Thankful Thursday: An Eventful Hospital Visit

Pain. Slightly disconcerting pain, and some things that didn’t feel right. A call to Nurse on Call and more pain.  A suggested doctor’s visit aaaand more PAIN.

Monday wasn’t a good day for me. I woke up, got O to kinder and began to be very aware of some twinges in my lower back and belly. I was 27 weeks, 6 days pregnant, so it was MUCH too early for what I suspected these pains were. I had some extra symptoms going on, and a call to the state Nurse service, suggesting I see a doctor as soon as I possibly could got me a bit on edge. I sat around riding out the pain all day, managed to get O home and waited for B to come look after me.

At 4.30pm, the local GP couldn’t tell me whether I was in premature labour or not, and suggested I go home, rest and call an ambulance if the pain got worse. My GP isn’t my baby doctor, the nearest OB was an hour away at the hospital where I’m planning to deliver, so all I could do was nod miserably and go home.

B got home at around 5.30 after helping build a cool room all day. By this stage, I felt sure I was contracting. The pains were making me cry and squirm. I begged B to get O fed and have a shower, while I called my Dad and Stepmum to check they could come and take O in case things progressed...which they did. Fresh out of the shower, B was on the phone to the ambulance asking them to come and get us. I needed to go to the hospital. I was in pain, and I was scared, begging my tiny person to stay put.

The paramedics and my Dad arrived around the same time, and I half-listened to O trying to con Poppy into taking EVERY TOY SHE OWNS to his house, until she realised something was happening to me and came to watch them strap me to the stretcher. Her big, curious eyes. 

“ ‘Scuse me, Ambulance,” she addressed the Paramedic. I remember, because it made everyone smile. “Will my mummy come home to me tomorrow?”

The young female paramedic told my little one she wasn’t sure, but they were doing everything they could to make her Mummy better. This, coupled with the notion of my ride as an adventure (an idea cleverly orchestrated by Dad and Stepmum) was enough to reassure O, who waved and blew kisses before climbing into my Dad’s ute as the ambulance pulled out my driveway, a concerned B and a panicked me inside.

Things were slowing down now. Murphy’s Law always kicks me with ambulances. I’m in serious pain until they come, then I’m fine and I feel like a hypochondriac. Nevertheless, they took me the hour to my delivery hospital. 

I was taken straight into a delivery room. Examined, pressed, prodded. My little person was sitting breech, quite high up. I had bloods, swabs, the works. They were checking me over, reassuring me. Keeping me warm, keeping B calm. They reassured him that he could stay the night with me (he had no way home) and me that I wasn’t in labour. THANK GOD. But they were giving me some steroids to mature Diddy’s lungs, just in case. I was staying overnight, and I was having scans in the morning.

I didn’t sleep that night. My pain had stopped, my cheeky monkey was playing tricks on me, and I was feeling silly.

The next morning, my dad came and took B home, and I went for my scans, to see everything was fine. Then I was left to my own devices for a few hours, reading crappy magazines and writing questions I hadn’t yet asked the maternity clinic staff, birth plans and hospital bag lists.

At 5pm, they released me with a second steroid shot and instructions to REST!! Relieved, B and I hopped in the car and headed for home. A stop to see O, spending another night with Poppy so I could rest.

I’m not sure what to think now. Every twinge, every niggle scares me. I’m being told I need to be aware, and not to hesitate to go back. I’m getting the impression, with the steroid shots and the midwife who sat with me and gently suggested maybe I should get a few preemie-size grosuits, that we’ll be meeting our tiny person slightly sooner than anticipated. I’m packing my hospital bag now, my birth plan is sorted and I’m making sure things are ready as best I can, and that arrangements are made for O should I have an absence.

But today, I’m celebrating Thankful Thursday with Six By TheBay. I’m thankful that my little person stayed put, and is still in there. I’m thankful that when I was scared, and in pain, and needed to get to a hospital that it could happen. I'm thankful that I was looked after and checked over, not made to feel silly for my panic and pain. I’m thankful to be surrounded by family who took care of O, B and myself when we needed it. But most of all, no matter when my baby comes, by all accounts it’s a healthy bubba. I’m thankful that I’m breeding a healthy baby, and that I can fight to give that baby the best chance at a good life.