Day One in the hospital

Not a full day, granted, but I want to keep track of what goes on in here, especially since I hope to be here for a nice, long while. At least two weeks. Before the babies are born, that is.

So we checked in around 11 (I mean, I was admitted – it’s not a hotel, after all) and my doctor came in to say hello shortly thereafter. The nurse who brought me in showed me around and I got changed into a gown while George set up the computer for internet access (priorities!)

I had my first session of attempting to monitor all three babies’ heartbeats at the same time. Not easy. Hardly even possible. So after about an hour, the nurses gave up. My blood pressure was also checked during this time. It wasn’t great, but not horribly high, either.

A little while later, a resident came in and checked to see how I was feeling. Everyone here is really nice, I have to say. Later, because we weren’t able to get the heartrates for 20 minutes total, she brought in an u/s machine and checked them out. Babies are fine. Always good to hear. 🙂

The rest of the day included such highlights as lunch (ick), dinner (better), a salad from Whole Foods brought by George (best) and some chocolate (heaven!) Teresa and Jon and Gareth also stopped by. Tee brought me some goodies in my new favorite scent from Bath & Body Works which was v sweet.

Oh yeah, turns out I have the best room on the floor! It’s private (whew), pretty big, and even has a little foyer. Tee hee! Good stuff. I’m also loving this hospital bed. I need one at home. So handy that you can sit up and read and not need a gajillion pillows. It was v hot in here, but the windows open a bit, and we brought a fan. So now I’m even a tad chilly.

Tomorrow the highlight of my day will be the end of 24 hours of urine collection (heh) and finding out the results of that, and bloodwork. Woot!

Eep!

Well, now it’s time for some excitement!

Went to the doctor yesterday, and based on several factors, he is admitting me tomorrow for the duration. Hopefully that duration is at least two weeks, but we’ll see. My blood pressure is starting to creep up, my ankles are just getting more and more swollen, and (here’s the fun one) I gained 17 lbs in 11 days. So, yeah, it’s time.

As soon as he walked in the room after reviewing my bp, weight gain, etc, George and I both knew what he was going to say. You could just tell by the look on his face that he wasn’t giving me great news. But really, I don’t consider it bad news. I’m happy to do whatever to make this pregnancy last as long as possible. It definitely sucks not to be at home, but it’s a small price. Goodness knows I’ve had it very easy compared to most of the stories I read about triplet pregnancies.

So today, some friends are coming over to visit, I need to pack, and George and I will spend some time together alone. (Mostly I will just make him scratch my back for several hours to make up for all of the scratch-free nights I have ahead of me.)

Thank goodness the hospital has wireless access, so I will still be posting and all that. Woo!

PS Funny – the doc measured my belly, and if I were having just one, I’d be 47 weeks pregnant! tee hee! Silly.

Thanksgiving

Can you believe it’s Thanksgiving week already? Can you believe I’m 31 weeks pregnant? I only have THREE TO FIVE weeks left! That’s twenty-one to thirty-five days, people! (Actually, since it’s Monday, it’s really 20-34 days.) No sooner than 20 days, though. No way.

Tomorrow I’m going into the office for a bit to do some work and then it’s the office Thanksgiving. Yum! I’m bringing a premade apple pie. Hope no one minds. At least it was fresh at the grocery store, not a frozen one.

And then Emily’s coming to visit, along with Jenny and Rob too. And at some point this week I’ll get to see Kristie…and Renny…and baby Chloe…and Maura…so fun!

Thursday we’re actually having Thanksgiving dinner at our house. And we’re doing the turkey. But don’t worry. I’m not doing anything except telling George what to do. I will not be lifting a 14 lb turkey! Mom and Jenny et al are bringing the rest of the food. Mmmm….

Have a doctor’s appointment on Friday. Uh oh. Day after a big feast. Thank goodness I’m supposed to be gaining weight!

Now it’s time for a bitch session!
– hands are numb and swollen. Be thankful for this post, it’s dang hard to type now.
– heartburn is evil. And nothing seems to help. Except Tums, but only briefly.
– restless legs are v annoying.
– I barely fit behind the wheel of my car. Ha!
– Knees are killing me.
– George laughs at me every time I try to get off the couch. Okay, I’m sure it is a comical sight, but hmmmmmph!

