23w6d and Problems

Tomorrow is viability day. I've been waiting the whole pregnancy for this day, and I'm so glad and relieved that it is almost upon us. Unfortunately, V Day doesn't come without complications.

I went to my regularly scheduled OB appointment yesterday. My appointment was scheduled for 4:15, and at 5:00 I was told there were 3 other people ahead of me. I thought about leaving because Andy wasn't feeling well and I wanted to see Evie before bed time. I decided to stay to check on my blood pressue, and I was put in a room at 5:25. I was told at that point that my blood pressure was 160/96. She asked if I was uptight, and I said yes, I was a little pissed that I waited over an hour. When the doctor came in, I asked him to take it again himself. The nurse's reading seemed ridiculous, so he agreed to do it. It was 160/90. At that point, he told me I was a troublemaker, and decided to listen to the baby. He sounded great! But the doctor was very unhappy.

He told me he needed to consult with my high risk OB (MFM). He said he was "going to let [me] go home" and call in the morning after they talked. Which basically means he was considering sending me straight to the hospital but decided not to. I then reminded him that I was supposed to travel to St. Louis next week for work. He looked at me like I was insane and said he'd talk to MFM about that. MFM had cleared me two weeks ago to do it.

I went home with all sorts of scenarios in my head. I just wanted to know what they wanted me to do. Fortunately he called me at about 9:30 this morning. He said they'd talked, and they are thinking it might be a better idea for me to exclusively see MFM. He said he's having trouble noticing the differences between Pre-E and my already existing kidney problem, and he thinks I need someone more specialized to follow me. They wanted to bring me in for another MFM consult and take my blood pressure again. He also told me that I WILL develop Pre-E this time, the question is simply "when is it Pre-E vs. kidney problems"? At this point my BP is elevated, I'm swelling, (which I just noticed when I got home last night) and my protein loss has risen a little. He also told me they both said "absolutely do not travel" so I had to cancel those plans.

I called right away to schedule an appointment. I was told he didn't have anything until the following week, so she went to talk to him and he wanted to fit me in on Monday. He didn't have any appointments, and was on call at the hospital, but he felt it was urgent enough to bring me in, so I'll be talking with him and getting an ultrasound on Monday. I'm nervous because he must have thought it was very important to make that happen. I'm glad that it's not a dire need situation just yet, though.

I have so far to go before I'm comfortable having this baby. My first real goal is 32 weeks, and that seems so far away. It's 2 months! I am 32 weeks on January 4th. It's scary to think he could be born this year. He needs more time. And maybe I'm blowing things out of proportion, and they'll just switch up my meds, but I doubt it. With Evie, my urinary protein got LOWER. I was on half the medication, and I still didn't develop any issues to worry about until 32/33 weeks. My BP was high but it didn't get this high until later. I'm trying to prepare for bed rest. I can't imagine he will just add more meds. He added meds last week and apparently it didn't do anything to help. I'm grateful that I'm already at 24 weeks tomorrow but I just want my baby to be safe. Andy keeps checking on me and we know we'll get through it, but it's hard. It's tough when your doctor tells you you're guaranteed a life-threatening condition. I know I had it with E, but I already had the induction planned and I was almost 37 weeks. She didn't need the NICU or anything. And this time my problems are starting two months earlier. I just pray this baby stays in and my BP can be controlled. This situation really sucks. Please say prayers for us.