Weekend Hospital Shenanigans

What a crazy weekend!!!

I had my 34 week Dr.'s appt Friday morning at 9:30am. Those of you who know me well, know that this is quite early for me;) So I woke up, grabbed a string cheese and an apple and was out the door (I did shower, don't worry). By the time I got there, I'd had the string cheese and about 1/3 the apple... I was still hungry but wasn't worried because I could eat in an hour, after my appt. I was actually really excited about this appt because my blood glucose numbers were way down for the week and I was excited for my Dr's sweet, approving praise :)

For the first time, I hardly had to wait to get in (very unusual) and was greeted by my cute nurse who is due in about 2-3 weeks herself and we engaged in fun pregnancy stories and what-not. We were still talking as she took my blood pressure and when she was done, she paused and said, "Give me a minute... I need to concentrate more." After 2 more cuffs, switching arms, calling the Dr in and 5-6 blood pressure checks, they determined that my BP actually was as high as they thought (150/90... ouch!), which was a surprise to us all and informed me that I needed to drive around the block and check myself into Triage at the hospital. What the heck?! By the way, my Dr was very pleased with my glucose numbers ;)

So I left the office with the thought, "This is what it is, everything will be just fine." The second I left the double doors I LOST IT! I was bawling, knew that I had to call Scott, but didn't want to sound hysterical, so I waited in my car for 15 minutes until I was somewhat composed and called... The composure lasted all of 2 seconds. I had to leave him a message because he was with a client and cried through the whole thing. He called me back shortly and had cancelled the rest of his day to be with me :)

So I checked myself into Triage and they were really nice and told me they just needed to run a few tests and monitor my BP and the baby's heartrate. Well, the tests came back and half of them were fine and the other half not so fine. I had protein in my urine and my uric acid was high, but my liver function was great and my platelets (sp) were low (which is good). So they told me, because I was right in the middle (just like with everything in this pregnancy) they had to check me into anti-partom for 24 hrs to collect a 24-hr urine "sample" and keep my BP under close watch. They asked me at this point (1:00) if I needed anything and I told them I desperately needed to eat because of my gestational diabetes and for the simple fact that baby and I were STARVING! She assured me that as soon as I was wheeled over (yeah, no more walking for me) she would introduce me to my new nurse and they would let me order food right away (no outside food because they wanted me on their strict hospital diet).

Well we got there, and immediately they wanted me to get an ultrasound to check on baby, so I was wheeled down there, the lady informed me my bladder was too full, so I had to be wheeled back to "collect" that urine, then wheeled back again for the ultrasound. Jayna looked great, but she was making cute little "sucky" faces like she was starving and I cried again because I didn't want her to starve (I know, irrational! But I'm pregnant... it's my job). She's weighing around 5lbs 3oz (give or take a pound) and she's in the 50th percentile... Perfect!

So now it's 3:00 and I'm finally wheeled back to my room and I'm on the cusp of insanity because I need to eat (apple and string cheese didn't sustain very long) and the nurse comes in to hook me up to more monitors. I inform her I STILL haven't eaten and she made it top priority :) (I had really great nurses the whole time I was there). So we ordered a meal, which didn't get there until about 4 and it was literally 2oz of chicken, 1/2 cup of mashed potatoes, and 1/2 cup of green beans... Seriously?! I haven't eaten in 7 hrs and you're giving me a total of about 250 calories?! I about cried again, had a heart-to-heart with the dietician (who put me on a 2200 calorie specific carb count diet) and informed her that by 6:00 I would have had less than 400 calories for the day... Unacceptable! So they allowed me to order a double meal at 6:00 of a chicken salad and chicken quesadilla. They forgot to bring me my snacks, which were set up from the beginning for the night time, but my awesome friend Lesley hooked me up with some crackers that she snuck in. There you have it... my mundain bout with food for that day... You know you would have died without knowing all of that. Haha!

So, backtracking a bit, my Dr. came in at about 4:30 to talk to me before she left for the weekend and told me she wanted to put me on bedrest... NNNNOOOOO!!! So I asked her if I could still teach my voice lessons because they are my stress reliever and social outlet and she said as long as I was sitting and spacing them out so I could rest in between, she didn't see a problem. Halleluia!!! So I felt pretty good, but she did say that the Dr on call would have to make the final decision based on my BPs and test results. On Friday, my BP peaked at 156/96 and the lowest was 126/68... all over the place! She also informed me that they would be giving me steroids to help Jayna's lungs develop in case they had to deliver her this week. What?! I freaked out a bit at this point... as ready as I thought I was, I'm not ready to be a mom yet! My baby needs more time to develop! I never, ever thought I would have to have an early delivery (very rare in my family)! She also said the steroids would elevate my glucose numbers so they'd probably have to put me on insulin, as well... so much for all my hard work to not have to take it! Oh well, I'll do anything to help little Jayna at this point!