On the other hand, George is being so incredibly helpful and he won’t let me do anything, so I will let him get away with the laughing. 🙂

Now, for fun, I got around to posting the video from our first ultrasound on YouTube. It’s quite entertaining. 😀

Woo!

Woo hoo! Found out last night that I do not have Gestational Diabetes! If you know me, you know this is a big deal – I honestly don’t know how I’d survive without sugar. Clearly, my years of training by being a sugar fiend have paid off! Heh. My doctor even said I passed the glucose tolerance test “with flying colors”! Woo!

In a complete topic change, I just want to alert those out there who will be visiting and helping out with the babies – please get a flu shot. I’m letting you know now so that you have time to get it before they come. I’ll write a longer post about it later, but it’s just one of the ways we are going to have to try to prevent the babies from contracting RSV, a very dangerous disease in preemies.

If you want to read more about it, here are some websites:

RSVprotection.com
RSVinfo.com
RSV at the March of Dimes website

So, you get the point…it’s dangerous for teeny babies. Flu shots are easy! Two seconds!

And in yet other news, Emily’s coming in tonight!!! Yaaaay!

Nursery pics

Nursery is almost done! Thank you Kristina for helping so much this past week. I think she’s in the wrong line of work. Professional organizing would be much more her speed.

Going from left to right, from the doorway:

Nursery

Nursery!

Changing table

The third crib

And more random shots:
Crib 1

Cribs 1 and 2

The new chair!
New chair

And the bathroom is now chock full o’ storage (and bath stuff)
Organized bathroom!

Bathroom organization

11/13/07

Sorry I haven’t been posting much. Kristina is in town and between work and hanging out with her, I haven’t had much time for anything. But we’ve got the house in a state of high organization. It’s v exciting.

Today is our 2nd anniversary! Yay! We didnt’ do anything since we went out to eat last week, so it’s kind of anticlimactic. But still. Yay us! Hee.

I also had an appointment with the MFM. Dare I say it was slightly…boring? But only in the best way.

Took the glucose test (don’t know the results yet, dear god I hope I passed!) and then went in to see my doctor. Babies look good (didn’t get their weights, I forgot to ask, but he didn’t mention them, so that’s good), my cervix is “a role model cervix”, nice, long, and closed (sorry to the squeamish, but this is a big deal), my blood pressure was fine, etc, etc, etc.

Babies are so cute – we got some great face shots. All babies are head-down (which makes not a whit of difference in my circumstances, just saying) but some of them have their feet by their heads. Silly kids. 🙂 I will have George scan the pics we got later so you can see. We saw hair on Baby B, which doesn’t surprise me at all – George and I are both pretty hairy, after all. Heh.

I guess that’s about it…I go back a week from Friday, but just for a checkup. I won’t see them again on u/s until December 10 – if I make it that long. That’s 34 weeks! Yow! I hope I make it that long!

Soooo…yeah. Good appointment!

11/7/07

Oh yummmmmmmy. George and I just got back from our anniversary dinner, even though the actual date isn’t until Monday. We’re celebrating early since Kristina is coming tomorrow for a week (wahoo!)

We went to a restaurant called Clancy’s, and the service was great and the food was great and the atmosphere was…great. (Need new adjectives.) Let me describe my delicious meal…

First, I had a salad of lump crabmeat (a TON of it) over a bed of mixed greens, and a creole mustard-caper dressing. Oh holy cow. I mean, there was a TON of crabmeat. Almost literally. I swear. It was so good. Then for my entree, I had scallops in a butter sauce with mashed potatoes and vegetables. They were fancy mashed potatoes, of course. I think she mentioned truffle oil, but I don’t know about that. Anyway, the scallops were huge and amazing. I loooove scallops. For dessert, we split their house specialty dessert, a lemon icebox pie. It was sooo good.

George had a white bean and andouille sausage soup and an amazing pork tenderloin with mashed sweet potatoes and vegetables. Holy crap, that pork was good. I don’t order it in restaurants, but that dish would have changed my mind. Sooo good.

The waitress was nice enough to have the bartender make me a faux Cosmopolitan, so I even felt somewhat normal for a bit. Torturously, they sat us in the “wine room”, which is lined in wine bottles. Sigh. So tempting.

