This has been a hard week for me as a pregnant woman in the homestretch. I've had a horribly difficult time controlling my whining, and I get super irritated if Cody doesn't baby me when I'm feeling blue. In the midst of my irritation, I know that he's a man and that he'll never understand what it's like for a baby to make a woman so happy and so miserable in the same breath. Just last night at the dinner table, I made it about 6 bites into my food before Ella started Jazzercising. I have a really difficult time eating while she's moving that much (it just makes me feel a little nauseated), and by the time she calmed down fifteen minutes later, I felt so full that eating another bite of dinner was just impossible. So I was fairly irritated, and then I looked at my sausage fingers, and my purple swollen feet. Then the baby shot an appendage up into my rib cage right about the time I realized how sweaty and gross I felt. And then my ant bite stings started itching... and in THAT moment, the world started tumbling down around me. And the tears fell. Not a hysterical cry... just enough that the tears fell rapidly and consistently. When Cody came back into the room, I immediately recognized the "Oh Crap" stance that he took... not because he was annoyed with me, but because he knew he was on thin ice, and whatever he chose to do was either going to make the situation better or worse. He chose to hug. Hugs are always good for a pregnant woman. Then he walked me to the couch and told me to put my feet up. And I was okay after that. I think that sometimes, it's just better to cry.
It's so hard to be so in love with your sweetest baby and so ready to stop being pregnant. It's sincerely one of the hardest lines to walk. Don't let anybody tell you that you'll love being pregnant everyday, because you won't. I have sincerely enjoyed my pregnancy more over the last 6 weeks than I could have possibly imagined, but there were days in the midst of it all that I was just ready to be done. Those days are becoming more frequent. I want to sleep on my stomach, have a glass of wine, enjoy a scalding bubble bath, and be able to move freely without somebody saying "Be Careful!" I've said it before, and I'll say it again, Pregnancy is closer to a year of life than farther away from it. It's hard, surprisingly painful, and full things that nobody warns you about in the books. The key to preventing teen pregnancy is developing a pill that makes you feel the way you do in your first trimester or your third trimester. The exhaustion alone is enough to make me REALLY consider making Ella my only offspring.
People always laugh when I say that. Apparently, I'm going to hate being pregnant until the second I see her. Then I'm going to hold her and smell her baby head (I can already testify that few things in this world smell better than a newborn baby)... and I'll forget it all. I'll be willing and enthusiastic about giving her a sibling. I've made a very conscious effort to document the good, the bad, and the ugly on this blog. Even if I forget, I'll read it to remember.
The blog is late this week because I've been battling about sharing details about my latest appointment, but the entire purpose of the blog is to keep you informed. I know that I stalked a few pregnancy blogs before I was even pregnant because I wanted to know what to expect. So, I'll share our latest adventure in pregnancy.
Basically, I've felt a little wonky for the past few weeks. Mostly because of the swelling in my feet. I don't know if you've ever dealt with swelling, but it kind of feels like your skin is going to rip into shreds every time you take a step. My feet were always the worst at work because my legs were too short to reach the floor, so they dangled all day. Blood and fluid pooled, and then they turned purple. I would come home from work and put them up for about an hour, but then I would be back up and around to cook dinner, making them swell right back up. Last week, I noticed my hands felt uncomfortably hot. I looked down and they were sausage fingers, and beet red... except around my knuckles, where they were white. It was miserable. I hated how my hands felt. On top of that, I spent all day typing at work, so when I got home at night, carpal tunnel syndrome kicked in (a totally normal pregnancy symptom, btw) and they tingled. I kept my hands submerged in ice, and felt like I was losing my mind for whining about it all so much. I'm pretty sure I accomplished nothing of true substance of work last week, and I was already looking for reasons to quit sooner. I skipped the blog Thursday because I was being such a negative nancy. At the doctor's appointment Friday, I felt surprisingly zazzy, even though my hands were already starting their nonsense at 9:00 in the morning. They weighed me (I've gained 7 pounds to date) and then took my blood pressure. I wasn't paying any attention because I was looking at the wall of hysterical pamphlets. The nurse said "Is it always that high?" and when I looked over at the machine, the stat read 135/89. I said "WOAH!" and then "No." Which is true, I check my blood pressure at home with a really good machine. Truth be told, my blood pressure has been up the entire pregnancy. I attributed it to the gallbladder in the second trimester, because it dropped after we took the thing out. But it's gradually been climbing again since. I was dreading the conversation with the doctor, but when he came in the room, he said "Hey, so you're 33 weeks." and I said "Why yes, I am." and he smirked. He listened to Ella's heartbeat and said "Alright, I'll see you in 2 weeks. We'll be doing your strep swab then." *shudder*
