This place looks familar

Jenni has been admitted back into the Family Maternity Center here at the Hospital after a rough night at home and in the E.R.

Yesterday she was having a rough day. She was complaining about her stomach hurting whenever she ate food, so she was avoiding food as much as possible. On top of that she was having some other weird pains. She couldn't get comforable in her make-shift bed. If she tried to lay down on our flat bed she had difficulting breathing. She also wasn't able to nap as everytime she would start to doze off, she kept feeling like she wasn't breathing and would startle herself awake. She was also swollen still even being 9 days postpartum and she probably wouldn't mention this, but had yet to lose any weight. She still weighed the same as before she delivered Taylor, so you know she was uncomfortable from all the swelling

She called her doctor last night (who just happened to be on call) and mentioned some of the systems she was having. The doctor thought it might be some stomach virus and told her to go on the B.R.A.T diet (Bread, Rice, Apples?, Toast).

Jenni was pretty sure that was not the case and when I got home at 9pm she asked me to take her to the local drugstore and have her blood presure / pulse taken. She was afraid her blood pressure was too low.

Her blood pressure ended up being 138 / 82. This is quite high for Jenni as she is usually never over 120 even when she is stressed. Her pulse was a measly 40 bpm, which is way low as she is usually 70's-80's.

We decided to go home and just take it easy through the night and if she was still having the issues then we would go into her doctor's office in the morning.

Well, Jenni never could get comfortable and ended up getting a really bad headache. She tried sleeping in 3 different places and nothing worked. By 3am she still hadn't slept and she had been crying on and off because of the pain. I asked if she wanted to go to the E.R. and she said yes.

Luckily, her mom was here on her last night, so she stayed with Preston, and then Jenni, Taylor & I went to the E.R. Her headache was the worst she has ever had and I have seen her go through some pretty bad headaches. Once in the E.R. around 4am they took her vitals and started an IV (which took 3 pokes and 30 minutes because she was so swollen). Her blood pressure was through the roof at 185 / 90 and her pulse was still down at 40 bpm. They did x-rays, cat scans, heart monitoring, and about 5 different blood tests.

The ER Doctor gave her some pain medicine to hide the headache and a shot of something into her IV to make her flush her fluids. It worked like a charm and her headache was gone and she was getting up to pee every 10 minutes.

Luckily her OB was on call at the hospital so the ER doctor was communicating with her OB through this whole process. All the test came back great, except for some enzyme that was excreting from her pancreas that really shouldn't be (hence the stomach pain). They said going without food for 24 hours should restart her pancreas and getting it excreting the correct enzymes.

Both doctors were still baffled with her low heart rate though so they decided to admit her to the hospital around 7am, so we moved from the E.R., back up to the Family Maternity Center. In fact, we were in the room just across the hall from where we were staying when Taylor was born last week.

They got her started on some magnesium, which was supposed to prevent her from getting any seizures while her blood pressure was high and they were hoping she would continue to flush out more fluid and figured that should relieve her high blood pressure.

Everything worked perfectly and her blood pressure quickly dropped back down to normal levels. He OB started working with the cardiologist to figure out why her heart rate was so slow. She was still getting all the oxygen she needed so there was really no concern except for the fact that it never really is this low for her.

The cardiologist didn't think it was needed, but her OB just wanted to make sure, so they moved us up to the 5 floor to a special room where they could monitor her heart better over night. Her new OB has been awesome through this past 2 weeks. She's so positive and always give Jenni a big hug every time she sees her. Every time Jenni has issues or problems it seem like her doctor is on call and in the hospital. Her OB has been watching and monitoring her all day and making all the calls even after being up on call all last night as well.

Jenni just had an EKG i think, it was an ultrasound on her heart and the cardiologist is now reviewing that and we are waiting for blood results to see if her pancreas is back to normal

Jenni is doing well. She is a bit scared, but mostly just really tired for being up for 36 straight hours and now going without food for the last 24 hours. Jenni is still able to breastfeed Taylor even without eating anything and Taylor has been an awesome baby through it all, making my job a bit easier. Taylor and I are off to get some dinner ourselves while Jenni finally gets some sleep. Preston is stoked to once again get to stay at "Brammas" house.

We'll be here for the night and then evaluate tomorrow to see if Jenni needs to stick around another day or two. I'll try to update, but my windows of opportunity are far and few between. I'm hoping we all get to sleep a bit tonight.