The Story Begins
On Saturday evening around 8pm June 18th, 2011 I was sitting on the couch, Desmund was asleep next to me. I was watching tv. The house was calm, my husband was in the field, I felt a contraction immediately IGNORED it. Denial is my first instinct. Then 45 minutes later it happened again lasting a good 5 minutes. I went into complete panic no this could not be happening again! I know what this is! Panic Attack begins, balling my eyes out starts, breathing heavily, Desmund is still sleeping. So I call my husband who is currently in training at a different location. Then I call my friend she says you just need to listen to the babies heart beat and make sure everything is ok. So we she comes and picks me and Des and we are off to the horrible dreadful TMC. We get there and tell them I'm having contractions I'm 20 weeks. They consult and then say you should go to St. Mary's either we can take you via Ambulance or you can drive on your own. From my last experience in preterm labor going in the ambulance was not the American version of going in an ambulance. Especially while having contractions lying on your back strapped down in an ambulance that slams on there breaks every 5 minutes or less and you have to sign a waiver before you get in it, and you only reach maybe 35 miles an hour! Taxi's are much faster here they speed, run reds which is ok here and you get there in one piece because they do some crazy stunt driver stuff. Well good thing my friend had a car we got there is 30 minutes and Desmund slept like the whole time. We got checked in right away and brought up to the OB department and seen immediately. Very nice considering I usually have to wait in america. They did a transvaginal ultrasound right away followed by the normal abdominal ultrasound. In the states it's rare they do the transvaginal so I've been told. They did it right away and knew what was wrong within 5 minutes of me being in there! AMAZING! So in conclusion she said I could be hospitalized or since I had a baby I could go home but had to be on permanent bedrest. So I said yes I will go home. Only problem was I have a 1 year old and my husband is in the field. Hoping my amazing friends would lend a hand and sure enough they did! Surprisingly two nurses were still there that had been there when I had my first son just one year before! They remembered us! That made me comforted alone.
So then the journey to get my husband home began. His family told me they should let him come home and so I went with that and we got him home the next day by 11am. Don't know for how long but he's home since I'm not allowed to get up or do anything but potty breaks.
Conclusion
And what does this all mean. I have an insufficient cervix which is a short length of cervix at 20 weeks the normal is 4 to 4.5. Mine is a 2.2 which puts me at a 20% risk of delivery before 28 weeks and a 25% risk of having an early preterm labor. Early meaning before 35 weeks. My son Desmund was born at 35 weeks I went into preterm labor at 34 weeks 2 days. At least we know what is wrong with me now and why I carry babies so low!
Treatments
Now what do we do? Well since we are in Korea I have to go to Army doctors but I'm working on finding out if they have things closer than our nearest hospital two hours away by bus. I need progesterone anything they do shots or gel treatments and also a cervical cerclage. Where they sew you up so the baby doesn't fall out anytime soon. I'm 20 weeks and they usually place the stitches in around 14 weeks unless you go into labor and dilate. So right now we are calling and waiting. There is no time for the waiting game but man these army docs suck!! And unfortunately I don't speak Korean or I'd be on the phone trying to find anyone near us with the progesterone.
We were suppose to be PCSing early out of Korea but for now we are stuck until this baby decides to come and hopefully that will be at least 20 more weeks! So hopefully Desmund will be our only preemie in Korea but we shall see! Hoping for the best. Praying for the best!
=Stuck Here=
