Wednesday, April 16, 2008

One Down, Two More To Go

My first doctor's appointment of the week is out of the way. Only two more to go.

My big news for the day is that my OB is rescheduling the twins' birthday. I'm very happy about this. I'm sad to lose St. Rita, whose feast day is May 22, as our prayer partner in the birth process but it's for a good cause. Since both babies are head down and have remained head down - as of today - my OB is going to let me try a regular delivery of the non-c-section variety. The catch is, of course, that they have to stay head down. If either switches then I'm screwed and off to surgery I go.

Our tentative date for induction is May 27. I'll be 38 weeks and 3 days (or so - there continues to be a several day discrepancy between my counting, my OB's counting, and the peri-nate's counting). That does mean more days of finger pricking and more days of big belly time. But it also gives the twins a slightly better chance of having mature lungs at birth ... and it gives me a better chance of going into labor naturally so I don't have to be induced - which is part of my master plan.

Today the doctor strongly encouraged me to have the epidural. It's as if she could see the natural child birth books on my dresser. How did she know? I shave my arm pits. I don't look like a woman of nature who shuns epidurals. What she doesn't know is that I'm so woefully unprepared for natural child birth that I sincerely doubt that I could do it again this time around. For starters, I'm too tired. For seconders, I'm getting absolutely no backrubbing from my "birth coach" (which is supposed to be happening every night to ensure that I'm relaxed enough to go to my "special place" when real labor starts).

Also a factor are the labor-like pains I'm experiencing everyday. I get a lot of cramping (which I believe I've mentioned) that radiates around to my back. It's a lot like labor pain. It's pain that makes me angry. No other way to describe it. I just get really angry. That reminds me of real labor and how bad it felt and that makes me think that maybe getting stabbed in the spinal column isn't so bad afterall.

In other news, Will got to see the Pope today. He went with his grandma to D.C. She said he was mature and very well behaved. Huh? My son??? I'm so proud! I wish I could have seen him. He led one decade of the rosary on a bus full of older kids and adults. He said to my mom, "I'm going to volunteer to lead. I have the courage." And then he did. When he finished, the entire bus clapped because he did such a good job. I can totally see him in seminary! He saw the Pope-mobile but got confused and thinks that it's a black stretch limo. Not surprised about that since he's dutifully saving his allowance to buy a limo when he's 16. (as if we're going to let him get his driver's license then).

Mr. Cubby had his first encounter with real sushi today. He likes it. And he loves playing with his chop sticks. It's heartbreaking and hysterical to watch him try to eat with them. He hunches over his tray with a chop stick in either hand. His brow is furrowed and his eyes focused with amazing intensity on the food he wants to pick up. He pushes the chop sticks together and smushes the food between the points and then... the food falls or flies away from his sticks. Poor kid. But so adorable to watch a near-2-year-old try to eat this way.

Monday, April 14, 2008

Finger Prickin' Good

Those finger pricking lancets suck. 25% of them don't hurt but the rest of them do. This morning's was brutal. It bled and bled and hurt and hurt and now there's a big ol' bruise on my finger. I swear I did NOTHING different. I used a new lancet. It was horrible. But I felt better when I had my lowest fasting glucose levels to date - even though I ate peanut M&M's last night (and an apple, peanut butter, cheese, and nuts - yes, I am pregnant and I eat weird things when I'm pregnant).

Today, I've been eating more carbs than I'm allowed because I'm ravenously hungry. (That means hungry like a raven and as you probably know, birds eat two to three times their weight in food every day). My sugars have been normal - higher than usual but normal. Hooray.

Babies are kicking. They make me tired. It's hard to sit up, roll over, get out of bed, pee, lay down comfortably, stand for very long, or watch The Bachelor: London Caling (that's only because watching it makes me crave sparkling wine). Again, I'm not complaining. I'm thrilled to be pregnant and to be in the home-stretch. I'm only noting that I have officially entered the hard to do anything stage of pregnancy.

