An (itchy) Twist in the Road

As we like to call it, our "Adventures in Baby-making" has been a windy road that has deepened our appreciation for the fact that anything worth doing is often fraught with hurdles, frustrations, set-backs & lots of adaptation & re-determination.

And to be honest, while the "perfect" outcomes we were seeing with each ultrasound, doppler listen & other test along the way through this pregnancy have made me so very happy, a part of me was still waiting in the corner of the ring for the next big challenge to appear before we actually reached this first "finish line" of a successful full-term pregnancy & birth.

And boy did it appear!

About two weeks ago, which was four days before our second Baby Shower was scheduled in Sarasota, FL (about a 3.5 hour drive from our current home in Grant), I began itching. A lot. All over. No rashes, bumps. Just itching.

I let my midwife know, and since it was still general, she figured it was just another one of your normal weird-ass pregnancy symptoms. Later that evening I realized it was centering in my hands and feet, and while taking a hopefully-therapeutic oatmeal bath, I did some Google searching... soon to learn that hand-and-foot itches CAN be the indication of a rare but extremely serious genetic pregnancy condition known as "Intrahepatic Cholestasis of Pregnancy" (ICP).

And yeah, how often do you let yourself freak out about a "rare but serious" condition that you find on google and MIGHT match something you're experiencing?

Well, the more I read, the more I seemed sure this was worth freaking out about. ICP basically stops your liver from doing it's normal thing of flushing out your toxins through normal routes, so those toxins go all up in your blood-stream, which causes an itching that no lotion, skin treatment, or even Benadryl can touch. Sucks for the Mom, but it's way worse for baby: if left untreated, and even treated during a full-term pregnancy (usually 40-42 weeks for first time Moms), can lead to still-birth as the toxins reach the baby in those final weeks.

I call my midwife in the morning and with the new info about my symptoms. She agrees it could be serious and sends me for a blood test of liver activity and bile salt acid levels that same day.

Meanwhile, we're due in Sarasota in two days! We pack up that night while I itch away. On top of normal sleep struggles I'd been experiencing, the itching made sleep all but impossible, and come next morning I was suuuuper tired. We still got to thoroughly enjoy meeting our dear friends Pablo & Alejandra's baby Nilo (for the first time! such a joy!) and catch up with them over amazing fresh fish at Owen's Fish Camp.

That night staying in a hotel, I did battle with the itchies again... and I tell you, scenes from "The

Shining" and "Old Boy" became quite real for me. I reached a point in doing battle with this sneaky, smart, never-tiring itch adversary where I literally thought I might go mad--running up and down the halls and such. Luckily, Trae as always was so there for me and helped me calm down. Come the next day I was tired, not only from not sleeping but experienced an even steeper depth of fatigue and weakness. I stayed seated for the entire baby shower, as any length of time standing had me feeling ready to faint flat. The shower was so beautiful, so lovingly put together and my greatest frustration was feeling my own total lack of capacity to be present and truly appreciate, absorb & reciprocate all this love toward us and our coming bundle.

I check in with my midwife as we hit the road, car full to the brim with generous gifts and food from the shower. She says my liver test numbers are disturbingly high and, if at all possible, to go straight to the hospital. Trae high-tails it across the state on I-4 to Holmes Regional, where they bring me into a lovely Mother-Baby suite and strap gooey monitors on me, then wheel me down to get an ultrasound (my first experience being whooshed around a hospital flat on my back on a stretcher! As strangely exciting and disconcerting as the movie make it out to be...)... Everyone was super kind, and the tests showed baby and my organs doing just perfect.

They got me back up to my room (more whooshing) and told us they'd keep me overnight for monitoring... and, angels that they were, gave me an amazing, beautiful, so incredibly precious drug to help ease the itching and make me drowsy. I got my first real night's sleep in many days.

My (well-fed, kindly cared-for) stay there ended on Monday with a refreshingly candid visit from the new local high-risk maternal medicine specialist, Dr. Yeagley. A plan was formulated to visit with her once I was out to get the medicine for this condition, and she bore the news that there was just no way I could go to full term without risking the baby's life. This would mean medical induction at the hospital between 37-38 weeks, possibly sooner depending on my test results. (The most important test results--the ones showing what impacts baby, take way longer to come back.)

Long story short, it's been an itchy two weeks, with some sleep, and Trae and I doing lots of consulting with midwife and specialist to come up with a plan for how to have the most empowered, natural birth possible knowing that we will need to induce. I've learned SO MUCH about the birth process, induction, hospital vs. home birth practices & procedures, & how to become flexible & focused enough to plan for a path somewhere between the two... while being open to whatever, of course, needs to happen to ensure the health & successful arrival of our precious baby girl to the outside world.

And, it's meant a lot of scrambling to get ready in two weeks what we thought we had four weeks to complete! Including getting my work in place to run without me for the two weeks leave I plan to take off... all of this on top of at least two new Dr. appointments a week as well as blood testing to monitor my levels and baby's well-being. I'm also more alert than ever now to her movements, which are now way more meaningful than a pleasant and magical check-in with her stretches, hiccups and wild little motion flurries--they are signs of life & that she's still in a happy, non-toxic environment inside me.

Soooo.... the long and short of it is: we will be having a baby sooner than we thought! And the hoped-for birth plan has shifted. Our midwives has shifted to one midwife (my friend Muraiha) becoming our doula, with the assistance of another doula they highly recommended who we just love. We are chanting for the healthiest, happiest outcome possible. I'm itchy as hell and still not sleeping much, but grateful beyond words for the love and support of the most amazing husband, our family, friends & health care helpers, as well as for our Buddhist practice which always steers us toward a place of strength & unshakeable determination for victory.