Let me start this entry by saying that I’ve always been proud that Canada has a “free” universal health care system for all of its citizens. I know there are longer wait times and other issues but basically it’s an amazing thing that anyone who is ill or injured is treated the same.
In case you’ve missed a few entries – this pregnancy hasn’t exactly been textbook easy.
First of all I’m 35 – apparently that’s the magic number for all the “bad stuff” to happen so to begin with I was tested for everything from Scurvy to the baby having Downs Syndrome (both are negative by the way).
Then at 23 weeks my cervix was shortening – hence being benched and Rick coming home early from the sandbox.
That apparently decided to reverse itself just in time for intra-uterine growth restriction – a fancy way to say that the little miss isn’t getting all she needs from the placenta and is grossly undersized.
So in response to all this I go to the doctor at least three times per week. Twice for bio-physicals where I get an ultrasound and they take a stress strip of the baby’s heart and movements and once to my OB/GYN for all the other stuff. Amongst all of this I also see the OB specialist for a “special” ultrasound where the baby is measured etc.
So yesterday I’m at one of the anti-natal bio-physicals and they take my blood pressure. I sort of figured it was up a bit because I haven’t seen my ankles in weeks and I woke up with a puffy face. My BP was 150/100 – not a good sign. The nurse waited a few more minutes and took it again – it was 157-107 – wonderful.
So off to Labour and Delivery I was sent for blood work and urinalysis. Instead of inducing me – they decided to give me blood pressure medication. The twit who gave it to me tested my blood pressure twice within a 10-minute window – it was, after all just a few minutes before shift change. The BP was going down I was allowed to leave with a prescription to take at home.
The last thing I was told was (and I quote) – “If you are feeling any headaches, flashing lights, upper abdominal pain – make sure you call L&D and come in to be checked out.”
So off we went. They told me to expect some light-headedness as the BP was dropping and until it levelled off I’d feel “strange”. And I did.
But around 8 PM I started to get a headache.
I’m a migraine sufferer – so when I say I’ve got a headache – it doesn’t mean I’ve got a little discomfort. It means “Dear God take me now”.
Tylenol – the only crap I’m allowed to take – doesn’t touch it. Lying down in a dark room with a facecloth over my eyes just makes me want to cry. So after an hour or so I call L&D – following orders like a good patient.
The nurse, Lynn, tells me to take more Tylenol and to have a hot bath. “The damp weather could cause some people to have headaches.”
It’s been raining for 8 days straight at this point – it’s not like the barometric pressure is going up and down – I feel like crying and reaching through the phone to choke the life out of nurse Lynn.
So I take the bath – it makes me nauseous. I take more Tylenol and lie down. When Rick climbs the stairs I’m crying from the pain. I beg him for one of my migraine pills and he relents and gives it to me. These knock me out and I wake up without the migraine – usually.
This time – I wake up and am thinking what I can use to hang myself. The pain is horrible.
Rick is pissed that I haven’t called L&D again.
Both my OB and the specialist OB have told me time and again – that I should go to L&D and that I’m not bothering anyone by doing so – they understand what kind of a person I am and that I’d rather die in a corner than bother someone. But they didn’t hear Nurse Lynn. And in all honesty I’d rather the top of my head blew like Mount Vesuvius before I called her back.
That and I’m afraid that even at 9 months pregnant I’d find the energy to kick the crap out of her and the Resident Dr. MacDonald who despite having my chart in front of him – having several conversations with me and, I thought, was smarter than a brick – told me to take a freaking bath! I’m not so much into giving birth in jail.
So I’m here. Wearing sunglasses on a rainy morning inside so I can look at the monitor. Needing to get this frustration off of my chest before I actually pick up the phone to call Labour and Delivery to tell them that my “little headache” has now been 14 hours long I’ve taken the blessed bath and lay down in the dark and can I please come in to have someone take a whole two GD minutes out of their shift to press a button on an automatic BP machine to check my freaking blood pressure…
I don’t think it’s so much to ask.
I keep thinking about my friend who told me what the acronym for our local hospital DECH (Dr. Everet Chalmers Hospital) really stands for – Don’t Ever Come Here. After the last 24 hours - I think she’s right.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Monday, June 15, 2009
Biting my ninja tongue
I’m still waiting to glow.
