Seven months later...

The last entry I wrote was April 22. I had lightning crotch. I was incredibly swollen. I was consistently out of breath; and I was completely unaware of the fact that all of these “normal” pregnancy side effects were actually symptoms of the preeclampsia that was about to rear its ugly head.

Allow me to rewind. My pregnancy obviously had been no walk in the park, but none of it was life threatening to myself or my baby. A few days after writing that last post, I started to feel really “off.” I joked about not being able to catch my breath, but all of a sudden walking from the living room to the kitchen had me so winded, that it felt like I had just crossed the finish line of a marathon. I’ve never, nor will I ever run that distance, but I’m assuming one is pretty breathless at that point.

By that weekend, my whole body was tingly and the only thing I could squeeze my feet into were my husband’s shoes. He wears a size 12, and they were snug, so you can visualize how sexy my balloon hooves were.

I called my O.B. on a Sunday after my mouth and hands went completely numb. She sent me to triage, just to have my blood pressure checked and to make sure everything was okay. I didn’t leave the hospital until Thursday. I ended up having every symptom of preeclampsia, minus the protein in my urine. At this point I think I was 33/34 weeks pregnant. Each day they'd tell me I was either going home or having the baby.

After monitoring my erratic blood pressure patterns over five days, they deemed me to have gestational hypertension, aka high blood pressure during pregnancy. They sent me home with a blood pressure cuff. I had to take my pressure multiple times a day as well as go to a non-stress test every three days at my OB’s office. My blood pressure was all over the place, but they wanted me to make it 36 weeks before delivering.

On May 13, I woke up looking like I swallowed Jabba the Hut; like I detached my massive jaw and just took down an entire slug-like alien in one gulp. I was enormous. I went into my non-stress test, with not a clue what was ahead for me that day. During the non-stress test, they found that my blood pressure had sky rocketed. And, not only was that high, but I gained 12 lbs. over the weekend and my urine test showed the protein for preeclampsia.

At this point, I had not a clue how serious this was. The nurses were incredibly calm. They told me to go home, get my bags, and make my way to Magee. I went home, got a shower and curled my hair. My husband literally tried on minimum six different pairs of black jeans. We took our good old time, thinking they’d probably just admit me to be monitored again.

After running some tests, the doctor came in and calmly informed us that I had severe preeclampsia, and that he wanted to get the baby out before 5:00. This was at 4:30. My jaw hit the fucking floor. This was not part of the plan. I had a scheduled c-section. I wasn’t having this baby at 35 weeks, with a doctor I didn’t know. Panic set in. This was supposed to be my calm, easy labor and delivery.

At this point, I still didn’t grasp the severity of the situation. When my mom arrived, the nurses explained to her and my husband that I was at an insanely high risk for a stroke. And that I, myself and my unborn baby could potentially lose our lives. My mom and Michael, aka my dream team, calmly explained to me that I need to take a deep breath and go with it because there was no other option.

When you have preeclampsia or high blood pressure, you have to receive magnesium through an IV prior to delivery and for 24 hours after. If anyone has ever had a magnesium drip, I want to say one thing: you poor fucking soul. It is hell on earth. I’ll write an entire post just on the mag drip, because anyone who has experienced that bitch deserves a fucking medal.

I’m not going to get too into my c-section in this post, so I’ll just say this; it took a team of anesthesiologists over an hour to place my spinal. I’m genuinely not ready to relive that experience, so after some more therapy sessions, I’ll revisit that adventure.

Once my spinal was in correctly, minus throwing up a few times, the c-section itself was amazing. I felt some pressure, and then I physically felt the weight of him being lifted from my body. It was absolutely incredible.

Because he was 35 weeks, they had the NICU doctors there ready to take him if need be. After checking him out, he was presumed healthy, and they laid my son, Ozzy, on my chest with the help of my husband. It was by far the best feeling I had ever experienced in my entire life.

Every single struggle leading up to that moment completely evaporated into thin air. This was that feeling I had heard so many mothers talk about. Ozzy was here and healthy, so nothing else mattered.

As I looked into his beautiful, huge, blue eyes, a feeling of warmth washed over me. I looked up at Michael, who was smiling down at me, and with tears in my eyes, I said “Yeah, I’m going to puke, you gotta take him.”

And just like that, the pattern of life with two kids began. A moment of complete bliss and euphoria, quickly cut short by someone puking, peeing, shitting or crying. But, all totally worth it.