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Calling all the Pregnant PS''ers

Hi Ladies,

First, a very belated double Congrats to MP!! MP I hope you and your little ones are doing great. Having just been where you are now, I know that things are likely super-challenging right now. Take any and all help that is offered, and please sleep WHENEVER you can. I feel like things are more manageable now, but I am still exhausted almost all the time, but somehow it seems ok. Hope you are doing ok!!

Choro - Belated congrats to you as well. Wow to your birth story!! I hope you are settling in well with baby girl!

April20 - You are so close! Sorry for all of the discomfort and pain! Hopefully, your L&D will be nice and quick to make up for this early discomfort.

Aviastar - Your MW sounds super-annoying. My glucose was 139. My MW explained that they always recommend a modified diet for borderline tests, but certainly never said I had GD. If you don't, then you don't. I more or less indicated I wanted to do the three hour test, which turned out to be fine anyway. The tech who did the three hour draws though I was crazy for opting to do the test, and in hindsight, I have to agree!

JGator - Eek re: your fall. I'm glad you and baby are ok. I hope your MIL is doing well with her treatment.
 
MP, we miss you. Please post and update when you can. I think about you often.

LV, great to hear from you. How is life with 2? And, does your little boy sleep? That is my greatest fear (sleep deprivation), by the way. Thanks for asking about MIL - she is doing better than expected so far with chemo. Next cycle starts next week - my DH is going there this weekend.

April, good luck. Hope you can deliver early.

AHL, what a pain on the office wait time!

Avia, I cannot believe you were treated like you have GD when you passed! That's insane. Did you find any baskets or end up making them? My only suggestion is Home Goods, but I don't know if they will be exactly what you have in mind.

Too Patient, thanks for your concern. I was checking my BP at home and it was closer to my normal ranges so I stopped worrying about it. I should check it again though.

AFM, I think I passed my GD test yesterday. I got my results online today, and I got a 131 - the cutoff is 139, but there is also some note on there about 90% being accurate if cutoff is 129 instead of 139. So, hopefully my doctor will call and say I'm in the clear. My mom is coming for 2 weeks on Saturday, and my DH is going to see his parents for about 10 days. I have been itchy again, but not on the bottoms of my feet or bottoms of my hands so doctor said not to worry. I take Benadryl when it's bad at night though. I'll be 26 weeks tomorrow. I can't believe it, but I am also feeling like it's more real with viability rates going up every week! My DH finished taking down a flower wallpaper border in the baby room so now we have to decide if the existing Yellow is okay or if I want it painted Grey. I am leaning towards grey.
 
JGator: That GD number sounds great! I failed my 1 hour at 157 and then passed the 3 hour. I would think that your number shouldn't warrant any further concern.

So my doc called me yesterday with the results of the blood work he ordered. The good news is absolutely everything is normal. The insane swelling is not effecting my system adversely in any way. The bad news is he has no medical reason to induce me before 39 weeks to alleviate the swelling or prevent it from turning into something worse. He literally told me that if I could go into labor before my appointment next week, it would be a REALLY good thing. I asked him if he had any tips for me and he told me not "ethically". So I reached out to my Bradley instructor, how has some homeopathic things that will work if your body is "ready". So I'm going to give them a try. I hope they work. My feet are RED this morning and I've only been up for an hour. It's hard to bend my toes. This junk has to stop!

For science, here's a pic of my poor feet. The swelling extends up my entire leg. And also my arms. And some in my face. I'm really a hot mess.

img_0577.jpg
 
Or dear April! That's what my ankle look like with a level three sprain! I would do near anything to end that! I'm hoping something works!
 
