Midwife Appt. 10/12/05 – “The Wake Up Call”
Where to begin? The beginning usually works well….
5:10am I awake to the unceasing movement of my child in my womb and a slight urge to pee. Deciding that as long as I’m awake I may as well count his movements. I do just that.…. He makes his required ten moves in less than 1 minute. (Does he think it’s party time???) Then I go to the bathroom. …. While I’m there I realize that I am hungry. I know that Ethan will continue to move as long as I am hungry. So I quietly head down the dark hall to the kitchen and try to silently fix myself a snack in the dark- Luke’s alarm is set to go off at 5:50 and I don’t want to wake him….. Too bad! He’s awake when I get back to bed about 10 minutes later. He asks if I’m okay, and I explain my activities. Then we both try to act like we’re going back to sleep. Hah! That’s it. We’re both awake by that point and just chalk it up to good practice for after Ethan is born.
This is how our day began.
Keeping in mind that I normally wake up at 8:30am these days, I figure I’ll just get started sewing Ethan’s quilt and take a nap sometime around midmorning when I feel tired again.
Plans are a funny thing.
Through a series of “I’ll take my nap when I finish this” thoughts, somehow I’ve made it to 3:55pm without a nap and I still have to get the laundry out of the dryer, at least lay it out so it won’t wrinkle, and leave the house no later than 4:20 so that I can pick up Luke for our midwife appointment at 5:15 and still be on time! Finally, dead tired, I drop everything I’m doing, set the egg timer for 20 minutes (when the laundry should be done drying anyway) and decide to at least lay down on the bed for that period of time …. to heck with being late! (The clinic is always running late anyway.)
So I dose for what seems both not long enough and yet way longer than 20 minutes. I reluctantly pop my eyes open to check the egg timer…. 55 minutes! What in the world??? Apparently there is something wrong with our timer. So I jump out of bed to see that it is already 4:20pm, grab my keys, rush out the door and down to the laundry room. The last dryer is just turning off as I unload the first two. So, with 3 loads of laundry loaded quickly into my basket, I rush (as quickly I as I can these days) back to the apartment and lay out the clothes in record time. Then, without even stopping to pee, I grab my car keys, my purse, the cell phone, the papers I’ll need for the appointment (ironically, including a copy of my Birth Plan for the midwife), and then rush out to the car.
No, I do not speed. (Couldn’t afford the ticket anyway.)
After quickly picking up Luke, we make it to the Midwifes’ office by 5:20pm. Only 5 minutes late. Shouldn’t be a big deal. The last 2 times we got here 10 minutes early and weren’t shown in until 20 minutes after our appointment anyway. …. Wrong. Tonight they’re actually running on time! So, while I’m doing my usual peeing in a cup routine, they show Luke into one of the rooms.
I join him in the room and they weigh me, then set me down on the table and take my blood pressure. …. “I’ll check you again in a little bit.” The nurse says. In other words, my blood pressure is high. I’m surprised, but not shocked after all the rushing I’d just been doing. No biggie. I try to relax while we wait for the midwife.
The midwife comes in and we going through my list of questions about the GBS testing, antibiotic issues, recommended pediatricians, etc. Then she says that she’s going to take my blood pressure again. Okay. …………. It’s high again.
Now the midwife says that she hates having to tell me that she’s concerned about my blood pressure because it’s a joke to tell someone, “I’m concerned about your blood pressure, now try to relax so it’ll come down.” Well, if that was all she had said, I MIGHT have been able to accomplish that, but she also had to tell me that if it didn’t come down they would send me to the hospital for testing to see if I had pregnancy induced hypertension (a.k.a. pre-eclampsia). She also said that if I DID have pre-eclampsia, they would induce my labor that night. HELLO! Yeah. Right. Relax… uh huh, suuuuurrrrrre! No problem!
Well, they had me lay on my left side for about another 15 minutes or so, then took my blood pressure again. This time it was RIGHT at the cut off for what's considered high, and she decided that since it had not significantly decreased (enough to be normal for me), she was going to send me to the hospital for the testing and monitoring. Oh goody! NOW I can relax! (note the dripping sarcasm)
Soooo…. After a few more questions on my part about the various possible outcomes of all of this, and after doing that GBS test that I had been praying so much about, we left the office and headed for the hospital. (BTW I won’t get the results of the GBS test until Friday, and the anemia thing didn’t even get done thanks to my blood pressure situation.)
