Final Score: Hypertension 1, Keyboard Biologist 0
Well, ring the bell to end the match. The Keyboard Biologist is down for the count. The blood pressure is still up, so I get to lie down. I am going to be bonding with the concept of the horizontal so that my baby can continue to work on her very personal developmental biology project
Strangely enough, I am less disturbed by this than I would have been a week ago. I am not sure if it is because of the warning flag that got thrown last Thursday, or because my primary OB took the time to help me understand what we're dealing with and why trying to fight it wouldn't be in my best interests. Perhaps it is just that the big heart is listening to the rapid little beats of the small heart beneath it. Pregnancy seems to be a real caterpillar to butterfly metamorphosis for me. I feel like the woman who I was in the fall is not quite the same woman I am now... and that bringing my baby into the world will take that transition even farther. Becoming a mother is a much deeper experience than I ever imagined it might be.
Hearing from so many of you about your own experiences really made a difference, too. There is a good deal of strength to be gained from the feeling that I am not alone and knowing that others have made similar journies to mine and that some of you are walking down the same path at almost the same time.
Which leads me to an apology. Not for being whiny on Friday, but for an overactive spam filter that seems to have decided that many of my comments do not deserve to make it onto my blog, and, thus, for the past several weeks I seem to have been losing words that I most certainly wanted to read. I forced Movable Type to cough up what it had incorrectly caught in its filters, and I will be watching closely in the next couple of days to make sure it stops it's bad behavior. In the meantime, if you left a comment with a question and didn't hear back from me... please comment again or send me an email. Or if you just had a comment disappear into the ether, my apologies. Even though I've restored them all, and I've read as many as I found, it's likely going to be difficult for me to respond to most of them from earlier than late last week. So please know that your words are always appreciated, even if you don't hear back from me directly.
Finally, a little more knitting -- some of the fruits of my weekend bed rest activities:
Since my current situation has the potential to lead to a baby a bit earlier than expected, I clearly need to finish up this little garment soon. Not that she'll be big enough to wear it for a long time, but the little pieces of sweater help me visualize her and being with a healthy baby in the future.
Take good care of yourself! It's definitely one of those things that you won't regret later on. I wish both you and your baby a healthy pregnancy, and I can't wait to see the baby wearing that cute little sweater that you are working on there!
At least the bed rest allows for plenty of knitting time. Rest up and stay safe, both of you!
I'm glad you are being taken care of. :) It may not be the ideal situation for now, but soon it will just be a page in the baby book and you'll have your hands full of the Zster.
Motherhood is truly a journey that never ends. Welcome to the fun. ;)
One of the things motherhood did for me was make me appreciate my own mother more. It also taught me to just let things go, you can't control when a child will be sick, tired, cranky or happy, I've learned to take those downtimes & use them to slow down myself instead of fretting about what I might have gotten done.
A long time? You will soon find out that instead of the nice, sautering rate you life has gone by up to now, it's about to start galloping. I'm trying to figure out why my son is crawling and eating finger foods, and exactly where has the past 9 months gone, and why is he already wearing clothes designed for 1 yr. olds? And didn't I used to have time to knit? I've also discovered that if I keep him up til 10-11 pm, I get the morning all to myself....
That's a great attitude to have. I was on bed rest with my older son and at first I didn't adjust well (I kept thinking how inconvenient it was to me). Then my nurse midwife took the time to explain that this was my first act of motherhood, the first time I get the opportunity to put my child's needs above my own. I settled down and really started to focus on the baby inside, and I think I enjoyed pregnancy more then than at any other time. Take this time, bond with Z, do something good for you and her (maybe start a breastfeeding sweater for fall *grins*).
It sounds like you have a great OB. That helps so much. I'm glad you are feeling okay with all of this. Your description of the butterfly is great. It's all so worth it in the end. Take care.
Its sounds like you have got a great OB doctor. Take her advice and take it easy. Baby Z and you will be much happier. Had the same problem and my daughter was born 3 weeks early. Very healthy and beautiful. Can't wait to see a picture of Baby Z. Best to you.
Be well, all of you! I hope your rest time can translate into plenty of knitting time.
Hang in there. Try and enjoy these last few weeks of metamorphasis, the result is truly worth it. I have the same issue with my movable type, and have gotten into the habit of always checking the junk comment file.
You are a wonderful mother! You are already taking such good care of baby Z. You are in my thoughts and prayers; I "check in" every day. Try to enjoy the rest and knitting time. Hope John is doing well.
a good OB can go a long way. I love the way you have compared it to a catipiller to butterfly. i never thought of it that way but it so makes sense!!!! good luck. I am not sure how far along into your pregnancy you are since i just started reading.. but you may want to check out netflix. they were a saviour on my bed rest.