Hi all, I've been meaning to check in, but life has been crazy to say the least. I'll start with the good news. Baby boy O is doing great. And Baby Girl N came home from the hospital yesterday at three weeks old and 2.5 weeks post surgery, and her heart surgery appears to be successful. Now for the not so good news. She was born with an abnormal or floppy airway (or the intubation from surgery possibly damaged her vocal cord), which makes her breathing very noisy and labored. I mean very labored. She also was not able to drink from a bottle before surgery, so she wasn't able to establish a rooting reflex or understand sucking. As a result and combined with her airway problem, she is not able to feed by bottle, so she has a NG tube and is fed that way every three hours. We need her to grow and get stronger to potentially improve the airway, but we also need to practice getting her to try to feed from a bottle. It's going to be a long, challenging process, and she only can take a few mls at a time, which is practically nothing. And with a twin brother who is the usual needy newborn and a toddler, I'm very overwhelmed. My mom is still here, and we have all sorts of specialists and home health care supporting us, but I just never imagined how complicated this would be, and it's scary. Baby girl will likely face some developmental delays due to her abnormalities and surgery, etc. But we just need to take it a day and a week at a time for now. I'd appreciate any prayers or good thoughts that she continues to get stronger and improves her breathing and feeding.

Well, I babbled more than I meant to, and I'm sure there are typos, but I just ranged to fill you all in.

Wishing all of you the best with your pregnancies. I'll try to check in from time to time when I can.
 
MP, so glad to hear an update and delighted that O and N are both at home and that N's surgery went well.

Very sorry to hear that N has the additional challenge of the floppy airway/labored breathing/feeding challenges. Postpartum on its own is overwhelming and twins in general are a crazy amount of work. With a toddler, a healthy newborn, and a newborn with special challenges including feeding, it must be really difficult. I can only imagine how overwhelming this all is!

Sending you lots of prayers for endurance, patience, and energy, and for N's continued growth and healing.

I am in NYC and if there is anything I can help with please let me know!
 
MP I can only hope that things get better each day. Hugs to you and all of the babies.
 
So I'm in L & D. I'm either leaking amniotic fluid or I can add peeing myself to the list of pregnancy good times. I am having contractions. Hopefully i will know soon what's going on. One of the docs I love is on today so that's a bonus!
 
April20|1437838020|3907298 said:
So I'm in L & D. I'm either leaking amniotic fluid or I can add peeing myself to the list of pregnancy good times. I am having contractions. Hopefully i will know soon what's going on. One of the docs I love is on today so that's a bonus!
Click to expand...

Fingers crossed for a safe delivery for you April20! I'll be thinking of you!
 
I'm ruptured! Not going home without a baby!!!
 
Congrats April!
 
April, yay! So excited you will have your baby AND relief from all the pain and discomfort! Thinking about you!

MP- you and your family are always in my thoughts and prayers. There is so much good news in your update; I know this is such a challenging time, but you will come out of this on top!
 
Baby is here. We are both okay but it was super rough. Will post more later.

Eliza Josephine- 7lbs 3oz, 19".
 
So many congratulations! I'm glad the rough road has resulted in a lovely baby girl, I hope you are recovering well and get home soon! :appl:
 
Congrats April (and I love her name!)
 
MP, thinking of you tons. I can't imagine how physically exhausted and emotionally drained you must feel. I'm so glad that you are being supported with home care and that your mother is there to help support you as well, but the toll you bear as the mother must be overwhelming. Wishing the best for little N--newborns grow so fast--really hoping that as she grows, the rooting reflex kicks in and she can take a bottle. I feel like that would make a huge difference for you right now.

April, congrats!
 
Congratulations, April! I'm sorry it was a rough road, but she's here ( and gorgeously named, I might add!) and I hope you feel better and can come home soon!
 
MP, thanks for checking in. Hugs to you. I wish I lived nearby and could come help you get some sleep for a few hours. I know how precious that is. You are doing a great job. Once N grows, the issue should start to resolve on its own, from what I read. I hope that is the case. How is Ev handling being a big brother?

April, congrats! Beautiful name!

AFM, I had some serious itchiness over the weekend and pain in my shoulder, elbow and wrist which kept me up a lot. I really only can sleep if I take Benadryl at night, and I don't think that's a good long term solution. I have 13 weeks to go. I have a call in to the doctor to see what they suggest. I feel like I have arthritis in my arm which is sounding like carpal tunnel, but I don't know if the shoulder pain is from sleeping on my side or not. Just very achy and painful and more so at night. My mom is here now so it's great to have her around too.
 
