Me oh my. Let me give you the sum up of this pregnancy:
Week 5- week 18: TERRIBLE nausea. With this one, not only was I throwing up, I got strongly nauseous after doing dishes for 5 minutes, it was a sad time. I felt awful. - lost 11-13 pounds.
Week 18: I joined a Thyroid study. They're testing to see if pregnant mom's thyroid being normal makes the baby have a higher IQ than babies whose mom's lower thyroid was left untreated. Magical side effect --Nausea was 80% gone! I could live again, it was awesome.
Week 20: Totally inspired Dr. Wilde decided to test me early for Gestational Diabetes. Results were positive. I was scared and devestated. Anywho, baby was healthy, I'm glad we discovered it early. It was really hard to be on a restricted diet, not because it was hard to diet, but hard to stop losing weight.
Week 20-32: We struggled A LOT with learning what to eat to gain weight and finally got it figured out after getting IV fluids on 4 separate occasions, weekly diabetes "specialist" visits and 3 ultrasounds to check on the bugger. Whole milk instead of 1%, as much bacon and eggs as I could stand, nuts and soda... soda? Who knew.
Week 33: Blood pressure goes up... my lower number was chilling nicely in the 60s for the whole pregnancy, week 33 -> 92. Grr... Now they're worried I have Pre-eclampsia or Toxemia. I get a couple of blood tests and a 24 hour urine. I know it's not a fun topic, but something funny, I had to work while I was doing the 24 hour urine... you basically collect everything for a day and keep it in a jug, then keep that jug with ice packs or in a fridge. I didn't want to keep this backpack with me at all times, so I left it in the bathroom on the floor under the sinks with a note: This belongs to Amy Garner, please DO NOT MOVE. Thanks! 801-373-9810... someone complained anyway, security removed it anyway. I had an angry talk with that security officer and my favorite argument was, "if you thought it was something dangerous like a bomb, it's better to go off in [the manager's] office opposed to the bathroom?"
Labs came back fine - we're just tracking blood pressure more closely now. Fun fact: little guy was head-up during the ultrasound this week, naughty boy. I'm so ready to spank his newborn wrinkly tush.
Week 34- week 35 1/2: visiting the Dr's office twice/week for blood pressure test, two NST (non-stress tests where they monitor baby for 20 minutes), and yes, another 24-urine on Thanksgiving day. Yay.
Thanksgiving Day: My feet swell... this is normal for some pregos, but not for me and it went from 0 to 60 in 24 hours without going down during the night. I was admitted to Labor and Delivery and monitored for 3 hours... my blood pressure was the highest it's been and they start talking about "if" we had to induce... thank goodness it's not pre-eclampsia yet, still just high blood pressure. I get to go home, but on BEDREST. dun dun dun...
Week 36: Present time :) After 3 days of bedrest, my blood pressure is the lowest it's been in 3 weeks. Yay! Even though there aren't studies backing up the theory bedrest lowers blood pressure, I guess I've become a believer - for me anyway. Every day counts. We're praying this week is a boring one and my blood pressure stays down. I am SOOO lucky and blessed to have people in our new neighborhood volunteering to come play with the boys a couple hours each day. Stephen was talking up a storm with Jen Ricks who helped us today - thank you so much!
So... I was laying in bed a few days ago, crying... why on earth is it one problem after another with this baby? He's kicking and going crazy everyday like life is peachy keen but we are struggling to keep him in there! Then it popped into my head, "where there's a Will, there's a way." I cried myself to sleep, but thought, okay, this guy's going to come when he's meant to come and he'll be ready. I'm so happy we chose to name him William. No Bill, Billy, Mac or Buddy... if you don't want to call him William, it's Will, because his is strong.
Love you all!!!