Hey! I know it seems like being tied to a chair right now but I urge you to enjoy it while it lasts. I have 4 kids and the days of sitting or lying quietly and being able to knit something start to finish without interruption are LONG LONG gone. This may be your last chance for a while to just TAKE IT EASY and spoil yourself. I say go for it!
I was on three months of in-hospital bedrest with my son - I knit 12-14 hours a day to stay sane (he had a LOT of baby clothes!) It was frustrating at the time, but now, 4 years later, it's barely a blip in the memory, and I am blessed with a delightful, perfect, healthy child. It really is a metamorphosis - this process of becoming not just one person, but two - of having every choice and action affect the wee one. As an onlooker, it appears intrusive and troublesome, but when I went through it, I found it to be... enlarging. I became more, not less - and though there are things you set aside for a time in the early going, they grow up so terribly quickly, and the day comes when you would love to get nothing done all day but rock and breastfeed. (Oh, and as a GP who did loads of obstetrics in my early practice years - pregnancy induced hypertension is nothing to fool around with. Really.)
Great fruits! I'll run the stairs extra for you! :) With bed rest, I'm assuming we will see lots of posts and lots of progress. Get the hubby to take the beautiful outside pictures for you. :)
"Becoming a mother is a much deeper experience than I ever imagined it might be."
What true and wise words. It's an amazing thing, really, especially when you're open to the process.
Aren't you glad you knit? How else to face bed rest.
I am wishing wellness and a full-term gestation for your little one.
Sorry/happy to say that no, you will never be that womman again. But the woman you're becoming is who you are meant to be. And the woman your baby needs and wants. Enjoy your rest while you can get it, even with the aches and pains!
Do please remember -- it's not your fault, it just happens a lot to first time moms, and there's nothing you can do to not have pre-eclampsia. (It's human nature to wonder why this is happening, and if it's something you did.) That being said, it's kind of an awakening to realize that only you can do this -- be the safe haven for this little person and nourish her until it's time for her arrival (then nourish her afterwards, too, of course!). That was a real awakening for me during my stint of bedrest -- I was determined before that to do it all, to be a busy physician and not let pregnancy slow me down; but I was made to realize that I had colleagues who could help take care of my patients, and a husband who could clean and cook (well, cook, anyway!), but NO ONE ELSE could do this thing for my baby -- only me. So that was my most important job then.
A day at a time -- though this is not going according to our picture-perfect imagination of how it should be, you are at a safe time, you have a great OB who's keeping a close eye on things, and if Z ends up needing to come a bit earlier, you and she will still be fine.
A day at a time. Knit away, and I hope the quilt returns before Z comes!
Sorry to hear about the bed rest - you seem to have such a good outlook on it though. Lots of good thoughts for you and the baby. I hope the knitting makes the time go faster.
The sweater is so cute! I hope you're able to rest without worry that things aren't getting done. Miss Z is way more important than dishes, etc!
I'm sorry you're on bedrest! But I hope baby Z stays put for as long as she needs to - for both your sakes.
I think maybe the real score is Baby Z 10, Keyboard Biologist Mom 10. Welcome to Motherhood!
You're absolutely right - you're not the woman you were in the fall and motherhood will change you in a brazilian different and unexpected ways... if you're doing it right. I have a sneaking suspicion you will.
Visualize yourself with a healthy baby (not fully developed, but healthy) now! Your sweater is looking great. Motherhood surely changes just about everything. But it's all good!
I was on 4 months of bedrest when I was pregnant with my triplets. It's frustrating, bou CAN do this. It's all worth it for baby Z! Sometimes being a mom means giving up that control we all love to hang onto and just letting go to the things we can't control (boy did my kids as teenagers teach me that one - LOL). I'm a lurker here at chez Keyboard Biologist, but I've really enjoyed getting to share in your knitting and pregnancy adventures. Stay healthy, knit a lot and take care of Z.
Think of this time as way to get prepared, mentally, for your new baby. I never had that (LouLa was 3 weeks early and very unexpected). The first few months were rough, and part of it could have been that I wasn't really mentally prepared for her. I never had time to relax and get ready for her. Of course, I don't think that you can ever be really ready for a newborn. :)
Sometimes, enforced bedrest is not a bad thing. (Easy for me to say, of course.) Think of all the knitting you'll have time for! And, really, the calm before the storm . . . babies are wonderful, but they sometimes bring chaos in their wakes, so getting all the rest you can now . . .
My mum was put on bed-rest when she was pregnant with my younger brother. Having a truly-annoying toddler (me) to cope with and being forced to put your feet up can't have been fun for her! Take the time and use it as best you can - knit more! :)
I agree with previous comments about bedrest as an opportunity to knit and perhaps catch up on blogs. Think of yourself as a queen who must be pampered. Good luck and take care.
