C&P from E's blog - The birth

christenm · February 2010

Here's my failed trip to L&D and the drama that went on after she was born. Far as the actual birthing part - cervadil (spelling?) for two days, still no progress so they broke the water, contractions were 45 seconds apart with no dilation. So c/s was done.

I'll put the failed L&D trip here, then the afterwards part in a response for anyone interested.

Pointless trip to labor and delivery

Well all weekend I was miserable because I was having a hard time breathing full breaths. I was running out of breath just from talking in a regular conversation and anytime I sat down or tried to sleep laying down, I couldn't breath. Made for quite the fun weekend. So first thing Monday morning when the doctor's office opened, I called and asked to speak to the nurse practitioner to see if she might have any tips on positions I could get in or something to make life a little more pleasant. The response was that they wanted me to go get checked at labor and delivery and make sure everything was okay. So James came home from work and brought me and we spent about three hours there hooked up to just about every machine the hospital had, before they informed that it sucked that I was having problems breathing, but deal with it. Thanks. No tips from them. And the nurse in l&d was super rude, saying how we should have gone to the ER for this. I told her that the doctor said for me to come to L&D, I am going on 37 weeks pregnant and I'm not going to the ER just to have them send me to L&D. I'd probably still be waiting if I had done that!!

So my doctor appointment is Thursday and I believe we'll be discussing the possibility of induction. BRING IT ON!!!

christenm · February 2010

Well I'm FINALLY home from the hospital. They discharged me on Monday evening. Elise was born on August 16 and while in the hospital the next day after I had her, I started coughing bad. Doctors said that it was bronchitis (spelling?) with a touch of walking pneumonia. They sent me and Elise both home on Wednesday, August 20. At around 1-2 AM Thursday morning (yes after being home just a few hours), I was having horrible trouble breathing. Luckily my mom was staying with us and we left the baby with her and went to the emergency room where it turns out I was having congestive heart failure. Apparently I had eclampsia really bad and the coughing was misdiagnosed. During my labor and C-section, they pumped me full of fluids via IV and I ended up with way too much fluid around my heart and lungs. I was put in the ICU. After about two days of lasiks (again, I can't spell sorry) which basically get the fluid out of you, my blood pressure was back down and my heart was beating normally and my oxygen levels were 100 % unassisted. It took a few days for them to get my blood pressure under control via medicine so I didn't get to come home until Monday evening. Which meant my 28th birthday was spent in the hospital!! Super fun times! The doctors believe it will be a postpartum thing, that my heart functions should go back to normal after a couple of months of medication. So keep your fingers crossed for me!