Bitch, bitch, whine.
Nov. 18th, 2008 02:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivkaI went to get my third trimester lab stuff done today.
This time I got better advice about how to prepare for the glucose tolerance test so it wouldn't make me violently nauseated. My plan was to drop Alex off at school and then go to a diner to protein-load. Unfortunately, after I parked outside the diner at 9am and fed the meter, I discovered that it didn't open until 9:30. No problem, there was another diner a block and a half away. I struggled through the bitterly cold wind only to find the lights off and a "family emergency" sign on the door. Okay.
I went to the hospital. Fortunately, the cafeteria was still serving breakfast. I loaded up on two hard-boiled eggs, two sausage links, and two strips of bacon (no carbs allowed) and went down to the lab. I waited ten minutes to check in and another half-hour to be seen. They drew some blood to type and cross for my Rhogam shot and made me drink a hideous syrupy orange drink with 50g of glucose in it. Yum.
I settled in for the hour-long wait. Another woman who arrived shortly after me for the same test decided to while away the interval with a long stream-of-consciousness cell phone conversation. At the other end of the room, some kind of Christian news broadcast informed me that 45% of people surveyed thought the US had become too open to different ideas and lifestyles. It was a long hour.
At the end of the hour, they drew more blood and told me that the blood bank needed another half-hour to prepare my Rhogam shot. The sugar crash hit, and I fell asleep sitting upright in the waiting room. They woke me at noon to walk me down to the blood bank, and then, Rhogam dose in hand, on to the "Center for Advanced Fetal Care," where ten people were already crammed into a tiny waiting room the size of a large elevator. Including a noisy preverbal toddler and a family playing "Bible Trivia" from a book. Poorly. ("On what island did Saint John write the book of Revelation? ...I'll give you a clue, it starts with P." "Pennsylvania?")
A nurse eventually led me back to an exam room and asked me to bend over the table and expose what she euphemistically referred to as my "hip." "They brought me a big needle, and I got a smaller one," she said, "but this is still going to hurt." And it did, a lot, as she punctured my skin. Then: "Okay, this is the part that hurts." She started to depress the plunger, and I was unable to stifle a sharp Wow. "Yeah, they changed the formulation, and most people seem to think this one hurts more."
I had been at the hospital for more than three hours. I made my way back to my car and drove over to Michael's office. I pulled into the parking lot, gathered my things, and realized that I had left my library book at the hospital. I fervently wished that I could just go home. The blood sugar challenge was interacting predictably with pregnancy hormones, making me exhausted and overwhelmed. But I had an important meeting with my boss at 3, so I had to go to work. I drove back to the hospital, went back to the Center for Advanced Fetal Care, found my book in the exam room, drove back to Michael's office, and walked from there to the light rail platform. It was bitterly cold, and I was underdressed. I cried a little while I waited for my train.
Took the train to my stop, hit my work hospital (it's a different one) for some lunch - by now it was 2pm - and came to my office. Only to discover that Lydia had left a message on my machine yesterday, which for some reason I hadn't gotten then. Canceling the meeting, of course. I could've gone straight home from the hospital.
My "hip" hurts.
This time I got better advice about how to prepare for the glucose tolerance test so it wouldn't make me violently nauseated. My plan was to drop Alex off at school and then go to a diner to protein-load. Unfortunately, after I parked outside the diner at 9am and fed the meter, I discovered that it didn't open until 9:30. No problem, there was another diner a block and a half away. I struggled through the bitterly cold wind only to find the lights off and a "family emergency" sign on the door. Okay.
I went to the hospital. Fortunately, the cafeteria was still serving breakfast. I loaded up on two hard-boiled eggs, two sausage links, and two strips of bacon (no carbs allowed) and went down to the lab. I waited ten minutes to check in and another half-hour to be seen. They drew some blood to type and cross for my Rhogam shot and made me drink a hideous syrupy orange drink with 50g of glucose in it. Yum.
I settled in for the hour-long wait. Another woman who arrived shortly after me for the same test decided to while away the interval with a long stream-of-consciousness cell phone conversation. At the other end of the room, some kind of Christian news broadcast informed me that 45% of people surveyed thought the US had become too open to different ideas and lifestyles. It was a long hour.
At the end of the hour, they drew more blood and told me that the blood bank needed another half-hour to prepare my Rhogam shot. The sugar crash hit, and I fell asleep sitting upright in the waiting room. They woke me at noon to walk me down to the blood bank, and then, Rhogam dose in hand, on to the "Center for Advanced Fetal Care," where ten people were already crammed into a tiny waiting room the size of a large elevator. Including a noisy preverbal toddler and a family playing "Bible Trivia" from a book. Poorly. ("On what island did Saint John write the book of Revelation? ...I'll give you a clue, it starts with P." "Pennsylvania?")
A nurse eventually led me back to an exam room and asked me to bend over the table and expose what she euphemistically referred to as my "hip." "They brought me a big needle, and I got a smaller one," she said, "but this is still going to hurt." And it did, a lot, as she punctured my skin. Then: "Okay, this is the part that hurts." She started to depress the plunger, and I was unable to stifle a sharp Wow. "Yeah, they changed the formulation, and most people seem to think this one hurts more."
I had been at the hospital for more than three hours. I made my way back to my car and drove over to Michael's office. I pulled into the parking lot, gathered my things, and realized that I had left my library book at the hospital. I fervently wished that I could just go home. The blood sugar challenge was interacting predictably with pregnancy hormones, making me exhausted and overwhelmed. But I had an important meeting with my boss at 3, so I had to go to work. I drove back to the hospital, went back to the Center for Advanced Fetal Care, found my book in the exam room, drove back to Michael's office, and walked from there to the light rail platform. It was bitterly cold, and I was underdressed. I cried a little while I waited for my train.
Took the train to my stop, hit my work hospital (it's a different one) for some lunch - by now it was 2pm - and came to my office. Only to discover that Lydia had left a message on my machine yesterday, which for some reason I hadn't gotten then. Canceling the meeting, of course. I could've gone straight home from the hospital.
My "hip" hurts.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-11-18 07:29 pm (UTC)she will get there in, um, july. (short legs, you know.)
no subject
Date: 2008-11-18 07:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-18 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-18 07:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-18 08:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-18 09:54 pm (UTC)Luckily, the only needles involved in that experience were applied (rather badly and with some difficulty given that my veins collapsed because of my low blood sugar) to my arms.
Feel better
no subject
Date: 2008-11-18 10:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-19 12:15 am (UTC)Feel better soon.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-19 02:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-20 04:06 am (UTC)