went to work at a school instead, where she felt much safer.

Anyway… back to the cyst.

Shortly after that cyst ruptured when I was 17, Anthony and I ended up conceiving Devun. Deep down, I’ve always believed that cyst may have been blocking me from getting pregnant. We had gone nearly three years without protection and never once gotten pregnant before that happened. Maybe that’s medically possible and maybe it isn’t, but it’s something I’ve always believed in my heart.

Apparently I believed it enough that after whatever happened last night, I literally had a dream that I got pregnant again NOW.

Which is honestly hilarious considering Anthony got fixed shortly after Will was born.

(And trust me… THAT story is a whole blog post by itself.)