Adventures in Labor & Delivery

Ever since our appointment on Monday, I've been monitoring my blood pressure with a cuff that goes on your wrist that I borrowed from my dad. Last night, I got some really high readings. Like, scary high. 160/100 high. Add to this the fact that I'd been having headaches for about a day and a half (which she said to watch out for), and I got a little worried. So I called the on-call number and spoke with the on-call OB. He said that the wrist cuff was probably not the most accurate, but I should definitely head up to Labor & Delivery to get monitored and some blood tests. This was at about 9:30 PM, so my parents came over to stay with Isaac (who was in bed), and James and I left.

Needless to say, I was freaked out. Here are some of the thoughts that were going through my head, "OMG, what if I have preeclampsia and they have to deliver baby TONIGHT?! I'm only 35 weeks! Are his lungs developed enough? Will he have long-term affects of being premature?" Yeah, I'm a bit of an overreactor like that sometimes. But when the doctor tells you to get your butt to labor and delivery asap, you tend to get a little scared.

So when we got to labor and delivery, the nurse took me back to the room where they keep the people who they aren't sure are staying. This particular room has three beds and they only really keep you there to be monitored, not if you're actually in labor. Thankfully, I was the only person in there. Anyhoo, the nurse took my blood pressure and it was in the 170s/115. Yikes! After a few more tries and doing different things that might help (switching arms, turning off the lights, etc...) she got a reading of 150something/108, so that's the one she recorded. Then the resident came in and said he talked to the on-call OB and they were going to do blood work and test my urine for protein, and that since my BP was so high, they were going to start me on a beta blocker called Labetalol.

We were there for a few hours. Poor James had to get up for work at 3am, so around 11pm, he went home and my parents came to keep me company instead. It seemed like a long night, and we didn't get home until midnight. Long story short, my labs all came back looking good, which was a huge relief. So instead of preeclampsia, I just have Pregnancy Induced Hypertension. This does put me at a higher risk of developing preeclampsia though, so I'm still on modified bed rest for now. That means no trip to the lake for us this weekend. Boo.

They wanted me to follow up with my regular OB today, so I called this morning and went in for an appointment at 1:30 PM. At the appointment, my BP was 140/88. She said I absolutely did the right thing by calling last night and that she was SO glad I did. She's going to keep me on the Labetalol and we're still shooting for a VBAC. But she explained to me that if my blood pressure gets too high or if I develop preeclapsia, a VBAC is pretty much out of the question because baby would have to be delivered early, and she won't use Pitocin if you've had a previous c-section (increased risk of uterine rupture, as I believe I mentioned in my previous post). But she made it clear that, at this point, there is no reason why baby would need to come now. I still have an ultrasound and another appointment scheduled for Monday, but she also added a NST (non stress test) to the list, which I believe I'll be doing weekly from now on. A NST is just where they have you lay there with a little contraption on your belly that monitors baby's heartbeat for about 30 minutes, just to make sure everything is okay.

And I just want to end by saying THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU to my wonderful parents. They dropped everything to come watch Isaac so we could go to the hospital, they were more than happy to come chill with me at 11 PM, and they spent all morning/afternoon at my house to help me with Isaac so I could take it easy per doctor's orders. I do NOT know what I would do without them. They are truly amazing. I love you guys so much!