It Was A Sign Of Things To Come

If it's too good to be true... It probably is.. That's the story of my life right now.

I went into the hospital for 11 days beginning at the end of June. I was allowed to go home on July 6, but that was short lived. A week and a half after getting home, I was laying in bed, literally doing nothing. I'm pretty sure I was half asleep. Suddenly I woke up to a gush of liquid and I knew that was NOT a good thing. I had been careful not to overexert myself to avoid this specific situation. Turns out I couldn't have prevented it anyways.

I called my Aunt in hopes that she would tell me that everything would be okay. Long shot I know, but I was grasping at straws here. She told me that I needed to call the hospital and that they were going to tell me to come in, so I decided to get into the shower to prepare for my imminent long stay at the hospital. This whole time, my husband was at the zoo with our son. I called him once I was out of the shower and told him that I had called our Aunt, I called the doctor and I'm pretty sure my water had broken. He wasted no time leaving the zoo, arranging for someone to take care of our son and making it home to take me to Labor and Delivery. In all of this, thankfully I wasn't having any contractions. If I was, they weren't strong enough for me to notice them over how upset I already was.

When we got to the hospital, I was hooked up to all the monitors again and told them what happened. They did their tests and they came back really quickly. My water was definitely broken. I was taken straight to a delivery room, and told that I was getting put back on the worst drug in existence... Magnesium sulfate. I had already done two days of that medicine the first time around and it was misery. It makes me super hot, my eyes get fuzzy and it acts as a muscle relaxer so I can't move or get up to pee. So here I was about to be put through it again for another two days. The medicine is used to stop contractions and boost the baby's brain development just in case delivery was going to happen soon, so it was legitimately necessary, but I was NOT happy about all of this. My frustration was evident in how difficult it was to get the IV in. One nurse tried twice, but each time my vein collapsed, then they got another nurse who wasn't so gentle and also unsuccessful. Finally they got an anesthesiologist to get the IV started. Then they had to take blood before starting all the drugs and that took another two tries. I was a friggin pin cushion. Pretty sure it was so difficult because my body was mad at what was coming and trying to do all it could to prevent it.

Finally it all got started. The next two days are fuzzy and I know I posted stuff on Facebook, but I really don't remember what I said. I vaguely remember people telling me how positive I was, but now that I'm off all the drugs and finally in my right mind again, I can tell you that I'm legitimately upset about this whole thing. I'm stuck here in the hospital until I deliver this baby. Since my water is broken, I'm at super high risk for infection, so I'm getting a regular dose of antibiotics, and the baby is getting monitored twice a day to make sure he's healthy and strong. I'm still not having contractions and I'm not even dilated at all. I have no idea how that's possible, but that's not something I shouldn't complain about. I'm only 28 weeks pregnant, and that's definitely too early to be having a baby. The doctors want me to make it to 34 weeks ideally. After that, the risk of infection to the baby is greater if he stays inside, so they need him out at that time. Who knows if I'll make it that far though. The doctors don't even know. They've seen people make it to 34 weeks, but they've also seen people not last another week. So right now it's just a waiting game to see if my body makes this baby come first or if they have to intervene to make the baby come.

Meanwhile, my saint of a husband is pulling double duty being stay at home dad and provider. Our Ward and family and friends are providing overwhelming support to my husband, offering to bring him food and take care of our son. This whole situation sure is taking it's toll on us though. Warren knows that I'm at "the doctor" but he doesn't know why I can't come home. That makes it hard for Ray to deal with Warren sometimes because every once and a while, he just needs his Mom and I'm not able to be there for him, and that's hard for me. Ray is exhausted trying to keep up with everything, and I'm bored and mad... I wish there was some explanation as to why I could have such a normal first pregnancy (minus all the sickness) and then have this second pregnancy be so completely polar opposite and high risk.

So that's what's going on. Just a whole lot of waiting now. I'm in need of prayers to have a good attitude now more than ever. The thought of potentially spending six weeks in the hospital is not a pleasant one. Not only that, but the thought of having to come back every day to spend time with my tiny preemie baby once he's born until he's allowed to come come is almost too much to deal with. These next few months are pretty daunting to think about. I'm truly grateful for all the people that have shown such an outpouring of love to my family and I. You will never know how much that means to me. Keep it coming. I need it.