Last Wednesday I had an appointment with my doctor, well more like his nurses to get my weekly 17p Progesterone shot. It takes a lot of effort these days to shower and get dressed, let a lone get in the car and go to an appointment. They decided that now that I was 32 weeks along, they'd also give me a second round of steroid shots to help with the babies lung development. So TWO shots were on the line up for that day. Later that evening, I started having all sorts of contractions and some were even a bit painful. I timed them and they were coming pretty consistently between 6-10 min apart. With all my knowledge of how to stop contractions I did everything I'd been taught and laid awake in bed with Stephen seeing if they would just stop on their own. Finally at 11pm, we decided to call the on-call dr and see if we needed to go in. She told us to just keep doing what we were doing and if they got worse to head in. About an hour later (3 hrs total) they stopped and I was able to finally fall asleep around 2am.
The next day, Thursday, I had another appointment this time for an ultrasound and yet again....another shot. So I quickly showered and threw a hat on not wanting to spend any time on my feet getting ready. We went in and my cervix had changed dramatically, measuring only 0.8 in length and completely open at the top. We explained what happened the night before and the doctor had me put on the monitors in the office. (My biggest issue is that I can't always feel my contractions. So the fact that I COULD feel them, had everyone worried a bit)After a while it was clear that I was still contracting and pretty consistently, even though I only felt one or two here and there. Thank goodness their office is at the hospital and they sent me upstairs to check in to L&D. I was again monitored for a few hours and then my OB came by. He checked me and said that I was dialated to a 3-4. I was seriously in shock and then the routine of trying to stop labor started.... or so we thought.
All of the sudden there was somebody there to give me an IV and was talking like I was going straight into the OR for my c-section. Then somebody else came and to get blood samples and I was totally confused. Our doc had said previously they'd try to stop things up until 34 weeks and I was only 32? Then apparently they changed their minds or something because they put me on magnesium sulfate to slow things down and see if it would help. It did. Thankfully. I was then switched to an L&D room overnight for close watching. They were monitoring both babies as well as contractions all night long. The next day I started having more contractions so they upped the dose of magnesium.
This stuff is the worse out there. You basically lose function of your entire body and feel awful. Hot sweets, constant headache, foggy brain, can't keep your eyes open(yet you are fully or somewhat fully conscious of everything going on), nausea, light headedness, you lose the ability to urinate. (sounds awful, but it's true) and the longer/more intense you are on the medication the worse and more severe the symptoms become. They kept me on this awful stuff for 36 hours this time and things finally calmed down. Then after a little while, I stabilized, my contractions were minimal and they decided I didn't need to be right there next to the OR in Labor and Delivery. So a few hours later they sent me up to the High Risk Perinatal floor which is where I was before.
What a relief. It was so nice to be off that awful medicine and was so great to see familiar faces of the nurses and staff. And yet at the same time so weird to be back. Didn't I just leave this place? I promised myself I didn't want to be back at the hospital until I was going to deliver. We'll I'm back...and I'm here to stay until I do deliver.
It's a bit harder to be back here now that I know how "luxurious" bed rest at home is. Trying to wrap my mind around it is weird. Last night I woke up in the middle of the night not knowing whether I was at home or here. It's all such a blur. Going on week 8 of bedrest, I'm very ready to be done. The end is in sight though only a few more weeks. Then we will move from this craziness of life to a whole other crazy with two babies in our house.
Back in Bed
32 weeks
1 comment:
Lots of love sent your way. You and your sweet baby girls have continually been in my prayers.
Post a Comment