As you can probably guess, I only slept for about 2 hrs that night... So much going through my head, not to mention, lying in an uncomfortable bed and having all the water drain from your body (5 lbs worth, in fact) makes you have to go to the bathroom about once every hour... no fun! I got to sleep at about 5am and then they came in to draw my blood at 7am. I don't know what the lady that poked me did, but my arm wouldn't stop bleeding... I bled right through the bandage. Gross! By then I was WIDE awake and for some odd reason hyped up on adrenaline (or steroids) and had a ridiculous, unending energy all day!

Nurses kept accumulating in my room because (I think) Scott and I were their favorite guests :) It was like a big party all day. They would come in and I would tell stories (like I so like to do) and we would talk for an hour, until they decided they should probably get on to their other patients... We tried to make the best of the situation and had a pretty good time.

So the Dr on call came in mid-day on Saturday and said because my BP had somewhat stablized at 148/84 that day, they MIGHT (heavily emphasized) send me home, but it all depended on my 24-hr results. He did inform me that IF they sent me home, I was to do exactly what I was allowed to do at the hospital... pee and shower. Other than that, I was to be lying down or have my feet up... They didn't even allow me a wheelchair ride to tour the NICU. So I asked if I was allowed to attend church... "Absolutely not! The good Lord will understand!" and when I said I just needed to find a substitute to play the piano for me, he made it ABSOLUTELY CLEAR that I was to not touch the piano for the rest of my pregnancy. :(  There went my dreams of teaching! I had to call all my students and inform them that I wasn't allowed to teach anymore and that now I may have to take more than a month off... Gulp! "Ouch" to not being able to see and chat with them, "ouch" to all the breakthroughs we had last week that hopefully won't go away, and "ouch" financially!!! This really is the hardest part for me! I'm kind of a work-a-holic! The other REALLY hard part is having to rely fully on other people to do things that I feel perfectly capable and energetic enough to do... my independant side will definitely struggle with this one!

So, finally at 5:00 Saturday night, my urine test came back and the proteins were at 4500 and they are supposed to be under 4000... I'm officially preeclamptic! They did send me home and Scott has been fabulous, as always! I've been put on a low sodium (and still low-carb) diet, which makes it a bit difficult because Scott knows very little about nutrition. I'm trying to come up with an easy menu that he can have ready for me to grab while he's at work and so he doesn't have to be in the kitchen the whole time he is home.

What I do have to say about this whole situation is that EVERYTHING has fallen into place for it all to work out. Magically, the night before my Dr's visit, I thought to myself, "Too bad I can't take August off instead of September" because many of my students were having to cancel in August, but have a more steady schedule in Sept. Magically, Scott is completely booked up on hours in August after struggling for months to get hours... Which is a blessing financially, but a curse seeing as he has to take care of me. Magically, Jayna was measuring small for months and had a huge growth spurt 2 weeks ago taking her from the 14th percentile to the 50th. My Dr was talking about inducing a week early anyways because of my gestational diabetes and assured me she would take all precautions to make sure Jayna was ready. If I had been hospitalized even a week later, they would have more than likely made me deliver during that stay at 35 weeks (talk about overwhelming)! Now, I'm given a chance to be on bed rest in the comfort of my own home and have the chance to hopefully make it to 36 or hopefully 37 (full-term) weeks before they deliver. They told me that if I can keep my BP down and be really good and make it to 37 weeks, more than likely everything will be able to go well and I won't need a c-section and Jayna should be developed enough so there won't be any major complications.

I'm soooo grateful for all of you who've kept us in your prayers and for all of your support in every way! I know that Heavenly Father is watching over us! Even though I'm extremely overwhelmed by the thought of meeting my little girl possibly in the next few weeks, I'm absolutely excited and know that everything will work out for the best!

Love you all!!!

Ants! Ants Everywhere!

AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!! So I went into the kitchen to get some left-over birthday goodness, and guess what?! I know, the title gives it away... Ants had completely overtaken my kitchen!!! This is so irritating! We keep a very clean kitchen... Never keep food out unless it's well covered, always wipe off the countertops and do the dishes within a reasonable amount of time. Does this seem to matter? No!

I've decided this is how the person who came up with the delicatessen of chocolate covered ants did it. He left a bowl of chocolate on his countertop one day and came back to it and it was swarming with ants... He loved his chocolate so much that he refused to throw it out so he just ate it with the ants. Someone caught him and pointed out how disgusting it was, so instead of owning up to the grossness, he just called it a delicatessen and it became a thing. There you have it... My version of the story!

