OB Appointments | Goddess in Progress

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Day at the hospital, 30w5d

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (1)· June 28th, 2007

Yesterday was my now-weekly smorgasbord of doctor’s appointments. The short version of the story is that all was well with all three of us.

First was my 9:45 OB appointment. Yet again, my doctor was stuck on call in the hospital. Thankfully they didn’t even attempt to reschedule me, but simply had me see another doctor in the practice. He was nice, but rushed. And was kind enough to comment on both my weight and my stretch marks. Nice to meet you, too, jerkface. Yes, I’m up about 35+ pounds, but all of my other doctors don’t seem remotely concerned. In the meantime, my blood pressure is still just fine and my belly is measuring about 40 weeks. No wonder all of my maternity shirts are getting too short.

On my way out, I realized I had managed to spill a cup full of water onto my driver’s seat, and I had only a single napkin in the car. I also discovered that the driver of the Honda Odyssey to my left had parked so close that I couldn’t actually squeeze my enormous belly in between the cars. Nothing quite so graceful as a pregnant lady having to climb in the passenger side, only to sit her big behind in a nice, wet seat. I had a damp tush for the rest of the morning.

On over to the hospital for my ultrasound, where the babies had their first official biophysical profile. They scored 100%! Good test takers, clearly. They both showed good levels of amniotic fluid, practiced breathing movements, moved their little hands, and had a good kick or two. No growth estimates, we’ll check that again next week.

The non-stress test didn’t go as smoothly as last week, only because the babies were less cooperative. Their heartbeats, though clearly good and present and all of that, were harder to find and keep a lock on to track for more than two or three minutes at a time, and that with the poor nurse standing next to me holding the sensors on my belly. Alas, they were troublemakers. But what tracking they did get looked just fine, and I didn’t have any contractions while on the monitor. So after about half an hour, they decided it was good enough and sent me home. Back again next week!

I went home and was finally able to change out of my damp shorts (I swear I wasn’t leaking amniotic fluid!), huddled in my bedroom with the air conditioning for a while, and topped off my day with my very first prenatal massage. It was nothing short of delicious. I must do this again. My back has been so stiff and out of sorts, yet it feels almost impossible to get a good stretch or to crack my back. So to have someone work on my stressed muscles and aching joints for over an hour was just heaven.

That’s the update from here. Hope everyone is doing well out in pregnancy/baby land.

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Categories : Hospital, OB Appointments, Pregnancy, Ultrasounds

Tags : NST/BPP, prenatal massage

Impressive statistics

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (0)· June 22nd, 2007

Want to know the percentage of OB appointments I’ve had for this pregnancy that have been canceled? 57%

That’s right, four out of seven have been canceled the day of the appointment.

I thought I might have better luck today, since I was sitting on my couch at 2pm, about to get up and leave for my 2:30 appointment, when the phone rang. I saw the name of my OB’s office on the caller ID, and realized it was happening… again. It happened last time, as I was already out for the morning, thinking I was using my time off from work oh-so-productively. I got to keep the one before that (because I was seeing the nurse practitioner), but the one before that got rescheduled at the last minute, too.

Aside from one time being due to my OB having a cold, they always get canceled because of their ridiculous policy of scheduling office appointments on days when they’re also on call for Labor & Delivery. Shockingly, they then miss a whole ton of appointments!! It’s getting really aggravating.

I’ve decided that, now that I’m already missing a day of work every week for the ultrasounds and non-stress tests, I will not schedule my OB appointments for a time that will cause me to miss more than an hour of work. Either they can fit me in on the same day as my hospital appointments, or they can see me Friday afternoons when I’m off (yay, half-day Fridays in the summer!), or they can see me very first thing in the morning or very last thing in the afternoon.

It’s also a little annoying to keep getting put off, given I’m a relatively high-risk patient. I know they want to watch me closely for preeclampsia and other things, so it’s extra annoying to have to wait almost another week to be seen. And I even had real questions I wanted to ask, things I wanted to make sure were normal, etc, and now I have to wait again! Yes, I could call the nurse, but she didn’t return my call the last time I had a question like that, so I’m not too keen on leaving more messages.

So, that’s the story of my would-be 30 week OB appointment. If they cancel next Wednesday, I might have to have a pregnancy-induced nutty.

