I have been wanting to post about our first week and now I may just get my chance. Two are napping and two are playing in the yard with Dada. Sleep sounds tempting, but it would only last about 30 minutes before I'd have to wake up to pump again-- so blogging wins.
We have been home a week now, more or less. We had a minor interruption to our routine Monday afternoon when we took M to her doctor's appointment. While we were there I described some symptoms I'd been experiencing over the weekend (shortness of breath and chest constriction while lying down, a slow heart rate, headaches, a choking sensation when I reclined, and pain under my ribs)and the doctor decided to check my blood pressure. Sure enough it was elevated, and just enough so to send me to the hospital to get a chest x-ray and blood work. The original plan was to wait at the hospital until doc called us with any results and then we'd either head home or head upstairs to be admitted. Honestly, I thought I'd be home by late evening, but that would turn out not to be the case.
I won't even begin to describe the awful mess that is the ER, but I'll just say that we spent 9 hours there waiting and having a few tests done. I had a chest x-ray, ad EKG, a series of blood work, and a V Q lung test (ventilation and quantification), and the remainder of those hours were spent waiting in a tiny room with a curtain, one t.v., a sweet newborn and her very tired and cranky parents.
Those tests revealed nothing to be in my lungs, fluid or an embolism-- Thank God!
While we were doing all of our waiting, my stats were constantly monitored and my heart rate ranged from the upper 30's to the mid 40's. My blood pressure hovered around 150/80, which I've learned is not as high as I thought it was. Having a normal bp of 107/70 is the reason I thought the former numbers sounded so high. Once they ruled out my lungs as the source for my problems, they moved on to a number of other body parts. Heart, gallbladder, and brain. They were thinking of cardiomyopathy, due to my one week post-delivery status. So they admitted me to the hospital at about 3 am so that I could undergo an echo in the morning.
I had the echo, and everything looked fine. I had a bit of elevated pressure going into my right atrium and right valve, a bit of fluid around my heart, and it was slightly enlarged--but no cardiomyopathy. They attributed the other things to being one week post-partum.
They scanned my gallbladder, kidneys, and liver-- all normal.
Last but not least, and MRI for my brain-- which also came back normal.
A complete relief-- heck yes!
A complete frustration that they can't exactly figure out what's wrong with me-- heck yes!
Since there was nothing serious that they could find, I was finally releasedinto the wild to go home around 10 Tuesday night.
We have been home a week now, more or less. We had a minor interruption to our routine Monday afternoon when we took M to her doctor's appointment. While we were there I described some symptoms I'd been experiencing over the weekend (shortness of breath and chest constriction while lying down, a slow heart rate, headaches, a choking sensation when I reclined, and pain under my ribs)and the doctor decided to check my blood pressure. Sure enough it was elevated, and just enough so to send me to the hospital to get a chest x-ray and blood work. The original plan was to wait at the hospital until doc called us with any results and then we'd either head home or head upstairs to be admitted. Honestly, I thought I'd be home by late evening, but that would turn out not to be the case.
I won't even begin to describe the awful mess that is the ER, but I'll just say that we spent 9 hours there waiting and having a few tests done. I had a chest x-ray, ad EKG, a series of blood work, and a V Q lung test (ventilation and quantification), and the remainder of those hours were spent waiting in a tiny room with a curtain, one t.v., a sweet newborn and her very tired and cranky parents.
Those tests revealed nothing to be in my lungs, fluid or an embolism-- Thank God!
While we were doing all of our waiting, my stats were constantly monitored and my heart rate ranged from the upper 30's to the mid 40's. My blood pressure hovered around 150/80, which I've learned is not as high as I thought it was. Having a normal bp of 107/70 is the reason I thought the former numbers sounded so high. Once they ruled out my lungs as the source for my problems, they moved on to a number of other body parts. Heart, gallbladder, and brain. They were thinking of cardiomyopathy, due to my one week post-delivery status. So they admitted me to the hospital at about 3 am so that I could undergo an echo in the morning.
I had the echo, and everything looked fine. I had a bit of elevated pressure going into my right atrium and right valve, a bit of fluid around my heart, and it was slightly enlarged--but no cardiomyopathy. They attributed the other things to being one week post-partum.
They scanned my gallbladder, kidneys, and liver-- all normal.
Last but not least, and MRI for my brain-- which also came back normal.
A complete relief-- heck yes!
A complete frustration that they can't exactly figure out what's wrong with me-- heck yes!
Since there was nothing serious that they could find, I was finally released
I'll be checking in with my gp on Tuesday and the cardiologist in a month to make sure the fluid, pressure and enlarged heart have all gone down or away. Hopefully, my symptoms will disappear before then and I'll just feel silly going in to see the cardiologist feeling fantastic.
The ironic thing about all of this:
I planned an elective induction last week for a number of reasons, just to be shown that I'm not really in control. My one child who was delivered at 40 weeks was 9 pounds-- I wanted a slightly smaller baby to make an easier delivery. HA. She was born at 39 weeks and 2 days weighing an even 7 pounds, but her delivery was very different and more difficult than the others. Never had the C-word been said in my delivery room until this time. Never did I stall at dilation once my water broke until this time.
And let's not talk about experiencing an easier recovery-- okay, let's do.
This has been the most difficult recovery due to everything I listed above. Usually, once I've been home a couple of days, I'm all but back into my normal routine. I tried getting back into the swing of things immediately this time and it came back to bite me-- well, it took a little bite, but still, I've never had a bite taken at me before!
But let me tell you about what has been super, awesome, beautiful, precious, and perfect!
And here is a recap of all the other wonderful moments from the week!
Coming home to a quiet house with all three older sisters asleep! 
Having three older girls who take care of each other and love on each other so sweetly. Here is big sis Peach reading to sissies. 
And most importantly, adding a beautiful little miracle who sleeps and eats like a champ!
1 comment:
hope everything gets into the swing of normal soon!! your little m is so cute!!
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