MIDNIGHT SCARE

Well, another week, another drama. On Friday night I woke up at 2:15 am in a pool of blood and fluid. Jack thought my water had broken - waaaaaaay too early. When we got to the ER we were able to be admitted directly to Labor & Delivery. The nurse checked me out and took some samples and agreed it seemed like my water had broken, but final diagnosis needed to be made with ultrasound. Jack kept having to lie on the floor because he felt faint. In usual form, I refused to believe miscarriage is possible. As we waited for the ultrasound technician to come in from home, we got to hear the baby's heartbeat, loud and strong as ever. When the technician came in, she was able to immediately tell us that the amniotic fluid level was high - PHEW. It turns out I have partial placental previa, which means I could go into premature labor and may need a C-section if it doesn't right itself over the next month. We were elated to find out the baby was not in immediate danger and was in fact healthy and swimming around like a minnow.

We found out this little gipper is a baby girl. Yahoo! We cracked up when we saw her on the screen. She had a thumbs-up on her left hand and a hang-ten on her right. She's apparently oblivious to our little scare in the night. It looks like she has deep set eyes and jowls and in our photo it looks like she's smiling. Later on, the perinatologist said this little girl has a long femur, and is developing quickly.


My doctor kept me in the hospital for the weekend, but felt it was safe to send me home on bedrest. I'll have another ultrasound in 3 weeks, which will tell us if the placenta has grown away from the cervix or if it's still posing a problem. My body has apparently attempted a correction of the situation and has grown an apple-sized blood clot to dam up the area that started bleeding. On ultrasound, we saw our baby girl had the back of her head resting comfortably on the clot like a pillow.


So I'll be on bedrest for about a month and maybe two. After the end of two months, I'll be safe to deliver a preemie with a fighting chance to survive, if I go into early labor. I'm hoping the previa will "go away" over this next month though.