If it isn't one thing, it's another...

Okay, so the past few weeks have been a bit of a struggle for me. It almost certainly is rooted in my less than stellar attitude with this pregnancy...I am very ready to be done. I always say that I am pretty "good at being pregnant", meaning I don't get the morning sickness, high blood pressure, swelling, terrible heartburn, and other lovelies that are typically associated with pregnancy.  I generally feel good, energetic, and optimistic.  However, with a lack of time to work out this time around, as well as a toddler who is coming into her own to take care of, the walls have definitely been closing in on me.


It started out when I was having major pain walking. The pain eventually eased up, even went away for a few days. But then my hip would start to hurt and moving around became difficult again. Once that went away, the first pain would come back.  Then I started having acid reflux at night, adding to my difficulty sleeping. I was lucky to get just a few hours of sleep each night, and if I woke up at all, it was all over...I was never able to fall back asleep. My doctor prescribed me some medicine and it quickly took care of the heartburn.  So once I got the heartburn sorted out, I woke up one morning with a pretty bad sore throat. I devoured as much vitamin C as I could get my hands on and gargled with hot water and cayenne pepper....although it literally tasted like hell, it actually worked and I was able to fight off the sickness within about 2 days, without putting any drugs into my body. Somewhere among all of this, I found myself getting pretty down, possibly even depressed. I was just so tired of there always being SOMETHING wrong, always being in one type of pain or another. I was finding NO joy in my pregnancy and that made me feel even worse. I felt sorry for myself a lot. I felt like I was sitting in a never ending waiting room just waiting to not be pregnant anymore. While having so many personal issues, I totally forgot the fact that there is a real, living little guy in my belly who is totally dependent on ME right now.  I lost sight of the future in front of me...a new baby to delight in, snuggle with, and give endless kisses to.  I even have let Ryan slip into being a burden, rather than this fun, cool, smart little kid I get to hang out with all day.

Well, it's funny how God puts people in your path to help you through times like these...one Sunday, when I was feeling particularly low, barely able to walk, our Pastor's daughter caught me in the hall after church. Being pregnant herself, we struck up a conversation about our pregnancies, past and present. I told her how I felt like I was waiting around, basically stalled out, and she began to tell me how she felt the exact same way in her second pregnancy. She told me how she became convicted and how she overcame it.  She gave me so much encouragement and after that, I had about a week of feeling much more optimistic about my situation.

So for a few days, I felt relatively normal. Mild pain when walking, nothing out of the ordinary. Then the night before last we were having dinner and I ate a pretty typical amount of food, definitely did not OVER eat. But as soon as I got up from the table, I felt so full that I could barely function. I was so uncomfortable and I even started having a really intense hot flash. I laid down, I walked around, I got on all fours...no position was comfortable at ALL. I started feeling sick, so Dave got me a cold wash cloth for my neck and face, and I draped myself over my exercise ball to let my belly hang. I eventually found myself in the bathroom floor peeling off my clothes and wishing to throw up....which I did...a LOT. I thought I would feel better after that, but there was really no change. The baby was moving like CRAZY and not letting up. I was also having sharp pain in my stomach. I came back to our room to lay on the bed and I noticed that I was having dull, nauseating pain in my lower back. And all at once it dawned on me...that's contractions, right? As I laid there, I struggled with the thought of whether or not to call my doctor. I know that false contractions are much more common in second pregnancies, and I thought that I was making a big deal out of an upset stomach and Braxton Hicks. Then my mind drifted to this story I had read only the day before of a mother whose baby lost his heartbeat right in the doctors office and was stillborn at 37 weeks...and I decided that it's better to call over nothing than not call over SOMETHING. I tearfully explained what I was going through and she sent me to the hospital to be evaluated.

I was pretty hysterical the whole time. Besides feeling absolutely miserable - I can't remember the last time I felt so awful - I kept thinking "what if he is coming early??", not to mention I was a wreck over what to do with Ryan. Luckily, Dave handled it all and our friend, Makenzie, met us at the hospital to take Ryan. I went on up as she and Dave switched cars. They told me where to go and I was so pitiful as I made the very lonely and long walk down the hallway. When I came to the end of the hall, I turned around to the nurses station and quietly sobbed "I don't know where I'm supposed to be". They grabbed me up and walked me to a room where I sat all alone for several excruciating minutes. All I could think was "where IS someone?! My baby could be in trauma, and I'm sitting here in this stupid pink chair crying alone!!"

The nurse finally came in, as well as an admin to get me all set up. I didn't have my wallet or ID, so they had to look me up by my past records at that hospital. We literally grabbed Ryan and ran out the door...I had nothing, which made me feel pretty vulnerable and helpless. 

Dave came in, I was put in the bed, hooked up to a baby monitor, and asked 100 questions. Again, all I could think was "HELLO!? Can we make sure the baby is okay??"

They tested my urine and found I was "severely dehydrated". How in the world could I ever get dehydrated?? I carry a huge 24 ounce cup with me everywhere I go and probably drink more water than anyone I know! I had taken Ryan to the park that day for about 2 hours...it was quite warm out, but I never imagined I was so fragile that being outside for that amount of time would land me in the hospital!  

The nurse had to start me on an IV, which she was adamant about putting in my hand. As she stuck me, she literally fished around in there for a solid 2 or 3 minutes. She kept saying she was trying to 'save the spot', but it felt like she was dragging a fishing hook out of my vein. She then tried to start my IV, knowing it wasn't in correctly, and the fluid bubbled up under my skin. And it HURT!!! Then she tried the other hand...which yielded the same results. So I'm laying there with 2 bruised hands that feel like someone just smashed with a hammer...not even kidding, it felt like some tiny bone in my hands was snapped in two.

