Karaoke and Flooding

Remember this line from the last post...?

"...and on my side I just need to get my hospital bag ready. But that's still a ways off.."

Keep that in mind as you read..

Last Friday night I went out with some work friends for a last Hurrah at Karaoke. It was an awesome night, filled with singing, rapping (well not me obviously), eating, drinking (again not me) and general rowdiness. Huge amounts of fun were had.. And after 4 hours of this we weren't ready to bail yet so we went out to a bar on George St called 3 Wise Monkeys (??) where we danced and chatted drunkenly (I chatted soberly). As one of my drunken colleagues told me three times at that bar, I was sober, 8.5 months pregnant (probably the only 8.5 month pregnant woman in the city) and I got hit on (yes, you heard right, I got hit on!), so I was doin' alright that night. I did take it easy, I danced, but not outrageously, just on the spot. And I went home before midnight, so it was pretty sedate.

Tony and Josie were at Mat and Wendy's for dinner and they were staying there the night cause it got pretty late, so when I got home I was on my own. I caught up on email and Facebook and hit the sack around 1am feeling very stiff and tired.

At 2am, I felt a bit of a leak. And sorry folks but this is gonna get a bit graphic cause I need this down for posterity.

I threw myself out of bed (well I kinda dragged myself) and in the three steps from my bed to the toilet, I was gushing. Luckily I was able to make it to the toilet for most of it, but let's just say I had no time to pull off undies or anything like that. So I sat, and gushed. And gushed. And gushed. Man there was a huge amount of gushing going on. So once the gushing abated some, I noticed water on the floor in front of the toilet so I mopped that up with some toilet paper which I chucked in the loo (effectively blocking the toilet when I flushed, and then tried to push it through with the toilet brush, which my wonderful husband fixed the next day). At that point I was still leaking, and not wanting to continue leaking everywhere but knowing I had to get to my phone which was in the bedroom, I kinda waddled quickly, got the phone and then went and stood in the shower.

First I txt'd Tony to see if he was awake. That was kinda silly cause I wasn't gonna stand there waiting for a response now was I? It was about 215am by now so I just called him. He was still awake, and when I told him that my waters had broken (which I had to repeat three times for it to sink in!) he said "Have you called the ambulance?", and when I said "No, I called you", I could FEEL his eyes rolling at me from across the bridge! So I hung up with him, (he left Josie with Mat and sped off home at that point) and rang 000.

So the lady on the phone asked me a bunch of questions:

Lady: Where are you now?
Me: uhm in the shower.
Lady: is the water on?
Me: no..
Lady (laughing): why are you in the shower??
Me: cause I am still leaking and I don't want to have to clean the floor...
Lady (still laughing): ok then..

So after a few more questions she tells me the ambulance would be there soon and to go sit and rest somewhere. Yeh right. I'm still leaking lady, as if I'm gonna go sit somewhere.. So practicality winning over, I wrapped myself in a towel, went and put on a decent top (I was about to go out in public after all!) stuck my phone in my bra (as you do) and went downstairs to get comfortable. The only thing I could realistically sit on without making a mess was a little round plastic stool so I got that, put it in front of the front door and sat to wait for the ambulance.

It was an amusing sight I must say.

Luckily I didn't have to wait long, and I don't know how many speed limits Tony broke, driving from the north, but he arrived at the same time as the ambulance.

So they put me on the stretcher outside, and then stood over me discussing whether to take me straight to maternity or to emergency, while I lay, freezing without a blanket, and with it just starting to rain. Finally I cleared my throat and mentioned I was a little cold and they jumped into action and got me covered and into the ambulance and off to maternity we went.

I started getting contractions in the ambulance. About 2 min apart. Which was not good. It was a short ride and then we were at the hospital and they took me up to the delivery suites. There I was given a shot of steroid and a couple of pills to stop the contractions.

I am only 33 weeks so while not dire, it's still a bit early to deliver. The steroid they gave me was to faster develop Jordan's lungs cause at this stage they are not fully developed and it takes 24-48 hours to do it's job, so I had a few rounds of the pills to stop the contractions to give the steroid time to work. Contractions slowed right down almost straight away and by the middle of Saturday I was having maybe one or two contractions an hour with several hours in between. Not especially strong and very irregular. They also put me on antibiotics for the increased risk of infection after the waters have broken.

So now it's Monday, I have been moved to the maternity ward cause nothing was happening, and am waiting for the OB to come tell me whether I can go home or not. I am crossing my fingers for shore leave. I want to go home. I want to finalize some things at work (via VPN of course). I had two weeks left to get my shit done!! If I do go home, I am on full bed rest until I go into labour again, which means I am pretty much on maternity leave now.

And that's the story so far. The hope is that I don't go into labour and that Jordan has a few more weeks to cook but if I deliver now, the OB is confident that all will be fine. Feeding will be an issue, and he will have to stay in the NICU for a few weeks, but it won't be anything dire.

I'll update again when I know something more :-)

Mari