God is good!

Lots of good news this week!

So last week at my 28 week appointment, I had my 1-hour glucose test to see if I am at risk for gestational diabetes. The nurse called the next day to let me know that my blood-work was good, except for my blood-sugar being elevated so I would need to come back and do the 3-hour test... oh joy. I went in on Tuesday this week to do that one. The glucola drink was twice as sugary as the last time and made me feel nauseous for the first hour after drinking it. Luckily I didn't have to stay in the office in between the hourly blood draws so after the first hour, I went and walked around at Walgreens and then during the last hour I walked around at Publix a little and that made me feel a little better. When I was done, the nurse told me she would call in the morning with the results. I was a little nervous waiting for the call... when she finally called, she said she had good news, woohoo! I passed! The first draw was a little elevated but the others were good, so no gestational diabetes for me! One less thing to worry about :).

Then on Wednesday afternoon, I had my appointment with the neurologist. She did a basic neuro exam and asked me a bunch of questions (most of which seemed to be asking me about stroke symptoms), then looked at my eyes since the ophthalmologist said my optic nerve was a little pale. Based on that and what I told her about my vision, she said from a neuro standpoint, she thought I was fine. I asked about the abnormality on the MRI, and to my surprise she hadn't actually looked at my MRI yet, so she went to look at it and came back. She said she was not impressed (which I'm thinking is with the techs or radiologist) and said it was an incidental finding (i.e. not affecting my vision) and that there might not be anything even there and it's just the way they cut the slides and went from one image to another.... or it could just be something from an old injury when I was young. She asked if I had any and I told her about the car accident I was in in 5th grade and got a concussion from... and she said, "Well there you go!" So she was not at all concerned about that and just to be on the safe side, I will be going back after little man is born to get an MRI with contrast (which I can't have while pregnant) to check everything more clearly. So as of right now, it doesn't appear there's anything to worry about... so hopefully this vision thing is just a weird pregnancy symptom and will be gone after I give birth :).

Today, Ken finally got orders! And he did get Norfolk, which was the best option for him right now. He didn't get the ship he wanted, but we're hoping it will work out for the best this way. The ship he's going to will only have one more deployment and then be decommissioned (which supposedly is an awful schedule and why Ken didn't want this ship). The nice thing for Ken is that this last deployment is supposed to be an "Around the World" type tour where they stop at a lot of ports so Ken will hopefully get to see lots of cool places. Then from what he's heard so far (not sure if it's actually true) but the deployment is not supposed to start until a little after the baby is born... so hopefully he'd be able to come home when he's born and spend time with us before he leaves, which would be awesome! He does have to report mid-December though, so he may not actually be here for the birth but thankfully I have Bobbi to help with that. Plus, she's the one who's been going with me to all my childbirth classes anyway.

And lastly, speaking of childbirth... I received some reassuring info at my 28 week appointment last week about going natural. I spent most of my appointment talking with a L&D nurse who is training with the midwife at my OB's office to become a midwife. I hadn't planned on asking some of the questions I had thought of from my childbirth class since I have some time, but since she worked at the hospital I'll be delivering at, I figured I could ask a few things about the hospital. She did see on my chart that I didn't want an epidural and she asked if I wanted to try without it or just not have it and I told her it was completely off the table, not an option due to my scoliosis. This then got the conversation going about going natural. She said that there are a lot of nurses at the hospital who are knowledgeable and have experience with natural births and that some of the rooms have tubs that I can labor in... all of which made me feel tons better. I also asked if I can bring a birthing ball and she said that would be fine. She said my OB's office is very supportive of natural births (which I hadn't worried about). She also said that I wouldn't have to be hooked up to an IV... just have a port in case of emergency, or a fetal monitor so that I can be up and move around when I need/want to. I told her I didn't want to be on my back at all, and she agreed that being on your back is the worst position to be. Then the actual midwife came in to make sure I didn't have any other questions and also talked a little about me going natural. She said that since I have told them now that I want to go unmedicated, they will not even offer me anything while I'm in the hospital and that I should come up with a code word and tell my birth coach what it is in case I think I might really actually want something once I'm in labor as they won't give it to me if I ask, unless I use the code word so they know I'm really in need of it or whatever. But she was confident I wouldn't need it. I thought that was pretty great :).

Well, that's all for now. I'm looking forward to spending a nice long weekend with Ken :). (Sorry this was another long update... I'm going to try to do more smaller updates instead of these big long ones!)