After dinner, we met some friends out at a neighborhood bar, where I had a rare glass of wine. On top of so much food, I didn’t feel guilty for a bit. It was so good (and probably crap wine, even.)

So tomorrow night Kristina’s coming in. Yay! I am v v v excited. Woo!

11/5/07

Let me post really quick before I need to log in for work…Blogger will be blocked after that.

Weekend was fun. Spent Saturday in Hammond with Ren, Gary, and Alison. We hung out, and saw Bee Movie. It wasn’t bad. Better than I expected, esp with all of the hype going on around it.

I left around 4:30, then we went to a barbecue at Steph’s house. Mmm, ribs. Yum.

Well. I get a call early Sunday morning saying that SOMEONE went into labor late Saturday night and then proceeded to HAVE A BABY a few hours later. (I won’t say names, you know. I’ll let her tell. You know.) I just can’t believe I was with her mere hours before this all happened! (Dangit, did I tell?)

Anyway, baby girl has yet to be named, but I’ve seen a picture, and she’s as cute as can be. I can’t wait to see her! We’ll be visiting next weekend, Kristina and I.

So yesterday I was 29 weeks. Woo! One more week til 30! Actually, six days now! And a week from today is our second anniversary. Can you believe it? We’re going to go out to eat tomorrow night to celebrate. Mmmmm. Food.

Okay, must work!

11/1/07

I do want to post more, but my fingers are so darn stiff! It’s really hard. Ugh. But post I will! I will persevere!

Today is my first day not going into the office. Though, technically that’s tomorrow, since today is a holiday. Today I’m going to get my car inspected, get my eyes examined, and go buy another pair of lounging pants, since that’s what I’ll be doing from here on out.

I’m going to order some new glasses, too, since I figure I won’t be putting in my contacts much once the babies are born. So may as well have some new glasses, eh? That’ll be fun. I like new glasses.

Kristina will be here in less than a week! Yippee! I can’t wait. It’s going to be nice to get so much done around here, and to have company during the day – even though of course I’ll be working as well.

Last night, we went on a “hayride” around the neighborhood with some of the kids. A friend put some bales of hay in a trailer that he hitched to his SUV. It was v fun. I dressed as a pregnant woman. Heh. So creative. It was really fun, though.

28 weeks!

28 weeks! I meant to post this yesterday, when I hit the big milestone.

I can’t believe there are only 6-8 more weeks (KNOCK ON WOOD) of this. But it’s so comforting to know that if the babies did decide to make their entrance earlier (NOT THAT THEY’RE ALLOWED TO) they’d more than likely be fine, for the most part.

Let’s see, what can I complain about? My numb hands? Yeah, that’s getting pretty old. But I guess I’m getting used to it. I had to start wearing this highly attractive belt thing to support my big ol’ belly. Actually, I’m not complaining about that. It’s pretty handy and it seems to help with the discomfort of carrying an extra 40 lbs on my torso. I will complain about my knees, though. They’re starting to ache a bit.

In better news, Wednesday is my last day of coming into the office. I’ll be working from home starting Friday (Thursday is a holiday for us) which I think will be good for me. I ordered a table to use as a desk while sitting on the sofa, which I hope will work out well.

Went to a Halloween party on Saturday night. I’ll post a picture of my costume when I get a picture from someone who brought a camera. It was a good costume in theory, if I wasn’t thrilled about the execution of
it. Ah well.

Next big milestone….30 weeks!

Books, books, and more books

>I have really good friends. Sometimes it’s hard to take it all in, you know? The kindness of people?

On Wednesday, I got two packages in the mail. One was from a friend of a friend – this is a girl I’ve never even met! But she sent me three adorable little ducky outfits for the triplets. She didn’t need them anymore, so I was the lucky recipient. Too bad they don’t fit me, they look comfy. tee hee! Thanks Beth! 🙂

The other package was from a group of friends I have that live all over the country. The box was big and heavy (don’t worry, I didn’t move it.) I open it up, and what do I see?

The box was completely full of children’s books. Full to the brim. Almost 100 books. These girls had gotten together and sent me their favorite books from their childhood or their own kids’. It was amazing, and there were so many books in there that I loved as a kid (or during my stint as a children’s bookseller at B&N.)


Between these books, another box from another friend that came yesterday, and the books I got from my showers, these babies are going to be very literate and well-read (to).