Scott did some snooping and discovered that there is no sealant at the bottom of our siding, so ants are marching by the thousands up behind the siding, crawling up the woodwork, going across the wiring and coming out our electrical outlets... Good times! Yet another project to prolong getting started on our basement. We sprayed like crazy, but if anyone has any other great, pregnancy-safe suggestions, please let us know!

Happy Birthday and Anniversary to me :)

These last four days have spoiled me rotten! On the 14th, I had an awesome baby shower for Jayna and got so many great things! Then that night, Scott and I went out for our anniversary (which was the 15th) and exchanged gifts afterwards. Now, I have to tell you about Scott and his gift giving. His main love language (on the giving aspect) is definitely gift giving... He has been absolutely giddy the last few weeks about giving me my anniversary and birthday gifts! So much so, that he had a really hard time waiting until the actual days to give them to me. I must say, I know why he gets so excited... He puts sooooo much thought into his gifts and he'll remember an off-the-cuff comment you made like 7 months ago. This is awesome, except for two small problems: 1) He has a really hard time staying within the budgets that we set for such occassions and 2) He is the hardest person in the world to shop for because everything I can think to get for him is like $400 over budget or absolutely boring, which makes me look like a shmuck whenever we exchange!!!

So, for our anniversary I was trying to think of things that he might have wanted/needed, but we never acted upon. I was pretty happy with my gift to him, until I saw his excitement for what he got for me. I ended up getting him nice new headphones for his computer (his other ones were falling apart), an accordian case for all of his paperwork for work, and a huge Costco bag of M&M's (his favorite... They're already half-way gone, I'm sure). Then he told me what he got me... I couldn't open it because it wasn't openable. He took the sewing maching I got from my mom years ago (a very nice, but old machine) and is having it completely refurbished! I am soooo excited! I've been so bored since I quit working at BSU and have been looking for hobbies. He was talking about how he's excited because I can practice sewing on baby items and if they don't turn out, it's no big deal because these things don't have to last that long anyways. I've not been great at sewing in the past, but I think it was mainly because the machine was having issues and my bobbins would always tangle and what not, but I'm really excited to get creative with this gift and learn a new craft!

Then we come to today, my birthday! Mind you, we're having a baby so we set our bday budget at $50... Well, the gift Scott got me for my birthday (he would settle for nothing less) cost a lot more than $50, so what did he do? He saved up his allowance (yes, we have a small allowance each month) so he could buy me this gift. He came into the room this morning when I was still sleeping and basically woke me up because he was dying to give me this gift... Haha! I, being a very patient person, and wanting something to look forward to for the rest of the day, made him wait until tonight... This is sooooo backwards!
So I taught my lessons for the day (which were all awesome lessons -- tons of breakthroughs today) and on my break, Scott walked in with flowers and a balloon... Sweet! I love getting flowers! Then when I was done for the day I got to open my gift -- wait for it -- an Android Tablet!!! I'm sooooo excited! I'm not very technologically inclined, but I'm really excited for this! My computer is quite old and having a lot of issues, so it's hard for me to have my whole life on it anymore and playing any kind of games has become too much for my computer. Well, now I don't have to worry about that! I'm so excited to have something new to play with (and something so mobile)! Sadly, the upper right corner of the touch screen doesn't work so we have to return it and get another, so it will be a bit before I can play with it, but I'm not complaining!

Do I feel way too spoiled? Yes! Not to mention multiple birthday wishes from awesome friends and family and birthday money from both sets of parents! Normally, I would feel a bit guilty for being so showered, but I realize that here in about 6 weeks, it will never be about me ever again... Cute little Jayna will become the center of it all! So, for today, I'm basking in my spoiled-ness! Jayna did decide to make herself known today amidst celebrating... I felt my first Braxton Hicks contraction. Freaked me out at first, but all is well :) She just wanted her moment ;)

First Year

Being almost 33 weeks pregnant and unable to do many of the things I used to enjoy doing (mainly because I have no energy in this 100 degree weather), I've been trying to think of hobbies to occupy my time. I then remembered that once upon a time I had a blog, but that blog is a health motivational blog... Seeing as I've completely let myself slide this first year of marriage, I would feel guilty even thinking of posting in that blog. So I thought, hmmm, I bet everybody would just love to read about my life and random thoughts, so I'm going to write about the life and times of us Bakers! I know you're excited (all two of you reading this)...

So, here I am on our 1-year anniversary thinking to myself, "I feel like Scott and I have known each other FOREVER!" and at the same time thinking, "How on earth has this first year of marriage gone so fast?!" and "How has so much happened in one single year?!"