Mr. Cubby is awake and calling for me so I must be off. Enjoy your day, Rachel. And take care of those cankles. :)

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Getting Doctors On My Side

Last night ended with my mom sitting tight-lipped in front of me at our kitchen barnter (bar/ counter). I was, as I often find myself these days, feeling rather like I did at 16. We were arguing, albeit nicely, over whether or not I was allowed to drive myself (IN MY OWN CAR) to the doctor. Normally I let her drive me everywhere and Mr. Cubby is shuttled along for the ride. He's logging a lot of car time these days as my number of weekly doctor visits climbs.

We got up this morning with the problem unresolved and no matter how I tried to frame the situation in a consistent, logical way my mom could only picture the 16 year old idiot me trying to borrow the car so I could crash it into a tree for fun. (I never did that but my mom often had that face when I wanted to borrow the car). My appointment was at 12:45, right during Mr. Cubby's sacred nap time. Why on earth would I want my very congested baby to skip his nap so my mom could drive me to the doctor? That's like agreeing to accept two minutes of peace now and a thousand minutes of crying later. Not worth it.

Finally, I get a bright idea and call my OB's office. Normally I would never call my doctor to settle a disagreement; I'd just talk my way into (or out of) doing what I want. But 16 year old me is much less credible than 35 year old me so I knew I didn't have a chance of swaying my mom's opinion of the situation.

The catch with the doctor is she's not in the office on Thursdays. I know this and I psych myself up to beg for professional help. I sit on hold for literally 10 minutes waiting. Then the receptionist gets on and I explain in my stressed-out voice (because I was) that I need someone to look at my file and tell me whether or not I've been restricted from driving. Amazingly she transfers me right away to the nurse practitioner. The brilliant NP tells me that my file says nothing about driving restrictions (which I already know) and that if I promise to drive only to my appointment and then back home - not doing any shopping in between - then it's OK.
Hooray.

My mom accepts this and turns over the keys. As soon as I walk into the garage ALONE at last, I yell, "See ya later, sucker. I'm never coming back." My mom peers out of the kitchen door, smiling. "Aren't you forgetting something?" she asks in her smart-mom voice. (I have one of those too so I knew that I had indeed forgotten something). She still had my credit card. D'oh! My new-found freedom (and a pit stop at the Cheesecake Factory) vanished ... but only temporarily because I needed the credit card to pay the doctor. She was very nice to retrieve it for me and I was sufficiently humbled that I didn't taunt her again.

My date with the perinatologist (high risk doc) went very VERY well all things considered. My only beef with him was that he said my blood sugar levels looked "fine." I thought they looked GRRRRRREAT and I was hoping he'd do his Tony the Tiger impersonation to express his wonder and awe at the magnificent way I was managing my blood sugar through diet alone but he didn't.

My biggest thrill - outside of confirming that we are still having a boy and a girl - came when the doc told me that I could take a 10 minute walk a day. (Great way to start training for the Army 10 miler, right?) I was beside myself with happiness. Honestly. He cautioned that I should stop if I started having regular contractions (duh) and that I needed to be careful since I was walking a fine line between trying to prevent premature labor and control the GD. He was very reassuring about the pregnancy overall and even told me that since I had gone to 38 weeks with Mr. Cubby that I shouldn't have any problems going the distance this time. It's refreshing to hear that after all the warnings and cautions of my OB.

These guys are also optimistic about the babies being born "the regular way" as opposed to a c-section. The girl has been head down for two weeks and the boy is super head down, burrowed into my pelvis, back in pole position ready to get out first when the time comes.

The peri-nate gave me a goal of staying pregnant until 34 weeks. Once most twin pregnancies hit 34 weeks, the babies usually do well. They're still preemies but they do much better. He didn't promise no time in the NICU so we'll try to go as long as we can to avoid that. Also at 34 weeks the plan is to ease up on some of the activity restrictions.

Next week I see the OB, the peri-nate, and the dietitian. Would prefer it to be my stylist, personal shopper, and masseuse. I'll offer it up.

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Not dealing well with stupid diabetes

I've renamed gestational diabetes, "stupid diabetes" - because it's the stupidest thing ever in so many ways.