I have a few minutes so thought I'd type up a birth story of sorts.

I had spoken with one of my docs on Thursday and he'd sort of jokingly said if I could get myself into labor by my appointment that next week, it would be a good thing. I slept really horribly Friday night. Insane back pain that I just could not get relief from. I got up around 6 and decided to just get some work done. When I got up, I noticed that I was either peeing myself or might be leaking amniotic fluid. I really figured it could go either way, but decided that I had better finish up some work loose ends just in case. Around 8 I went to wake my husband up and told him I was going to call the on call OB line and give them a heads up that I might be leaking and that I needed to be checked. I told him if I was leaking they wouldn't let us go home so we'd better be prepared to stay. I took a shower and finished packing our hospital bag. DH started installing the car seat. We are such slackers. We kept procrastinating on things and were left scrambling. Oh well. Thank goodness for You Tube is all I have to say! When we were doing that, I noticed that I was having moments of even more intense back pain on top of the pain I already had. I sort of knew this was "it". I told DH that we needed to stop and get breakfast on the way as I didn't want to get there and then not be allowed to eat. So we hit the Chick FIL A. This was around 930. We arrived at the hospital around 10. When we checked in I asked who the OB on duty was. My practice as around 8 plus residents and they rotate. I have two favorites. The one I've seen the most and who was very aware of the ins and outs of my pregnancy was on duty. Seriously, this was like winning the pregnant lady lottery!!

Once we were in triage, they sent a resident in to do the swab to test for amniotic fluid. Ummmm. No one told me this was done using an UNLUBRICATED speculum. Yeah. That was NOT FUN. But within minutes they came back and told me I was ruptured and was being admitted. A couple minutes after this, my doc came in. She was so excited to see me and wanted to do a cervical check since we hadn't done one at all. I was 90% effaced and barely open. She was able to stretch me to a 2-3 and do a membrane sweep to try and get things rolling. She gave me a four hour window to see how things progressed before we started talking pitocin since she knew I wanted to go med free. At that four hour mark I was a 5 and was managing pain med free. I was so happy. That was so short lived. We finally got moved out of triage and into a room and honestly it all went downhill from there. I will spare you the details but an unmedicated back labor is ridiculous. In having to lay down for a NST on the baby and vitals for me for 20 mins, the pain got away from me. I could never get back in control. I spent literally two hours screaming thru nearly non-stop contractions. I kept telling DH to get me the drugs. He kept telling me no, it's not what i want and that I might be disappointed. I told him it wasn't what I had wanted but I wanted them now and to go get the DAMN DOCTOR. Both DH and my doula thought I was probably in transition. Honestly I thought I was too. Doc comes in, checks me. 5!!!!!! I get the EPI. Long story even further shortened is that my back labor was so bad they literally had to top it off hourly or I went from no pain to full on contractions I could feel in 15 seconds. It was ROUGH. And then I started running a fever from an infection due to extended time with waters broken and had to have antibiotics. Around 830 am my doc came back on shift and said she wanted me to start practice pushing while she did a c section. We did that with the nurse and I did move the baby down. But it wore me out. I was mentally, physically and emotionally spent. They topped off my EPI well and let me sleep a bit.