Being my OCD self, I immediately started organizing and categorizing my recollections of this past year in my brain, and realized that I should probably record these thoughts for future posterity and figured this blog was probably the way to get me excited about that. Here goes:

Major events of this last year:

• Marriage to Scott July 15th, 2011
• My back goes out July 22nd and stays out until October 15th -- Boy, was that fun!
• Honeymoon to Hawaii's (Big Island) Wai Kaloa Hilton-- Incredible! (Other than my back being out) Haha!
• I had a fever of over 100 (up to 104 for two days) for two weeks at the beginning of October with no explanation from doctors
• 3rd week of October - I'm finally free from all of my ailments! Wahoo!
• October 26th - Got a new nephew, Kimball (Lance and Becky's)... So stinkin' cute!
• November 6th - Scott has an ER visit -- His turn! Takes a few months to recover mentally and financially!
• December 28th (?) - Got a new nephew, Isom (Kempton and Bonnie's)... Also, so stinkin' cute!
• In December, I start to notice that out of nowhere I'm extremely competitive and angry... What the junk?
• January 2, 2012 - I did my first workout in a long time and laid on the floor bawling after the warm-up portion of my video because I'm so depressed about how far I've let myself slide.
• January 3rd - Laid in bed bawling that night because of my 50lb weight-gain over the last year... Then realized I was way too emotional about everything and cried some more. Then got really motivated to get back on the bandwagon to get those 50lbs back off.
• January 5th - Found out I was pregnant (as of December 1st). Haha! That explains everything! So much for my motivation to lose weight... Hopefully it will come back after baby is born!
• In February (I'll have to ask specific dates :s) Grandma Lance passed away. I sobbed for an entire weekend because I was picturing her back with my Grandpa Lance and happy a full of life again.
• In April (again, forgot the specific date) Aunt Carolyn passed away. After her ridiculous health struggles, I was again glad that she could be free from all of her pain. I always admired her positive attitude and sense of humor despite her struggles. What a great woman!
• April 24th - Find out that our new little one will be a GIRL - Jayna Lynn!
• May 2nd - Scott starts his new job as a PSR. What a blessing, except his ridiculous management team!
• May 14th - My last day working at BSU as an accompanist after 11 years. Very bittersweet! Still teaching voice though (would never forgive myself if I quit that)
• June 15-17th - Cox family reunion and baby shower... Fun times, but the last time I'm travelling while pregnant!
• July 14th - Boise baby shower... Way fun!
• Spaces in between? Pure boredome... I'm not good with down time!

Bored yet? Sure hope not because now I get to post what I've learned in this crazy, eventful year:

• First off, I've learned that no matter how much you think you have your life put together, there will always be trials to test your boundaries, your faith, and to keep you humble.
• Marriage is wonderful! One of the reasons is because as you go through trials, you have someone by your side helping you with your trials and loving you despite your trials.
• Marriage is difficult! One of the reasons is because as your spouse goes through trials, you realize that those trials are also your trials. Therefore, you have twice as many trials, but twice the help to get through them. The difficult part for us this year has been to remain positive despite the rough start.
• I've learned that being single for almost 32 years (for me) and 31 years (for Scott) was such a blessing (though it didn't seem that way at the time)... We both learned so much in those years that prepared us to be a better spouse for one another and wouldn't give that up for anything. The greatest admiration we have for each other, is the other's ability to empathize... I can't imagine being married to someone without this incredibly important attribute!
• Despite my efforts to keep ties with friends, it's next to impossible to do when you're creating the strongest, longest lasting, and most important tie. The realization that your friends will come and go hit me hard (being a person who has a hard time letting go), but I'm so grateful for an incredible family and husband that will always be there! This is not saying I don't love my friends to death and that I won't continue to keep ties... I just had the realization this year that most people have right after high school. I'm a little slow.
• I've learned that back pain and pregnancy totally change a person... I keep joking that Scott has yet to be married to the girl he married. But then again, having a child changes a person, so we'll just continue changing together throughout the rest of our lives. Goodbye old Jerusha, hello new Jerusha. Hopefully I can make these "progressive" changes rather than "digressive" changes.
• Most importantly, I've learned that I married the perfect man for me! It has seemed through this year that our strengths and weaknesses have perfectly complimented each other. We've definitely had the trials to test this. I'm so grateful for Scott's ability to always make me smile (even during all of my hormonal sob-fests), his fascination and drive to help and love everyone around him, and his incredible gift of communication... There's nothing that we can't/don't talk about.

So there you have it, a year's worth of brain-dump. Don't worry, all posts won't be this long! It will also be much more exciting in the future as my sis-in-law Becky teaches me the blogging ropes. I'll be able to do pictures and all sorts of fun stuff!