Okay, so here's the story:
Kenny and I were planning on having our baby at the Agape Birth Center in Rigby; we even had everything paid for in advance at 34 weeks. At our 36 week appointment (Mar. 8) I had gained 10 pounds in 2 weeks, I had protein in my urine, my urine output wasn't as much as my fluid intake, my ankles and feet were really swollen, and my blood pressure was high. These are all signs of preeclampsia/toxemia. The midwives put me on a high protein, low fat, low carb diet (250 grams of protein a day) and asked me to stay home from work for a little while (mild bed rest). With preeclampsia your blood thickens, therefore your kidneys don't filter as well, so your body keeps the toxins in the blood and releases protein in your urine. The idea behind the high protein diet was that it helps your liver to make more albumin (this is the major protein in your plasma which helps with keeping pressure between your blood vessels and the space outside the vessels). The swelling was due to decreased albumin levels--with those low levels, fluid spills into the interstitial spaces causing the swelling. Once I started my diet my blood pressure went down a little and I started to increase my urine output which were good signs, however I still had protein in my urine, my swelling wasn't going down, and my blood pressure wasn't going down to where it needed to be. The midwives were drawing my blood every few days to do a liver panel to keep an eye on what my liver was doing. There were a couple values that just kept taking dips. On March 18 they decided to try stripping my membranes to see if that would throw me into labor because they felt like the best thing was to try to get the baby here. When she stripped my membranes I was dilated to 2cm and 80% effaced (which was a good sign). The next day, Thursday March 18, she got my 3rd set of lab values back and my liver wasn't looking so great, so she decided at that point she needed to do a transfer of care. She called Dr. Cox here in Pocatello and he said he wanted to see me right away (this was at about 2:30pm). Kenny and I went to the Pocatello Womens Health Clinic and we ended up waiting for about 45 minutes just to see Dr. Cox's PA because he was in surgery (so much for wanting to see me right away). The PA checked me and said I had dilated to 4cm and 80% effaced. They then wanted us to go to Labor and Delivery to do a Non-Stress Test on the baby which was only supposed to take 20 minutes. I think we waited about 45-60 minutes for them to even hook me up to the machine. Then they decided to keep me hooked up to it for 4 hours! We didn't see a doctor that entire time, the nurses kept saying they were talking to Dr. Cox on the phone, and Dr. Jones (the on call doctor) and they wanted me to stay until they figured out what to do. We both got so frustrated cause nobody was really telling us what was going on, and I was keeping my midwife posted on what was going on and she was frustrated too. We finally were able to talk to Dr. Jones on the phone to get some answers and found out that they were going to induce me that night. My midwife sent her certified doula (a birthing assistant), who is also a student midwife with lots of knowledge, to be with me during labor, and I had my friend, Dana, who is training to be a doula come too. They admitted me at around 10pm, then hooked me up to fluids, penicillin (since I hadn't done a Group B Strep test yet), pitosin (inducer), and magnesium sulfate (with preeclampsia it can go as far as eclampsia which is seizing and the mag sulfate helps keep that under control). I also had a belt strapped around my waist to monitor contractions and the baby's heartbeat, a blood pressure cuff on my left arm, and eventually a urine catheter. So basically I was strapped to the bed which was NOT part of my birth plan. The mag sulfate makes you nauseous and hot and pitosin contractions are horrible! They had to draw my blood every 4 hours to measure the amount of mag sulfate in my blood to make sure I was getting enough or not getting too much. At 8am the next morning (after a wretched night of contractions), I hadn't dilated past 4cm, so we decided to have them break my water to see if that would help things along. Well, the contractions became ten times worse after that and I couldn't take it anymore--I asked for the epidural. This was something I really didn't want to do, but I was in so much pain and I couldn't move around to help with the pain because I had so many things hooked to me. They had to insert the epidural cath twice because the first time they put it into a blood vessel (and that could cause cardiac arrest they said), so they re-inserted it (all through horrible contractions) and gave me the meds. Well, it took the edge off for about 30 minutes, it only worked on the left side, and eventually I felt everything again--so the epidural didn't work. So I eventually had the full force contractions again, but they were all confined to my right side--nice huh? But things were moving along and I was actually dilating very well. I started pushing at 11:00am and baby Logan Scott Garrett was born at 11:43am. He was 6 lbs 6 oz and 19.5 in long. We asked that the doctor put the baby on my chest and let me identify the sex for myself instead of having it announced. Logan was very healthy--it was me they were worried about. They had to keep me on the mag sulfate for 24 hours after the birth, and then they had to monitor me for 24 hours after taking me off the mag sulfate. So we were able to go home on Sunday. Thanks to our amazing doulas Dana and Valerie and our fantastic nurse Tammy Kenny and I were able to bring Logan here how we wanted considering the circumstances (no C-section). We were the only ones that day who didn't end up with a C-section which was pretty incredible considering I had preeclampsia.