On route to the hospital, we made a series of phone calls to my parents, Luke’s parents, our doula, and David Fairchild. So everyone was on alert and praying.
As soon as I’m done with the phone calls, Luke starts telling me little stories about his day at work. This is something he continues to do during every down moment of the night. He’s completely natural about it and he actually manages to totally distract me from what’s going on while he’s talking.
After checking in at the hospital, I am (thank you Lord!) not placed in the busy, noisy, triage room as I’d expected to be, but instead shown to a quiet, two person room with no one in it. Yeah! Then I get to pee in yet another cup and strip down so that I can put on a hospital gown before laying down on my favorite blue paper thingy that they use to cover the beds – let’s just say it sticks. Not so yeah. Then, as they’re hooking me up to all kinds of monitors, I realize I don’t feel well. Why? I’d skipped my usual afternoon snack, I haven’t had any dinner, and it’s well past dinner time. The nurse says she’ll ask the midwife if I can have something to eat. (Umm, hello, I’m PREGNANT! Just feed me!)
The first blood pressure test comes back still high. Uh oh. Breathe. Relax! Think about something else! The nurse thinks the cuff might be too small. So she comes back a few minutes later with a larger cuff and takes my pressure again. NORMAL!!!! YEAH!!!!!
Now I’m set up for automatic blood pressure checking every 15 minutes while listening to Ethan squirming like crazy and kicking at the heartbeat monitor because he’s hungry too. (His heartbeat is perfect, BTW.)
The nurse comes back and draws my blood so that they can test my liver and kidney function (one of the ways they detect preeclampsia). Then, a few minutes later the midwife comes in and talks to me. She gives me the run down on what’s happening and what might happen, and (PTL!) gets me a chicken salad sandwich, some milk, and some orange juice. Woohoo! I am a MUCH happier camper! Meanwhile I’ve had 2 more bloodpressure checks and both have come out NORMAL! Yeah! So basically, we’re just waiting for the lab results.
In the meantime the midwife wanted to check my amniotic fluid index. I was leary of this because of its high inaccuracy rates, and tactfully told her so. She understood my concern and that I would not be willing to make any decisions based solely on the results of such a test. This having been said, she did perform the ultrasound and found plenty of amniotic fluid. So no problems there either. As a special bonus, we got to SEE Ethan for the first time since June. He is head down as we suspected, and his little back is off to my left side. We even saw him moving his little fingers over his face! And we got a new (if not super clear) picture of him. (Oh, and there is no question – his testicles have decended to their proper place. - Our son is not a modest boy!)
Many more normal blood pressure checks later, the lab results are finally in and everything is NORMAL! My kidneys are fine. My liver is fine. My urine does not have protein in it. I do NOT have preeclampsia! I am NOT going to be induced! I GET TO GO HOME! Thank you Lord!
So, that’s the story of yesterday…….
Why did I title it, “The Wake Up Call”? Several reasons.
First, because I realized that I’ve been too set on “he’ll be here in a month” and “I’ve got a month to get A, B, and C, done”. I’ve focused too heavily on keeping the house in pristine order and not enough on accomplishing the things that HAVE to get done BEFORE Ethan arrives! For example, I realized that I hadn’t even packed my hospital bag yet. It was something on my list of things to do, but it wasn’t prioritized where it should have been.
I also realized that I’d kept resting and exercise on the bottom end of my priorities- where they’ve been my whole life- after getting my other tasks accomplished (i.e. dishes, laundry, sewing, blogging, etc.). As a result, I’ve only taken a nap maybe 3 times since quitting work (although I’ve gotten more sleep at night) and I’ve only exercised about that many times as well. Last night made me realize that, HELLO, I am running out of time to get my body into the best shape it can be to handle the stresses of labor! I need to shift things around and make sure that I do these things!
Lastly, the events of last night put a check on my emotions. For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been saying telling Ethan he can come out anytime he’s ready, but when faced with the reality of potentially not having him in me anymore within a matter of hours…. suddenly I wasn’t so sure I was ready for that. Suddenly it’s all more real. We’re actually going to have a baby to put in that bassinette that’s been sitting at the foot of our bed for nearly a month. We’re actually going to have a baby that I’ll have to breastfeed and change and care for. There is actually going to be a little person in my arms instead of somewhere under a lump of fat in my belly. While all of this is great…. it’s sort of like the exciting feeling you get just as you reach the top of a rollercoaster, before its first major drop. It seemed like that trip up took forever, but then suddenly you’re there and you’re wondering, “Am I really ready for this?”
