My dad’s aunt (whose birthday was today) died the Sunday before I hit 38 weeks. Her funeral was scheduled for Thursday morning. I also had a regularly scheduled NST that afternoon, and we were going to schedule my induction for the following Wednesday. As a result, I took a half day off at work. Because I live in America and teach in an independent school instead of a catholic school now, I didn’t get any paid leave. I could do up to 12 weeks through FMLA, but I wouldn’t be able to afford that. I had five sick days roll over from last year plus three personals and seven sick for this year. That covered three weeks off. Then one week is our fall break, which wouldn’t count against me because no one was at work and I wasn’t missing anything and they didn’t have to pay my sub. So by taking six weeks off, four would be covered and I would only miss two weeks pay. Yay America!
But now that I knew I was getting induced on Wednesday, that presented a problem. It would have made sense to take off Monday and/or Tuesday, depending on what time my induction was scheduled. But now I had a funeral to attend. So I went in to make it a half day absent and would definitely go in on Monday.
They hadn’t been able to find a sub for me, but I convinced my amazing friend Melinda to apply. Spoiler alert: they hired her Thursday afternoon. Back to that in a minute.
But they wanted her to shadow me on Tuesday. So it looked like maybe I would at least go in for half a day Tuesday.
On the way to the funeral, we got into an accident. I was fine, baby was moving, no bleeding, and since I had the appointment in a few hours, we went to the funeral and then the reception at my aunt’s house. My car has a lot of damage, and our son was at school, but we were fine. Mark brought me to my aunt’s house and went home with my car since he wasn’t going to take it to work. My mom picks my son up from school every day, so she was going to bring me with her, pick him up, then bring me to my doctor appointment and then take us home.
We got to my doctor, and she immediately sent me to Labor and Delicery. I found out later it was so they could make sure my placenta was functioning properly in light of the accident, but she offered no explanation and ordered me straight to the hospital. I got to L and D and they sent me to the ER because it was a car accident. I spent a couple hours down there before getting cleared. They needed to make sure I was okay and cleared of trauma before L and D could see me. Then they brought me back up to one of the triage rooms up there and hooked me to a monitor and checked my cervix. At my appointment on Monday, my doctor said that I was “sealed up hard and tight” and the baby was “sitting in your throat.” When they checked me, I was starting to dilate and was almost to 2, but baby was still up high and my cervix wasn’t very soft.
When they sent me to the ER, I had my mom take my son to her house. Didn’t want him exposed to lord knows what in there. When I thought I was just going to be there for an hour or so at L and D, they were coming with me. But ER seemed like a bad place for a 2 1/2-year-old to hang out. So I spent more than an hour just hanging out in the ER waiting room. A very conservative family was there because the grandma had fallen, and the nurses sat me in a wheelchair by them. They were very friendly and were good company. Grandma and grandpa were going to pray for me and I got to hear all about the family. It was an okay way to spend the afternoon. I bit my tongue over a few things they said, but they were sweet to me.
After half an hour on the monitors, the baby’s heart had two deceleration events. They weren’t major, but they were enough to make them keep me for observation until after 11 p.m. in events like this, they like to observe for 12 hours following the incident. Since it happened at 11 a.m., that’s why they had me stay until then.
Mark had been at work for a while and I told him to stay unless there was any reason I needed him. It was basically a longer version of my usual NSTs, so nothing he could do.
They wouldn’t let me have water because with the deceleration events, there was a chance of emergency c-section.
While I was there, I started feeling more of the Braxton-Hicks contractions. Some were a little strong and felt like period cramps. I was nervous and lonely and a little bored.
The nurses periodically checked on me and said that baby was behaving and they had a feeling that I would probably go home at 11.
While I was in the ER, my friend texted me to say that she had been hired, and my head of school sent me an email about it. I told her about being in the ER and that I would keep her posted. Once I found out that I was stuck until at least 11, she arranged a sub for the next day. My sub hasn’t done paperwork and fingerprints yet, so she couldn’t come in. But I would be at work Monday, so no big deal.
They scheduled a very intense ultrasound session for me. Eventually they came back with the results and said everything looked good and the nurses said it was looking like I’d probably go home. One even said she’d almost be willing to put money on those odds.
I was texting with friends for a while and my cousin Alicia decided to come keep me company. I was so grateful and it gave me more reason to keep Mark at work. He was able to leave a little earlier than usual because his relief guy got there early. He went home, packed a bag for our son, including at outfit for the next day because that was school picture day (I only remembered when his teacher texted out a reminder!), showered and had dinner since I couldn’t eat and he was afraid we’d be admitted and he wouldn’t get to shower, then brought everything to my parents. Around 11 the nurse came in and said “Feel like going home?” Yay! Baby and I were fine and getting released. We had quite a walk to the car because Mark arrived after the nearest garage was closed and parked in a weird lot. Took a lot of walking because a lot of entrances were not open. But we made it. Picked up our son, got me a bottle of water, and the. Stopped to make sure I could finally get dinner.
I was supposed to take it easy and was glad school arranged a sub already. I sent an email to my students to let them know that I would be back Monday and that everything was fine.
Friday morning, the Braxton-Hicks were gone. I had a nice, restful day at home and rode with Mark to pick up our son from school. He gets our way before I am allowed to leave, so I never get to pick him up. It was nice to dinthat two days in a row.
I was looking forward to a weekend of getting the house more in shape and relaxing with my lady friends at a Pizza, PJs, and Prosecco Night. We do this every few months. We wear pajamas and watch cheesy movies and eat and drink the title items. I was going tonbit have the Prosecco obviously, but was very much looking forward to one last night before things got crazy.
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