Steph and I had a follow up doctors appointment earlier today. Her blood pressure is still very high (even though she spent all morning on the couch doing nothing as directed). She is on bed 
rest, and gets to "can" her pee for 24 hours. They sent us home with a pilgrims hat and an ugly brown baby bucket seat (pictured to the left) to help her collect her samples. I don't really know how these things are supposed to work or help her with her "specimen", but Steph seems to get it. They also said we have to keep it refrigerated, so no drinking mountain dew from our fridge.On a more serious note, Steph’s high blood pressure, swelling, and the spots she has been seeing are all signs of toxemia/preclampsia/pregnancy-induced-hypertension. If untreated, this could send Steph into seizures and can also harm the baby. Treatment for this involves bed rest and the cure is delivering the baby. We have to return to the doctor on Friday, and he said to bring Steph’s bag and the car seat. We are doing a balancing act between keeping him incubated and maintaining his and Steph’s health. The doctor wants us to make it to Wednesday September 12th before inducing, but said depending on the results of her 24hour peepee and our visit on Friday, we might be sent to labor and delivery to be induced Friday afternoon.
As of today, she is 35 weeks along and they estimated the baby’s weight at 4lbs, 9oz (10th percentile for this stage in the pregnancy). The doctor would like Steph to be at 36 weeks before he induces her, so that would put us at next Wednesday. The major concern is his lung development and the doctor said that lung development has no correlation with weight, so him being just 4.5 lbs doesn’t factor into his lungs. At 36 weeks, baby survival rate is essentially 100% and 90% of infants go home with mom. At 35 weeks, we are still at a very high survival rate, but typically a significantly higher percentage has to stay in the hospital for several days or weeks.
We are hoping for the best, and I think the doctor is preparing us for the worst. I will update again as soon as I can…
