Yesterday was kind of a rough day with contractions - I had more than usual and wasn't feeling all that great. I made it through church ok and we went to Hatch's for dinner still doing ok (just not great). I kept up on my nifedipine and that helped with contractions, but I was still having about 1 or 2 an hour. When we got home, I sat in bed and tried to finish my work for the weekend when I noticed that my contractions were getting to be about 5 minutes apart! Yikes! I called up to L&D at the U and a lovely nurse named Michele (who just so happens to be my sister) answered and she gave me some suggestions to slow down the contractions. I took an extra pill and guzzled down water. After a half hour, it seemed to help - contractions were about 10-15 minutes apart now. It was about 10pm and I was trying to decide if we should come in to the hospital or just wait it out at home. Just when I decided to just stay home, the contractions started up again, and luckily Isaac was already asleep, so my good friend Rachele came over for a few minutes until Ammon arrived to keep an eye on Isaac and we were off to the hospital.
On our drive up there, it was nearly impossible to not think about the other late night trips up to the hospital - with our first little girl thinking it was impossible to actually be in labor at 22 weeks, then with Isaac at around 21 weeks after significant cervical shortening and some bleeding. How here we were with this one, but at least knowing that if she were born at 27 weeks, although it would require a long stay in the NICU, she would be ok.
As soon as we got to L&D, Michele met us and took us back to an exam room and hooked me up to the monitors to see how baby was doing. They found her heartbeat and monitored the contractions. The doctor came in and did an exam to check my cervix, make sure my water sack hadn't broke yet, and checked for a few other things. They did this test where they check for fetal fibronectin tissue which breaks down in preparation for labor - essentially, if the test comes back positive, odds are likely that the mom will deliver within two weeks, and if it's negative, the mom has a 99% chance of NOT delivering in the next two weeks, which helps determine if the contractions are productive labor contractions or not. Amazingly, the test came back negative, so it looks like baby is staying put for at least two more weeks. YEAH!
They were able to figure out the cause of the contractions, thank goodness. It turns out that it all leads back to my sinus infection last week, go figure. To get rid of the sinus infection, I took a round antibiotics. One of the side effects is that it puts me at a higher risk of a yeast infection. I didn't realize it, but I am coming down with a yeast infection, and in pregnant moms, any infection can cause contractions. Michele said that infections are the most common reasons that moms come in with pre-term contractions. Since they caught the infection early, it's not going to get too bad. I got some pills to take care of it and already the contractions are not bad. I don't think I've had any this morning so far. My next doctors appointment in on Thursday, and it's a good think that they caught the infection now because otherwise it could have gotten pretty bad by waiting a few more days. So it was a good thing we went in and didn't need to spend the night. I packed a little bag with things just in case, and I am so glad we didn't need it. We got home just before 2am and I had no problem falling asleep. :) Thanks so much to Ammon and Rachele for helping us out last night!!!
2 comments:
This post is bringing back major flashbacks! Thank goodness you are home...sometimes "overnight" in the hospital can turn into a month, as we know. I never thought I'd be so grateful to hear about an infection. I'm so glad you and baby are safe! You are seriously close to the home stretch now! Keep it up! :)
Wow! I glad you guys are still doing fine, that must have been scary. I had no idea infections could cause contractions.
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