Tonight was a long night for me.
I'm trying to process everything so its good for me to type and share.
Basically, I had been feeling off for about 3 days and I felt like my blood pressure was high.
My blood pressure through out this pregnancy has been slowly going up.
So my Dad suggested that I got to the store and buy a blood pressure monitor to have at the house for my own safety.
We picked one up and the first reading was 158/110. Or something like that... which if you don't know, its ridiculously dangerously high.
So i went to a local drug store to compare blood pressure readings with their machine that they usually have near the pharmacy before panicking and running to the hospital. There the blood pressure machine read 153/103. No much a of a difference.
I was told at a previous appointment that anything over 140 on top or 90 on the bottom is serious and to contact someone immediately.
Basically, i ended up at my birth center and they ran all sorts of tests.
Many of you know that I was planning a natural Water birth and was pretty excited to have that experience.
My Doctor came in and told me that I have a serious medical condition called Pre-eclampsia. Water birth is out of the question now and I am considered a "high risk pregnancy". My doctor said that she wants me on bed rest for the remainder of my pregnancy. When my doctor told me that i could not go to my pregnancy swim class anymore, I started to cry. I basically can get up to go to the bathroom and shower and thats it.
Thats 11 weeks of bed rest.
....and thats if I don't go into pre-term labor which this condition causes because it can mess with the placenta.
I will probably need to be induced, she said that they will not let me go past 39 weeks pregnant (11 weeks from today).
This is serious for my body because my kidneys are starting to stress. They will be monitoring how my body is dealing with the condition and make depending on how it does they will decide when i will need to be induced. This is a big change from the natural water birth that I envisioned for us.
There is a delicate balance at this point.
NO one in this county will take a baby and mom before 35 weeks. I would have to be transported to San Fransico which is 5-6 hours south of here.
Between 35-and 37 weeks i would have to go to St. Joe's which is a hospital that I am unfamiliar with which is about 20-25 mins from here.
at 37 weeks they will take me at my Birth Center.
So thats the goal. I need to keep this baby in me until 37 weeks at least.
So thats where we are at for now. I'm processing lots of information and hoping for the best. Trying to roll with the punches, trying to start excepting all of these changes in plans and "what ifs". All I want is a healthy baby.
I'll have plenty of time here while on bed rest so feel free to chat with me, blog with me, facebook with me and call me. <3
Naomi were married in April and as part of their honeymoon decided to come out here to the redwoods and hang with us. We felt so grateful to be able to spend time with them :) Not only did they bring there fabulous selves but they brought a little treat for us from their farmer's market in Tennessee that they frequent, an Owl onesie! Jeff LOVES owls and I often call him the owl king because they seem to follow him where ever he goes. Thanks for this super cute gift guys!