In the meantime, we found out that this awesome OB from a private practice just happened to be on the floor. He delivers at my hospital but usually isn't around on a Sunday morning and wasn't supposed to be. He was in jeans! He's like the labor whisperer. He will deliver vaginal breech babies. Knows how to turn other presentations. Knows when it won't work and a section has to happen. Women travel from out of state for him. He agreed to assess me. Let me say at this point DH was advocating for me. I didn't care what happened as long as they got her out NOW. He came and assessed me and then walked my OB thru what she was feeling and what is actually meant. It was pretty cool to listen to them. Baby was posterior AND twisted weird. He thought they could get her out with forceps but that I wouldn't be able to push her out alone. The drugged the HELL out of me (thank god) and assembled a team of eight docs, residents and nurses. DH had one leg, my doula had the other. They got the forceps on her and told me when to push. DH told me today that the doc was literally pulling with his legs braced while I pushed. It was not a casual thing. She was out in nine pushes (three sets of three). It was such a fast delivery that I tore horrifically. It's fourth degree. It's going to take multiple doc visits and a perineum doc visit to make it okay. I am not looking forward to this but my docs knew I wanted a vaginal birth, Eliza's head was already engaged and she needed to come out. They made it happen without things escalating to an emergency situation so I call it a win.

They let me do skin to skin for only a couple minutes before she needed to be looked at due to the infection I had. They took her away and that's when they noticed her foot. Her right foot has some issues. We aren't sure if it got crunched in the womb and is how it is due to lack of space or if it formed incorrectly. She has control of movement but it needs to be looked at by an orthopedist. They're calling it a club foot but I don't know if that's true or just for lack of a better term. DH is so upset. He wants her to be perfect. He's scared that every day counts and that we are doing her a disservice by not already having her looked at. I assured him this evening that if timing was that critical the hospital would have brought the specialist in. We're at one of the best hospitals in the entire southeast. They don't play around. I trust that if she needed to be seen at one day old they would have made that happen. And I keep thinking that her foot is fixable. It's not horrible. It's not life threatening. I keep thinking about MPs daughter. They have something serious to lose sleep over. It really puts things into perspective for me.

Eliza got really beat up and bruised on her head from the forceps. She has jaundice and has been under bili lights all day. She can only come out to nurse. She hates this. If it was up to her she would lay across my chest with my boob casually in her mouth All. Day. Long. Her style is being crimped! We hope she can come off tomorrow and go home. She is also getting her last dose of antibiotics for the infection I had. Poor thing looks like she lost a fight and has been stuck with a hep-lock in her arm since almost birth. She hasn't had it so easy either. She was in the nursery for almost four hours after birth. I didn't get to hold her again until 430. DH went with her and did hold her, so that was good.

So at the end of the day everything I wanted for a "birth plan" went the complete opposite. But she's okay and that's all the matters.

I will post a pic once I have one that isn't terrible.
 
Oh April! I am so glad that Eliza is here, but sorry that you both have had such a rough go of it.

I started crying when I read your post as our deliveries had a lot of similarities (baby who ended up being posterior and asynclitic, labor started with rupture of fluids, horrific back labor, "failure to progress", desire for med-free vaginal delivery that ended up being full of interventions, considering it a win in the end b/c healthy baby and healthy mama...). My labor was a little different as I was allowed to progress for nearly 40 hours, and in the end had some attempted vacuum assistance (didn't work b/c he had so much hair:-)) and a small episiotomy instead of any tearing for which I am eternally grateful. If I had delivered earlier I would likely have had a 4th degree tear as well or an emergency C-section.

E was super beat up with a ridge over his forehead, dents all over his skull, and a giant flat pointy spot that lasted for months, but he was and is totally fine. Thankfully he had lots of black hair so after a few days it wasn't obvious unless you looked closely or felt his head:-)

All this to say, things will feel better soon, Eliza's head/face and jaundice will heal, and you will heal (my SIL had a 4th degree tear, I am so sorry as that is really painful and hard!!! she said that the donut pillow, sitz bath, "padsicles", and specialists like perineum specialist and physical therapist were really helpful in healing from her tear).

Best wishes on this recovery and both of you being home soon. The first few weeks are an overwhelming blur, but such a special time.

Babies get contorted all kinds of crazy ways in the womb, so hopefully Eliza's foot will resolve itself, but if not my understanding is that club feet are very treatable and treatment can begin with an older pre-walking infant, but are not advised/indicated for a newborn. So your DH can breathe a sigh of relief on that. I am sure that your Drs are doing any necessary screenings for underlying or related medical conditions and will help you come up with a treatment plan at the right time.

