Wednesday 9 October 2013

28 Weeks (10/09/13)

What an interesting week of appointments.  On September 29 I went in for my blood work to be done for Crohn’s and Gestational Diabetes.  On Tuesday I get a call from my general physician, Dr B.  I got stressed to no end thinking he got the results and is calling me in sooner than seeing my OB because it was positive for Diabetes.  They wouldn’t tell me what it was over the phone, so I had to go in for a rush appointment.  (He was going on Vacation as of Thursday.)  So I get an appointment for the same day, had to leave work early, so did Deb because we were car pooling, and when making the appointment, I had forgotten I didn’t have the car that day.  Buggar.  We get to the appointment a bit late because of traffic, and the receptionist wasn’t too pleasant about it, even though we called to explain we would be late.  Once in with Dr B, he rushed me in because I’m anemic.  I all ready F#%*ng know that.  I’m trying various forms of iron.  Alas he had me try yet another version of supplements.  (Didn’t work).  He was looking at the paperwork from the gastrologist (Dr. W) but didn’t have the results for the Diabetes yet.  Are you kidding me, we rushed and stressed and missed work to find out something I all ready knew.  He also had concerns that I might have arthritis as something was inflamed.  At which point, I asked for a copy of my blood work.  After investigating the results, I figured it was my Crohn’s that was inflamed, and would discuss with Dr. W the following week. 

On Monday I saw my gastrologist, Dr W. for Crohn’s.  That day I was seeing two specialist at the opposite ends of the city.  The first appointment was supposed to be at 8:45, which in theory left plenty of time to get to my following appointment at 10:30.  Well, the receptionist at Dr W had double booked time and she had a meeting until 9:30.  Needless to say I didn’t get in to my appointment until 9:45.  On the upside my blood work is looking good.  The high levels of inflammation were within acceptable levels for pregnancy. 

From there I quickly made it to my next appointment, luckily traffic was good.  That is the benefits of not travelling during rush hour.  The next appointment was with the Problems in Pregnancy clinic with Dr H.  I was more excited about this appointment because my asthma is getting worse and they would be dealing with that.  Originally I thought this appointment was going to be relatively on time, and get to work at a decent time.  Nope, that was not the case.   The nurse took me in almost right on time. She did my weight, and blood pressure, both not too bad.  Then I waited for the doctor to come in.  After about 20 minutes I saw Dr H’s partner doctor who was helping that day.  We went over most of the concerning issues and questions they had. 

One of the major benefits of that appointment was, I got to get my Gestational Diabetes results two days sooner.  I do NOT have Gestational Diabetes.  Woohoo. 

The appointment went fairly well, but the partner doctor wouldn’t go over any of the options until Dr H reviewed the information.  So I had to wait again.  This time it was about an hour and a half.  By this time I was starving.  I hadn’t had any snacks, thinking this appointment would be quick, so I had just eaten breakfast.  Snicker Joe was starting to come out, as it was after 12:30 by the time the two doctors came back in.  Apparently there was a medical emergency that morning which put everything behind. 

We went over everything and the main point Dr H was drilling that I was not happy about was my weight gain.  She didn’t like that I drank my calories having prune juice with iron tablets to help with constipation.  She instantly lumped me in the horrible eater category because of my weight, and of course blamed my constipation on the fact I don’t drink enough water.  I do know I need to get more exercise, but as my asthma is getting worse it is getting even harder to want to walk with the anticipation of a major coughing fit.  Not once did she ask how much I actually drink, nor did she ask what it was I eat on a regular basis.  The hopeful silver lining to this appointment was the fact they are changing up my inhalers to improve my asthma, in theory. 

Once in the car I started to inhale my lunch, and ended up snacking most of the afternoon.  Changing up my morning eating routine messed up my entire day. 

From that appointment I went directly to Walmart to get the new prescriptions filled.  At Walmart they didn’t have some of the items in stock, so I needed to pick everything up the next day. 

At work I started to discuss more definite dates for my Maternity leave with my bosses.  Based on generally a clean bill of health I had figured I would be able to work until December 20th.  In my mind that was great news, almost an extra month of full income, as I had figured I would stop working December 1st due to medical leave for one reason or another.  My immediate boss was ok with things, bringing in my replacement third week in November and then us both working the month of December.  The next up boss had some slight issues with the scheduling of things and not getting proper notice if I go on medical leave if needed, which is why we wanted to bring in my replacement as early as we had figured.  After a slight brief discussion the higher up boss left having to “noodle” about this, meaning she had to talk to a lawyer and or read up on medical leave.  I wasn’t having the best of days and this fueled for me to be disgruntled perpetuated by pregnancy hormones.  By the time I got home I was fuming, the door wasn’t open so I had to hunt for my keys, with my hands full, which I ended up dropping things, then the dogs were jumping up and poking their claws in my leg, dinner wasn’t on the go, and even though I had been snacking most of the afternoon I wasn’t wanting to wait long for dinner.  All very trivial things that normally would have been no problem, but hormones were making a mountain out of a few small mole hills. 

We all ended up going out for dinner to a buffet and slowly I calmed down.  Needless to say we didn’t get a lot done that night.

That brings us to today’s appointment with my OB, Dr C.  My blood pressure was good, I had only gained .4kg since the last appointment, I had figured everything was good to go, and wanted to discuss maternity leave with a bit more certainty, making sure working till December 20th was ok.  As soon as I brought up leave, she said I should be stopping work now.  With high blood pressure, the more pregnant I get the worse it can be, and if it goes off the rails things can go wrong trying to get my blood pressure back to normal.  This totally blindsided me.  I mentioned I have a low stress desk job, but she thinks I should start medical leave as soon as possible.  I told her that I still had to train a replacement and probably the earliest I would be able to stop working would be early November. She agreed that it “should” be ok for me to continue to work that long, but not much longer.

Once back at work, I talked it over with my immediate boss and we came up with approximate dates to work with while talking with the higher up boss, provided my replacement can start that early.  We had called my replacement saying she got the job on Monday, and then gave tentative dates on Tuesday.  However we are now moving things up about a month.  My replacement is pretty flexible but she does have to give notice where she is working now. 

In the end, my tentative medical leave will start November 8th ish, depending on the start date of my replacement, as cautious medical leave, and so I can start to see the home nurses frequently.  Other than take my blood pressure, I’m not sure what they do.  

Here is week 27 belly photo.



The belly is starting to come in, but still mostly just look like I’ve gained weight.

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