Not grow – I’m doing plenty of that. Today when I looked in the mirror I looked like I was smuggling a beach ball. Sigh.
I’ve gotten two good reports in a row from the doctors and you’d think that I’d be dancing in the streets. But somehow I can’t stop walking on eggshells. Every twinge and movement is analyzed, every feeling examined and categorized I feel like some sort of alien scientist – I half expect the little grey men from Area 51 to show up and assist.
I’m reading “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” like it’s the key to the universe. This weeks’ message is to expect increased scatterbrained activities. And to prove it – I’ve managed to misplace my ankles – right on cue.
My feet are so swollen that I have one pair of shoes I can wear and my toes look like mini Vienna Sausages.
Remind me again who said pregnant women are beautiful?
Because I feel like a hippo, look like a manatee and waddle like a duck. Proof that God has a sick sense of humour.
Maybe it’s a “nature” thing. Make the increasingly pregnant woman so repulsive that no other mammal will come near thing. The natural defences of a pregnant human female, on display for everyone to see. Only it doesn’t quite work that way does it?
Apparently the physical appearance of a woman in the advanced stages of pregnancy is an open invitation for anyone over the age of 50 to walk up and start talking, and/or touching the increasing baby bump.
I’ve gotten advice, unsolicited advice, from complete strangers on how to avoid tearing in labour and delivery. Apparently the sight of a woman in her eighth month is license to throw out all social rules and jump right to talking about the female genitalia.
And then there’s the twenty-year-old that has the same appointment schedule with the OB who tells me all about childbirth and newborns every time we’re sitting in the waiting room. I’m almost thirty-six years old – I’ve brought one or both my kids to more appointments than I can count and she thinks this is my first dog and pony show…maybe there’s something to that scatterbrained thing after all.
Only a few more weeks – I can do a few more weeks – right? I just have to keep biting my tongue, reminding myself not to go ninja on the old touchy feely folks and to nod and smile at the chick in the OB’s office all the while swelling and aching and waddling my way to the dignity-devoid space of the delivery room.
I can do that…I just need a lobotomy and a couple of good stiff drinks to get me there.
Not grow – I’m doing plenty of that. Today when I looked in the mirror I looked like I was smuggling a beach ball. Sigh.
I’ve gotten two good reports in a row from the doctors and you’d think that I’d be dancing in the streets. But somehow I can’t stop walking on eggshells. Every twinge and movement is analyzed, every feeling examined and categorized I feel like some sort of alien scientist – I half expect the little grey men from Area 51 to show up and assist.
I’m reading “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” like it’s the key to the universe. This weeks’ message is to expect increased scatterbrained activities. And to prove it – I’ve managed to misplace my ankles – right on cue.
My feet are so swollen that I have one pair of shoes I can wear and my toes look like mini Vienna Sausages.
Remind me again who said pregnant women are beautiful?
Because I feel like a hippo, look like a manatee and waddle like a duck. Proof that God has a sick sense of humour.
Maybe it’s a “nature” thing. Make the increasingly pregnant woman so repulsive that no other mammal will come near thing. The natural defences of a pregnant human female, on display for everyone to see. Only it doesn’t quite work that way does it?
Apparently the physical appearance of a woman in the advanced stages of pregnancy is an open invitation for anyone over the age of 50 to walk up and start talking, and/or touching the increasing baby bump.
I’ve gotten advice, unsolicited advice, from complete strangers on how to avoid tearing in labour and delivery. Apparently the sight of a woman in her eighth month is license to throw out all social rules and jump right to talking about the female genitalia.
And then there’s the twenty-year-old that has the same appointment schedule with the OB who tells me all about childbirth and newborns every time we’re sitting in the waiting room. I’m almost thirty-six years old – I’ve brought one or both my kids to more appointments than I can count and she thinks this is my first dog and pony show…maybe there’s something to that scatterbrained thing after all.
Only a few more weeks – I can do a few more weeks – right? I just have to keep biting my tongue, reminding myself not to go ninja on the old touchy feely folks and to nod and smile at the chick in the OB’s office all the while swelling and aching and waddling my way to the dignity-devoid space of the delivery room.
I can do that…I just need a lobotomy and a couple of good stiff drinks to get me there.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Spinning
Four A.M.
What the heck am I doing up at four in the freaking morning?
Counting baby movements – what else?
