Our little scare

Some of you may have already heard from us, through family, or from friends - but I'm sure there are a lot of you that haven't... All is fine and good now, but on Tuesday (July 21) I went into early labor, kind of. Around 1 p.m. I started getting some Braxton Hicks contractions, which is nothing new for me. I've always gotten a lot of them throughout this pregnancy, but never enough to warrant calling the doctor - though my doctor was aware of me getting the ones I did. After a little while I started to think that maybe I had had a few too many, so I started writing them down on paper at 2 p.m. I also started drinking extra water and laid down, not that I had been very active that day aside from doing some laundry and dishes... I was getting them somewhat regularly, but still wasn't worrying. I took a hot shower, but that didn't help (it usually stops them, as does drinking water). So I laid back down and continued to write them down until about 4 p.m. and I tallied them up. Yeah, so I had had 32 contractions! All of them Braxton Hicks, they were completely painless, but considering you're only supposed to get up to 4 an hour, well, I knew I was WAY too high. So I called the doctors office and left a message. Unfortunately my doctor is on vacation until next Wednesday, so the on-call doctor called me back and said to head into the OB department at the hospital so they could hook me up to the monitors and check things out. I still wasn't worried at this point, I figured they'd just go away on their own in awhile. I had to call Jer and have him leave work early since we share a car, and luckily he was in his office, because he's in a lot of meetings throughout the day and often isn't around... He hadn't brought his cell phone that day, which is something we will never allow to happen again, so I was relieved to see he was in. Anyway, so he came to get me and we got to the hospital a little after 4:30 or so. They hooked me up and made me click this button every time I thought I was having a contraction (I guess it's pretty common for women to think they're having contractions, when really they're not, so they like to cross check what you think is a contraction with what they think). As I was doing that they started to get a little stronger (though never painful, they were still Braxton Hicks), but instead of registering as a 20 or so on the TOCO scale, they were starting to be more like 30. This worried the doctor, so she decided to give me a shot of Terbutaline to stop the contractions. Well, that worked... For about an hour. Then I started to get a few contractions again, so they gave me another shot to stop them. This worked pretty well, so they moved me to a regular recovery room (I had been in a labor and delivery room), and continued to monitor me... I had a few more, but very spaced out. Jer and I finally started to relax and we watched Conan before he finally had to leave to let the dogs out and try and get a little sleep himself. I laid there in the dark not really sleeping and then I got three more contractions, which really pissed me off. I figured it was over. They opted to do one last shot of Terbutaline (they can only do up to 3 before you start getting bad side effects), and we prayed that was all it would take. Luckily it was. I finally fell asleep and didn't get any more contractions until about 3:30, then I only had one mild one because a) I was so completely starving by this point it wasn't even funny, and b) I really had to pee! Those are two things that commonly cause a Braxton Hicks, so we didn't worry since it's the only one I got and didn't get another after I used the bathroom and got some food. My nurse was awesome and went to scrounge up whatever food she could find since the cafeteria was closed. Unfortunately that meant not eating the healthiest food, but I could care less at that point. She found me cheerios, milk, pudding, and some vanilla wafers with peanut butter. I ate most of it, besides the cookies, since I finally got full. I was pretty much awake at that point, so I just kind of laid there and hoped Jer would wake up early so I'd have someone to talk to. Luckily he was up early (says he hardly slept at all) and was in before 5 a.m. Of course this is the point at which I finally got tired and crashed, so the poor guy had to sit there and watch me sleep! I'm think I just needed him there to feel comfortable. I dozed on and off for awhile and then I got some breakfast around 7:30 a.m. or so. Nothing to write home about, but I was already starving again by this point so I ate some eggs, bacon, OJ, and rice krispies with milk. Jer at my toast and potatoes and coffee, since I didn't want them. It was also my birthday that day, so the cafeteria put some happy birthday stuff on my tray, which was nice. Jer took some pictures of me, but I'm not sure where the camera is so I can't post them right now. Maybe later. After breakfast the doctor came in and she said she was happy with how I'd been doing, so said she'd have me walk around for an hour and take a shower, then monitor me again for an hour to see if that had any effect on me. So Jer and I hit the halls, me looking amazingly awesome, as I'm sure you can imagine... Then I took a hot shower and cleaned up a bit before being strapped back into bed. They monitored me again and all was well, so I was given the all clear to go home. We got home around 10:30 a.m. or so on Wednesday (July 22), my 28th birthday.

For now they have me taking the pill form of Terbutaline every 4 hours for a week in order to prevent me from getting any more contractions. After that we just hope it doesn't happen again. And from what I've read it generally doesn't, so I'm trying not to worry. As I mentioned earlier, I had been getting quite a few Braxton Hicks contractions before this - never more than 4 an hour except once, but it wasn't that many more and they went away after lots of water and a hot shower... I did notice that generally when I got them it was because I was active, really hungry, really had to go to the bathroom, too hot, or really stressed out. And when I say active, I mean simply walking me dogs at a regular pace for 15 minutes would bring on 2 or 3... So not even heavy activity. So my plan for now is to cut out all of those variables. I'll still walk the dogs with Jer, but it'll be a short slow walk to the end of the block and then he can take them further while I go home. I'll also still do my prenatal yoga since that never caused any... No more brisk walks outside, no more elliptical, etc. etc. I'm not risking it. I'm going to make sure I eat regularly and never let myself get too hungry (I've been pretty good at this anyway, it only happened a few times). I'm always going to drink lots of water (again, I've been pretty dang good at this all along, but there have been a few times). I'm not going to go outside for long periods of time when it's hot... As for the stress, I'm not a stresser and am good about keeping this in check, as far as normal daily stress. I only noticed stress brought them on because the ONE time I did experience a lot of stress - after our car accident - I got a ton of contractions. Not immediately after (not from impact), but after I'd been dwelling on it for too long. So I guess if I ever find myself in an extremely stressful situation like that again, I'm going to have to work really hard to not worry about it.

I think we'll be okay. I have 8 weeks, that's two months, until I'm 37 weeks. At 37 weeks the baby will be completely developed and can be safely born without any interventions. So if I make it there, I'm good. However, if I were to go earlier than that things would still probably be fine - even if I were to deliver today. Sure, the baby would be in NCIU for awhile and that would suck, but at least I know she would survive. It's obviously not at all what I want, but I am comforted in knowing that at least at this point in my pregnancy my baby will live.

So that's where we're at. I'm sorry this was so long, but I wanted to get all of the details in there. Thank you to everyone for all of your love and support. My next doctors appointment is on Tuesday, so I'll update again after that.