We spent the afternoon at the doctor's office yesterday. What was intended to be a two hour "initial OB" visit ran about four hours. It was worth it, though.

Let me explain from the beginning. Last year I was diagnosed by a cardiologist with something called Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome. It causes dehydration, low blood pressure, tachycardia, and a slew of other not-so-fun but not life-threatening symptoms. The worst thing about it is that it causes chronic, debilitating fatigue; something I have been battling since I was a teenager. Since getting a diagnosis and being able to address all this as a real problem and not just something in my head-as people often thought it was- I have been able to manage it better. However it continues to be a challenge.

Of women with POTS who get pregnant, 1/3 magically get better, 1/3 stay the same, and 1/3 get much more severe symptoms. I, unfortunately, have fallen in that last category. I have not been able to do my job well, I have missed work, and I spend most of my days too tired to lift my head off the pillow. It has been rough. Add to that "morning sickness" which does not relent day or night and you have one sick puppy. Luckily, zofran helps keep me from calling the buicks too often, but I still have had a very hard time keeping down enough fluids.

Which leads us to the doctor's visit yesterday. They tested for ketones in my urine- a way to detect dehydration. The test changes color from pink to dark purple depending on the amount of ketones. Dark purple is severely dehydrated. Mine was gray; as in off the charts. So they told me they would give me a liter of iv fluids (lactated ringers, for those curious) and told me to call and come in for another bag of fluids any time I felt like I needed it.

It has made a world of difference. I feel like a new person today. I was able to wake up this morning and get out of bed without having to force myself. I went and ran errands without feeling like I needed to lay down after two hours of being on my feet. I feel GOOD- something I haven't felt in a long, long time. I feel like I have the tools I need to stay healthy now. And the best part- I feel like I can keep my job because I'll have the energy to actually DO my job now. That takes an enormous amount of stress off of us. We have both been very concerned I would lose my job, and thus our insurance. Hopefully now things will be better. Today, I have been able to drink fluids, eat, and get some exercise (walking). All of these things will help break the cycle I was in. I also went to an orthopedic store to get compression hose, which my cardiologist has been telling me to get forever now. They cost $150.00 without insurance! Once the doc's office faxes over the Rx I'm going to go pick them up, hopefully for significantly less money. They should help keep my stamina up at work too, by making my body have to work less hard to return blood to the heart.

So... enough about that. The rest of the OB visit was great too. We met Dr. Cobb and his nurse Lisa. Dr. Cobb is great. I think we are going to have a smooth experience with he and Lisa at the helm. Lisa is a little bouncy and sporadic but knows her stuff and was the first person really willing to hear me when I said I'm too dehydrated. We had an ultrasound, which was awesome. Our critter actually looks a little human now. There are ten little fingers that she waved around for us. Her heart is beating at 150-160 beats per minute, which is perfect. It was so cool to see our baby. It made it real. We have pictures of the ultrasound. I will get Wesley to hook up the scanner and we'll post them later. She looked better in real-time though. The pictures seem pretty blurry by comparison.

Speaking of pictures. I have pictures of my bump to show you. It may not seem like much, but it's a little chubbiness due to the baby- which is so cool. Please forgive my lack of radiance in the photos; I ended up tossing my cookies not long after they were taken.





Oh! One other thing that I'm pretty excited about. Wesley and I have decided to wait until the delivery to find out the sex of the baby. So I may be calling my son "she" for the next seven months but I'm looking forward to the surprise. I'm realizing that unisex baby stuff is prettier than the boy/girl stuff anyways. My parents didn't find out the sex and both have separately told me how awesome it is to hear "It's a boy!" or "It's a girl!" in the delivery room. I'm going to take their word for it. We've also been talking about other delivery room choices, but I'll save that for a later post.

With love,
Eryn