ahhh, pregnancy -- now complete with bed rest!

Still pregnant, but just by a hair if that's possible. The morning started off pretty stressfully -- I was six or seven minutes down the road, on the way to my doctor's appointment, when I realized that, although I had packed my hospital bag, LM's diaper bag, a book to read, lunch for work and my co-workers' thank-you notes, I had in fact forgotten the most important thing: the Great Golden Jug of Urine I had dutifully collected and refrigerated for the preceeding 24 hours. As I was pulling out of my driveway after retrieving said jug, my "Low Fuel" light came on -- I love it when Joe drives my car to work and then decides not to fill up the tank for me -- so I had to stop for gas, too. I was so sure I was going to be late for my doctor's appointment, considering that the office is located on a very popular rush-hour traffic route, but somehow I made it there with a few minutes to spare.

I was called back, turned in my "gift" (the nurse's word, not mine, I much preferred the Jug of Mass Destruction), was weighed and had my BP taken. It was 160/98. After 500 mg had been added to my daily dose of blood pressure medicine on Friday, bringing the total to 1500 mg of Aldomet a day.

The doctor toyed with the idea of sending me right to the hospital, but then he decided to try a week of bed rest first: 6 to 8 hours a day of laying on my side and resting. Under no circumstances, he told me, should I be working. He said this is "classic, textbook" gestational hypertenstion: Even though I'm feeling fine -- physically the best I've felt in a few weeks, actually -- my blood pressure is starting to become unmanageable and will most likely continue to do so until they'll have no choice to induce me early to avoid any complications with the baby's growth and development. He said the doctors all joke about women who have gestational hypertension, saying it's not a matter of if they'll be delivered early, but when. I was like, ha ha funny joke. "The good news," he said, "is that you look much better in person than you do on paper -- not swollen or sick at all." And I was like, thanks...that means a lot.

So, that's the current plan: bed rest for the rest of this week, and another appointment on Friday to determine the next move. If the bed rest hasn't helped bring my blood pressure down by then, I'll most likely be induced on Monday the 12th. If the rest does help my BP, the doctor said he'd like to give it another week, just to give LM as much of a chance to grow and mature as possible. In the meantime, I'll continue to have my NSTs to make sure LM isn't being affected by the sudden increase in BP.

I had a few loose ends to tie up at work, so I went in there for a couple of hours after my doctor's appointment. I explained the situation to my managers, and they were very understanding -- as they have been throughout my entire pregnancy. I said goodbye to my co-workers, locked up all my files, set up my "out-of-office" message on my e-mail and updated my voice mail to say I'd be out on maternity leave until August. It felt weird leaving work like that, knowing I'll be gone for so long, especially since it happened a couple of weeks before I expected it to. Now, there's nothing left to do before the baby comes except hang out on the couch with some good books and the remote while Joe waits on me hand and foot. That really doesn't sound so bad to me right now, especially since I am pretty tired a lot of the time. I'm feeling very at peace with this whole situation, although I'm sure that may change as the week progresses. Some relaxation will be nice; it just sucks that it's so beautiful outside, and I'm stuck indoors. I could go lay on my side in the grass, but that would probably get pretty uncomfortable and itchy after a little while.

I'll update this week as much as possible to let you know what's going on, but I'm going to try to follow the doctor's orders as strictly as I can and do very little this week, so my posts may be infrequent and boring. Not that, you know, that's any different from usual. Please keep LM and I in your prayers, and send lots of growth and development vibes his way!