And he walked out of the room. I debated whether or not I should catch him, mostly because I was shocked he didn't say anything about my blood pressure. I knew my husband would wring my neck if I didn't say anything after all of the whining I did, so I called the doctor back in and asked him what I could do for swelling in my hands. He kind of looked at me, then took my hands. He did all sorts of poking and squeezing, and looked at my feet. Fortunately, they were looking a little purple as well, so he sighed and said the following:
"Well, your blood pressure has gradually been climbing for this entire pregnancy. I haven't said anything because it isn't something you should obsess over. Swelling is a normal part of pregnancy, but swelling that badly in your hands is not a good thing. You're going to have to put them above your head, and if you're not at a place at your job that you can do that, it's probably time to consider maternity leave. I don't want you to stress out, but these are symptoms of pre-eclampsia, and we don't want to mess around with that. I'm not diagnosing you, but I want you to start coming in weekly instead of waiting two weeks. I don't want you to worry. Pre-eclampsia happens in 1 out of every 10 pregnancies. I know exactly what to watch for. So I'll see you next week."
But all I heard was:
"You suck at growing humans. First, your gallbladder gave out. Now you've got pre-eclampsia. Thank you for being such a worthless human being. You may as well quit working so that you can lay on the couch and not contribute to your family's well being. Now I have to see you every single week instead of on a regular schedule. Also, tell your body good job for doing a terrible job at taking care of itself while you're pregnant."
So I've been in a super weird place for the last few days. I've left my job earlier than anticipated, battled my mother daily about what's considered "Overdoing it," missed my husband immensely because these have been those days where his arms are the only place I wanted to be (he's at camp leading street youths to Jesus,) and pondered why the Lord made me the 1/10. Most days, it feels like if it's a risk in pregnancy, I'm a prime candidate for it. And that's hard. It's so hard to watch your friends have simple, surgery free pregnancies, and know that yours is considered "a hard pregnancy" to doctors. I feel like less of a woman, because my body can't do the one thing that a woman should be able to do without it sucking the life out of me. I hate how it makes me feel. I hate that I can't "nest" because my body exhausts so easily. I hate that I have to have my parents do things for me because it's too risky for me to do it myself (you know, like go to the grocery store.)
Of course, my body took this as a cue to go ahead and pile on a little bit of misery. Since my appointment, there have been ligaments stretching in a more painful way than I've dealt with to date. I've felt nauseous almost every minute of every day because my torso is just short enough that my enormous child compresses my stomach all of the time, making me feel sick. My hips have given up on supporting me in bed, and my loose joints make my back hurt all of the time. All since Friday. It's been a hard, hard, hard three days. I didn't want to tell anyone because even though my blood pressure is completely out of my control, you still get a lot of really judgemental looks while you're pregnant and there's a complication. July 19th has never felt farther away. And now that I have seven weeks to sit and stare at the wall, it's enough to make me cry just thinking about it.
So what does it all mean? If my blood pressure won't chill out, I won't be able to have Ella naturally. It's riskier for me to try and push her than to be sliced in half on an operating table. It means bedrest if I can't get my stuff together, and it means that she might come early. These don't seem major problems, but I've already had my stomach cut open once this pregnancy, I don't look forward to it again. It means in a future birth, it's another c-section. It means that it's just another thing that I had planned spiraling completely out of my control. So I ask for your prayers as we venture down the path of the final seven weeks of this pregnancy. Pray for my sanity while I stay "chill," pray for Cody as he tries to not seem like such a busy body around somebody that already feels lazy, and pray for sweet Ella, as she still has some growing to do before she can come and cuddle with me.
That's where we are at the moment. The bump picture this week is a selfie (I hate that I took a selfie. I'm so ashamed.) But Cody wasn't around to take it and now that I'm unemployed, I can't take them at work. I even made sure there were cliche water spots in the picture. Please judge me. I can't stand selfie pictures.
Large Marge Out.
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