High Blood Pressure - really?

What a week we have had.  I mean can I have an uneventful pregnancy?  Apparently the Lord loves to teach me lots of things through pregnancy and birth and I guess that is a pretty good way to speak to a Mommy's heart.

Last week while cooking dinner I felt short of breath and I could feel my blood beating through my veins.  It wasn't the first time, I had felt this way more and more over the past couple of days but being distracted with 3 littles I dismissed it.  I asked Matt to locate my blood pressure monitor.  He found it and my bp was 174/88.  Whoa!  Very high!  My blood pressure is usually on the low side somewhere around 115/60.  After dinner I rested.  The next day I went to the local hospital and had my urine checked for protein.  I was a little swollen, which is very rare for me, so pre-eclampsia was my first thought.  The pee stick revealed there was protein in my urine.  It freaked me out a little bit because I was not quite 26 weeks along.

My friend suggested I do a 24 hour urine test so that afternoon I started collecting pee.  So gross!  Anyway, I collected it, measured it and collected a sample to take back to the hospital.  I was expecting to get results that same day.  It was last Friday, over a week ago now.  Saturday morning I went back for blood tests.  My friend Tracy and I walked the blood over to the lab.  Once again I was hoping for results the same day, but several of the tests would not be ready until Sunday.  So I waited, rested and checked my bp several times each day.  It fluctuated from low to border-line to high over the weekend. Monday afternoon I finally got a call that all the tests were complete and my protein level was through the roof at 12.63.  The norm is .15  Freaked out!  We called our go to guy and asked what he thought we should do and he said head to HK and get checked out.  Should we take the overnight train to Shenzhen then cross the border to avoid flying.... no, he said just get there.  Fly directly there.  So, although we had to take 2 flights we were able to get to HK that night for less than a fortune.

Matt took the kids to the hotel and I went to the hospital.  I had called my OB, same one I used with Pete, and asked her which hospital I should go to.  Because I had not planned to deliver in HK I had not registered at a hospital.  Registering requires HK$47,000.  She said the international private hospital would not accept me so I should just go directly to Queen Mary, a public hospital, but a good choice.  In the ER my bp was up, 148/88.  They immediately put me in a wheelchair and after waiting half an hour I was told they were going to admit me to the maternity ward.

In the maternity ward my bp was taken and found to be normal.  It was 4am.  I had not been allowed to walk so I assume the rest helped my BP go down.  They checked for protein and the pee stick said negative!  What?  awesome!  They pointed me to a bed next to the window.  Being a public hospital everything is communal.  There were about 8 sections with the nurses station in the middle.  Each section had 8 beds separated by a curtain.  There was a laboring woman in my section.  She did such a good job, laboring alone on a yoga ball in front of the window (which was also in front of my bed).  I prayed for her, but left her alone.  I didn't sleep!  Around 6 they came to check on her and I heard them say "Don't push, let's call your husband."  They wheeled her away a few minutes later to the labor room.  Then there was a shift change, all the lights came on and I tried to sleep.  I did a little.  No one ever checked my bp again although they came several times to check the fetal heartbeat.  I commented several times to several doctors that came by that no one had checked my bp again.  They didn't seem concerned.  Being a University Hospital, there were usually several doctors standing around anytime a doctor came around.  By 8 am they had deemed me ok, the blood test looked good except my platelets which were dangerously low.  They decided that was ok too though since I have a history of blood clumping and low readings.  The doctor didn't know about the "special tube"  to take my blood, so it clumped.  They decided not to retest.  They let me go around 10:30.

I saw my OB that afternoon. She also did a protein dip stick which showed normal!  Very thankful! My bp was borderline but within normal limits.  She did a sonogram and I got to see baby Noah's face.  Precious!  It brought tears to my eyes.  I wasn't expecting to see a 3D image and then all of a sudden there he was, looking as cute as could be!  After talking with my doctor she decided she wanted a good platelet count and sent me to a hematologist.  Apparently, this was the only way I could get blood drawn into a citrate tube aka "the special tube".

So the platelet count was normal.  And although my bp went up and down during our time in HK it seemed to stay pretty close to normal most of the time.  No protein was found in my urine and so things look better than expected!

Travel day was rough.  My bp stayed high all day, and the day after also, but today after catching up on sleep and resting and eating well my bp is back to normal.  I still get short of breath when I try to do anything like cook or clean up or teach school, but it seems that I can maybe keep this thing under control for the moment with rest.  That is key, but also easier said than done.

The kids need Mom to be involved with their daily activities.  So, they get amped up with a big change in the norm.  Matt is awesome and has been holding down the fort, but it can get stressful.  Just trying to make sure we have milk and bread, that the load of clothes in the washer makes it to the clothesline, keeping up with home school and meals and all that stuff.  Its just a lot to do.  But by God's grace we'll make it through.  He is good and I'm sure He has a plan in all of it.  Back to trusting Him alone.

We will undoubtably be traveling to our delivery location soon.  Probably in the next 2-3 weeks.  We have a lot to do between now and then.  Here we go!