So Much For My Complication Free Pregnancy.
Hubby and I left to go to my in-laws for our final baby-free trip on Saturday morning. I fully expected to have some swelling in my feet and ankles; it’s a 4 hour drive, and the weather is miserably hot and humid here in Missouri. So when we got to his mom’s house, I didn’t think anything of my puffy feet. But then it persisted into Sunday, and I thought that was odd. Up until that point, I had not had any swelling whatsoever. We all trooped out to Walmart, the closest major attraction. Yup, rural Missouri for ya! LOL. While we were there I decided to check my blood pressure, more out of curiosity than anything else. It was 134/99. The 134 wasn’t unusual, I’d had that before at midwife appointments, but the 99 was a little worrisome. I called my midwife and she told me to take it easy, try drinking some water with lots of lemon juice and/or eat some watermelon. They’re both supposed to be diuretics and would help the swelling go down. Neither one worked though. I talked to my midwife again on Monday, and she said it was totally up to us whether we wanted to come home early to get checked out. Since I had no other symptoms of pre-e, like headache or dizziness, we opted to stay there until today as originally planned. I had my 34 week appointment today anyway, and since baby girl was still super active and things weren’t really getting too much worse, we decided staying didn’t pose too much of a risk.
We got to the appointment today, directly after our 4 hour trip back to Kansas City and I was hurting terribly. I could barely put on my flip flops my feet were soooo big. I peed in a cup, and thankfully it was totally fine. No protein, no signs of dehydration, no nothing. She checked my blood pressure, and it was a little bit alarming at 150/98. And I have severe pitting edema in my calves, ankles and feet, plus I’ve gained a whopping 10 pounds in the last two weeks. She attributed that to water weight though. She hemmed and hawed about prescribing medication, but since she couldn’t really legitimately diagnose me as pre-ecclamptic, she decided we’d try a more natural approach first. She put me on modified bed rest and told me to get some nettle supplements. My husband is going grocery shopping for me tomorrow, since that does not fall into the OK to do category when one is on bedrest, so he’ll pick up some nettles for me. In the meantime, I have some Yogi Mother to Be tea, and it has nettles in it. I’m hoping that will help, along with being back in my own house and sleeping in my own bed. I have to go back in next Thursday for a blood pressure check. If things haven’t improved, then we’ll talk more seriously about medication, and probably bedrest for the remainder of the pregnancy.
This has been such a textbook pregnancy so far, and I guess I was sort of waiting for SOMETHING to happen. I’m just thankful it’s not more severe. As for baby, she’s doing just fine. Her heartbeat is still very strong, she’s active, I’m still measuring about a week ahead. She’s head down, but she’s got herself folded in half. It can’t be comfortable, but whatever. Her head is down, though still not engaged, her butt and back are curved up over my belly button, and her feet are down low on my right. That explains a lot of the strangely positioned kicks and punches and wiggles I’ve been feeling.
Anyway, I’m exactly 34 weeks today, and it struck me this morning that I’ll be full term in 3 weeks from today. I literally stopped what I’d been doing when this realization hit me, and I’m pretty sure my heart stopped and my jaw hit the floor. I must have been an amusing sight. Haha. I’m excited, but really nervous because there’s so much left that I want to do, and very little of it is acceptable bedrest activity, even if it is modified and not complete bedrest.
Okay, I think I’m done now. This has gotten long enough, and if you made it through the whole thing, go eat a cookie. And eat one for me while you’re at it. I like Oreos. ;)