I'm feeling great and staying very healthy!  I passed my first glucose intolerance test, and don't have to go for any more.  What a relief! 

The baby doesn't make little bumps and kicks anymore.  Now it is more like grand sweeping movements across my belly, or my whole belly moves at once.  The baby is definitely long.  When I am teaching, he/she loves to stretch out and do a couple flips.  I'm assuming that he/she is responding to the sound of my voice.  The baby also likes somersaulting while I'm driving in the car.  Makes life interesting!

This week brought some new and exciting developments to the adventure. My group of obstetricians have been suspicious of my having pre-eclampsia, based upon my family history, swelling, elevated blood pressure, vision issues, etc. They have been monitoring me very closely, and brought me in every 4-5 days for the last week or so for close observation.

On Monday the nurse practitioner told me that if I became sick at all to call the office. Well, Tuesday night, the night before my last day of student teaching, I became really sick with a GI bug. At 1:30a.m. I told Derek "Let's call my mom and get a game plan together here." We called the OB's answering service, and one of the doctors's called me right back. I was told to head to the hospital, so off we went.

We got to the hospital before 4a.m., and they put the fetal monitor on, took bloodwork, and gave me some gingerale. After waiting for the lab results to come back, my uric acid levels were a little elevated, but none of my labs indicated that the baby should be delivered. They told me that they'd rather wait for me to pass over the 39 week mark (which is Sunday Nov. 29th) and see if I can go into labor naturally - without being induced. (I have to say, when we headed in, I half-hoped I'd be there to have this little one...whether it be by C-section or iduction. But it's totally fine with me to get this GI bug under wraps, finish nesting at home, and then have this baby! Going into labor naturally would be better too, I know. I'm just so close to the due date at this point, why not just deliver?!) In the end, they deduced that I probably just had a gastroenteritis, and that my dehyhration was causing a few erratic contractions. They put me on some IV fluids, then gave me Reglan too. Man- did I perk back up! It only took about an hour, but I was ready to leap out of the bed and get to school.

I left the hospital at about 9:30am though, with a script for Reglan (to help control the nausea and keep my GI tract moving along properly). I came home and slept a whole lot, and even kept down some saltines and chicken noodle soup.

This morning (Nov. 27th) I went with my Mom and Kyla to the OB's office. They gave me an ultrasound to check the baby and the fluid around him/her. Everything's fine! The technician did say that this baby has nice big feet and "Angelina Jolie - like lips!" She saw the gender, but the 3 of us were very strong and we all resisted the temptation of finding out!!!! After the ultrasound I saw the nurse practitioner again, and she was being very cautionary with me. She says to absolutely do nothing, because of the pregnancy-induced hyptertension/pre-eclampsia, and that she believes that I will not make it to December 6th before having Baby Kenny!!!! I'm not dilated at all yet, but my body is doing other things to get ready to deliver... Overall, I feel like I am in great hands and in a wonderful practice that is very meticulous about pre-natal care.