Love the low bp reading

So it might be a bit hard to see what is in the photo but it is my belly. The baby is getting bigger and am starting to show, and I suppose I should be as I am hitting on to 22 weeks today. YAY.
Went and saw my midwife yesterday and everything is going along swimmingly. BP is 114/66 which is ace. It is always great to get a low bp reading. I feel like I get on a bit of a high for a few days. Last one that was taken was at the dr when I took Molly and it was 127/80. The interesting thing is that I tend to get higher reading on the electronic machines. At least at the maternity unit they always use a manual gismo.
Heard the babies heartbeat and all is sounding good. At the moment at least. I think that is the hard bit. I always feel that there should be a "at the moment" part because it might turn pear shape.... BUT at the moment it is good. And that is cool. I was trying to remember what I was like with Molly at this stage. We had just moved country, were looking for a house, looking for work and organizing a wedding. I think that I was pretty puffy by this stage... and as everyone who I have read who had hellp talks about thinking that this is normal, so did I. I just thought that this is what you got when you were pregnant. Hard to know the abnormal when you have never had the normal before.
Anyway trying to keep my head above water. For some reason I am really worried about the 23 week. I have been for a long time. I think that I see the 24 weeks as a bit of a milestone. At 24 weeks they are far more likely to do interventions although my midwife said that at Adelaide they will intervene at 23 weeks if the parents decide. Which I don't think think that we would. But who knows until we are in that situation. But to be 23 weeks and to have something happen would be full on as the babies just have a better chance at every week that they stay in.
So fingers crossed that we cruise through the next 2 weeks. If they go as fast as the last 2 weeks we will be through them before you know it.
Thoughts going out to all the neonate parents.

Temperatures

Molly was a bit sick the other day and she had some pretty wicked temperatures. It freaks me out when she gets a temperature as she had a febrile seizure last year when she had a nasty ear infection. So when she had 39.3 the other day all I could think was that she was going to have another one. 

I had worked with people with epilepsy before so I was well aware of what you do when someone is having a seizure; namely put them in the recovery position, make sure that there is nothing close to them, look at the clock and then go and put the jug on. They were so common where I worked that it was a non event. Then when Molly had one, it totally broke all the rules. I felt so helpless. I just wanted it to stop and my logical brain went completely out the window for at least a few VERY long seconds until I got a grip and then thought what needed to happen. Namely keep her where she was ( she was in her car seat), get John and then head to the ed to see why this was happening.

So when the temps kept on coming the other night, I freaked out. John is a legend and keeps his cool under the most amazing pressure (although there are some times where is blood pressure tells another story). I was flapping round around where John just thought she should go to sleep and we will reassess in the morning. Which is what we did and it will all cool.

I think that one of the hardest parts of PTSD is that you immediately go for the worst possible scenario.  Molly is going to get sick. The next baby is going to get sick and it is trying to find the way to keep the emotions out of what is going on. I think that when things really happen there is such a huge amount of adrenaline pumping that it find of makes your feet stay on the ground. No adrenaline, no grounding. I am not sure if that is right and there are so many other things that effect the way that I deal with stuff.... fatigue namely and we are all pretty tired at the moment. 

It reminds me of the bigger picture with this pregnancy. Here I am at times flapping around wondering what is going to happen ( and I am sure that this is partly personality as I am not that patient at the best of times) and getting anxious just like I was with Molly and her temperatures. When all I need to do is take a step back and think that it is not about what happens in the future, at the moment all is well. Molly was sick and she had a high temp and she did not have a seizure despite all the worry that I did. And I felt a bit silly worrying about it afterwards. It totally could be the same with this pregnancy. I could flap and worry and get anxious and make my family life pretty hard and it might turn out ok. 

Head spaces. Man they are tough work. And changing long term entrenched thinking. Some times it is so easy to just go with what you know. It really does take such a lot of effort to change.

So better go and get the girl who is hanging with her mate.

Thoughts heading out to all the neonatal parents and their babies.

Caved

HAHA
Was reading the preeclampsia foundation website and had a wee freak out so rang to see where my midwife was. And she is still on holiday.

 I found the website really confronting as here were women that had got hellp at 19-24 weeks. As I said in the last post there are some pretty good signs that things are ok.... I do have to watch my denial levels. Plus hellp is something that happens pretty quickly. Jan my midwife in nz said that if it was to happen again typically it happens earlier and is more severe....
So I am sure that I will hear from my midwife next week. Back on for fortnightly bp's and peeing in cups. YAY.

Cruising

So we are cruising.

It really feels like a bit of an anticlimax with this pregnancy.... I think that I said this in the last post but then I freak out thinking what if it is not.... what if it happens again and we are just on the cusp of craziness....

