So, the blood in my urine thing happened again. I had been feeling kind of achy in my lower abdomen all day, but charted it up to the fact that I'm pregnant and didn't think much about it. However, in the evening when I got home, I again noticed blood in my urine. Around that time, I also noticed that I didn't seem to be passing anywhere near as much urine as I should have been considering the amount of liquid I had been drinking.
I called the doc who encouraged me to go in to the hospital, although they had done nothing useful for me on the previous visit. I told her I'd have dinner and then bring myself in. She seemed satisfied enough with that. She also suggested that I have them catheterize me so that we could find out once and for all if the blood was coming from my bladder(which I insisted it was) or if it was vaginal bleeding (which they were pretty convinced it was).
I went into the "pregnancy ER" and they remembered me from last time. I got all checked in and eventually they got around to doing the catheterization. I don't think I've ever been catheterized before. It wasn't super fun, but it wasn't too horribly awful, either. The verdict? Blood in my urine. I resisted the urge to say, "I told you so!"
They took blood samples and made me hang out hooked up to the fetal monitor for an eternity. I guess they wanted to get 20 minutes straight of baby's heartbeat and movements on record, but baby kept moving out of range. Hours later, after I asked what was going on, the nurse explained this 20 minute thing to me - so I took it into my own hands (literally) as I wanted to get out of there and go home (it was now well past midnight). Every time baby moved out of range, I'd chase him with the monitor until I got a good solid heartbeat. This involved some pretty weird contortions to keep the monitor reading - but it was totally worth it because I did finally get released from the hospital around 2:30am.
Exhausted, dehydrated (they would only give me ice chips) and famished, I headed home. Once home, I fried two eggs, ate them, climbed in bed, kissed GeekBoy, and fell fast asleep.
At 6am, I woke up feeling horribly nauseous and proceeded to go to the bathroom and have a dry heaving fit. That was followed by a nice round of diarrhea. I won't continue with the lovely details, but in a nutshell, my entire day was spent yacking and pooping. I called the doc and he didn't think that my bloody urine episode and the gastroenteritis were related. At first he wanted me to come into the hospital, but when I protested (as they'd done nothing useful on the past two torturous visits) he agreed that I could stay home as long as I was able to hold liquids down by afternoon/evening.
Thank heavens things settled down by then and I was able to drink some tea without losing it. After that point, I worked hard to rehydrate and I woke up the next morning feeling achy and battered, but much better off.
During the food poisoning day, I was a bit confused what to do about insulin and blood sugars since I was unable to keep anything down and I'd heard that blood sugars can skyrocket when one is sick. I decided to skip the insulin (and avoid the possibility of a low that I couldn't address) and keep a close eye on my sugars. Surprisingly, all day, they stayed just over 100 which seemed perfectly reasonable to me.
As a side note, I bought the eggs the day before from underneath a sign stating that the store's eggs had NOT been part of the big salmonella egg recall. So who knows?!?
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Saturday, August 21, 2010
It's called diabetes. Duh.
Went to the doc again last week for another checkup and follow-up ultrasound. Apparently, last time they didn't feel like they got an adequate look at the baby's heart due to his position so they wanted to scan again. Fine by me - I've got pretty good insurance coverage (thank heavens). Baby was still there doing his thing! His profile shot looked kind of weird to me (he had a bulbous looking nose) so I went online to look at what other 22 week ultrasounds look like. Can you say...exactly the same? It's weird how similar the scans are. In fact, I'm not sure I could tell the difference between some of them.
During the doctor part of the visit, the doc reviewed my blood sugar numbers from the past couple of weeks. My morning fasting numbers are still significantly higher than they should be despite a couple of increases in my nighttime insulin dosage and plenty of experimentation with my bedtime snack. Nothing (so far) seems to consistently work. I asked the doc if there are some people whose morning numbers are just always out of whack no matter what they do, thinking that I might fall into that category. He looked at me and said, "Yes." Feeling pleased that I wasn't the only one, he continued, "They're called diabetics."
Gee, doc. Thanks for the enlightenment.
