More Complications

I ended up staying in the hospital for 3 weeks.  Originally, my OB practice wanted to keep me in the hospital until I was 32 weeks gestation, but in the end decided to keep me until 34 weeks gestation (although I did ask to be released a couple days early so I could enjoy the Iowa/Iowa State football game at home).  A baby born at 34 weeks gestation is pretty close to having a baby born at full term so this was a great goal to make.  I don't believe when I started my bed rest at 25 weeks that my physicians thought I would make it to 34 weeks.  I know we had a lot of people praying for us which made all the difference.

6 Days Before Delivery

At the end of my hospitalization, I started having intense itching, primarily of my feet and palms of my hands (odd places to itch, huh?).  It was always worse at night and would keep me up for hours.  The next morning I would have lesions on my legs where I had been itching.  I tried everything: three different lotions, benadryl, a humidifier, but nothing helped.   I discussed my itching with a few of my physicians and no one had an explanation.  One physician thought it was because of the sheets used in the hospital and the dryness of the hospital so I went ahead and accepted that explanation.  However, after I was discharged and was sleeping in my own bed with my own sheets, the itching persisted.  The evening of the football game, I had had enough. I started doing some research online and came across Intrahepatic Cholestasis of Pregnancy.  Pregnant moms who had this suffered from itching of their feet and hands and it was primarily worse at night.  Well, that described me to a T, so I called the physician on call and told her I thought I had this (thankfully she knew I was a nurse practitioner or she probably would have thought I was crazy by trying to diagnose myself).  She had me come in to the office on Monday for lab work.  The labs took 5 days to get back, but they did show I had this condition.  Just one more thing to add to the pile...At least I didn't have pre-eclampsia and gestational diabetes or I probably would have had every single pregnancy complication...

Intrahepatic cholestasis is usually not problematic for the mother (besides the I-would-not-wish-this-on-anybody itchiness), but it can cause still birth.  Of course I was very alarmed when I read this and until I had my official diagnosis, my OB had me come into the office twice a week to monitor the babies closely.  My OB practice sees about 1 or 2 patients a year with this diagnosis and my particular OB had never had a twin mom with this condition (I'm sure she'll never forget me now!).  I received the diagnosis on a Friday.  She spoke with a high risk OB who recommended the babies be delivered at 35 weeks, which was in 3 days, to prevent the risk of still birth.  So after trying to keep these babies inside for nearly 10 weeks, now I was being told that I would be INDUCED!  It was bittersweet hearing that because although I was pretty comfortable throughout the entire pregnancy, the last couple weeks had been horrible because of the itching and lack of sleep.  I was ready for the pregnancy to be over, but I was really hoping to make it to 36 weeks.  My bed rest restrictions were removed for the weekend, but I had to go into the hospital on Saturday and Sunday for an ultrasound and monitoring of the babies. 

That Friday night I did what I had been wanting to do for 10 weeks-I went shopping!  That night Justin, Alena, and I went to Target.  I rode in the electric cart while we shopped around (I'm sure that was a sight).  To this day whenever we go to Target, Alena asks me if I'm going to ride in the electric cart...

Since my bed rest restrictions were removed, I was also told to stop the Procardia (the medication which was helping to keep my contractions under control).  So it was no surprise when early Sunday morning, my contractions picked up.

This was our last picture as a family of 3!