Updates

So this post has been a long time coming, I realize that. In my defense life has been crazy! I finally finished summer term and can proudly say that I have passed all of my theory core! This summer has been exhausting, but I'm so grateful that I just sucked it up and finished everything. I'm still not finished with school, but most of the classes that I have left are more of the "show up and take the test variety" rather than the "be in class every day or you will fail variety." I'm excited though because for the first time ever I will only have two hours of class a day in the fall! Just as a comparison I had class from 8-3 during the summer. This means that I finally get to settle down and prepare for our baby to get here!

We had a little bit of extra excitement this week in the form of an extra doctors visit. I had been noticing that my blood pressure was going up at each appointment, so I decided to just keep an eye on it. I've always had super low blood pressure (like 90/60) so even just seeing my blood pressure in the 100s is a shock for me. However, it had been getting as high as 140/87 and I'd been swelling a lot in my hands, feet, and face, so I decided a quick call to the doctor might be a good idea. They decided to have me come in, and unfortunately my blood pressure was up to 140/110. This was cause for concern (and some panic) because it hints towards preeclampsia.
Needless to say they sent me over to the hospital to do a non-stress test and make sure everything was okay with baby. The test itself is a breeze, you basically lay down and they hook up monitors to your stomach to check the baby's heart rate, and monitor your blood pressure every 10 minutes. Thankfully, once I laid down my blood pressure went down to 126/86 (still not perfect, but your blood pressure is expected to go up during pregnancy) and baby was kicking at all the monitors during the entire test. We definitely have a stinker on our hands here! He had his own ideas about having monitors strapped to him :)

The only thing I didn't like about the test was that they checked you in to a room on the labor and delivery floor in order to have it done. I was just looking around the whole time thinking, "I'm not quite ready to be here yet, can I come back in a few weeks?" As nerve-wracking as that was though, it was nice to see the area where we will have the baby in a few weeks and get acquainted with the procedures they have up there. If nothing else, now I won't worry that we will wander the hospital for hours looking for labor and delivery :)

Even though the NST came back normal, they still wanted to do a few more tests just to see where our levels of concern should be. Basically they had me do a 24 hour urine collection. I pray that none of you will ever have to do this. This is not painful in the least, but is disgusting, and if you are still suffering from morning sickness and nausea, it is one of the last things you will ever want to do. You can probably guess what it consists of. That's right, they give you a big jug and tell you to collect all of your urine in that jug for the next 24 hours, and keep the jug in the fridge. Excuse me, but my food is in the fridge. Let's just say that neither Ryan nor I had much of an appetite that day.

Anyways I haven't heard back on the results of that test, or my blood test, so I'm hoping that means everything is checking out normal and I just have to take it easy for the next little while. I definitely consider it a blessing that my blood pressure came down so quickly just by lying down. My mom is convinced that they're going to put me on bed-rest if this continues to be an issue, but I'm hoping they will hold off on that for another week or so. We're moving on Monday, and I just can't take a break until then. If I do have to go on bed-rest though, at least I'll be able to update this blog more! Here's to looking at the bright side!