X-Ray Visions

Getting up at the crack of dawn, injecting myself with multiple units of insulin, grabbing a quick balanced breakfast and picking up my doting mother - all before 8am was not my idea of fun. But I still arrived right on time for my leg-rewrapping.

All of this seems very ho-hum until you factor in the fact that I was up every two hours the night before to rewrap my left leg which was THROBBING in pain. I can barely bend due to my big ol' baby belly but I had to figure out how to pull my leg up and carefully wrap my own foot, ankle and calf with layers of flesh-colored compression bandages. I cried. I screamed at them. But nothing helped. They ached - and I was all alone. With no help. I was the picture of perfection of pitifulness...

So as I hobbled into the Therapist's office my mother jumped the gun, "Can we talk about maintenance? She is going to need to do something else..." I could've kissed her.

Rebecca, my Lymphedema Therapist agreed that it may be easier just to see how I do this week and then go and have me measured for compression hose garments (sooo pretty! Ugh) by the end of the week. I can be re-evaluated after Baby Harry's arrival.

Afterwards we went for a Gestational Diabetes check up and giggled and laughed as Baby Harry, now 5lbs and 3oz, hid his face from the Tech's probing wand. But when she went to check on his organs - he was more than ready to show his junk to her. So I was given 4-D images of his "turtle" instead of his chubby face. Harry was happy to find out that his namesake already has hair since he, as a child, sprouted fuzz sometime around the 2 year mark and was very cue ballish before that. I came out with enough hair to braid so I wasn't too worried.

After slightly raising my insulin (yucky) - I was sent on my way so I dropped mom off and went home for a well-deserved nap.

One hour and not nearly enough z's later I was rudely awaken by the Perinatal Center: "Your test is showing fluid in your system. You have to go to Ob-Triage and have them check your lungs. Are you having trouble breathing?"

"I have a five pound baby laying on my lungs. Yes - I have trouble breathing," I said - in a sleep-like stupor.

"No, you need to go," she said.

"Fine," I said and gathered my things, and mother, and went to the local hospital.

After navigating the Labyrinth halls of Cabell Huntington, we finally find ourselves in "Labor and Delivery."

I wanted to run.

Although I was wary - I did one x-ray and, after three hours of baby heart monitoring, I was free to go with no fluid to be found.

It was scary.

And now I worry my baby will be affected by the Radioactive X-ray. Will he glow in the dark? Have X-ray Vision? Telekinesis?

Seriously - if I was a pregnant horse on a farm - they'd have already shot me.