Just Testing

I did not intend to have a trial run, yesterday. The universe, however, had other plans.

Yesterday started as a really good day, what with it being Friday and all. I was the only one in the office, making it nice and quiet and allowing me to get lots done. Around 3:00, I began to feel a headache coming on. No biggy. I've had a few recently and it's apparently very normal in the third trimester. Well, by 6:30, it had only gotten worse, so I looked at my handy-dandy sheet from my doctor and it said I could take Tylenol, regular or extra-strength. So, I did. Usually, this makes me feel better in about 30 minutes. No such luck. By 7:30, I was re-reading the label to find out when I could take more--not anytime soon. I went back to my doctor's handout. For headaches lasting 2-3 hours after taking Tylenol, I was to call the practice if open, otherwise, head to the hospital. This is because headaches can be a sign of preeclampsia--something for which I am now at a higher risk because of the GD.

Crud. I'm sure it's fine. I don't want to go to the hospital. I have another hour. I'll just lay down, maybe fall asleep. It will go away. Wrong. 8:20 arrives and headache is still present. I alert Phil and we head out to the hospital. "Best case scenario," I tell him, "this thing goes away on the way there." "Best case," he tell me, "is it goes away before we leave the garage." I smile slightly, but no such luck. He decides to time the drive just so we'll know for "the real thing"--25 minutes driving "regular" speed. We arrive--headache still present. Well, at least I didn't make us drive to the city for nothing.

We go up to the OB triage floor, give them my info and wait. All of their rooms are full, but they will get me in as soon as they can. We sit out in the lobby, along with lots of families who are there to support laboring mamas elsewhere on the floor. About 30 minutes later, we get called back to one of the observation rooms. We chat with the nurse and I get hooked up to the monitors--one checking baby's heart rate and the other monitoring contractions. Seeing as I am feeling nothing but my headache, I am surprised when the nurse asks me if I felt "that contraction." Nope, I tell her.

They runs lots of tests and the resident comes in to talk with me. All the tests are coming back fine and baby is doing extremely well. They are going to give me a prescription med for the headache and see how that goes. If it doesn't work, they'll try something through an IV. Also, they are going to give me a shot to stop the contractions. What?! Turns out, I'm having quite regular contractions every two minutes, but not feeling them. Alrighty, then. The nurse comes in and shows me the chart and, sure enough, there they are. Huh. I never would have thought I could have contractions and not feel them. Who knew?!

Anyway, the meds work like a charm. The contractions stopped and the headache went away without having to resort to IV meds. Yay! They check to make sure I'm not dilated (nope--0-1), and get ready to send me home. Before they clear me to leave, they want to take my blood pressure one more time (high blood pressure is also a sign of preeclampsia). Instead of dropping, as they had expected, it was the highest I had ever had--150 over something. Yeah. That's a problem. So, the resident comes back in. Since all the other tests were clear, I get to go home, but they want me to come back Sunday morning for more monitoring and another set of tests, just to be sure. If those tests come back fine, they will look at treating me for high blood pressure.

Sunday morning. Right. Obviously, Phil is not going to be able to go with me. Do I go by myself? Try and find someone to go with me? It's the church's annual Harvest Feast on Sunday and many of my friends will be involved with that. Phooey. Can't ask them to go. I unilaterally decide that I will just go by myself. After all, I don't expect them to find anything wrong. But, when I see some friends at the church this morning, and they all ask, "who's going with you?", I realize that I probably ought to take someone. So, I promise them that I will not go by myself.

Ultimately, I found a good friend who I would be comfortable having with me in the room as I wear nothing but a hospital gown and get poked and prodded in embarrassing ways. She is going to pick me up in the morning and we'll go get me checked out. I am fairly certain this will all be fine. I even did a free blood pressure check at the store when I picked up my script today and it was back to where it should be. I think it just got high from the meds they gave me to stop the contractions. Nevertheless, I will go and let the professionals do what they do. I'd rather be safe than sorry. And, hey, at least I'll be quite familiar with the process for when it's really time.