Fun and Excitement
We've had an eventful last week and a half. I spent all of last week in the hospital with kidney stones. Not fun at all! Happily, despite A LOT of discomfort, the kidney stones are resolved for the time being (although there's still one in my right kidney that I'm supposed to get looked at after I deliver,) and Alex seemed to do pretty well through all of it. There were a couple of times where I started contracting, but we responded well to medication to stop those. Unfortunately, at our Monday OB appointment, they decided I was measuring too small and sent me for a growth ultrasound and monitoring. The growth ultrasound shows that Alex is right on track, just riding a bit low (so we were measuring about 7-8 weeks behind) so that was good news, but the heart rate monitoring didn't go so well. His heart rate wasn't bad, they said, but they did keep telling us that while it wasn't bad, it wasn't "quite right" since his heart rate wasn't accelerating periodically. They kept us hooked up to a monitor for over 3 hours and had us come back again Tuesday morning. After another ultrasound and two hours on the monitor at the doctor's office, they sent us to the hospital for further monitoring, which lasted from about 12:30 until 6:00PM. At the end of the day, they said that his heart rate still wasn't showing appropriate accelerations and nothing had changed, but since nothing bad had happened in all that time of monitoring, it was unlikely to, so there was no reason to try to deliver the baby that day. I'm under orders to lie on my left side as much as possible, limit activity, and follow up with the doctor next Monday.
All in all, it was very frustrating, since everyone kept telling us not to worry, but they felt the need to have us hooked up to monitors for hours at a time and even sent us to be admitted to the hospital for monitoring. It's awful hard not to worry when people keep frowning at your baby's tracing and saying that it's not right. Apparently, however, his tracing, while not "reactive," was "reassuring," so I'm supposed to do frequent kick counts and, like I said, rest. Spending most of your time lying on your side is difficult, to say the least, when one is also responsible for a very active 3 year old boy.
I'm looking forward to all of this being resolved, but that, of course, can't happen until I deliver, and right now, I'm only at 35 weeks. While it seems likely that this baby will be born on time if not a tiny bit early and not follow Daniel's example of being forced out two weeks late, it could still be a while before things are resolved. While it seems for now that everyone is safe and healthy, please keep baby Alex in your thoughts and prayers.
All in all, it was very frustrating, since everyone kept telling us not to worry, but they felt the need to have us hooked up to monitors for hours at a time and even sent us to be admitted to the hospital for monitoring. It's awful hard not to worry when people keep frowning at your baby's tracing and saying that it's not right. Apparently, however, his tracing, while not "reactive," was "reassuring," so I'm supposed to do frequent kick counts and, like I said, rest. Spending most of your time lying on your side is difficult, to say the least, when one is also responsible for a very active 3 year old boy.
I'm looking forward to all of this being resolved, but that, of course, can't happen until I deliver, and right now, I'm only at 35 weeks. While it seems likely that this baby will be born on time if not a tiny bit early and not follow Daniel's example of being forced out two weeks late, it could still be a while before things are resolved. While it seems for now that everyone is safe and healthy, please keep baby Alex in your thoughts and prayers.