tos and pregnancy
 

has anyone got pregnant while having tos?
how was caring for the baby without able to life/ hold her/him?

Many of us acquired TOS in our middle years, after kids were mostly past the toting & holding ages.

A few in the past had toddlers but with older kids & spouse around to help.

If you are already pregnant I guess you would just deal with it as it comes up.

But if planning to have a baby, it takes a lot of weighing the pros & cons...
just a few things to ponder...

stable long term help & support from spouse & close family /friends?
finances
medications? now or in the possible future
pain level you are at now , and what might it go up to in the future with the more lax ligaments of pregnancy

My TOS became obvious during pregnancy. I had mild symptoms for years but never would have known something was amiss until I got pregnant, which is when I was diagnosed. No doctor can explain why this happened. Things got pretty bad late in pregnancy (my guess is because of the extra weight and expanding rib cage). One specialist told me sometimes pregnancy relieves symptoms because the hormone relaxin relaxes the scalene muscles.

As far as caring for a child, it is quite difficult. Childcare, especially of an infant, is full of repetitive arm motions. Not just holding the child, but preparing everything the baby needs. If I could afford it I would have someone come in a few times a week to take care of my four-month-old because of the difficulties with my TOS.

It is also stressful to the family dynamic. I cannot do a number of things my partner and I agreed I would be responsible for (the discussion happened before I was diagnosed). It breaks my heart not being able to provide for my family as well as I want to. That being said, I've never denied my daughter what she wants or needs because of my arms.

My biggest piece of advice is make sure you have the financial, emotional, logistical support in place before having a child. And be honest with yourself that your TOS will pose a challenge to raising a child. Feel free to ask me any questions about the topic.

thats tough. thanx for the feedback on both. i have considered all the aspects.
i could see that with caring the baby, your health/ arms would be a lot worse afterwards. i was working so hard before despite the pain and it came to the point where i reallllly couldnt do anything. i was barely able to feed myself, or lift a cup of water. i dont want to be that bad again. now.. with a lot of rest, i could do more and its more manageable. but there are a lot of restrictions, i know if i do so much again it would just be that bad again.

i do hope to have a baby one day but yes, financially i couldnt even pay for myself, let alone a baby. nor that i could care for one. no family help here.

i love to hear more stories on tos with pregnancy and baby.
i am thinking what if i have the surgery and wonder if that would work. so many people said things have gone wrong.

I am not sure how far back the forum goes with our TOS mom's, but over the years life has gone one.

I know that if you do a search "this forum" above there has to be several claims, The years after the babies are walking and the caring of a family are always more challenging then the pregnancy or infant roads to cross.

As they are babies, pregnancy, sometime a C section is used to not stress by pushing,
Caring for the baby is always having support. Did you see the dad on TV with the boppy, he was a little person and had many challenges as would a tos mom. The mom in that case was little too, she was a nurse and Dad was stay at home dad with the baby.

If you can find some of those old segments that show the tent type play area on the floor, the door access to crib instead of lifting out, keeping things at height on the floor instead of typical changing tables, changing areas, With my grandson, I had a foam contour for a dressing area, it was on the Kitchen table when grandson was in the highchair, or open top swing, then on the floor at napping area so I did not have to lift. Kept a Umbrella stroller, for everything when he was older, from car to house, car to school, etc.
Just some things I recall at the moment. You are correct, it is a cost issue to a child. The diapers, formula even with nursing is astronomical for some reason, The doctor visits and care when there area colds and viruses, Two illnesses of grandson for ER and then Pneumonia, now adenoid and tonsil since he was in preschool and Kindergarten.

Good luck in the future, our children are such a reflection of the life we have and wish, loving us unconditionally.
di

I did it. We knew going in that I had pretty severe neurogenic and venous TOS. My having a kid involved a lot of planning ahead of time, and a lot of modification of physical parenting tasks. And my accepting the emotionally difficult fact that yes, when she got to be a certain (still small!) size, I couldn't just lift her like the other moms. We found other ways to get our cuddles in, such as co-sleeping. We found work-arounds for everything -- we had to be quite creative sometimes, and some of what we did looked ridiculous, I'm sure. With the right body mechanics, I could pick her up longer than we expected. And I trained her to climb into her carseat and her highchair (with some assistance from me) at a very young age, because I just couldn't lift her.

Sometimes it was hard, but it was so, so worth it. Before we tried to conceive, I did everything I could to get the condition under control (tons of PT, botox injections), and wean myself off the meds that would have been unsafe during pregnancy. (My husband was already doing the laundry and dishes -- things I can't do -- so that was obviously a big help.) If I had gotten the diagnosis WHILE pregnant, it would have been a totally different thing. I'm sure being prepared ahead of time for all the extra challenges made a big difference.

We are stopping with one, because there is no way I would manage two young kids with my limitations. But we did make it work, and she is the light of my life. And I don't think the TOS has prevented me from being a good parent to her. Not at all.

My symptoms did not get any worse during pregnancy, for what it's worth. They might have gotten like 10% better, possibly because I was just doing less work at home and at the office.

This is so good to hear. Thank you.