ER visit

Due to the update overload & the extremely long Hawaii post, it's likely that most of you missed the cryptic message about Jeremiah & I adding to our family. That's right, baby #4 - Due Feb 3!

So last Wednesday morning Jack went to play at Tyler's & I took advantage of the time with just one child & spent the morning shopping. Around lunchtime my stomach was having some sharp pains that I attributed to hunger, although I noticed as I was eating that my stomach was still having the same pains. By the time I picked Callie up from school at 2 I was feeling pretty uncomfortable. After we were home I ended up calling Jeremiah in tears because my stomach was hurting so badly. I called the Dr.'s office & left a message. As many of you have had babies & have had to call & leave a message, you can relate to what a wonderful experience that can be. Yes, that is sarcasm. I see a Dr. who's part of a group so it was one of the other Dr.'s assistants who returned my call. She told me that I must be having round ligament pain. I told her this was my 4th baby & I realize that every pregnancy is different (which this one really has been for me), but I just couldn't believe that this much pain was round ligament pain. She insisted that it was & told me I could go to the ER to get checked out if it would make me more comfortable. Thanks a lot. I was pretty ticked because that Dr. has never heard of me before, but I've had 2 babies with my other Dr., and he's in my ward! He would realize that I wouldn't have called the office unless I really was concerned.

I was in pain just being perfectly still, but it really hurt to walk or move in any way at all. And then my stomach would clench up and hurt even more. But I wasn't sure what to do because it seemed kind of drastic to go to the ER and what if I just had super bad gas or the stomach flu or something? Jeremiah had already come home by this point because he was really worried. He reminded me that I'd already met our deductible for the year with my hernia surgery in January, so if that's what was holding me back from finding out that I might have the stomach flu to not worry about it. But to me it wasn't just the cost of an ER visit - it's the time that it takes to be in the ER & like I mentioned it seemed a little extreme to have to go to the ER. But at 5:00 we got to the hospital to begin our very long night.

It took almost 2 hours to get a bed. After I was in a curtained area in a hospital gown with an IV in my arm a woman on a rotation or maybe she was a resident came in to find the baby's heartbeat. She said as she was getting out the little machine that this was probably her third time doing this & she hadn't ever had success so we shouldn't be alarmed if she couldn't find the heartbeat. She didn't find it. Then another guy (he might have said he was a Dr., but if I had to guess I would say first day as a resident) tried to find the heartbeat. He kept putting his ear closer to the little machine that projects the heartbeat & someone pointed out to him that there was a volume dial on the side. So we're feeling like we're in pretty good hands at this point. Oh, sarcasm again. Then my nurse tries & she can't find the heartbeat either. I'm still not really worried because it seemed like when the first woman was trying the baby squirmed from the prodding. But Jeremiah's freaking out inside I think. Finally another nurse came in who knew what to do & found the heartbeat in 2 seconds. Every resident, nurse, or person who was coming into my little curtained area at that point seemed dubious about my pain until they found out it was baby #4, not #1. So maybe I was legit.

After this I called my Dr. I knew if by chance he was on call up in OB he'd come down. No such luck but he talked to me for a little bit & assured me that I was NOT having round ligament pain. I'm only 16 weeks & he said that doesn't even happen to people who are less than 20 weeks or more than 28 weeks, and besides, the type of pain I was in wouldn't be round ligament pain (by this point the pain was just like almost constant labor contractions). We talked about the possibility of miscarriage, but he didn't say it definitely sounded like that. He didn't know what was going on but assured me there were great Dr.'s in the ER. So then I deduced it was either stomach flu or maybe I actually was miscarrying. Jeremiah dismissed stomach flu since I wasn't nauseaous, I hadn't thrown up, & I was in fact starving. So of course we thought that I must be losing the baby & Jeremiah started calling our family to say that the Dr. said I most likely was (which is actually not what the Dr. said!).

After 5 hours they finally did an ultrasound & found that I had a cyst on one of my ovaries that had ruptured. An ER Dr. said that usually if people are in pain from that, the pain is really intense until the rupture and then if the pain isn't relieved immediately it would be within a few hours. An hour before I left the ER they gave me some morphine (which didn't help the pain much at all), and just before midnight I hobbled out of the ER.

The next morning I was still in a ton of pain. Not as much as the night before, but I was not okay. I got in to see my Dr. that afternoon & he said he didn't think all of my pain was from the ruptured cyst or the low-lying placenta the radiologist had noticed in the ultrasound. He just didn't know what was wrong with me. I asked him if that was his official diagnosis. Yes it was. He said I should take it easy until I felt better or until I was far enough along to do anything more (b/c at 16 weeks the baby isn't really considered viable). So I was a little frustrated when I went home. Oh & he said I can't run any more. Boo!

Fortunately by the time I went to bed that night (Thursday) I was feeling better than I had been in the morning, and when I woke up the next day (Friday) I was 80% better. I wasn't in pain at all if I was motionless, and it was only a little uncomfortable to walk and a little more uncomfortable to bend or twist or get up/down. And by Saturday I felt pretty much normal again. And now it's all just a bad memory.