A Tiger (and broken water)

The evening of Monday, March 23 started like any other Monday evening. After dinner we decided to break into our new kit of face paint and make Jaisal into a tiger. 

He squirmed a little bit at the end, but the results were pretty good. 

Afterwards we played a family game of tag/hunting where Jaisal the tiger tried to catch various prey. Kirk and I were monkeys, elephants, giraffes and other assorted animals.

While we were playing, however, I wasn't feeling quite right. Before I put Jaisal to bed, I told Kirk that I thought my water broke, but that seemed odd at 28 weeks so we could talk about it later. While I was putting Jaisal to bed, my initial thoughts were confirmed.

Once at the hospital, the doctors ran some tests and told me that my gut feelings were right. My water had broke. I had PPROM'ed (premature partial rupture of membranes) and I would not be leaving the hospital until I delivered (which we hoped was about 6 weeks later when I would be 34 weeks pregnant).

It was quite the whirlwind night. My biggest risks now were getting an infection and/or going into early labor. I was immediately started on IV antibiotics to try to eliminate any possible infection and also to add some latency to labor. I also got a 24-hour dose of magnesium to again try to delay labor and also to help with development of blood vessels to the baby's brain. The magnesium was horrible! I was started on a high dose bolus that made me super sick and for the entire period after that I was loopy and couldn't think straight. I also received the first of two steroid shots to help the baby's lungs develop surfactant so that they could breathe more easily when she eventually came into the world.

(this IV was no joke. It hurt every time they connected to it or I moved my fingers in certain ways. Nearly two weeks later, I still have a slight bruise where it was inserted.)

We also had conversations with our OB and the neonatologists about how likely delivery was at certain intervals and what the risks are for preemies at various gestational ages. Basically the odds for the baby were better on every front for each day longer she stayed in my belly. The odds of delivery after PPROM are 50% of women deliver in the first 48 hours, then 50% deliver in the first week, then 50% deliver in the second week and so on and so forth until you reach 34 weeks when all women are induced because the risk of infection outweighs the benefits of staying pregnant.