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Categories : OB Appointments, Pregnancy

OB Appointment, 28w

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (0)· June 9th, 2007

Had my always-brief OB appointment this afternoon. It was originally scheduled for Wednesday, but for the third time in six appointments, I got a call at 8:45am telling me my 10:30 appointment was cancelled. It’s enormously frustrating. The doctors rotate who is on call for Labor & Delivery at the hospital, but they still make appointments in the office for those days. Sometimes you get lucky and they aren’t called away, but often you don’t. It’s especially annoying, because it’s not as though I ever had much choice in the appointment time to begin with. I take whatever time they say I can have, and pretty much plan everything around that appointment. And yet, 50% of the time, it gets cancelled that morning. Ugh. I know they’re down a doctor right now because one has left and the new person hasn’t started, but still. It’s annoying.

Anyways, this afternoon went just fine. Blood pressure is still nice and low at 106/62. The pee-in-a-cup ritual is getting increasingly tricky, since my enormous belly prevents me from getting any kind of aim. Weight keeps going up, but no one seems concerned. The measurement of my belly says I’m measuring 35 weeks… theoretically bigger than my mom was when I was born! (I was a 34-weeker.) Heartbeats were good, but a little tricky to find because they kept moving.

I asked about the reflux that my TUMS can’t quite keep up with anymore, and was told Prilosec or Zantac were just fine to take daily if I want. She told me to just keep an eye on stomach discomforts. Heartburn and reflux is normal, but she said to call if I get indegestion-like pain around my ribcage (on the right side, in particular) that doesn’t go away. They’re monitoring me closely for preeclampsia (twins put me at higher risk, but so far so good), but apparently some women have more or less asymptomatic preeclampsia that only manifests in chest/GI pain. Interesting, indeed.

She then prepped me for what to expect next month. July is going to be… busy. Beginning at 32 weeks, I will be getting a non-stress test and biophysical profile every week. Both of these take place at the hospital. The NST will be in Labor & Delivery, since the equipment they have at my OB’s office can only measure one at a time, so I’d be there forever. The BPP is basically an ultrasound, so every other week, it will be done at my usual perinatologist appointments. On the “off” weeks, they’ll be done in the radiology department at the hospital. Of course, all of these appointments are in addition to my every-other-week OB appointments (which will probably become weekly if I make it to August). So that’s 2-3 appointments per week for the month of July. Good thing I’m not planning on going anywhere. As my friend said this afternoon, “when will you go to work??” It’s unclear.

Obviously it’s a good thing that we’ll be keeping such a close eye on the twins. Since things can change so quickly, it’s comforting to know that we’ll be able to catch things that might come up. And so far, news has been largely positive, so I should probably look at it as being able to get good news at least twice a week. But as always, it’s hard not to worry. I know the next couple of weeks are the main “danger zone” as far as pre-term labor goes, so naturally I’m overanalyzing every twinge and tightening. So far I’m showing no signs at all, cervix is good, etc. But still. And somehow, the talk of all of these upcoming appointments is a little bit nerve-wracking.

In the meantime, I should probably just enjoy my last month of only having doctor’s appointments every other week…

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Categories : OB Appointments, Pregnancy

Tags : heartburn, NST/BPP

OB Appointment, 25w4d

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (1)· May 23rd, 2007

Had my regular OB checkup yesterday. Before my 9AM appointment (I didn’t think they really existed!), I had to stop in on the ground floor phlebotomy lab and drink some super-sweet flat orange soda for my glucose challenge test. I then popped up to the third floor for the usual pee-in-a-cup, blood-pressure routine. My appointment was actually with the office’s nurse practitioner, who I like quite a bit. I’m measuring nearly 33 weeks, 7 1/2 ahead of my true gestation. Got to hear those beautiful heartbeats, including baby A kicking the microphone in between beats. By feel, there’s a chance she’s gone back head-down, but we’ll see tomorrow at the next ultrasound. Here’s hoping for a growth spurt.

After the (always brief) appointment, I scheduled my next for another two weeks, and went downstairs to await the great blood draw. At precisely one hour post-soda, I had three little vials of blood drawn. And it only took two pokes! She sure tried for a while to make the first one work, though. Not fun.

Completely unrelated to my doctor’s appointment, I stayed home from work for the day. Before I left, while doing the usual post-shower things like lotion and teeth brushing, I was musing on how lucky I’d been that my back hasn’t been bothering me too much. After all, I’ve long had back problems, but they’ve been mostly absent from this pregnancy. I spoke too soon. Barely finished with the thought, my back decided to spasm, in a fit of pregnancy karma. I had to hobble into the bedroom to wake my husband up to help me finish lotioning. It was quite a sight.

The pain wasn’t so awful, and it was certainly not worth missing a doctor’s appointment, but now that work is a much quieter place, it was a good day to avoid my uncomfortable desk chair. I spent the day on the couch, doing next to nothing, watching a wide variety of baby shows on Discovery Health or TLC. Not too shabby…

Fingers crossed that I’ll get good results from yesterday’s test, and not have to do the three-hour one!

