Easy Pregnancy Comes to a Screetching Halt

I'll admit, other than being sick in the beginning, this pregnancy was a pretty easy one.  I felt good most of the time, didn't gain a ton of weight (currently only gaining 16 pounds) and had no major problems.   That all changed at 32 weeks. 

I went in for a routine monthly visit.  When the doctor came in, he asked if I'd had a particularly stressful day.  I sort of laughed and said it had been a particularly stressful week.  After all, just a week before this appointment is when we lost Tom and dealt with everything that follows.   It turns out my blood pressure was a little on the high side   He didn't seem too concerned, but instead told me to come back in a week and try to meditate before I came in.   Sure, I'll try to relax when I fly out of work at 5:00 and fight traffic all the way in to Joliet to make my appointment.

The next week was more of the same, high blood pressure.  Another doctor had me lay on my side and took my blood pressure again which was lower this time.  He wasn't too concerened, but to be on the safe side, he ran a few tests which meant more blood work and peeing into a jug for 24 hours...a nightmare!  What happened at my next appointment was completely unexpected.  My doctor came into the room and announced that I was pre-eclamptic.   For future reference the Mayo Clinic describes preeclampsia as a condition of pregnancy marked by high blood pressure and excess protein in your urine after 20 weeks of pregnancy. Preeclampsia often causes only modest increases in blood pressure. Left untreated, however, preeclampsia can lead to serious — even fatal — complications for both you and your baby.   If you have preeclampsia, the only cure is delivery of your baby. If you're diagnosed with preeclampsia too early in your pregnancy for delivery to be an option, you and your doctor need to allow your baby more time to mature, without putting you or your baby at risk of serious complications. 



Cooper is really enjoying bed rest.

  This diagnosis also led to her telling me that I had to be on bed rest (at 34 weeks) and the goal was to get me to 36 weeks before they had to take the baby.  What a shocker!  A million thoughts ran through my head.  That's 6 weeks of income I had counted on that is gone.  That only gave me two weeks to get six weeks of things together to get ready for this baby.  I hadn't had my baby shower yet.  My dad was going out of town right around 36 weeks so he might miss this.   And on and on.  After a miserable night, I knew I had to gather my thoughts and figure out what to do about work.  I talked to my boss the next day and luckily I work for a really accomadating company and they were able to work with me about taking all this extra time off and allowed me to work from home since I was still feeling fine, but had to sit on the couch for weeks.

Another part of the diagnosis meant I had to see a fetal specialist each week, in addition to my weekly appointments with my regular doctor.  The specialist is there basically to run the same tests as my doctor but he is also a little more on the cautious side...which we found out about a week later.

So, while I was on bed rest, I had plenty of things to take care of at home.  I wanted to clean the house, get the baby's room a little more organized, the list goes on and on.  A few days in, I had a huge meltdown after an entire day on the couch.  I was bored.  I was tired of being told I couldn't get up and do certain things, even though I had SO MUCH to do.  After many tears I made myself get up and get in the shower and I felt much better.   It was from then on I decided that I would no longer sit in my pajama's all day long and sit in my own misery.  Every day, I would make a point to get up, shower, put some makeup and put in fresh clothes.  This proved to makes a work of difference.