So, it’s been a while. Can I use the pregnancy card? The truth is, I pride myself on having clever ideas and themes when it comes to this blog, but lately I’ve felt just about everything except clever.

At almost 30 weeks pregnant now, I go between feelings of extreme excitement and extreme terror every hour of every day with small bouts of emotional exhaustion mixed in.

Now in the third trimester, my fear of this all ending is so much worse than it was in the first. I’ve continued to have multiple subchorionic hematomas. Almost every ultrasound shows a new one. And they’ve baffled my OB and my perinatologist and Dr. KK. And I’ve been warned that hematomas this late in pregnancy could trigger pre-term labor. So I’ve been put on modified bed rest.  Up until 28 weeks, I was a total wreck. Now that we’ve reached viability, I am slightly less of a wreck, but still not fun to be around.

Dr. KK ordered me to see a hematologist to see if he could figure out why I’ve been having so many hematomas. So I added yet another doctor to my baby-making roster. He basically said a bunch of scary things about how using the blood thinners that Dr. KK prescribed for my blood clotting factors may have compromised the pregnancy and ordered me off all blood thinners immediately. He even said “I just hope it’s not too late.”

Then, a week later one of my regular blood tests to check for clotting factors came back way out of range and Dr. KK ordered me back on lovenox. I freaked out because of what my hematologist had said and I called him and all my other doctors to get their opinions. Getting through all the layers of receptionists and nurses and on-call doctors to actually speak one-on-one with my doctors was one challenge. Getting some of my doctors to actually speak to each other…one of the most difficult challenges I have ever faced. After two and a half weeks of translating medical speak between them and repeatedly giving each of them each other’s numbers and windows of availability all while freaking out that something terrible was going to happen to my baby if they couldn’t get their shit together, the majority of them were able to agree that I should not be on lovenox the remainder of my pregnancy.

Meanwhile, the hematologist ran a bunch of other blood tests and discovered that I have platelet dysfunction. Which basically means that I have the right number of platelets, but that they aren’t functioning properly, which puts me at risk for excessive bleeding and would likely explain the hematomas. However, his tests also showed that I am currently positive for lupus anticoagulant. So basically, I am at risk for both hemorrhaging and clotting. And treatment for one puts me at greater risk for the other. And all my doctors can ethically do at this point is treat what is currently showing itself as a threat…and that’s the bleeding.

So I’m freaking out about that. But now my hematologist’s main concern is me hemorrhaging at delivery. So he has ordered a platelet transfusion while I am in labor. This doesn’t concern me as much as the slight worry that because of my platelet dysfunction, the anesthesiologist may not allow me to have an epidural. This worry is compounded by the fact that our baby’s head is currently measuring 3 weeks ahead of schedule. Natural child birth is definitely not on my bucket list right now.

But I’ll tell you, I’ll suffer through 36 hours of natural, unmedicated labor of my big headed baby…heck, I’d gladly allow doctors to cut me open without any anesthesia to remove my baby if need-be. if it just means that at the end of all of this I get him in my arms. Living and healthy, big head and all.