Icy Trip to L&D

As I'm making pancakes for Christopher and I this morning I start feeling funny.  Brush it off...get a drink of water...nahhh. It's nothing.  Then my peripheral vision completely goes and I get huge bands of wavy silvery lines in my sight and I can hardly see anything at all.  I sat down; which actually made me super nauseous...(but probably kept me from fainting) and my vision went away even more -- from dime sized holes to absolutely nothing.  Totally scary experience.  After a minute I could see again -- but barely.  Nothing if I looked directly at the object and no peripherals...still had the huge silvery bands.  Thank goodness it happened on a weekend and Robert was home so we could go in right away. 

Big thanks to a wonderful neighbor who was able to watch Christopher for us today!  It had to be the worst day to go to the hospital...while it looked like it was just snowing a little outside, we got out to the car and it was completely iced over. (Really awesome when your 45 degree driveway is also iced and you're 6 months pregnant)  We got to the hospital and went up to L&D where they hooked me up to the monitors to make sure Ryan was ok...I was really nervous because during the episode he started flipping and moving like I've never felt him do before.  As soon as they put the heartrate monitor on and we heard his strong little heartbeat, I felt so much better.  They did a rudimentary eye test on me (which I flunked because I had no peripherals!) and decided to send me for a head CT scan.  We got the low-down on radiation exposure to the baby and they weighed the odds and strongly advised me to do it.  (Exposure was <1 and up to 6 is considered "safe" during pregnancy.  It also wasn't a direct scan on my abdomen and they covered me up with the lead vest.)  The contrast dye that they injected made me feel like I peed my pants...it was gross!  And I don't think Ryan liked it much either.  It does pose a risk to the baby's thyroid gland...but it's rare and something they can detect immediately after birth.  Thankfully the CT scan came back clean!

If you're prone to fainting before pregnancy...you're MORE prone to fainting during pregnancy.  With my heart condition, they're thinking it's just a simple case of that and the doctor gave me some tips on how to avoid it and what to do if it happens again.  He says as my uterus continues to grow, it will keep pushing on the major vein that affects blood supply.  My fuzzy vision is the side effect of my body nearly fainting and that if it happens again to sit down (preferably lay down) so blood can get to the brain.  Rx : rest.  I'm taking a short dinner / blog break now and am planning on going back to have an early bedtime tonight!

I do miss my little man so much, though...I know he's fine and having a fun time at his sleepover...it's just so weird without him  =(    Hopefully I wake up tomorrow feeling 100% refreshed and better.  Very thankful that both the baby and I are fine and it's nothing serious.