Four prescriptions later...

I went in for my weekly OB appointment and NST at 9:45 this morning. The NST went well (Pax wasn't completely uncooperative like last time) and I actually had a couple little contractions while hooked up to the monitor.

My OB gave me my induction date--May 2, 39 weeks on the dot. It's hard to believe I'm going to have a baby in just over a week... I feel like I still have so much to do!

HOWEVER... my PUPPP is still horrible and my OB really didn't like the look of it, especially since I've been treating it for a week and it's gotten worse, not better. She left the room for a minute, came back and told me that she'd called the dermatology office upstairs and made arrangements for them to squeeze me in immediately. I thought that was nice of her.

So I rushed upstairs--I didn't even have to wait very long to see the dermatologist, just a couple of minutes. She said I had a textbook case of PUPPP but she also thought that it might be compounded by an infection, so she took cultures from the worst places to check for staph. I asked if it could be worse because I have eczema, and she said she wouldn't be surprised if I were more susceptible to bacteria to begin with because my skin is sensitive, but that eczema wouldn't make the PUPPP worse (thank god). She gave me antibiotics even though the cultures will take a bit to get through the lab since she's 90% sure I have some sort of infection making the PUPPP so horrible.

She also told me to keep taking Benadryl at night to help the itch and to help me sleep, but also to take Zyrtec during the day--it'll help with the itching but won't make me drowsy. She also wrote me a prescription for Temovate (hooray, clobetasol!) and had the on-site pharmacy make a special compound lotion with menthol to cool the itch (I'm hoping they call me to come pick it up soon, I can't wait to try it out). In any case, I should finally stop itching soon, which makes me EXTREMELY happy.

Not my proudest moment.

After my shower last night, during which each and every single PUPPP blister on my body broke open, I had a complete meltdown. I tried to enlist my husband's help in finding one of the eight million "what to do if you think you are in labor" cards from my OB's office floating around the house. When he asked why I was looking for one, I cried that I needed to call the number because I absolutely had to have some sort of medical intervention right the eff then. I had to go to L&D and they had to give me IV steroids or induce labor or do something because I hurt all over and couldn't take it anymore.

He asked if I wanted to just go to the hospital, but then I realized that I was crying and wearing a bloody, wet towel and maybe I shouldn't get in the car looking like that.

I now have this horrible PUPPP rash all down my arms and legs in addition to my back, butt and belly. The only places unaffected are my hands, feet and face. I look like I have herpes or chicken pox or measles or something, my skin is hot to the touch, I am lumpy, and I cannot stop itching.

The Triamcinolone was supposed to last me for fifteen days, but I already on tube number two.

Tristan was kind enough to let me sit and mope in the bathroom while he applied the aloe vera and steroid ointment. I hurt too much to try and bend to reach my ankles or the inside of my legs. Then he made me a cup of tea, got me to agree to take some Benedryl, and I sat in bed and read a book until I fell asleep.

Yeah, I pretty much have the best husband ever. I know.

I'm calling my doctor's office as soon as they open on Monday and whining (possibly even crying) until they can either fit me in or call in a tube of Temovate to the pharmacy. I can't live like this.

I'm currently wearing a pair of size XL maternity jeans because we're out of food and need to go to the store. They don't fit--the waistband sags and the pants are long and baggy--but I'm glad I have them because they don't rub on the rash. It's better than continuing to wear my husband's flannel PJ pants, although I might have to keep wearing this ridiculous 2XL Spiderman affair I found in his t-shirt drawer. (My husband isn't even a size 2XL, so I have no idea why he has this giant shirt--but I'm glad he does.) I wish I had a giant, tent-like dress to wear, something without a waistband or, even better, without a waist to begin with. With less than three weeks to go, though, it's not worth it to buy new clothes--especially not ugly new clothes designed to cover my PUPPP-ruined body.

I can't help but wonder if this entire pregnancy is god striking me down for years of vanity. First I gained 45 pounds, then I erupted in itchy, hot, red blisters, and then... what? Can it get worse? What happens next?

Paxton has less than three weeks to make his exit before my OB makes it for him. I'm really starting to doubt I can keep it together that long...

PUPPP.

PUPPP. It sounds so cheerful, like maybe you get a dog at the end.

I wish.

I now have the pleasure of being one of the one-in-two-hundred pregnant women who experience PUPPP--an itchy, itchy, itchy rash that, more often than not in the past week or so, has resulted in my bleeding from my stretch marks. Go ahead, imagine what that looks like. I'll wait for you to return from the bathroom, since you will probably need to vomit.

My OB took one look at my stomach this morning, declared that I indeed had PUPPP, and brought me a prescription for Triamcinolone acetonide.

I've got this rash all over my stomach, my thighs, my butt... and, of course, my eczema has again bounded completely out of control. Basically, if parts of me are not covered in dry, scaly patches of eczema, they are covered in bloody, weepy PUPPP blisters.

I am very attractive right now.

I pointed this out to my husband while feeding and medicating the guinea pigs that live in our front room tonight. I had slathered on the steroid ointment and was doing my nightly animal care in my undies when he came out and informed me that the living room curtains were still open.

You might recall my one post where I talk about being a lingerie whore. No longer. I lost the fight last month, when I finally had to admit that my nice panties were getting stretched out by my giant ass. I bought cheap sports bras from Target to wear at night after a nightly examination proved that my boobs have sagged despite my best efforts to keep gravity away. I am now a walking underwear train wreck.