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Categories : Illness and Injury, OB Appointments, Pregnancy

Tags : back pain, blood draw, gestational diabetes

OB Appointment – 21w6d

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (0)· April 26th, 2007

A relatively uneventful trip to the OB’s office this morning.

My appointment was supposed to be yesterday, but my doctor came down with a cold and had to reschedule. This is my new OB, Dr. F. I really liked my old doctor (Dr. G), but she’s leaving the practice in June. I’d consider following her, but she’s going to an office downtown and to a hospital that isn’t my favorite. And since I picked this practice largely because of their affiliation with the hospital near my house, switching seemed a little silly. Anyways, I had long figured that, if I were going to one of the downtown Boston hospitals, I was guaranteed to go into labor during rush hour and a home Red Sox game. For those unfamiliar with Boston, many of the major hospitals are located down the street from Fenway Park. No thank you.

So, now I’m seeing Dr. F. She’s in the same practice, and came highly recommended, and I wasn’t disappointed. Not that I had extensive interaction with her, but she seemed very nice and all that.

Otherwise, it was pretty uneventful. Pee in a cup, step on the scale (ha!), take my blood pressure (still nice and low). Go in the exam room, measure the belly (measuring 28 weeks… 6 weeks ahead), listen to the heartbeats. Baby Boy B is still faster than his sister. Baby Girl A was dodging the doppler as best she could, moving all around.

I did ask about how labor & delivery on-call doctors worked, and it actually looks like a pretty small likelihood that my actual doctor would deliver me, unless it’s a scheduled c-section/inducing or I just happen to get lucky on one of the days she covers the hospital. Ah well.

Next month will be my last appointment on an “every 4 weeks” basis. After that, I switch to every two weeks with the OB, plus my perinatolgist appointments. Oh, and for my next appointment, I get to do the glucose challenge test to make sure I don’t have gestational diabetes. Hope I pass!

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Categories : OB Appointments, Pregnancy

OB Appointment, 13w3d

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (0)· February 27th, 2007

Hooray, all is still well!

I had my OB appointment this morning. Well, sort of. I got a call around 9AM saying that my doctor had a patient in the hospital and they were clearing her morning. A little frustrating, but good to know that she drops things and goes to the hospital for people, not just whoever is on hospital duty that day. So, they reschedule my 10:30 appointment for 11:45 with the nurse practitioner. Fine. I like her quite a bit, and I really didn’t care as long as I got some good reassurance.

And reassurance was readily available! Though I did make quite a jump in weight this week, she didn’t seem overly concerned (as long as it doesn’t keep happening). My overall weight gain is fine, and my blood pressure had not gone up. My uterus is measuring good and large (same as would be expected for 18 weeks if it was a singleton pregnancy), and she managed to find both of their heartbeats. They were down to about 150 and 160, which was fine. The second one took a minute to find, and seemed to be swimming away from the doppler, but there they were! Hooray!

I should hear soon about the time and date of the “big” ultrasound, when we’ll get the full anatomical scan and (hopefully) find out what combination of boys and girls we’ve got. Can’t wait for that!

Since everything looked good today, we decided to spill the beans to the world. I told my bosses at work, we told the rest of our family, and we’re telling all of our friends. It’s still a little scary for me, but very fun to get everyone’s reactions.

That’s the update from here! Hope everyone else out there is doing well…

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Categories : OB Appointments, Pregnancy

Tags : weight gain

Self-Advocacy

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (2)· February 2nd, 2007

Sometimes I’m not very good at sticking up for myself.

People who know me might laugh at this statement, and it’s not 100% true. When dealing with my students, I can be a total hard-ass. When I know I’ve got backing (like a clearly stated rule, policy, etc.), I have no problem being the “bad cop.”

But when it’s more ambiguous, I’m terrible. I’m not a particularly good negotiator, I hate situations when people haggle over prices or terms, and I don’t like to come across as particularly demanding. I’m something of a dyed-in-the-wool peacemaker that way. So calling my OB’s office to try to make my ultrasound appointment earlier was somewhat stressful for me.

It shouldn’t have been. I know my OB would have no problem with it. I know that when the nurse practitioner wrote down an order for an ultrasound in two weeks, she meant “about” two weeks. I know that the scheduling people read that as “at least” two weeks, and that’s all there was to it.

