#pregnancy2

January 7th at 9pm. She should be here on the 8th unless she’s stubborn like her brother and pushes it into the next morning. But since I’ll be farther along and it’s my second delivery, this will hopefully go much faster!

AT CHRISTMAS?

I know I keep being quiet on here, but such is life right now. But I did want to update on something fairly big happening.

As of Saturday, I hit 33 weeks pregnant. Saturday night, my feet began itching. That may not sound like a big deal, but it’s the primary symptom of the liver condition I had with my first pregnancy - cholestasis. It’s a condition that will solve itself after the pregnancy, but can cause stillbirth. I was diagnosed at 35 weeks last time. Standard procedure is medication, twice a week monitoring, and induction at 37 weeks. So that’s what we did and we have a wonderfully healthy 2 year old now.

The itchiness Saturday wasn’t unbearable but it’s a unique itchiness, so I recognized it immediately. The itchiness isn’t solved by any of your normal itchiness remedies because it has nothing to do with the skin, but rather is the result of liver bile crystallizing on skin tissues. For whatever reason, it is felt the most at night and on the hands and feet, but can be felt anywhere.

I luckily had a normal appointment scheduled for Monday - my 32 week check up that got pushed back because of the holiday and the office being closed. I told the nurse what was going on and I was immediately transferred to a different room for a non stress test. That’s essentially sitting in a room for 30 minutes with a heart rate monitor on my belly watching to see how the baby’s heart rate changes over time.

Baby girl moved a little too much (which they kind of expect) so it wasn’t the best test but it showed no problems. Movement is also always a good sign. I was prescribed the necessary meds and told to come back in the morning after fasting for the blood tests. The first comes back quickly and just looks at liver function. The second one is diagnostic but takes a week to come back.

I’ve been on the meds, but we don’t have test results back yet. I also have my twice a week monitoring scheduled through Christmas. On Mondays, a non stress test. On Thursdays, a biophysical ultrasound.

Another wall done in the nursery. Aside from the two missing knobs on the headband holder. That’ll be a quick fix.

I also reorganized the closet, gathered her sheets and curtains to be washed, and put away the stuff and trash that was out. After a quick Lowe’s run post nap time, I’ll be able to put the rest of the stuff up and finish the headband holder. Good progress.

I also need to keep up with keeping my kitchen nice or a lot of my work yesterday will disappear. 

Where’s my motivation? Oh, probably with my coffee. Baby girl decided that coffee was going to make me ill for the last two weeks of my pregnancy. How kind.