And so I told my husband that it wasn't my problem if our neighbors wanted to peep on my greased-up, fat, pregnant, rash-covered body, clad in a lime green compression bra and old, stained, hole-y panties.

Hopefully the Triamcinolone does it's job quickly. It was actually my first corticosteriod, way back in high school. I don't have much hope of it working on the eczema, but dear god I hope it works on the PUPPP. I can't take the itch, and that's saying something, because I have a lot of experience with being itchy. Clothing and bathing have become the enemy (both result in my bleeding from a million tiny flesh wounds) and I really like clothes and showers. Not only do I like clothes and showers, people seem to appreciate it when I make the effort to not smell and to cover myself in public...

Car Seat Fail

This is what a Chicco KeyFit 22 looks like installed on a LATCH base in the back of a VW Rabbit:



Note how it BARELY fits back there. The passenger seat is smooshed up so that my poor husband's knees are against the dashboard and the back of the seat is hitting the handle on the bucket. We tried installing it first behind the driver's seat, because my passenger seat is actually broken and doesn't stay forward (it doesn't lock on the tracks when you pull it up), but I couldn't get the seat far enough back for me to drive (curse these long legs)!

That $60 car seat base? It had to go.



Here is the seat installed with the seat belt behind the driver's seat. It actually fits, hooray! What is considerably less hooray is that it is a total PAIN IN THE BUTT and we're going to have strap the seat in every single time we use it. With a baby in it. Oh, the joy... BUT, it fits, I can get the seat back enough that I can drive, my husband isn't smashed against the dashboard, everyone is happy. For now. Until we need a bigger car seat.

...WHY didn't I just lease a bigger car instead of financing this stupid hatchback a few months ago???

I don't have a witty title for this.

I'm starting to feel like I live part-time at the Cleveland Clinic.

I went to the endocrine center on Monday and I just got home from a midwife appointment for an NST. I have a growth ultrasound with my perinatologist on Tuesday and an OB/GYN appointment on Friday. And after that... who knows? Eighteen more appointments with various medical professionals?

For the record: this is my OB/GYN. This guy is my perinatologist. This is the hunky OB/GYN who read a few of my ultrasounds (although that photo is decidedly not hunky at all).

The big thing is going to be the visit with Dr. Khoury, the perinatologist, on Tuesday. Pax has passed two NSTs in the past two weeks (with flying colors, even), but my blood sugar is still unpredictable and I can tell Pax is growing by leaps and bounds. The punches and kicks have turned into wiggles and squirms as he's started to run out of room in my uterus--but that hasn't stopped him from attempting to host his own 24/7 dance party, which is starting to become uncomfortable. (Still, poor Soup has it way worse. :P)

I've been driving myself crazy wondering when Pax is going to be evicted. My thoughts have slowly turned from "oh, diabetes means induction" to "oh, diabetes actually means induction and that's actually going to happen soon". The midwife I spoke with this morning after my NST told me that diabetes are normally induced between 39 and 40 weeks, and that I would definitely not be allowed to go past my original due date (the Clinic usually only considers induction after 41 weeks). In the same breath, she told me not to be surprised if Dr. Khoury gives me a date before 39 weeks--it all depends on Paxton's size and if we can regulate my blood sugar.

I'm going to be a little on-edge until Tuesday. I'll probably continue to be on-edge afterwards.

Who wants to take bets on my induction date???

Seriously?

I had an A1C drawn last week, and it was posted today as NOT being indicative of diabetes. I even came in .1 under the cutoff for "at risk of developing diabetes". My average blood glucose is 114.

Yet I spent two hours at the endocrine center yesterday afternoon being told not to be afraid if the perinatologist puts me on insulin since my postprandial numbers like to spike randomly.

I AM A WALKING DIABETES ENIGMA. FEAR ME.

Diabetes... for real this time!

Finally.

Three weeks ago, I went in for my usual appointment and my OB/GYN and I did our little dance about my weight gain. The tape measure came out, and my OB frowned. Apparently, I was suddenly measuring a month ahead, and my scheduled 36-week growth ultrasound became a surprise 33-week what-the-eff-is-wrong-with-you ultrasound.

Thankfully, nothing is wrong with Pax except that he is freaking gigantic. Why is he freaking gigantic? Well, that's my fault. That's my big, fat diabetic fault.

It took the attending OB for the ultrasound all of five minutes to check over my glucose tolerance scores and diagnose me with gestational diabetes. Why no one (besides myself, of course) could've figured this out sooner still baffles me. A pregnant lady presenting with inexplicable weight gain, a family history of Type II diabetes and borderline glucose intolerance... what part of that doesn't scream "please treat me, oh please, oh please"?

Anyway. I will climb down off my soapbox now...

The fun doesn't end there. I am currently living off a limited supply of glucose test strips given to me by the kind people at the endocrinology center, since my extremely crap-tastic health insurance is giving me the runaround on paying for the damn things. They denied my pharmacy claim, then, when I called, the customer service rep told me that test strips are "over the counter items" and the insurance won't pay for them. The HR manager at my husband's work contacted the insurance rep, who replied that the insurance will cover the test strips if I buy them from a medical supply store, since they will then be billed as DME. The problem now is that there is still a $100 deductible for DME and the nearest medical supply store is not exactly "near".

These are the same strips that are available at the pharmacy. I don't see why I need to order them from some specialty store a million miles away and drive forever to pick them up when they are available at the local CVS.

We'll see how this plays out.

BTW, the photo above is Pax at 33 weeks. He's already larger than my cousin's newborn, who coincidentally, arrived at 2 AM this morning. :)