Pregnancy Diaries // Entry 4

As it turns out, I'm a terrible bed rest patient. Thankfully, I'm not on strict bed rest… I can move around the house, fix myself food, etc., but just have to stick close to the couch and not do anything too strenuous. Even so, it's really hard when you want to be bustling around cleaning the house or running errands. On the plus side, it means I'm having several days of not having to go into the office for work!

But let me back up. The past few days have kind of been a roller coaster. I had my regular checkup on Wednesday, and my blood pressure was high, so my doc sent me back over to Labor & Delivery to monitor it more and keep an eye on the baby. (I had already been sent in once last month for some unexplained bleeding, so we'll be nice and familiar with the nurse's triage by the time I'm actually in labor!) Before I went, my doc warned me that I may need to be induced either in the next few days or possibly even that night, depending on what my blood pressure was doing and whether further tests indicated preeclampsia. I called Levi and he met me at the hospital, both of us unsure of what to expect.

A not-entirely-flattering shot from our first visit to L&D at 34 weeks.

I stayed on the monitors and had some blood work done, and in the meantime my blood pressure remained high. The nurses were amazed at how strong and active Baby Kauffman was as they monitored him. They kept saying, "only a very healthy baby can do that!" I was having fairly regular contractions about 7-9 minutes apart, but nothing to indicate labor. Since my blood pressure remained high, I was sent home and told to come back the next night. It was about the same Thursday night, but still no induction since it had not risen. I left urine samples to be analyzed, and found out Friday morning that everything was showing negative for preeclampsia. Good news! So for now, I'm on bed rest until my next regular checkup this coming Tuesday. We'll check my blood pressure again and go from there. I'm borderline between pre-hypertension and hypertension, so if it increases, we'll have to consider induction, or possibly medication to keep it down. Or if it remains the same, I may just have to lay low until this boy decides he's ready to come!

Overall, it was definitely hard not knowing what to expect or how to prepare ourselves mentally. It's probably a good lesson for me in not being able to control everything and not having the guarantee that I'll always be as prepared as I want to be. I'm thankful though, that I now have lots of down time to get baby clothes washed and put away and to get the last few items knocked off my to-do list! (From my couch…of course…) We're coming up on 38 weeks and I think it's finally sinking in that we'll have a baby any time now! (Who am I and when did I wind up a parent??)