During the doctor part of the visit, the doc reviewed my blood sugar numbers from the past couple of weeks. My morning fasting numbers are still significantly higher than they should be despite a couple of increases in my nighttime insulin dosage and plenty of experimentation with my bedtime snack. Nothing (so far) seems to consistently work. I asked the doc if there are some people whose morning numbers are just always out of whack no matter what they do, thinking that I might fall into that category. He looked at me and said, "Yes." Feeling pleased that I wasn't the only one, he continued, "They're called diabetics."
Gee, doc. Thanks for the enlightenment.
Hellooo Lap Band!
Since my partial unfill a while back, I've pretty much been acting like I don't have a lap band. I've been able to eat whatever I want, drink with meals, not chew my food particularly well, sip soda, and all of those other things one is not supposed to be doing with a lap band. In fact, I had kind of forgotten what it was like to have a filled band.
Tonight at dinner, my band decided to remind me that it's still there. Geekboy and I were eating chicken, barley, and salad. A few bites into the chicken, I got that familiar tightness that conveyed "you'd better stop now, or else...". I paused, commented to Geekboy that the band was back, and proceeded to go into a hiccup fit (a common lap band experience). I got up from the table, walked around a bit, and after a couple of minutes, I felt the chicken pass. Wow - it was quite a surprise to suddenly again be lap-band-y. I returned to my meal, taking small bites and chewing well and finished without incident. I wonder if this is the beginning of the band getting tighter from the pregnancy progressing? As long as I can still eat and drink well, that might not be such a bad thing as I've been putting on the poundage a little faster than desired (though I'm really only up 11 pounds from my low point now that I'm 24 weeks along). Originally, my goal had been to gain no more than 15 pounds during the entire pregnancy, but I'm not longer convinced that the pregnancy weight gain is entirely under my control.
Tonight at dinner, my band decided to remind me that it's still there. Geekboy and I were eating chicken, barley, and salad. A few bites into the chicken, I got that familiar tightness that conveyed "you'd better stop now, or else...". I paused, commented to Geekboy that the band was back, and proceeded to go into a hiccup fit (a common lap band experience). I got up from the table, walked around a bit, and after a couple of minutes, I felt the chicken pass. Wow - it was quite a surprise to suddenly again be lap-band-y. I returned to my meal, taking small bites and chewing well and finished without incident. I wonder if this is the beginning of the band getting tighter from the pregnancy progressing? As long as I can still eat and drink well, that might not be such a bad thing as I've been putting on the poundage a little faster than desired (though I'm really only up 11 pounds from my low point now that I'm 24 weeks along). Originally, my goal had been to gain no more than 15 pounds during the entire pregnancy, but I'm not longer convinced that the pregnancy weight gain is entirely under my control.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Sunday, Bloody Sunday...
Warning: this one may be gross.
This past Sunday, I got up, took care of my morning routine, had breakfast, and then headed out to run a ton of errands. I noticed that my lower abdomen was kind of achy in a not-too-bad-but-annoying-nonetheless menstrual crampy way, but I decided to ignore it and go on about my business. At my first stop, I went to the bathroom and noted that my pee looked oddly orange, but aside from the mental note, I didn't think much of it. I figured I was dehydrated or had eaten something strange that had colored my urine. (Kind of like what happens when you eat a lot of beets.)
All day, the crampiness continued and every time I peed, I noticed that it was still oddly colored. By the end of the day, I was starting to think it might be something to be concerned about.
Around 5pm, I finally headed home. At home, I peed in the "pee hat" I had leftover from my 24 hour pee test. (I think I blogged about the pee test, but I can't really remember.) If I didn't blog about it, here's the synopsis: the doctors ordered me to catch all of my pee for a 24 hour period so they could check it for protein and other schtuff. They gave me a "pee hat" which fits on the toilet and catches everything. Then I poured it into a big jug.
Looking in the pee hat, I was completely alarmed. The pee was reddish orange and clearly full of blood. (This hadn't been as apparent earlier in the day due to the dilution of the bloody pee in the toilet water.) I went and got Geekboy and told him that something bad was happening and I needed to get in touch with the doctor.
I called the doctor line and the doctor called me back. I explained what was going on and he suggested that I might have a urinary tract infection, but he wanted me to go to the hospital to be checked out so they would know for sure.
