I've been wanting to get the girls' birth stories written down while I still remember them. I thought I'd share Smartie's tonight. Catie's will be coming soon.
The Story of Smartie
My pregnancy with Smartie started out very easy—mild nausea in the first trimester and a fantastic second trimester. It wasn’t until ~30 weeks that things started seeming “off”. I started having quite a bit of swelling and some difficulty breathing. My doctor wrote this off as common in pregnancy, and since I’m pretty short there was not much room for baby AND lungs. By 32 weeks my swelling was getting worse. Other people were noticing that my face and hands seemed swollen.
At my 34 week check up, I had gained 10 pounds in two weeks. Quite a gain! My blood pressure was also up from baseline but not quite high enough to be diagnostic. At that point, I wasn’t dropping protein and my doctor wanted to take a wait-and-see approach. My big concern was my breathing. I was gasping for air with very little exertion and had an icy-burn sensation, like stepping out on a cold day and taking a deep breath. We thought maybe an allergy? So my doctor gave me a sample of allergy meds and told me to come back on Friday.
On Friday (35 weeks even) I woke up with a horrible headache. I started to black out in the shower and had to finish sitting down. Walking up and down the stairs caused my heart to race. I somehow made it to the doctor’s. I had gained another 4 pounds in three days, my blood pressure was now 50/50 points above baseline, and my protein dip was a +3. My doctor sent me immediately to the hospital. He wouldn’t even let me drive myself; a nurse drove me!
By the time Papa Runner left work and got to the hospital, they had run numerous tests. The official diagnosis was Pre-Eclampsia. My OB and baby’s pediatrician together decided to send me an hour away to a hospital with a NICU. At one point they talked about using the helicopter, but I stabilized enough for just an ambulance.
Once at the other hospital, they started me on magnesium sulfate to prevent seizures. I also was hooked up to numerous monitors, started on oxygen, and told I couldn’t even sit up. They wanted the lights left low, also to prevent seizures. I was allowed to watch the Cubs playoff game that night, though. Around 2 am, the attending OB finally got around to starting me on Cervadil (cervix softener.) I was on that for 12 hours followed by an hour break, then Pitocin. We watched another playoff game that night. (A win. In fact, it was their last post-season win to date!) After 7 hours on Pit with nothing happening, they decided to break my water. That finally got things moving!
By 1:00 am I was dilated to 3 and ready for an epidural. It took awhile to get it in place because my back was so swollen they couldn’t find the vertebrae! At 2:00 it was all finished and I fell sound asleep. The nurse was supposed to flip me over every 15-20 minutes but didn’t have the heart to wake me. Finally at 2:40 she told me she’d check me mid-roll. I was at 10 and ready to push! It took almost 2 hours of pushing, but at 4:28 am on Sunday, October 12, Smartie entered the world weighing 4lb 4oz and 17.75 inches long. She was taken to the NICU for 5 days, then another 4 days in the Intermediate unit before we finally took her home. She has been our joy ever since! (Mostly. Don't ask about today!)
It was not the intervention-free birth I had hoped for. But I realize how sick I was. If we had tried to wait through the weekend, there was a good chance we would have lost Smartie and/or myself. I look back with no regrets, just glad we both survived.
1 comment:
Thanks for sharing. I really am looking forward to seeing your next story. I was preeclamptic and my doctor allowed me to move 20 hours away at 30 weeks. He said that my symptoms of dizziness and seeing spots was nothing along with my horrible nausea that I did not have at all during my first trimester. My daughter was born at 33 weeks, just 13 days after our move. Thankfully my new doctor was very aware of preeclampsia and hospitalized me the minute she took a look at me (I honestly did not make it into an examination room. They pulled me into her office just minutes after arriving so that she could tell me that I was being hospitalized. She'd never met me before that point.) Less than 24 hours later I had my baby girl by c-section. I was too unstable for a natural birth. I was hospitalized for 5 additional days and was not able to see my baby in the NICU until 4 days after her birth. It took 3 months for my blood pressure to normalize and my kidneys to start functioning properly again. I'm now pregnant with a baby boy. He's due April 3rd. I will be having another c-section because of the risk of uterine eruption and a hip problem that the doctor said is a concern. (I've had a big problem with my hips for the last 12 years due to an injury.) We are hoping to make it to 39 weeks this go around. Thankfully all of my tests are looking good. They are doing 24 hour urine analyses on me every 2 to 4 weeks along with 4 vials of blood with each. They compare all of my levels to my previous ones to make sure that there are no differencs that would indicate a problem starting. Again, thank you for sharing your story. I'm always surprized to hear about doctors who take the "wait and see" approach with symptoms.
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