5:10am I awake to the unceasing movement of my child in my womb and a slight urge to pee. Deciding that as long as I’m awake I may as well count his movements. I do just that.…. He makes his required ten moves in less than 1 minute. (Does he think it’s party time???) Then I go to the bathroom. …. While I’m there I realize that I am hungry. I know that Ethan will continue to move as long as I am hungry. So I quietly head down the dark hall to the kitchen and try to silently fix myself a snack in the dark- Luke’s alarm is set to go off at 5:50 and I don’t want to wake him….. Too bad! He’s awake when I get back to bed about 10 minutes later. He asks if I’m okay, and I explain my activities. Then we both try to act like we’re going back to sleep. Hah! That’s it. We’re both awake by that point and just chalk it up to good practice for after Ethan is born.
This is how our day began.
Keeping in mind that I normally wake up at 8:30am these days, I figure I’ll just get started sewing Ethan’s quilt and take a nap sometime around midmorning when I feel tired again.
Plans are a funny thing.
Through a series of “I’ll take my nap when I finish this” thoughts, somehow I’ve made it to 3:55pm without a nap and I still have to get the laundry out of the dryer, at least lay it out so it won’t wrinkle, and leave the house no later than 4:20 so that I can pick up Luke for our midwife appointment at 5:15 and still be on time! Finally, dead tired, I drop everything I’m doing, set the egg timer for 20 minutes (when the laundry should be done drying anyway) and decide to at least lay down on the bed for that period of time …. to heck with being late! (The clinic is always running late anyway.)
So I dose for what seems both not long enough and yet way longer than 20 minutes. I reluctantly pop my eyes open to check the egg timer…. 55 minutes! What in the world??? Apparently there is something wrong with our timer. So I jump out of bed to see that it is already 4:20pm, grab my keys, rush out the door and down to the laundry room. The last dryer is just turning off as I unload the first two. So, with 3 loads of laundry loaded quickly into my basket, I rush (as quickly I as I can these days) back to the apartment and lay out the clothes in record time. Then, without even stopping to pee, I grab my car keys, my purse, the cell phone, the papers I’ll need for the appointment (ironically, including a copy of my Birth Plan for the midwife), and then rush out to the car.
No, I do not speed. (Couldn’t afford the ticket anyway.)
After quickly picking up Luke, we make it to the Midwifes’ office by 5:20pm. Only 5 minutes late. Shouldn’t be a big deal. The last 2 times we got here 10 minutes early and weren’t shown in until 20 minutes after our appointment anyway. …. Wrong. Tonight they’re actually running on time! So, while I’m doing my usual peeing in a cup routine, they show Luke into one of the rooms.
I join him in the room and they weigh me, then set me down on the table and take my blood pressure. …. “I’ll check you again in a little bit.” The nurse says. In other words, my blood pressure is high. I’m surprised, but not shocked after all the rushing I’d just been doing. No biggie. I try to relax while we wait for the midwife.
The midwife comes in and we going through my list of questions about the GBS testing, antibiotic issues, recommended pediatricians, etc. Then she says that she’s going to take my blood pressure again. Okay. …………. It’s high again.
Now the midwife says that she hates having to tell me that she’s concerned about my blood pressure because it’s a joke to tell someone, “I’m concerned about your blood pressure, now try to relax so it’ll come down.” Well, if that was all she had said, I MIGHT have been able to accomplish that, but she also had to tell me that if it didn’t come down they would send me to the hospital for testing to see if I had pregnancy induced hypertension (a.k.a. pre-eclampsia). She also said that if I DID have pre-eclampsia, they would induce my labor that night. HELLO! Yeah. Right. Relax… uh huh, suuuuurrrrrre! No problem!
Well, they had me lay on my left side for about another 15 minutes or so, then took my blood pressure again. This time it was RIGHT at the cut off for what's considered high, and she decided that since it had not significantly decreased (enough to be normal for me), she was going to send me to the hospital for the testing and monitoring. Oh goody! NOW I can relax! (note the dripping sarcasm)
Soooo…. After a few more questions on my part about the various possible outcomes of all of this, and after doing that GBS test that I had been praying so much about, we left the office and headed for the hospital. (BTW I won’t get the results of the GBS test until Friday, and the anemia thing didn’t even get done thanks to my blood pressure situation.)
On route to the hospital, we made a series of phone calls to my parents, Luke’s parents, our doula, and David Fairchild. So everyone was on alert and praying.