I told Geekboy to grab his computer because we were going for a ride. (He's much better off when he's got geeky entertainment.) I grabbed a big mug of water and we were out the door. I figured I should hydrate so I could pee when we got to the hospital.
At the medical complex where I'm being seen, they have a 24 hour pregnancy triage and assessment center. The nurses checked me in to an examining room and had me pee in a cup. It was pink - there was still obviously a decent amount of blood present, but it was nothing compared to what I'd discovered in the pee hat at home.
Then, while waiting to be seen in the patient room, I found that I had to pee every 5-10 minutes. I think it was a combination of being nervous and having consumed the giant mug of water on the way to the hospital. After a few more pees, the nurse arrived with a different cup for me to pee in. I produced the sample and it was as clear as tap water. For some reason, they decided to check for the presence of bacteria under a microscope on the clear pee sample (rather than the bloody one).
After about an hour, the doctor came in and told me that the sample was clean. She then conducted a quick pelvic exam (the first Geekboy had ever attended) and told me that my cervix looked a little tender and the q-tip swab she did produced a little bit of blood. She theorized that the blood in the urine was actually coming from my vaginal opening, rather than through my urethra. I questioned this theory a bit, but in the end, didn't want to get into a pointless argument with her. However, I'm 95% sure the blood was in my urine and not coming from somewhere else and mixing with the urine.
They sent us home. That evening, I had another slightly off-color pee (in the hat), but by morning, my pee was back to normal and the lower abdominal cramping was gone. I've been watching very carefully and I'm now on my third day of normal pee. I'm baffled by what happened, but I guess that if it's cleared up and the baby is fine, there's not much to worry about.
This is the type of thing where you begin to believe it's all in your head, but Geekboy has confirmed for me that it did, in fact, happen.
This past Sunday, I got up, took care of my morning routine, had breakfast, and then headed out to run a ton of errands. I noticed that my lower abdomen was kind of achy in a not-too-bad-but-annoying-nonetheless menstrual crampy way, but I decided to ignore it and go on about my business. At my first stop, I went to the bathroom and noted that my pee looked oddly orange, but aside from the mental note, I didn't think much of it. I figured I was dehydrated or had eaten something strange that had colored my urine. (Kind of like what happens when you eat a lot of beets.)
All day, the crampiness continued and every time I peed, I noticed that it was still oddly colored. By the end of the day, I was starting to think it might be something to be concerned about.
Around 5pm, I finally headed home. At home, I peed in the "pee hat" I had leftover from my 24 hour pee test. (I think I blogged about the pee test, but I can't really remember.) If I didn't blog about it, here's the synopsis: the doctors ordered me to catch all of my pee for a 24 hour period so they could check it for protein and other schtuff. They gave me a "pee hat" which fits on the toilet and catches everything. Then I poured it into a big jug.
Looking in the pee hat, I was completely alarmed. The pee was reddish orange and clearly full of blood. (This hadn't been as apparent earlier in the day due to the dilution of the bloody pee in the toilet water.) I went and got Geekboy and told him that something bad was happening and I needed to get in touch with the doctor.
I called the doctor line and the doctor called me back. I explained what was going on and he suggested that I might have a urinary tract infection, but he wanted me to go to the hospital to be checked out so they would know for sure.
I told Geekboy to grab his computer because we were going for a ride. (He's much better off when he's got geeky entertainment.) I grabbed a big mug of water and we were out the door. I figured I should hydrate so I could pee when we got to the hospital.
At the medical complex where I'm being seen, they have a 24 hour pregnancy triage and assessment center. The nurses checked me in to an examining room and had me pee in a cup. It was pink - there was still obviously a decent amount of blood present, but it was nothing compared to what I'd discovered in the pee hat at home.
Then, while waiting to be seen in the patient room, I found that I had to pee every 5-10 minutes. I think it was a combination of being nervous and having consumed the giant mug of water on the way to the hospital. After a few more pees, the nurse arrived with a different cup for me to pee in. I produced the sample and it was as clear as tap water. For some reason, they decided to check for the presence of bacteria under a microscope on the clear pee sample (rather than the bloody one).