The gerbil wheel in my head has been spinning again. Somehow I’ve got a morose feeling of dread. Like something isn’t right but I just can’t put my finger on it.
I get to the required six movements. They’re weak, so I head to the washroom and when I get back I start counting again.
I still can’t shake the idea that something is wrong.
Maybe I should call Labour and Delivery and speak to a nurse. And say what? – I woke up for no apparent reason and I can’t relax?
Besides – I don’t want to be a bother. Don’t ask where that comes from, it’s either a Newfie thing or a woman thing.
“No, no – you see to the others first I’ll just crawl over into this corner and die – when you get around to me let me know.” It’s almost laughable how we women are.
I’ve got an appointment with the OB in the afternoon. As long as there’s no pain or bleeding and as long as I can feel her moving I’ll stick to the schedule.
There’s no real “emergency”. I’m basically okay. I’m just channelling something. Picking up on the energy of the universe, as it were.
The alarm goes off and I hear the terrible news out of Brazil – an airliner carrying 220 passengers has disappeared. It makes my worries seem insignificant in contrast. Well, almost insignificant.
Kate is not going on the bus today. She was sent home every day last week after an episode each morning, which resulted in her being too weak to walk or stand on her own.
The neurologist is out of town – surprise, surprise. So in desperation the school, Rick and I decided that she would sleep until she woke up on her own and we’d drive her in to see if we could circumvent the issue by giving her more rest and less excitement (she adores the bus) first thing in the morning.
She’s happy enough to leave the house every day – but by the time she gets to school she’s, well for lack of a better word, she’s screwed up.
As she heads out the door with Rick I hear her chattering away at him – the one word she’s retained over the years is “daddy” and she uses it with him like a magpie. It means anything and everything you could imagine. And she’s excited so all I hear is a retreating echo of “daddy, daddy, daddy” until they reach the car.
Maybe it’s the lack of sleep, maybe it’s the emotional exhaustion of the last week, maybe it’s the pregnancy hormones or maybe some combination of the three but I can feel the tears start to prick the backs of my eyes.
I’m trying my best. I really am. I just don’t know if it’s good enough.
What the heck am I doing up at four in the freaking morning?
Counting baby movements – what else?
The gerbil wheel in my head has been spinning again. Somehow I’ve got a morose feeling of dread. Like something isn’t right but I just can’t put my finger on it.
I get to the required six movements. They’re weak, so I head to the washroom and when I get back I start counting again.
I still can’t shake the idea that something is wrong.
Maybe I should call Labour and Delivery and speak to a nurse. And say what? – I woke up for no apparent reason and I can’t relax?
Besides – I don’t want to be a bother. Don’t ask where that comes from, it’s either a Newfie thing or a woman thing.
“No, no – you see to the others first I’ll just crawl over into this corner and die – when you get around to me let me know.” It’s almost laughable how we women are.
I’ve got an appointment with the OB in the afternoon. As long as there’s no pain or bleeding and as long as I can feel her moving I’ll stick to the schedule.
There’s no real “emergency”. I’m basically okay. I’m just channelling something. Picking up on the energy of the universe, as it were.
The alarm goes off and I hear the terrible news out of Brazil – an airliner carrying 220 passengers has disappeared. It makes my worries seem insignificant in contrast. Well, almost insignificant.
Kate is not going on the bus today. She was sent home every day last week after an episode each morning, which resulted in her being too weak to walk or stand on her own.
The neurologist is out of town – surprise, surprise. So in desperation the school, Rick and I decided that she would sleep until she woke up on her own and we’d drive her in to see if we could circumvent the issue by giving her more rest and less excitement (she adores the bus) first thing in the morning.
She’s happy enough to leave the house every day – but by the time she gets to school she’s, well for lack of a better word, she’s screwed up.
As she heads out the door with Rick I hear her chattering away at him – the one word she’s retained over the years is “daddy” and she uses it with him like a magpie. It means anything and everything you could imagine. And she’s excited so all I hear is a retreating echo of “daddy, daddy, daddy” until they reach the car.
Maybe it’s the lack of sleep, maybe it’s the emotional exhaustion of the last week, maybe it’s the pregnancy hormones or maybe some combination of the three but I can feel the tears start to prick the backs of my eyes.
I’m trying my best. I really am. I just don’t know if it’s good enough.
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