For now, try to enjoy being a new mom as much as you can, even though it is unfolding in a very different way than you imagined.

Soon you will be home and all together!!!
 
Oh MP, I am keeping you and the babies in my prayers!! I can't imagine how difficult it must be for you right now. Big hugs!

Hi JG! Hang in there! Not too much longer now!!

Congrats April!!:)
 
Chubby cheeked squish! (Sorry it's upsidedown!)

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Oh that smooshy face! So much love!
 
April, she is gorgeous!
 
Congrats, April! Very happy for you. I'm sorry to hear about the issue with her foot. Nobody wants their baby to have any imperfections, so your feelings are understandable. But I just know everything will be fine and it will get fixed. Hope you are recovering okay.

Thinking of everyone else!

JGator, Ev is being a trooper. He loves the babies, especially his brother. He hasn't been able to interact much with N yet because of her health issues, but he says goodnight and good morning to them. The hardest part for me is that I don't get to give him much time or attention, and he is acting up a bit to get attention and his routine is all changed. Eventually, this phase will pass though. Thinking of you!

We continue to struggle with N's feedings. It's a lot of work, and she ends up vomiting after about 2-3 feedings a day. And Baby boy is HIGH MAINTENANCE. It's so ironic considering how much easier he has it than his sister, and he makes it a lot more stressful with his crying and needing to be held ask the time. Not that he can help it. But we have our hands full. Sometimes I see a light at the end of the tunnel, but other days I want to run away or curl up in the fetal position and wonder what has become of my life. I do know that this is only a phase, and these babies are going to be such blessings to our family. It's just going to be crazy busy and chaotic for the foreseeable future.
 
Hey MP - I am so sorry that N is having such a tough time. It must be so hard on you. Any mom's postpartum time is difficult with so much emotional balancing taking place, but seeing your little baby having such a hard time must be really hard to deal with, given all of the hormonal stuff happening as well. I feel for you!!

Re: Ev, is he still going to school? Everyone advised me to keep S's schedule the same, even though I felt guilty about that. I do think everyone was right. It was and is good for her at least to be able to keep that part of her routine. My pedi also advised that I should spend some time with her, however small, just her and I together, even if it was to take her out for an ice cream. Once I started doing that, she was more balanced, but let me tell you -- there were tough times (she was our center of the world child for 4 years, so it was a big adjustment for her.) I was really unprepared for it -- totally had my head in the clouds on preparing myself for the adjustment she would have to go through. Now at 11 weeks out, she is doing so much better -- a lot of B's awake time is spent with his big sister teaching him, she brings out lots of toys to show him, will read to him, etc. So, I know it will be tough for you, but even if you spend some short amount of time, just you and Ev, I think it will ease things for him a bit. And, if he's not going to school while you are home, definitely reconsider that!!

Re: baby boy, have you tried wearing him, maybe in a moby wrap? It may help. I have one that I won't need again, and I'd be happy to send it to you, if you want to contact admin. I know you will probably say no, but thought I would offer anyway!

April - Congratulations! Eliza (love her name!!) is gorgeous! Whoa to your birth story, and also YAY to having such a great team of docs to see you and your baby through such a tough L&D!!
 
I can officially feel the lightest tapping from baby! It started just a few days ago, a steady tapping from below my belly button. Mostly at night when I'm sitting on the couch leaned over. I love it!

I hope all of the new Mommies and babies are doing well and continuing to get strong and settle in!
 
Those first flutters are so cool AHL :appl:

I'm 12w today. Finally out of first tri. Had NT scan and Panorama done couple days ago. We still haven't told anyone except my mom but will tell in-laws today as we're having dinner with them. Hesitating telling others as I want this to be my own little secret as long as possible.
 
Yay BabyM! Will you find out the sex with the test results? I know that's not the point but it must be very nice to find out early if it's something you want to know. Here's to a healthy baby!
 
Thanks AHL. I actually don't want to know the gender and asked them to black it out before giving me other results. Hopefully they'll remember to do it.
 
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