My Own Best Advocate

Yesterday I became acutely aware of the speed at which your emotions can swing from one extreme to another.  Wednesday was a hellish day full of fear, pain, and unknowns but it also happened so fast I had little time to digest any of it.  I was in a fog.  Then came Thursday.  After minimal sleep I woke up feeling lonely, overwhelmed and full of fear.  It dawned on me that this is the most time I'd had in a room alone since before Charlie had been born.  Sure the first couple of hours of reading were great, but that was quickly followed by an overwhelming feeling of loneliness.  This was also on the heels of missing out on trick or treating with Charlie and his buddies.  Rick did a great job of face timing me and taking pictures, but it obviously wasn't the same.  That night I did my best to compartmentalize those feelings ie block it out.  But morning came and those feelings came storming in with a vengeance.
My OB came in early that Thursday morning and as if on a whim asked, "So do you want to go home today?" What?? Yes, of course I did but I had just been told by the perinatologist the day before that I'd be in the hospital for at least a week and we'd recheck my cervix and go from there.  Now my OB wanted me to make a decision to go home based on what?  I needed Rick there to listen and help make these decisions, but unfortunately he wasn't there.  I fumbled with my words, hoping I'd made sense to her.  She seemed to flit about the room as if unaware of what I regarded to be the severity of my situation.  "Alright, well we'll just wait until Monday then."  She left.  I was alone again in my hospital bed so confused as to what had just happened.  Wasn't it her job to consult with the specialist and provide me a recommendation for care?  I spent the rest of the morning in tears over my role in all of this.  I realized then and there that I'd have to be my own best advocate which felt difficult without being an expert in pre term labor.  I immediately texted a friend who I knew would provide me some answers.
Ivory, the mom of the two little girls I nannied for the past year is all too familiar with hospital bed rest.  She delivered her first daughter Emma at 28 weeks.  I started rattling off questions via text.  Her responses immediately calmed me down and also gave me an inner strength I knew I'd been missing.  She suggested getting in contact with the specialist and reviewing the plan.  Why hadn't I thought of that?  She also reminded me to stay away from the tuna salad at lunch.  She's invaluable!  I took her advice and finally summoned the courage to talk to a nurse about my feelings.  (Why I felt nervous about this I don't really know.) But she was great and gave me the down and dirty on my OB...let's just say she doesn't seem to be easy to work with and isn't a nurse favorite.  But she promised she'd talk to the specialist and try to get him in here to see me.  I was immediately relieved.  A couple hours later in walked the doctor.  He sat down and we chatted.  We determined the best course of action was to wait it out at the hospital through the weekend, then get an ultrasound on Monday to check my cervix.  If that all came back stable he was comfortable sending me home with restrictions.
It's now Saturday and I'm feeling much more emotionally stable:-)  I'm trying not to look much past Monday.  We'll see what the ultrasound brings.  Charlie is coming to visit me this afternoon and I can't wait.  He's the light of my life. I know the twins will shine just as bright when they finally arrive.


Here's a pic from Halloween.  Charlie was too busy checking out his loot to look up.  I was so happy he got to go trick or treat with his pals Lucy and Morrison!