I know, your thinking "of course you are, your only 34 weeks pregnant!" Yes, however most of you don't know about the week we've had. So, here it goes and just a warning, this will be long and might be a little TMI. :)
For a few weeks I've been having severe, really terrible heartburn, yeah most women get this when pregnant, but I was diagnosed with GERD about 10 years ago, so I know what heartburn/acid reflux is all about. THIS is different, this makes my whole rib/chest area hurt and causes sharp sudden pains below my sternum, I even began researching other possibilities such as Gallbladder problems and Costochondritis. Well, Sunday January 11th, I had horrible acid reflux that night and after a few hours of sitting up in bed trying to sleep, I finally got up and vomited. I felt a little better but not much. Same thing happened the next night and then finally on Wednesday night, I had a horrible stomach ache and back ache, I thought a bath might help, but it did nothing. I threw up twice and eventually around 5am, fell asleep for a couple of hours. Landon urged me to call my doctor for an appointment to get some medicine. I didn't want to because I didn't think they would be able to get me an appointment for the same day and I had an appointment coming up that next Tuesday anyway. But he begged me to, and thank God he did...
So I called and they said I could come in that morning, I was exactly 33 weeks that day. I went in and described what happened the night before and what's been going on for weeks. My doctor did think it was severe heartburn, but agreed it could possibly be my Gallbladder and also mentioned that I could be having contractions that radiated to the top of my uterus where everything was tender already because of all my organs being pushed upward. I thought that was weird and didn't make a lot of sense to me, but whatever. She decided to check me and low and behold I was 2-3 cm dilated, 60% effaced, baby was at a -3 station and my amniotic sac was "bulging". WHAT?!?! She asked me if I've been having contractions and I told her I've been having a ton of what I thought were Braxton Hicks contractions but I was pretty sure they were BH and not the real thing. She immediately sent me to the hospital to get monitored.
So I checked in at about 10:30 am and got settled in bed they put a monitor on for the baby and one for the contractions. And it began, we were able to see that I was indeed contracting every 4-7 minutes! They were pretty painless, I had a few that were a little uncomfortable and had to sort of breath through a little. But they weren't happy that I was having so many. So, I got hooked up to the IV and was given a steady drip of Magnesium Sulfate. That drug is the DEVIL. Seriously, it makes you feel like a loopy old woman. I say old woman because it gives you hot flashes like you wouldn't believe! But I guess it was necessary because they didn't get my contractions to really even slow down till about 6pm that night. However they never got stronger or more frequent, so that was good. I was given a shot of steroids just in case we had to deliver baby girl in the next day or two. I also had to have a drip of antibiotics every 4 hours because we didn't know if I was GBS + or not.
That night was horrible, I only got about 1 hour of sleep. They had to put a catheter in because every time my bladder got full I would contract. It was so uncomfortable I could only lay on my left side, every time I tried to roll over it hurt so bad. Well it also hurt my hips to be laying on one side all night, so no sleep for me. I finally begged them at about 6am in the morning to take it out of me. I promised I would empty my bladder before it got full and they agreed. Ahhh relief!
I was told I would be in the hospital for 48 hours after they started the magnesium and then a few hours after that to be monitored. I also needed that second steroid shot 24 hours after the first one. I continued to have some contractions, but never as bad as they were on Thursday. I slept pretty good Friday night and finally Saturday was the day! We would see what was going to happen once they took me off the magnesium. I would either be going home or be having a baby. CRAZY! They said if I started contracting again and had made some progression then they wouldn't be stopping labor again. Which was pretty terrifying, though they assured me she would be fine, and I had those steroid shots, so that was a tremendous plus. But she would still most definitely need some NICU time and that made scared me so much.
So 1pm came and they stopped the magnesium, I'm telling you within an hour I was feeling back to normal and I realized then how loopy and "strange" feeling, I had been! About 15 minutes later I had the strongest contraction I had had since getting there. I immediately started crying and the nurse walked in to ask if I had felt that and immediately got concerned because she saw me crying and thought it was really bad. I assured her that I wasn't crying because it hurt, but just that I was scared because that didn't seem very promising. I calmed myself down and we waited. I had another milder contraction about 30 minutes later (pretty good). And then an even milder one almost an hour later. So, that seemed promising and the nurse was happy with it! Now all we needed to do was check me again and hope that I hadn't progressed during my time there.
I was 3cm dilated, 60-70% effaced and she was going to call baby at a -1 station, but when she touched her head she moved up, so she wrote down -2. And no bulging bag! So all in all, good news! They gave me a dose of Procardia (another milder medicine that helps stop contractions, sometimes) and discharged me!
My orders were to be on strict bed rest, (ie: only getting up to use the bathroom) till at least 35 weeks and we would reevaluate. So our short term goal is to make it to 35 weeks and we go from there. I had a follow up appointment with my doctor this past Tuesday and still had not made any progression (Yay!). She is a very positive person but told me she would be surprised if I made it much past 35 weeks. WOW, that was kind of crazy to hear, but who knows, my baby could be really stubborn and end up going to her due date! lol
That was very long, if you made it this far, thank you! And we of course will take any prayers and good thoughts you have. My goal is to make it to at least 37 weeks so she is term. I also want to be able to have my baby shower! haha. We are so not prepared to be bringing a baby home right now!
But I thank God for our family, they have been amazing and we have a plan in place in case it does happen. I have round the clock care for as long as I need it. This week alone, I had my Grandma, sister, MIL and my mom here, all rotating shifts. They have been cooking/cleaning and keeping me company. On the Saturday I was released my inlaws and mom came and cleaned my house from top to bottom and my dad made us some food! I couldn't ask for better family!
