Practicing What I Preach

We spent 6 hours yesterday at labor and delivery in the hospital.

And at the end of it I was "encouraged" to induce...right then and there.

I'll back up for you a bit.

I had my regular weekly midwife appt yesterday at noon.

I had high blood pressure again.  But no protein in my urine in the dip stick test again.  Same as 2 weeks ago.

To ease my midwife's mind she sent me to the hospital so they could hook me up to a blood pressure machine and monitor it for a bit.  Her thought was better safe than sorry.

I don't disagree.  She needs to feel comfortable letting me continue with the homebirth.

For 5 hours I had a blood pressure cuff on measuring my blood pressure and monitors all over my belly measuring baby's heart rate and uterine contractions.

I also had a blood test done and another urine test.

All day long nurses and Dr.'s kept coming in saying how good everything was looking and that they were just waiting for my lab results to let me go.

Over the time period I had 2 blood pressure spikes.  

It happens whenever I talk through the reading.

The rest of the readings were all in the normal range.

But after 6 long hours of sitting in a closet strapped to monitors the HIGH RISK OB pops her face in and tells me that my labs came back, I have protein in my urine and that combined with the high blood pressure spikes she is diagnosing me with MILD PREECLAMPSIA and the fact that I'm 38 weeks, full term, she recommends an induction NOW.

I was somewhere between pissed off and absolutely devastated.

I'd done my homework as I know a few people who've dealt with high blood pressure during pregnancy and also because I'd been dealing with it myself and traditionally the next step is a 24-hour urine analysis before officially diagnosing MILD PREECLAMPSIA.  The full term thing led her to gloss over this step completely and she diagnosed me without the 24 hour test...which really pissed me off.  I am now plagued with an official diagnosis of preeclampsia in my chart regardless of what happens at this point.

We said no, we will not induce right now we want the 24-hour urine test.

She said she would agree to that if I would agree to a check of my amniotic fluid and an ultrasound to confirm baby is growing because preeclampsia can stunt baby's growth.

I agreed to both and after talking to my midwives if either is off, either low amniotic fluid or the baby concerningly small then we would go ahead with the induction.

After a quick ultrasound my amniotic fluid is measuring FINE and baby looks like he is growing fine.  I have a more detailed ultrasound later on today to confirm the baby's growth.

And that's where we stand right now.

About a heartbeat away from being induced for mild preeclampsia.

And getting farther and farther away from my longed for homebirth.

My title of this post is Practicing What I Preach because I made a few statements about appropriate birthing in previous posts and preeclampsia is one of the conditions in which a homebirth is no longer safe and in which an induction is completely appropriate to keep mama and baby out of harms way.

But I never imagined I would be in this position.

I WILL get the induction at the hospital if my 24-hour urine test comes back positive for proteins in a high enough volume to convince me that I have preeclampsia.  Practicing what I preach.

But I'm pissed.

I have no other signs of preeclampsia.  No headaches, no visual disturbances, no swelling.

If I wasn't who I was, if I hadn't done my research, if I didn't know there were options I would have been induced yesterday and probably have a baby right now...or be having one.  I'm in awe and absolutely astounded at the pressure that was put on me to induce.

Even if I don't have protein in my urine tomorrow I will be closely closely monitored from here on out with the very real possibility of an induction at any time.

It's very possible we will have a baby this weekend.

The homebirth is looking unrealistic because as I've stated...it's not safe at a certain point...and we're about at that point.

Even if I can get out from under this diagnosis of mild preeclampsia I don't know that my homebirth midwives will be comfortable with me being at home anymore.

So for now we are peeing into a jug for the next 24 hours.  Tomorrow will be spent hooked up to millions of monitors again...and then we go from there.

I'm devastated that everything I've prepared for over the past year is slipping through my fingers and that here at the very end, the final stretch, I'm having to completely change gears and try to accept that my birth experience is going to be nothing like I thought it would be.

I'm having a little trouble wrapping my brain around everything.

I'm holding out some hope that we can still do this at home, but realistically I'm trying to prepare myself for the induction and subsequent hospital birth.

And in the meantime we're trying like crazy to induce labor on our own.  Sex, nipple stimulation, evening primrose oil, acupressure, a chiropractor appointment, an acupuncture appointment, some long walks...this is my life probably until baby comes...if I have to do this in the hospital maybe I can at least avoid an induction!