But anyways, I called and left a message for my OB asking if she had any suggestions for how to make it earlier, tried to sound very nonchalant, non-urgent, etc. Someone from the office called back and said she thought I had sounded concerned, so she wanted to get right back to me. Ooops! Apparently my tone of voice, while trying hard to sound like it was no big deal, instead sounded sad and/or scared.

She checked with the nurse practitioner to make sure the earlier timing was OK, which of course was fine, and now I’m scheduled for February 9 (one week from today) in the office that I like. I got exactly what I wanted. So why do I feel a little guilty about it?

I know, especially when I’m pregnant and having been through what I have, I just need to stick up for whatever I need and not worry about how I come across. But it’s really hard for me to let go of that one. I want to be liked, I don’t want to get a reputation as an over-reacter, a demanding psycho, or generally just a crazy pregnant lady. Even though I know I have a little bit of license in the crazy department right now, I’m trying hard not to take advantage of it.

Well, now I just need to let go of that guilt, and be VERY happy that I have another ultrasound in one little week! Hooray! I’m very excited to make sure both twins are doing well. Assuming that’s the case, we might start selectively letting the cat out of the bag next weekend. I can’t wait!

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Categories : OB Appointments, Pregnancy, Ultrasounds

First Doctor’s Appointment

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (0)· January 30th, 2007

Well, I finally made it to my first official OB appointment. I’m about nine weeks, four days today. I met with the nurse practitioner (who usually does initial OB appointments), filled out a ton of forms, and talked about a couple of tests I might have done. She said I can do the nuchal translucency ultrasound if I want, but I’m at such low risk, it’s really only if I request it. I declined the AFP/triple screen blood test, because it has a pretty high rate of false positives with twins. I will, however, get a level II ultrasound (a more detailed ultrasound) at 18 weeks, so that would likely pick up something like Down’s syndrome or a neural tube defect. I did get a ton of blood drawn, checking everything from progesterone to blood sugar to HIV to whether or not I’m a carrier of the cystic fibrosis gene. That was fun, let me tell you.

But the good part is that the exam went well. My uterus is measuring more like 12 weeks, which is to be expected with twins. She even managed to pick up one of the heartbeats on doppler! We weren’t sure we’d be able to find anything at all this early, but there (quiet but strong) was one of them. She thought she might have heard another, but couldn’t get it well enough to be sure.

Anyways, things look pretty good. She said she’d schedule me for another u/s just to ease my mind in about two weeks, but the appointment the front desk found for me was with the office I don’t like and in three weeks, so I may try to call my OB tomorrow (she isn’t in on Tuesdays) and see if I can’t swing something just a little sooner. Scheduling is tricky this time of year, because I’m coming up on my busiest couple of weeks at work, so there are a bunch of days in the next month that are just out of the question.

That’s the update for now! Each positive result does take a teeny bit of the edge off of my anxiety. I don’t feel 100% great, but I probably never will and should just get used to it. But hey, this is farther than I’ve ever made it before, so for that, I’m thankful.

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Categories : OB Appointments, Pregnancy

Tags : blood draw, first trimester screening

Pregnancy #1: Post-Script

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (0)· August 7th, 2006

Boy, what a lucky girl I am! A pelvic exam and a blood draw, all in one day! Other than than, all was just fine for my checkup with the OB/GYN after the ups and downs of last month.

I discovered that, medically, what happened is not actually considered a miscarriage. My doctor said that what likely happened was that an egg was fertilized, and therefore started creating the hormones that would give a positive pregnancy test, but never actually implanted. It’s called a chemical pregnancy.

According to the website I found, it’s apparently pretty common, though most people don’t know it. That’s exactly the thought I kept coming back to: how easily I could have just not known at all. I took the test five or six days after my period “should” have come (though, being off the pill, who knows?). Just imagine if I had waited a few extra days… I would have seen the spotting and then just figured my period was being strange. This is the downside to paying as much attention as I do to these things.

Anyways, not too huge a deal, it seems, and the next time I get a positive test, I’ll be sent in for blood tests to check if hormone levels are as they should be. By the way, I did learn that a normal hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin) level by the time you miss your period is around 1000. When the nurse told me the results of my first test showed a level of around 57, I had no idea what that meant. Now I know!

In the meantime, we’re supposed to hold off on the “trying” until I get my next period, presumably to make sure everything has gotten back to normal. Well… we’ll see about that. Not that I *want* to get pregnant this cycle, but… well I’m not committed to *not* getting pregnant this cycle. I’ll let you know how that goes.

Back relatively soon, I hope…

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Categories : Miscarriage, OB Appointments

Tags : blood draw, chemical pregnancy, hCG