After about an hour, the doctor came in and told me that the sample was clean. She then conducted a quick pelvic exam (the first Geekboy had ever attended) and told me that my cervix looked a little tender and the q-tip swab she did produced a little bit of blood. She theorized that the blood in the urine was actually coming from my vaginal opening, rather than through my urethra. I questioned this theory a bit, but in the end, didn't want to get into a pointless argument with her. However, I'm 95% sure the blood was in my urine and not coming from somewhere else and mixing with the urine.
They sent us home. That evening, I had another slightly off-color pee (in the hat), but by morning, my pee was back to normal and the lower abdominal cramping was gone. I've been watching very carefully and I'm now on my third day of normal pee. I'm baffled by what happened, but I guess that if it's cleared up and the baby is fine, there's not much to worry about.
This is the type of thing where you begin to believe it's all in your head, but Geekboy has confirmed for me that it did, in fact, happen.
Blog Followers - Yay!
I haven't really made many efforts to publicize this blog yet as I've been distracted by my job, pregnancy, a basement renovation, figuring out whether to get married or not, the gestational diabetes, housekeeping, purchasing a new house, tenant turnover, and a whole host of other crazy stuff. However, it is on my list of things to do as it would be nice to know that there are folks out there in cyberspace reading (and hopefully learning from) my experiences. After a blogging hiatus of a few weeks, I was thrilled to sign on to see that I've got two blog followers. Yay! So now I've got impetus to keep up with the posts. Thanks blog followers! I'm glad you found your way here and I hope it's interesting to you. May many more followers soon follow your lead!
Morphing Lap Band Scars
I have five scars on my belly from the lap band surgery. Three are dots and two are more incision-type scars. One is about 3/4 of an inch long and the other is about 1 1/4 inches. They never really had a chance to fade after the surgery (I've been told this can take up to two years), but they used to be relatively flat and light pinkish.
As the pregnancy has progressed, I've noticed changes in the character of the scars. Especially in the last few weeks, they've grown much deeper in color and have also become much more raised/pronounced. In fact, one of the dot scars almost looks like a blister (but it's not infected or inflamed or anything).
I hadn't really noticed the morphing of the scars until one day when I looked in the mirror and I could see them THROUGH my shirt. It wasn't even a particularly tight shirt, but the scars caused the material to sit at a slightly different angle which caught the light. Weird. Since then, I've noticed that I can often see them through my shirts, but I doubt most people would notice. (Note: I'm not going to work in see-through shirts - it's the raised bumps I'm seeing under the fabric!)
I asked the doc about it and he said that weird things happen during pregnancy and a lot of them can be attributed to hormones.
The newly pronounced scars don't really bother me too much and geekboy doesn't seem the least bit bothered by them either - so, for the most part, I don't really care. But it seems like something that could be alarming or bothersome to scar-conscious individuals.
(I just tried taking a photo so you could see what I'm talking about, but it didn't work so well - sorry.)
As the pregnancy has progressed, I've noticed changes in the character of the scars. Especially in the last few weeks, they've grown much deeper in color and have also become much more raised/pronounced. In fact, one of the dot scars almost looks like a blister (but it's not infected or inflamed or anything).
I hadn't really noticed the morphing of the scars until one day when I looked in the mirror and I could see them THROUGH my shirt. It wasn't even a particularly tight shirt, but the scars caused the material to sit at a slightly different angle which caught the light. Weird. Since then, I've noticed that I can often see them through my shirts, but I doubt most people would notice. (Note: I'm not going to work in see-through shirts - it's the raised bumps I'm seeing under the fabric!)
I asked the doc about it and he said that weird things happen during pregnancy and a lot of them can be attributed to hormones.
The newly pronounced scars don't really bother me too much and geekboy doesn't seem the least bit bothered by them either - so, for the most part, I don't really care. But it seems like something that could be alarming or bothersome to scar-conscious individuals.
(I just tried taking a photo so you could see what I'm talking about, but it didn't work so well - sorry.)
Med Appointment
2 weeks ago, I had another medical appointment. I've been so bad about blogging that I can't even remember what happened. I'll try to remember and update this post. Consider this a placeholder.
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