I had the "blah blah blah" 2 hour diabetes seminar yesterday with two other unfortunate women. The diabetes ladies who run the clinic were very nice and it's not their fault that the clinic was stupid. It goes without saying that stupid diabetes would have a stupid clinic.

So I'm supposed to have blood glucose levels under 120 two hours after a meal. Normal people are allowed to have levels at 140. Last night I did my second finger prick test and I was so excited because I was sure I had done a really good job controlling my sugar/ carb intake. My blood sugar was at 119 - which did not make me a happy camper. That's just one measly point away from the "red flag" number. If I go above 120 two times, I have to call my doctor. Last night I was in tears thinking that I'd be put on insulin shots today. I just KNEW it was all going to go very bad, very quickly.

Until I got up this morning with a subversive plan.

I tested after getting out of bed. I was at 91. Not great but not horrid. My limit for morning (fasting) blood sugar levels is 95. After breakfast my mom left the house with Mr Cubby. (I can only write this because I know my mom and husband do not read my blog and therefore will not find out - Right friends?!!!) I pulled out the vacuum cleaner, replaced the broken belt, and vacuumed for 5 minutes tops. There was uncooked rice on the playroom floor (don't ask why) and it had been there for three days. My lovely burgundy and black dining room rug had become a shag, russet colored rug of pet hair. So I just cleaned up a bit. JUST A BIT, people. And guess what? My blood test 2 hours after breakfast was 89.

Just as I had suspected.

So here is the circular problem. Bed rest can lead to GD. It obviously did for me since my vacuum exercise test was very scientific. Both activity and GD can lead to pre-term birth. But activity can remedy GD where diet alone often fails. So the question is, just how much more dangerous would a 10 minute walk be to the babies as opposed to sky-rocketing blood sugar levels? Myself, I prefer the 10 minute walk to insulin shots. I promise that I will talk to my doctors about this tomorrow - please don't assume I'm going to continue to sneak around and exercise without permission. My activity scheme does seem to be effective - even if it's just 5 minutes of walking around. Tonight I walked several hundred feet to the stop sign by our house and back and got a reading of 113.

On a fun note, I was super depressed about having GD last night and John promised me lots of presents if I hang in there and a) don't have the babies early and b) keep up with my diet and blood testing. So it's not all bad. :)

Sunday, April 6, 2008

31 Weeks

Here's a shout out to all my girlfriends for throwing me a great baby shower yesterday. I know I've got great friends because I don't know many women who have friends willing to throw three baby showers - for the same person - ME - within four years of each other. Admittedly, we all share an affection for parties and shower food, which doesn't hurt. I promised to be back in a year or two pregnant with triplets so another shower could be justified.

The balloons were a big hit with Mr. Cubby. My favorite advice came from Rachel, who had GD during her first pregnancy. "You don't have your metre yet? (She swears she's British so she probably spells 'meter' that way - though without the accent, one has to wonder). Girlfriend, eat what ever you want." You know that's just what I wanted to hear since I've spent the last week nearly starving to death (OK, maybe that's a slight exaggeration) trying not to eat too many carbs. I mean, honestly, there is only so much beef jerky a girl can eat before she crumbles and turns to the Cheerios for a little carb relief.

I'd single Heather out for all her awesome cooking and partying throwing but she doesn't read this so poo to you, Heather. But I will give a shout out to my friend, Irene, who donated her life savings to the gift card fund. Holly, who co-hosted the shower doesn't read this either so poo to you, Holly. And Rachel, who was already singled out once, great party, thanks for being the motivating co-host behind the festivities.

Baby update: they haven't been born yet and are kicking HARD so all is still well.

Pregnancy update: I've been having a lot of cramping on and off in my lower abdomen, especially after an active day (of getting up from the couch a lot to stop Mr. Cubby from pulling lamps off tables and the like). The cramping is indeed a sign of pre-term labor (or labour if you're Rachel) so I haven't told anyone about it since I'd probably get super glued to my bed. I'm already too depressed over not being able to go out shopping; I couldn't handle being confined to bed all day. I'm a busy girl.