Week in review (week 31)

So Sunday started off with me feeling just a bit off. I took 2 naps throughout the day and by 9 pm Sunday night I was having some pretty severe pains across my abdomen, up my right side and across my back. I tried to get to sleep, but was feeling quite warm, achy and just uncomfortable and eventually took my temperature (which I read incorrectly and was actually a low grade fever) which I thought looked pretty normal, I than started shaking and shivering and woke Paul up around 11:30pm to ask him what he thought I should do. We both thought it may just be a case of the flu or something and he promptly fell back and asleep and I attempted to follow. At 2:30 am I was still shaking, in extreme pain and knew something just was not right. We decided to call my midwife on call, who called us back within 5 minutes (yay midwives :) ) and after listening to my symptoms asked us to meet her at the hospital in 45 minutes. We quickly got ready to go, and I grabbed a toothbrush last minute thinking we may be there until the next day.

Once at the hospital we headed up to the birthing unit and I was hooked up to a monitor which showed the baby doing fine, no contractions and a low grade fever of 37.3*C (99*F), I had not felt the baby move in a little bit and they gave me a popsicle which got him moving and had me complete a non-stress test. The midwife transferred my care to the OB on call who came in and told me that my symptoms were most likely either a kidney infection or appendicitis. He than advised us that he’d me starting me on some IV antibiotics immediately and that I’d be admitted for 2-3 days. We were than transferred to a room at about 5:30 am which was one of the birthing rooms, which luckily had a ‘daddy chair’ which was a little pull-out bed for Paul. Paul was exhausted and passed right out, while I had just been given some Tylenol to break my fever and was not able to sleep just yet.

I called my parents at 7:30 am and my mom headed down to be with me and Paul at the hospital. The OBcame in a little later to tell us that the tests had not come back with a strong result of a kidney infection, and we than met with the general surgeon regarding possible appendicitis. She informed us that the surgery could not be done laparoscopically due to my pregnancy and that there would be some difficulty in locating my appendix as the pregnancy moves everything around. I was than sent for an ultrasound in which they could not locate my appendix. While waiting for the ultrasound results my fever shot up to 39.7*C (103.5*F), and I was given some extra strength Tylenol to break this fever. I was starving by this point and so thirsty, but not allowed to eat anything as surgery my be happening shortly. I was than taken to have an MRI by my mom, while Paul headed home to deal with decker and grab some supplies for me for the hospital stay.

The MRI came back that it was not appendicitis and therefore no surgery would be needed and that I could eat and drink (at 5:30pm), and I was finally given some morphine for the pain. I was also given steroid shots to help prepare the babies lungs as the surgery would have had a 20% chance that he would have had to have been born via c-section while I was under for my surgery if his stats had begun dropping while under a general anesthesia. As well as a heightened risk of preterm labor with a kidney infection.

I was than in the hospital until Friday attempting to get the possible kidney infection cleared up, as some test results they required to determine a course of treatment did not come back until late Thursday afternoon. So from Monday to Thursday I was on Iv antibiotics and Morphine. And changed to oral antibiotics on Thursday evening and stopped the morphine when I accidentally ripped out my 4^th IV attempt on Thursday. I made the decision to move onto Tylenol 3’s which heightened my chance of heading home on Friday.

On Friday morning I was informed by the OB that the test results had shown that my fever had been caused by an E Coli. Infection (not from Mexico!) and that the sever pain is being caused by my uterus essentially crushing my right kidney and the tube that connects it to my bladder. I was advised that the pain I am in will most likely not deteriorate, but will most likely get worse in the next 8-9 weeks and would cease when the baby was no longer crushing my kidney.

So this long winded tale was to let you all know that I am home but that I am not quite ‘better’. I am hopped up on some strong pain killers and just trying to take it as easy as possible for the next 8-9 weeks.

Thank-you everyone for your thoughts and prayers during my hospital stay and during these next few weeks.