Dave walked out to find me something to drink and apparently stopped at the nurses station to tell them to get someone else in there to do my IV. Another nurse came in and quickly got one in my arm. It took a while for me to feel any better once they started me on fluids, maybe half an hour. They gave me some medicine for the nausea, but I was still having those nauseating contractions...

Side note- maybe I should explain...I have a difficult time discerning what is indeed a contraction. I imagine they should be quite painful, like a knife in your belly, but to me, they are more of just an annoying, slightly uncomfortable feeling. With Ryan, I started having contractions at 1:00a.m. and couldn't bring myself to the realization that I was indeed in labor until noon the next day when my physical therapist timed them at 5 minutes apart on the dot! I'm not saying that there aren't women who have knife-in-your-belly contractions, but I think that movies and TV tend to over-dramatize what childbirth CAN actually be like. Did you know I never once cried out in pain when having Ryan? I didn't feel a thing thanks to Mr. Epidural! I'm sure I made some struggling sounds because I was pushing so hard, and it can be hard to breath, but Dave says I was pretty quiet for the most part. 

So anyhow, back to the present...I was having dull, nauseating contractions across the top of my belly and in my lower back. They did an ultrasound on the baby, my kidneys, my gallbladder and liver. I had to lay in all sorts of uncomfortable positions, but mostly flat on my back which was not pleasant. Somewhere around looking at my gallbladder I had the guy stop and asked Dave to pull me up because I felt sick again. I threw up even more than I had before...Dave said a full 30 ounces...the bowl they gave me had measurements on the side.

Well, anyhow, the ultrasounds were all fine and the baby was perfect the entire time. The nurse told me I had a UTI so I had to have a bag of antibiotics for that...again, HOW did I get these things?? I have done absolutely nothing to merit having a UTI! After that bag was gone, I had to have another bag of fluids. It was just barely dripping and we stared at it for an hour, totally positive that none of the liquid had gone down at all. My good friend, Sam, who works at the hospital, snuck in to see me and gave the bag a good squeeze. It was nice to see a familiar face, and she even snuck me up a brownie...my tummy was completely empty! 

The nurse kept speeding up my drip, but it never seemed to go any faster. I laid there for probably 3 hours on this one bag. Dave and I decided that it was getting too late to try to pick Ryan up after we were discharged, so she stayed the night with Makenzie. Then we decided to try to get some rest because WHO KNOWS when this bag will ever finish! We were sure we would be there until morning. Dave curled up in a chair and I tried to find a position I could lay in while still picking up the baby's heartbeat on the monitor, keeping my IV arm straight, and working around the cords from the monitors and blood pressure cuff....it was not comfy to say the least. I was so exhausted, mentally and physically, that I was actually able to doze off, but it seemed the moment I would drift away, a nurse would come in or a monitor or alarm would go off, waking me up. Even in my sleep, I was very aware of the baby's heartbeat, and if it stopped on the monitor, I would wake up worried. 

Somewhere around 1:00a.m. the nurse came in and said we would be free to go soon. My contractions were 3 minutes apart the entire time we were there, but they said they were not the type of contractions that were causing any real changes or starting real labor. Still, hearing that you are having such steady contractions at only 31 weeks is pretty scary!! They checked my cervix and I had not had any change in dilation, so the nurse read us our discharge instructions and we were on our way.

When you leave the hospital, you are typically wheeled out in a wheelchair. For whatever reason, they didn't do that, and Dave and I just walked out on our own. It felt so strange, as if none of it even happened and we were just there for a visit. We were pretty quiet as we walked down the long hall, probably in awe of the crazy evening we had just endured. 

As we drove up to our house, Dave's heart sank and he said "how are we going to get into our house??". We had traded cars with Makenzie to avoid changing over the car seat, so we had no garage door opener or keys. Dave ran around the house trying every door, and even hoping he left his truck unlocked so we could get his garage door opener. No such luck. 

We sat in the driveway weighing our options. I was so tired that even the thought of sleeping in the car crossed my mind...and then I started to contemplate which window I wouldn't mind breaking. I didn't want to have to wake up Makenzie since she has sleep problems in the first place, and had to get up for work in a few hours. If only the dogs would just learn to unlock the door!!  Then I remembered that Barbara had a key to our house and she stayed up pretty late. I called her and we were able to drive over and get her key...it was at least 2:00 before we got into our house. The entire night was about a 7 hour ordeal that seemed more like an eternity...

Poor Dave had to get up at 5:30 to go pick up Ryan. I woke up with his alarm and never fell back asleep. When he got home with her, we all had breakfast together. Then Dave took Ryan to work with him to pick up his laptop so he could stay home with me for the day. Once they were home, I was finally able to drift off to sleep. 

What. A. Day.


So that was Wednesday/early Thursday.  And now here we are in the present...Friday.  Last night I had continuous acid reflux, despite taking my prescribed medication religiously, and kept having to get up to go to the bathroom as well...I have been trying to drink even MORE than usual to stay hydrated.  I barely slept at all.  Dave had to go back to work this morning, and I somehow came up with what I am sure is a sinus infection.  I'm telling you....if it isn't one thing, it's another.  I just hope that this is not a sign of times to come with this baby!  PLEASE let him be an easy baby!!


I will try to post something a little more positive this weekend...maybe some fun pictures :)


~ Attitude is the difference between an ordeal and an adventure ~