WK23: Day 7 - A Weekend with the Family

I’ve been lucky enough to be allowed home for the weekend and how lovely it’s been! I had a terrible night on the ward on Thursday as one women was in the early stages of labour and the other was snoring so loudly. I’m not a heavy sleeper so I spent the entire night awake until I couldn't bear it any more and at about 3:30am I went to see the midwife in tears. Luckily there was a single bed room available so I was able to sleep for about 4 hours before they woke me up as they needed it for a new patient. As you can probably imagine I was a bit of a wreck on Friday. Tiredness has got to be the worst thing when you’re feeling uncomfortable and irritable. After having a chat with my specialist we decided I could go home for the weekend as Mart is there to look after me and the point of being in hospital is to get rest not the opposite. I’m back in tomorrow for my first steroid injection and most probably will be readmitted to the ward. One of my closest friends has offered to set up his office at my house for the week to look after me so that I can have one more week at home, but I've been having quite a few tightenings this weekend so I’ll see what they think about that at my appointment tomorrow. It would be amazing, but if I’m showing any signs of preterm labour again I need to be on the ward.

I met a lovely twin mummy at the Tamba evening on Thursday and she popped in to see me in hospital on Friday with a book called ‘When You’re Expecting Twins, Triplets or Quads’ by Babara Luke. It is such a good book and I wish that I had read it much earlier on in my pregnancy. Thanks Jennie! I am now totally engrossed, cramming in all the useful and interesting information. One bit that has put my mind at rest a little is a chapter on cervical tightenings. I was never sure how many tightenings were considered serious or when I should be concerned enough to call the doctor. You are obviously told by your midwife during a singleton pregnancy to call the hospital when you are having 6 contractions an hour for more than two hours, however the tightenings I’m experiencing are more like braxton hicks with not a lot of pain. With multiples they can start very early on in your pregnancy and be the ‘real’ thing. Because I haven’t been given much information on the subject, I have sometimes just brushed off a number of niggles and pains as I didn't want to bother the hospital and delivery ward, putting them down to just strains of a multiple pregnancy. Reading the chapter on Warning Signs of Preterm Labour I have realised this is a really naive thing to do. In a multiple pregnancy it is so important to get to know your body and the signs it is giving to you so you can act on them accordingly. I’m lucky I have acted in time so far!

The advice the book gives you is to start monitoring your tightenings as routine from the 20th week of pregnancy. You should do this for an hour a day, it doesn’t matter which hour it is. Lie on your side and use your fingertips to detect the abdominal tightenings. Record the length of the tightenings, the frequency between them and what you were doing just before your monitoring hour. At the end of each hour follow the guidelines for the number of tightenings.

• If you had fewer than four tightenings in an hour you’re ok and should monitor again the next day
• If you had four or five tightenings in an hour, but no other symptoms of preterm labour, drink several glasses of water to combat the dehydration that can bring on tightenings. Then monitor again for an hour
• If you have six or more tightenings in an hour call your doctor immediately

They obviously stress that if you’re having less than four tightenings an hour, are not experiencing any signs of preterm labour but you ‘feel’ that something isn’t right then you need to call your doctor straight away.

I didn't have the chance to take a pic of my bump when I was in hospital, so here we all are at 23weeks. I haven't grown forward much this week, I seem to be growing width ways now!

23 weeks pregnant