Rose Gave us Quite the Scare

Last Wednesdsay (5/19) I went for a gorgeous 3.5 mile walk along the lake with some of my friends in the city. It was pretty warm, I was pushing a stroller, and I forgot my water bottle (yikes!) It wasn't a great combination to say the least. I started feeling tightness and pain on the way back from our walk and even kept taking breaks, but I remained uncomfortable. I came home, laid madison down for her nap and then laid down myself and drank a ton of water. I couldn't help but time was I was sure now ere contractions. They were about 6-10 minutes apart. But eventually stopped after an evening of rest and water.

So when the following Saturday (5/22) I was out hitting up yard sales with Madison, I didn't think too much about the tightness and pains I was feeling again. It was pretty hot out and I was pushing Maddy around the neighborhood checking out the deals (which I found some great ones that I will hopefully post on later). The pain and discomfort continued until I got Madison home and laid her down for a nap. I again laid down again and tried to rest and drink a bit of water (but I was feeling kind of nauseous too, so I couldn't down too much at once.) Maddy and I got an hour of downtime before it was time to church. The discomfort continued, but wasn 't horrible. Afterwards, I was in charge of setting up, running, and cleaning up after a pizza dinner at church. I wasn't feeling great, but kept busy. By the end when Tim and I were cleaning up, I was really feeling pretty bad. I even asked tim to carry everything out to the car for me so I could just walk out behind him empty handed. But again, I thought I would just go home and lay down and drink some water and the contractions would stop.

Tim had already planned to go to his previous boss's birthday party (which was 45 min way) and I told him just to go - that I would be totally fine and would call him if I needed him. Maddy and I got home at 8pm. I laid Maddy down and immediately had some water and laid down as well. Over the next our the contractions got to be anywhere between 4-10 minutes apart and they were feeling more painful. I was on my hands and knees on couch before I finally called tim around 9 and said, "babe, you had better come home" He rushed home as I called the doctor to see what I should do. Since I am only 26 weeks along, my doctor said to head into the hospital to see if they could get the contractions to stop. Fortunately our dear friend Stacey who has babysat Maddy since she was three months old, came over right away to stay with Madison while we headed out to the hospital.

I honestly thought that we would go in, get a shot to slow things down and head back home. But things kept coming up and before we knew it were there over 24 hours. The contractions continued even though they had hooked up me up to an iv for fluids. My last ultrasound indicated that I my placenta might be over my cervix, so they wanted to do an ultrasound before they could check if I was dilated. Things seemed to be progressing, so while we waited to get the ultrasound, they gave me a shot to slow down the contractions and a steroid shot to help Rose's lung development just in case she did come early. They also did a swab test to determine if I might be likely to have her preterm (crazy they can do that!), and a urine test to rule out any infections. At that point a midwife came in

and gave us the worst case scenario - if we couldn't get the contractions to stop, we would have to be flown over to Loyola because they have a high level center to take care of Rose. I did not need to hear that. I started to cry immediately. Fortunately the nurse came over right away to encourage me that there were many steps that they would take before that would ever be a possibility.

After that, we went to get the ultrasound. It was about an hour long and it was already past midnight. Tim and I could barely stay awake. But we were very thankful for it in the end, because the technician let us know that the placenta was just where it was supposed to be, that for SURE we were having a girl (the other tech had been unsure) and she even is mailing us a profile picture of our little Rosebud ;)

By the time we got back to our room, they let us know that the swab test came back negative as well as the urine test. THey check me and I was not dilated yet. So basically they wanted to still monitor me over night. and then stay til the next day so that I could get the "steroid booster shot" -they needed to be spread out over almost 24 hours. The contractions completely stopped by morning. The next day we got to relax and nap as we were taken well care of. I was glad that Stacey was able to stay with Maddy so that he could keep me company.

*The Doctor basically said that I was having preterm contractions, not preterm labor. They were consistent contractions, but did not seem to be leading to labor. He thinks I have a sensitive uterus and need to just be extra careful to drink plenty of fluids and take the time to rest as soon as I am feeling tightness and pain. I am so thankful that Rosebud did not come early and that she has some more time to keep baking. Thank you all for your prayers!

We ended up watching the LOST recap and finale from our hospital room. Quite the memory!