Quick Pregnancy Update

10/24/2009

Since my last fun and exciting pregnancy update, I have more to add. First, it turns out that my heart and blood pressure issues were from an allergic reaction to the progesterone shots I was getting. So, they took me off of those and I got much better. I continued with a (mostly) modified diet based on the recommendations given to me at the time.
Then, maybe a month ago a test I took at the doctor showed that I might have gestational diabetes. So, they did the 3 hour test and the whole test showed bad blood sugar until the end of the last hour where I was totally fine. So, my body is not technically diabetic, it just takes forever to process sugars. Who knows. So, had to do some diet modifications. Yay, fun!
A few weeks ago I got all swollen and woke up in the middle of the night because I couldn’t bend my fingers. My blood pressure was borderline-high so I went in to the doctor. It showed some protein deposits in my urine, but not enough to make me preeclamptic. Basically, my liver is starting to fail and I will hopefully make it through the rest of this pregnancy without it actually failing. If my liver does fail, then they’ll have to deliver the baby immediately. Today I’m almost to 32 weeks, so every day is a blessing. I’m hoping to get at least to 37 weeks so I can have a full term pregnancy. And I’m also hoping to not have liver failure since that totally stinks.
I started having severe hip pain about 2 weeks ago. It was to the point that I was maybe getting 3-4 hours of sleep a night. I went to my doctor (I’m starting to feel sorry for my doctor. Am I the crazy lady they talk about in the break room?) and she said my hips had too much pain and sent me to a chiropractic maternal specialist. I went there a week ago and they found (1) that my pelvic bone was separating, (2) that my left hip was almost popped out of the socket, and (3) that the back of my pelvic bone was tilting into my body. So, they popped my hip back in (ouch!), hit me with a chiropractic hammer looking thing to get my hip tilted the correct way, and pressed my pelvic bone back together. Then they wrapped me up in a belt. I was sore for about 3 days, but have been feeling much much better. I’ve also been getting about 8 hours of sleep a night since then. Yay! My hips will need to be watched through and after the pregnancy to make sure that everyone stays lined up as they should be. (Sidenote: my body started producing it’s own progesterone a couple of months ago, alleviating my need for progesterone supplements. Unfortunately, this increases my production of relaxin, which causes all of my joints to separate like crazy. Yay, fun!)
So, yeah, I’m almost 32 weeks. That means I have at least 5 more weeks to go before I’m considered full term, and possibly up to 8 weeks before the baby is born.
I am requesting that this child be exquisite in every way and eventually save the world or something. That would make all this pain & dealing with every bizarre side effect much better. The end question is, dare I attempt pregnancy again? Will side effects get better or worse? Probably a crap shoot, so we’ll just get this one out and hopefully some semblance of health and sanity will return to me. Eventually. Hopefully.