One Good Thing....

Before Bed Rest

After Bed Rest

One good thing about this bed rest stuff is that my feet are a lot smaller. This will be my silver lining around the gray cloud. Just a side note, Ben painted my toe nails for me. Isn't he sweet?

Prison Sentence

The two most dreaded words that a pregnant woman can hear are bed rest. Wednesday I went to my doctors office for a routine blood pressure check. Well, there was nothing routine about it. My blood pressure was high so I ended up winning a trip to the hospital for more monitoring. I was just a little stressed. I was in charge of the combined mutual activity that night and still didn't have everything squared away. I also had way too much to do, I didn't have time for all of this. While at labor and delivery, my anxiety and my blood pressure went through the roof. My blood pressure was so high, I was setting off alarms. I had my blood drawn and was monitored for close to two hours. The nurse came in and told me I could go home, and that my baby was fine. Then I was sentenced to bed rest. I looked at her with a blank stare and said what? She said I was now on bed rest and only supposed to get up to go to the bathroom. I think my jaw hit the floor. Did I mention I don't have time for this? I had to do the lovely 24 hour urine collection and go back to L&D the next day for more monitoring. I have the official diagnosis of PIH (pregnancy induced hypertension) The baby is doing just fine, she doesn't like to have her heart rate checked, she squirms all over the place. I'm on day 3 of my prison sentence, which stinks. I'm trying to keep positive about all of this and I do have to say that my feet and ankles are much smaller, but this still stinks!!! Yesterday, Addy brought me breakfast in bed. She had poured me a bowl of cereal and a glass of milk, by herself, and brought it to me. I was ready to cry. I'm the mom, I'm the one who should be getting her breakfast. My sister has been a great help. She has been coming over and getting the kids their lunch and making me be good. Ben is a great help too. He keeps reassuring me that this will all work out and that he doesn't mind taking care of me. I guess we'll see if he still says that in a few weeks. It's a good thing I only have a few weeks left. Wish me luck that I won't lose my mind!

An Oasis in the Desert

Last Thursday I was feeling like a bad mom. With the heat I feel like I have no energy and so I keep the kids inside and just absorb the air conditioning. Around 2 o'clock Thursday afternoon, I figured I should get them out of the house. We first went to a fabric store in Highland. While I was trying to find this store, I spotted a really cool water fountain. After the fabric store, I became the cool, spontaneous, fun mom to my kids for a few hours. I wandered back to where I spotted the fountain and the girls were so excited when they saw it. Addy informed me that she didn't have her swimming suit or a towel. My response was so, get your clothes wet. Come on we're being spontaneous here. We found ourselves at what I found out later is the Highland Town Center park. It's right in front of the Highland city hall. It was awesome! They have a big splash pad and a really shallow river with rocks that shoot water out. The girls had a ball! I enjoyed standing in the water as well, it felt good on my huge swollen feet. I'm glad that I had to wander to find the fabric store or else we may have never found this little oasis. If anyone is interested in going, let me know, my girls and I could live there the rest of the summer.

Barefoot and Pregnant

Ewwwwwwwww!!!

Look how huge!!!

I'm not complaining here, I just have lots of people ask how I'm doing, so here's the report. I totally understand the phrase "barefoot and pregnant." As I hit the last month of pregnancy, I can hardly even get my flip-flops on due to swollen feet. I'm due one month from today, Yahoo!!! I'm getting really uncomfortable due to the size of my belly (it was big to begin with), I have heartburn that goes up into my ears, I get up at least 5 times a night to go to the bathroom, and to top it all off, the iron supplements are killing the GI system. I was told last week at the doctor that my blood pressure is going up and with the swelling and all, I probably have preeclampsia. I could have told them that. I had it with Addy, I can tell I have it again. The good news, I'm already dilated to a 1, which is pretty good for me. I never dilated with my other girls until the week they were born. The head is down and I have contractions all the time. If I walk around too much, I contract. Going to Walmart is quite an adventure. I think that when the time is closer that I better just avoid that evil place. Besides the general discomfort, things are good. I just need to finish moving bedrooms around and get all of the baby stuff ready. I'm hoping that the baby either comes the last week in July or right on my due date. I just have too much to do that first week in August!