Kenny and I were planning on having our baby at the Agape Birth Center in Rigby; we even had everything paid for in advance at 34 weeks. At our 36 week appointment (Mar. 8) I had gained 10 pounds in 2 weeks, I had protein in my urine, my urine output wasn't as much as my fluid intake, my ankles and feet were really swollen, and my blood pressure was high. These are all signs of preeclampsia/toxemia. The midwives put me on a high protein, low fat, low carb diet (250 grams of protein a day) and asked me to stay home from work for a little while (mild bed rest). With preeclampsia your blood thickens, therefore your kidneys don't filter as well, so your body keeps the toxins in the blood and releases protein in your urine. The idea behind the high protein diet was that it helps your liver to make more albumin (this is the major protein in your plasma which helps with keeping pressure between your blood vessels and the space outside the vessels). The swelling was due to decreased albumin levels--with those low levels, fluid spills into the interstitial spaces causing the swelling. Once I started my diet my blood pressure went down a little and I started to increase my urine output which were good signs, however I still had protein in my urine, my swelling wasn't going down, and my blood pressure wasn't going down to where it needed to be. The midwives were drawing my blood every few days to do a liver panel to keep an eye on what my liver was doing. There were a couple values that just kept taking dips. On March 18 they decided to try stripping my membranes to see if that would throw me into labor because they felt like the best thing was to try to get the baby here. When she stripped my membranes I was dilated to 2cm and 80% effaced (which was a good sign). The next day, Thursday March 18, she got my 3rd set of lab values back and my liver wasn't looking so great, so she decided at that point she needed to do a transfer of care. She called Dr. Cox here in Pocatello and he said he wanted to see me right away (this was at about 2:30pm). Kenny and I went to the Pocatello Womens Health Clinic and we ended up waiting for about 45 minutes just to see Dr. Cox's PA because he was in surgery (so much for wanting to see me right away). The PA checked me and said I had dilated to 4cm and 80% effaced. They then wanted us to go to Labor and Delivery to do a Non-Stress Test on the baby which was only supposed to take 20 minutes. I think we waited about 45-60 minutes for them to even hook me up to the machine. Then they decided to keep me hooked up to it for 4 hours! We didn't see a doctor that entire time, the nurses kept saying they were talking to Dr. Cox on the phone, and Dr. Jones (the on call doctor) and they wanted me to stay until they figured out what to do. We both got so frustrated cause nobody was really telling us what was going on, and I was keeping my midwife posted on what was going on and she was frustrated too. We finally were able to talk to Dr. Jones on the phone to get some answers and found out that they were going to induce me that night. My midwife sent her certified doula (a birthing assistant), who is also a student midwife with lots of knowledge, to be with me during labor, and I had my friend, Dana, who is training to be a doula come too. They admitted me at around 10pm, then hooked me up to fluids, penicillin (since I hadn't done a Group B Strep test yet), pitosin (inducer), and magnesium sulfate (with preeclampsia it can go as far as eclampsia which is seizing and the mag sulfate helps keep that under control). I also had a belt strapped around my waist to monitor contractions and the baby's heartbeat, a blood pressure cuff on my left arm, and eventually a urine catheter. So basically I was strapped to the bed which was NOT part of my birth plan. The mag sulfate makes you nauseous and hot and pitosin contractions are horrible! They had to draw my blood every 4 hours to measure the amount of mag sulfate in my blood to make sure I was getting enough or not getting too much. At 8am the next morning (after a wretched night of contractions), I hadn't dilated past 4cm, so we decided to have them break my water to see if that would help things along. Well, the contractions became ten times worse after that and I couldn't take it anymore--I asked for the epidural. This was something I really didn't want to do, but I was in so much pain and I couldn't move around to help with the pain because I had so many things hooked to me. They had to insert the epidural cath twice because the first time they put it into a blood vessel (and that could cause cardiac arrest they said), so they re-inserted it (all through horrible contractions) and gave me the meds. Well, it took the edge off for about 30 minutes, it only worked on the left side, and eventually I felt everything again--so the epidural didn't work. So I eventually had the full force contractions again, but they were all confined to my right side--nice huh? But things were moving along and I was actually dilating very well. I started pushing at 11:00am and baby Logan Scott Garrett was born at 11:43am. He was 6 lbs 6 oz and 19.5 in long. We asked that the doctor put the baby on my chest and let me identify the sex for myself instead of having it announced. Logan was very healthy--it was me they were worried about. They had to keep me on the mag sulfate for 24 hours after the birth, and then they had to monitor me for 24 hours after taking me off the mag sulfate. So we were able to go home on Sunday. Thanks to our amazing doulas Dana and Valerie and our fantastic nurse Tammy Kenny and I were able to bring Logan here how we wanted considering the circumstances (no C-section). We were the only ones that day who didn't end up with a C-section which was pretty incredible considering I had preeclampsia.
Here I am--so excited to finally be able to eat!
Here's a picture of my swelling. It has finally just about gone away.
This is Logan in his way too big blessing outfit. We blessed him at our house the day we got home from the hospital. We wanted to do the blessing while my parents were here to help us out for a few days. They came all the way from Glendive, Montana.
Logan had Jaundice so we had to put him in this bili-bed for two days. It was the longest two days of our lives. He hated it.
