Stork'd This is what happens if you go Skinny Dipping during Adult Swim at the Gene Pool.

Thursday night, I planned to go to bed early and knit and read. I finished the blue baby hat I was working on and decided to come down and get a needle to finish weaving in the ends and show it to Peter when I was taken by surprise. As I was to the first landing of the stairs, my left knee buckled and popped loudly. It crumpled under me, I braced myself from falling down the stairs onto my belly with my hand on the handrail and my face on the wall, I think. That's the only thing I can think of that explains the cut and fat lip I have. I didn't black out, but it happened so fast, it's hard to recall just what happened to my head.

Peter came running and I'd sat myself on the stairs and was trying to gather myself. I already knew that my knee was going to be fun. I've torn the ACL in my OTHER knee and had knee surgery on it. I had him bring me 2 Tylenol immediately and I scootched on my but down the 10 or so stairs that were left and elevated my leg on the couch and had Peter get me some ice. But I was aware that I was starting to show signs of shock and even though I hadn't hit my belly or anything, the baby wasn't moving, so after about 15 minutes of discussion and shivering uncontrollably on the couch Peter called the EMTs to the house.

Please make a note that if you have to be carried out of a house by EMTs where there is a staircase you have to traverse, if at all possible, get the chair instead of the flat board. One, you feel like you're going to fall off the board, especially going around the corner of the stairs. Two, if you're a big person, or pregnant, sometimes those EMTs are tiny and not really able to bear the weight. Peter had to help with the board and there were 3 of them besides him.

As they were putting me in the back of the ambulance there were snowflakes falling on my face. :(  I started to warm up when in the ambulance, probably thanks to the oxygen they gave me.  They took me to the hospital I'm planning on delivering at, so luckily I didn't have to do a lot of check in. I'd already preregistered  for the birth so they had me in their computer system. Peter had to go get Ingrid out of bed and get her ready to go to the hospital. They met me in the ER after he'd gotten her up. She was very excited about it snowing outside. I was strapped flat on my back for at least 45 minutes or so, which is not good for a pregnant woman, so I asked for them to expedite getting me off the stupid board. They did so, realizing, oh 7 month pregnant lady  probably shouldn't be pinned flat on her back. 

The doc came in and checked me and let me off the board and we discussed x-rays. She said there really wasn't anything they'd be able to do for me even if I'd gotten an x-ray, so we opted out of getting them. They gave me a lame brace and a pair of crutches, not bothering to fit me really for either, and sent me to L&D for a baby check. I was contracting about every 2.5 minutes, very low intensity, so they kept me for observation. They kept saying soon, so Peter and Ingrid stayed. Finally at around 5 am I sent them home to get some sleep.  They got blood and urine samples and sent them off to the lab. They put in an IV and gave me 2 liters of fluid, and proceeded to stick me 3 times to give me medicine that made me feel like I'd had about 1000 cups of coffee, that stops contractions.  They were hoping 1 dose would do it, but I had to have 3.  They are willing to give up to 10 of them, I think she said. To add insult to injury, when the Dr. came in she also gave me a pelvic exam to make sure my cervix wasn't dilated, which it was not. I can only imagine what that would have been like receiving more doses of the contraction stopper. When I was texting Peter, I was stutter typing because my hands were so shaky.

All that time, they didn't offer me any sort of relief for my leg, not even Tylenol and kept me from getting comfortable by having  the fetal monitors on me. Every time I fell asleep for a few minutes they were checking on me.  Finally they got the contractions under control and the blood work they did came back with no issues, so they let me go home.

Baby is fine, but my knee hurts like a mofo. I'm pretty certain I tore my ACL, and have an appointment with an Orthopedist on Thursday, when Peter is supposed to go to NYC. I'm hoping with the RICE method that the knee will be usable by Monday in order to let him go back to work. I can have him take my car, if that's the case, so I have the automatic. I have a GP appointment on Monday, an Ultrasound on Wednesday, and the Ortho on Thursday that I'd like to be able to go to and have everything checked out. I'd also like to be able to pee when I want without asking for help, be able to do basic things like hobble to the kitchen, even with crutches, and maybe even sleep in my own bed on floor 3 instead of on the couch.

All I gotta say is that I feel like I'm in backwards town that is trying to look sparkly.

Not only were hick one and hick two embarassing their respective wives, but the tour guide was positively ridiculous. Did you know your wife won't speak to you if you don't bring HER a present for giving birth? I didn't know that either. I guess Peter is lucky. I still speak to him. He didn't give me anything for having Ingrid!

Wow! You get to labor and deliver in the same room! How novel! And use a birthing ball if you want! And have a squat bar! Okay, so it's not giving birth on the exam table in your doctors office, but most places that actually have a maternity ward have those things don't they? I'm just jaded because I birthed in the big city before, I'm sure, but the lady that gave the tour tried to make it seem like this was all cutting edge stuff. A tv in the labor and delivery room!  I'm sure it gets local channels, too!

Ingrid made a play of not wanting to got o preschool yesterday, but when Kelly brought out the play-doh, she was a gonner. She didn't care if I was around or not, didn't notice that I left, and was happy as a clam during her class. It doesn't hurt that they do painting a lot in class, as well. It's one of her favorite things to do. Currently, we have her easel in the kitchen and I brought up the paints so that she could paint at home. Shebrought her paint brushes up, and was so excited she couldn't wait for me to be done going to the bathroom. "I need to show you how to paint, mommy!" she kept saying.

It's funny. Aside from yarn art, I'm not really artistic at all. And really yarn art isn't neccessarily artistic the way I do it. All I do is follow a pattern or modify it just slightly to fit the yarn or needles I have available. She must have gotten all her artistic talent from her father. I'm really glad of it. I think it helps with higher thinking skills, especially later on it will.

Speaking of that, I'm also glad she shows some musical inclinations. She sings a lot and plays drums with a decent beat and appears to be interested in the guitar and wind instruments as well. She learns songs reallly fast and comes home from preschool with new ones I've not heard.