Home Sweet Home AGAIN

We are back home again! Hopefully this time for good. I was released early last night, and we nearly ran out of the building. My room got smaller with each trip back to Northside.

So, what happened? They don't really know. I went in last Tuesday and was diagnosed with the preeclampsia and congestive heart failure. On Wednesday night I started vomiting and having bad cramping, but the doctors and nurses reasoned it was a side effect of one of the many MANY drugs they had been giving me. On Thursday morning I felt better, met with my cardiologist and was discharged.

Thursday evening I started vomiting again and did so throughout the night. We contacted my doctors and they felt like I'd picked up a nasty bug in the hospital. By Friday evening I couldn't really get off of the sofa or even hold or feed Audrey. Mom and Dad came over and helped Graham and we all got to watch the snow together. By Saturday I still wasn't better and I'd lost 5-10 more pounds. Graham called my doctor and he told us to head over to the ER.

The ER doctor ordered a lot of blood tests, abdominal x-rays, and an ultrasound. They found extra fluid in my abdominal cavity, a very high white blood cell count, and silt in my gallbladder. I was extremely dehydrated as well. They couldn't explain what caused any of these things, but were able to begin treating them. I of course was admitted to the hospital and was told I'd AGAIN have to stay overnight. The only good news was that my heart and hemoglobin count looked better.

On Sunday I met with my general surgeon (the 6th doctor on team Laurel now). She did not feel like the gallbladder needs to come out right now, but it's one more thing we have to monitor. Yay. My labs were re-run and my white cell count had come back down to normal. I was keeping food down, so they agreed to discharge me. We were finally out of there around 6.

I missed out on Audrey's first snow and her first Valentine's day, but she was well taken care of...her grandfather bought her a dozen yellow roses and she got gifts and cards from her aunts, other grandparents and a valentine from her friend Alaina. Graham and I will have a Valentine's day do-over very soon. As if spending the day together in a hospital bed in a room the size of a closet wasn't romantic enough :)

Sorry for any abrupt or unanswered emails. We were absolutely overwhelmed with the situation and frustrated with the lack of diagnosis from the doctors. It was hard for us to tell everyone we were back in the hospital AGAIN and had no idea what was going on.

I'm sad Graham goes back to work tomorrow because we weren't able to use this time off as we had planned. Today we were able to spend a little time together with just the three of us but it just wasn't enough. I wish we had more time together with us all feeling well! To look on the bright side, we are very grateful that it was me in the hospital and not Audrey. We are so fortunate to have a healthy happy baby.

With Graham going back to work and me catching up a little on rest, we are finally open to visitors. Please call or email if you'd like to stop by and meet our sweet little girl. Thanks again for all of the prayers, cards, and calls.