Deja Vu...

It was all too familiar...

3 years ago this month, I found myself in the hospital in preterm labor at just over 30 weeks pregnant with our son, Jake.  While they were able to stop labor, because it had gone on for so long without me realizing it, my cervix had shortened into the milimeters (when it should be over 4cm) and I had to spend nearly 6 weeks, the remainder of the pregnancy, in the hospital on bedrest.

Here we go again...

3 years later (almost to the day), I found myself back in labor and delivery with regular contractions...only this time I was only 22 weeks pregnant.  MUCH too early for the baby to be born and survive.

The pregnancy had gone really smoothly up until that point.  Because of my problems last time, my doctors were watching me very closely this time for any signs that my cervix was shortening.  I was seeing a perinatologist and even getting progesterone injections in an effort to reduce my risk of preterm labor.  I was active, feeling great, and had convinced myself that whatever happened last time with Jake's pregnancy was a fluke. Well, apparently it was my healthy pregnancy with Abby that was the fluke. 

That day started like any other.  I felt great and had taken my kids over to a friend's house to play and have lunch.  But when we got back, I started to notice a weird feeling that felt a little like contractions.  Because I was still so early in the pregnancy, I wasn't even sure that I'd be able to really feel contractions that well. Maybe what I was feeling was some sort of stomach disturbance. They were never painful, so it was easy to try to put it out of my mind as I went on with the busy day taking care of my kids and house.  But everytime I would sit down and focus for a second, I realized that whatever I was feeling kept coming and going.  It took until later that night when I finally got everyone to bed and I could sit still for a while that I guessed that they were in fact contractions, and they were coming about every 2 minutes.  I tried laying down, sittting up, walking around, drinking water...nothing was stopping these contractions from coming.  I wondered if it was all in my head or could be explained some other way.  Finally, I decided that even if nothing serious was really going on and I ended up looking like an idiot, I still needed to call my doctor and head to labor and delivery late that night to check it out.

Thank goodness I did.  When they got me on the monitor, I was indeed contracting every couple minutes. When they checked my cervix, they discovered it was dilating and softening.  Not good. They began giving me shots of terbuteline to stop the contractions (a medicine I am more than familiar with from my last pregnancy) and it took until the next morning to get my uterus stable.  When I saw the perinatologist that morning, they measured my cervix and found it to prematurely shortening again.  Ugh.  Not good at all. This time, however, I had only shortened to 2cm. Still very short for this gestational age, but better than last time, I guess.  It was decided though, that because I was still so early, it would be an indfinite hospital stay for me again.  Boo.

Serious deja vu...

Once again, we found ourselves scrambling to figure out childcare and find help now that I could possibly be out of commission for the next several months.  And once again, the wonderful sweet friends that we have here in Texas came through, going above and beyond to help in any way that they could.  The difference this time, however, was that we've been here 3 more years and our circle of friends has grown immensly since then.  I found myself overwhelmed with the concern and graciousness of eveyrone around us. People began watching our kids, cleaning our house, mowing our lawn, bringing us meals, and I've had a VERY steady stream of visitors to keep me company and pass the time.  The flowers and extremely thoughtful gifts have brought me to tears several times and  I can't even tell you how loved and cared about we feel.  I continually thank God for placing so many wonderful people in our lives and providing everything we need through them. God is SO good.

So here we are...

Here indefinitely, waiting and praying that they can successfully keep me pregnant again.  Our precious baby needs more time to grow. I am very thankful to have the same doctors I had last time that will do everything in their power to help me have a healthy, term baby.  When I get lonely, discouraged, and frustrated, I remind myself of the outcome of our last preterm labor ordeal: a healthy, happy (and crazy) little boy about to turn 3.  I know that God has His hand in all this, and I know He is in control.  He will keep our sweet baby safe until the time is right,  And until then, we just wait.




Three years ago...

Now

The family making themselves comfortable in Mommy's hospital room

I only need to look at this healthy, wonderful, crazy kid to know that everything is going to be JUST FINE.