As soon as I’m done with the phone calls, Luke starts telling me little stories about his day at work. This is something he continues to do during every down moment of the night. He’s completely natural about it and he actually manages to totally distract me from what’s going on while he’s talking.
After checking in at the hospital, I am (thank you Lord!) not placed in the busy, noisy, triage room as I’d expected to be, but instead shown to a quiet, two person room with no one in it. Yeah! Then I get to pee in yet another cup and strip down so that I can put on a hospital gown before laying down on my favorite blue paper thingy that they use to cover the beds – let’s just say it sticks. Not so yeah. Then, as they’re hooking me up to all kinds of monitors, I realize I don’t feel well. Why? I’d skipped my usual afternoon snack, I haven’t had any dinner, and it’s well past dinner time. The nurse says she’ll ask the midwife if I can have something to eat. (Umm, hello, I’m PREGNANT! Just feed me!)
The first blood pressure test comes back still high. Uh oh. Breathe. Relax! Think about something else! The nurse thinks the cuff might be too small. So she comes back a few minutes later with a larger cuff and takes my pressure again. NORMAL!!!! YEAH!!!!!
Now I’m set up for automatic blood pressure checking every 15 minutes while listening to Ethan squirming like crazy and kicking at the heartbeat monitor because he’s hungry too. (His heartbeat is perfect, BTW.)
The nurse comes back and draws my blood so that they can test my liver and kidney function (one of the ways they detect preeclampsia). Then, a few minutes later the midwife comes in and talks to me. She gives me the run down on what’s happening and what might happen, and (PTL!) gets me a chicken salad sandwich, some milk, and some orange juice. Woohoo! I am a MUCH happier camper! Meanwhile I’ve had 2 more bloodpressure checks and both have come out NORMAL! Yeah! So basically, we’re just waiting for the lab results.
In the meantime the midwife wanted to check my amniotic fluid index. I was leary of this because of its high inaccuracy rates, and tactfully told her so. She understood my concern and that I would not be willing to make any decisions based solely on the results of such a test. This having been said, she did perform the ultrasound and found plenty of amniotic fluid. So no problems there either. As a special bonus, we got to SEE Ethan for the first time since June. He is head down as we suspected, and his little back is off to my left side. We even saw him moving his little fingers over his face! And we got a new (if not super clear) picture of him. (Oh, and there is no question – his testicles have decended to their proper place. - Our son is not a modest boy!)
Many more normal blood pressure checks later, the lab results are finally in and everything is NORMAL! My kidneys are fine. My liver is fine. My urine does not have protein in it. I do NOT have preeclampsia! I am NOT going to be induced! I GET TO GO HOME! Thank you Lord!
So, that’s the story of yesterday…….
Why did I title it, “The Wake Up Call”? Several reasons.
First, because I realized that I’ve been too set on “he’ll be here in a month” and “I’ve got a month to get A, B, and C, done”. I’ve focused too heavily on keeping the house in pristine order and not enough on accomplishing the things that HAVE to get done BEFORE Ethan arrives! For example, I realized that I hadn’t even packed my hospital bag yet. It was something on my list of things to do, but it wasn’t prioritized where it should have been.
I also realized that I’d kept resting and exercise on the bottom end of my priorities- where they’ve been my whole life- after getting my other tasks accomplished (i.e. dishes, laundry, sewing, blogging, etc.). As a result, I’ve only taken a nap maybe 3 times since quitting work (although I’ve gotten more sleep at night) and I’ve only exercised about that many times as well. Last night made me realize that, HELLO, I am running out of time to get my body into the best shape it can be to handle the stresses of labor! I need to shift things around and make sure that I do these things!
Lastly, the events of last night put a check on my emotions. For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been saying telling Ethan he can come out anytime he’s ready, but when faced with the reality of potentially not having him in me anymore within a matter of hours…. suddenly I wasn’t so sure I was ready for that. Suddenly it’s all more real. We’re actually going to have a baby to put in that bassinette that’s been sitting at the foot of our bed for nearly a month. We’re actually going to have a baby that I’ll have to breastfeed and change and care for. There is actually going to be a little person in my arms instead of somewhere under a lump of fat in my belly. While all of this is great…. it’s sort of like the exciting feeling you get just as you reach the top of a rollercoaster, before its first major drop. It seemed like that trip up took forever, but then suddenly you’re there and you’re wondering, “Am I really ready for this?”
posted by KMD | 1:27 PM
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