One Year Ago - August 5, 2008

Ok, obviously the picture isn't from a year ago, but the rest of this post is.

I didn't blog much about the early days of my hospitalization with JW last summer. 1) I didn't have a computer. 2) By the time I did have semi regular access to the blog either through my new phone or by a borrowed computer, pretty much everyone who reads this knew the story anyway. But in honor of Justice's quickly arriving 1st birthday I figure now is the time to go back and tell his story. Even if it's a year later, it's still pretty fresh in my mind, and a lot fresher than if I wait another 5 years or so to write this down for him. So here goes.

It was a pretty uneventful pregnancy until about 18 weeks when I had minor bleeding. It was very strange, only happening first thing in the morning and never enough to cause anyone but me any concern. An ultrasound and exam at 19 weeks (this was a scheduled visit prior to the onset of the bleeding) didn't show any issues that could be causing the bleeding so Dr. R chalked it up to a polyp on my cervix and that was that.

On Tuesday, August 5, 2008, 21 weeks 2 days pregnant, I had a follow up ultrasound. During the initial ultrasound 2 weeks earlier JW looked great. Of course at the time we didn't know he was a he because we wanted a surprise baby. Anyway, JW looked great but was curled up in a ball and did not allow the technician to get a good look at his stomach. So we scheduled another ultrasound for August 5. I took the girls with me, because what else was I going to do with them? We trooped on into the doctor's office, had the ultrasound, and the tech said she was able to see his stomach this time so we went on our merry way expecting to see Dr. R again in 2 weeks.

That afternoon I was getting ready to go do a facial when Dr. R's nurse called. She told me JW had low amniotic fluid and Dr. R wanted me to drink about a gallon of water and stay off my feet for the rest of the day. She scheduled me for another ultrasound the following morning. I canceled the facial and tried to follow dr's orders. It's kind of hard to stay off your feet with 2 very active 3 year olds, but I did my best.

I also googled what the most common causes of low amniotic fluid were and what the consequences may be. Not the best idea in the world, but I wanted to be prepared for whatever Dr. R might tell me the following day.