BUT there are some pretty good signs that it might not happen again or that we might get further along in the game. I can wear my engagement and wedding rings. I find it hard to remember what happened at what week with Molly but I am pretty sure that the rings were getting pretty tight by 20 weeks.  I am certainly feeling not as tired as I was with Molly.  So maybe things are ok. By this time with Molly we had moved countries and I was looking for work and organizing a wedding. At the moment I am organizing the washing and looking for the keys most days, so the stress levels are WAY different.

I think that the maternity unit has forgotten about me. My midwife was going on holiday and she was supposed to get hold of me when she got back. She has not gotten hold of me. I am pretty sure that she was back this week... but I will give it another week. The thing is I am not going to run to chase it up. I feel that this is the only part of my pregnancy that I will be able to feel like I am going through a normal pregnancy ( despite the aspirin daily). I feel ok, I am not having any bleeding and I have energy. I can feel the baby move and this is the one thing that makes me feel pregnant. That and my clothes are not fitting so well. From here on in it is going to go up a notch.... so I want to have a bit of time just to myself and with the baby. In 8 weeks the treatment plan was for me to go up every week and till that point I was supposed to go fortnightly. I think that this is a pretty tall ask due to feeling very stressed every time that I go up there and worse when I have to see someone that I have not met before and recount everything that happened AGAIN.

I think that one thing that hellp gave me is the trust in my body and my instincts to identify when something is wrong. I am the eternal denier and I am aware that this may happen again but when I had hellp with Molly I could not deny it any longer. So if there is an issue I will certainly seek out help but until that point I am just going to cruise.

That is unless my fear gets in the way. I look at some of the hellp websites and then have a wee panic. Should I be getting checked for this or for that?? I had hellp with Molly and I had very little input and Molly turned out fine. The stats are pretty good that it will not happen again.... although as much as I like quoting a good figure, it is all obsolete really. If I get it again then the risk is 100% and if I don't then the risk is 0%. All the 5-20% out the window.

So I feel like I swing from wanting to be wrapped in cotton wool to make sure that all is done as it should to wanting to be left alone until either I go into labour or the worse case scenario happens. I think that this may be different if I had faith in the health service here but I have none. And if anything happens then I will be on a plane to Adelaide and I know how jumpy they will be so less is more at this point.

Anyway it is bed time now. Still cannot last that long in the evening. That was the same before kids.

So my thoughts going out to parents hanging with the babies in neonatal units.

xxx

Planning

It has been 2 weeks since I have been on this and it has gone pretty fast.  Molly has not been sleeping well which makes for tired and grumpy parents. I hope that it is the last of her teeth coming through. She always has a tough time when she is teething, which means that we do as well and it also goes on for AGES.

Am getting on in weeks now. Up to 18 which still seems like not  a lot but getting there. Almost half way if we go term and over half way if we do not. Mum has come back from overseas so there have been some lengthly discussions about when she will come over to help which she has kindly offered to do. The issue is that my sister in NZ is pregnant as well and her due date is about 2 weeks before mine. Mum wants to help everyone but cannot be in two places at once. She had thoughts that she would go home for Louise's birth and then come back for ours. My sister had said to mum that she was worried about her fatigue levels when she gets to the end of her pregnancy.

And that brings up a huge amount of stuff for me. It always really amazes me how one statement can trigger so much.  It makes me sad that  I cannot just think about fatigue levels at the end of the pregnancy as the major thing to think about. We might have had the baby well before Louise gets to the end of her pregnancy. I get sad that I cannot feel the excitement of just thinking what is going to happen, that there is some fear and anxiety in there as there is no guarantee either way of how this pregnancy will end.

I know that there is positive thinking but there has to be some reality in there. Maybe we won't go to term and I have to not make myself to blame if that does not happen. It is like comments to the cancer patient that if they have a positive attitude then it will be ok. It might not be ok and it is not their fault if it is not. Not that I am a cancer patient and I certainly do not want to minimize what they go through. But all the positive thinking in the world would not have changed the outcome that happened with Molly.

But there is hope. Hope that it will be ok. And a lot of fingers crossed!!!!!!

It is not just Louise that is making me think about what is going to happen at the end. There seems to be a lot of pregnant women around at the moment. I feel that time is ticking so slow at time... although it is hard to believe that it is May already. I want to be at the end to see what happens. The suspense it killing me. I hear of other women that have had a preterm first child and have gone on to have a term second child and I want to be part of that club but I am not sure that I am going to get there.  Patience is something that I have never been that good at and I think that life is really hitting me home with a lot of lessons about how to get some... or at least survive until I get to the end.

Anyway it will come to the end at some stage. It is all about survival until then. I was pretty proud of myself because we were supposed to see the obgyn on Wednesday and we cancelled. I was starting to get worried and stressed about it as I am sure that they would have gone over the past again as it would have been a new one. All for nothing as I am feeling well. So I thought what is the point and cancelled. I feel that I am getting stronger in saying what I want and doing things to make sure that I am ok.

Anyway we are off to the fair. HORAY. Not really. I am sure that it will be lame but something different to do.

Thoughts to neonatal parents.