When you look back this will be a mere blip on the radar screen. My 18 yr old man-child is ready to move on just like the preemie baby, adorable toddler, imaginative school boy and cranky teenager did.
PS What is your due date?
Hoping things go as well for you as the did for me. I had pre-eclampsia with my first, discovered at my 37 wk visit. Went form the doctor's office straight to the delivery room and delivered 12 hours later. It took a couple of weeks for my blood pressure to get back to normal but everything worked out well enough, which I take total responsibility. Ha ha. In fact, he's at Princeton now working on a Chemstry fellowship.
The first time around when my dr told me to rest I went and picked raspberries telling my worried husband that because I liked doing it I was relaxing. No dice. Two days later she was a lot more explicit about what she meant by rest. When it happened again with #2 it was much more serious and much earlier in the pregnancy. I was scared and willing to lay very low and very still just so they wouldn't try to take my baby early. He came at 37wks and was a tiny 4lbs14oz, but he was ok. When it happened again with #3 I was ready. I had stuff organized so that when I hit 32 weeks I could take to my bed even with 2 toddlers. The thing about PIH (pre-eclampsia) is that it can come on so slowly that you really don't realize what crap you feel like until after you have that baby out and it goes away. It's only when you feel well again that you realize how poorly you were before. Trust your dr here. You aren't well and you do need to look after yourself so that you can look after your baby. It is truly an act of mothering and only the first of many many times when you will most willingly give up your own desires in favour of your child. Blessings to you
Hey, make the most of being able to lie there, relatlively, peacefully. Once young Z arrives she'll make her presence felt & you'll have very little time for doing anything like lying down, never mind sleeping! At least where she is now she's quiet & (fairly) portable - even if you aren't meant to be going anywhere.
As a Mum you're in it for the long haul, so best get started early.
Well, at least we're on the homestretch (kinda). And this IS the era of technology, so you can arm yourself with laptop, a DVD player and tons of knitting to keep you occupied. And get some of that rest so you can build up some sleep stores.
Weekly monitoring on me started yesterday, along with a nutrition class because of the marginal glucose. Not a bad diet, I must say, though they said olives were a "free" food and last night I overdid it a bit. Kept waking up for a drink of water every hour on the hour, I was so thirsty.
Hang in there, and remember I'm walking right behind you and cheering over here in Baltimore ...
W.
Just wanted to let you know I'm thinking about you....
It is these sorts of things that keep reminding me how wonderful modern technology is. You have bedrest, but you can share it with all of us...
When my sister had bedrest 12 years ago, she was just alone in her house with her TV and her regular phone, such as it was. It was lonely and depressing and hard.
You just have to give us a jingle,...and I know you will....and we'll be there for you. Love, Norma
You seem to be sanguine about the bed rest and at least it's not going to be for months and months. Plus it's hot and icky outside, so stay cool and comfy...
Just think, soon you'll be looking back on this doctor ordered bedrest and wonder if baby Z will ever let you sleep that long again! Take care.
Whatever it takes, indeed. Selflessness starts with the time of awareness of pregnancy, and I see this as part of that. It's just an opportunity to focus on other things while the wee one gets her act in place.
Best wishes as you await the debut of Baby Z. I was in your position 28 years ago with Baby A, and I already had a 6-year-old and a 3-year-old. Today we spent the holiday in the pool with her, her husband, and her two healthy children. By the way, don't forget to take care of yourself, too!
"Becoming a mother is a much deeper experience than I ever imagined it might be."
Amen, dear. My "baby" is now heading toward 26 years old. He and his big sister taught me things that college, two master's degrees, and three jobs failed to. I learned almost as much from my breast cancer diagnosis (stage I, thankfully), but learning from babies has much more potential for fun and smiles. (Though there were tears and down-times, too.
Hope your rest IS relaxing. Lollipop is DARLING.
I have chronic hypertension, but it still follows the same path as normal moms when pregnant. Awesome in the second trimester, naturally rises in the last 6 weeks before the EDD. I was frequently told to 'take it easy' which was not easy with two other kids. I'm surprised that bedrest is considered enough. I'm already on meds, but I would have thought that would be the route to take, because hypertension can result in early wearing out of the placenta and small babies. I refused to be induced before my due dates, and my babies were 7-14, 7-12, and 6-9. She was a surprise, LOL. It's sort of funny, having conflicting issues---GD (or just being borderline) can cause big babies, and hypertension can cause small babies.
But do as the doctor says! Get lots of books from the library. Now is a great time to formulate a parenting plan for the next 18 years!