Brown Is My Least Favorite Color

It's Saturday morning. Caetlin's Kindermusik class just started ten minutes ago. Obviously, I am not at that class. I'm at home, in bed, bored with the internet and TV. College football hasn't started yet. None of my books interest me and the house is too quiet.

I wish I were there with Bruce and Caetlin.

It all started with a very small brown smudge on the paper when I went to the toilet on awakening yesterday morning.

I realize how ominous that sounds, so I'm going to break the tension right away now: I'm still pregnant. Segunda still does her little ballet across my bladder every hour or so.

But there was the brown smudge.

With Caetlin, I had spotting a couple of times, but only in my first trimester. Nothing in the second or third trimesters. I haven't had any spotting with Segunda at all so far, so the smudge was of some concern to me. I tried to shake it off- it's got to be nothing- but I called the doctor anyway.

The nurse was sympathetic, but clearly thought the same thing: it's likely nothing. She offered to let me come in, if I wanted to, for peace of mind before the weekend. If it had been a different weekday, I'm not sure I would have gone in, but I didn't relish the thought of wondering and worrying all weekend.

They squeezed me in late in the day yesterday. First thing was hearing Segunda's heart; I had felt her moving all day and wasn't terribly worried that the worst had yet happened, but it was nice to hear it anyway. Then the pelvic exam. The doctor confirmed there was not much visible in there except for some more brown smudge, and the brown was actually a good sign. It meant it was older, had already dried and was just being flushed away.

The concern was where had it come from in the first place.

The doctor wheeled in an ultrasound machine, and when he turned out the lights, it became very dark in the room, as it was almost 5 p.m. on a rainy dreary day. He turned the machine on and Segunda flooded the screen, busily kicking and squirming. He didn't focus on the baby, once he ascertained her heart was beating and her cord was pulsing. After that, he looked at the placenta. The resolution was grainy, not good, but he pointed out how very close the placenta was, possibly still covering the cervix. That had been noted in an earlier ultrasound, with the expectation that the placenta would grow away from the cervix. At my 20 week ultrasound last week, done by the perinatal group that did the CVS, I had specifically asked about this. They had assured me that it had grown away, but here was my doctor expressing doubt about that point. He also identified what looked to him like a pocket of blood in the vicinity of the placenta.

He left the room to find a trained sonogram technician, and at first we thought I would have to come back in on Monday to confirm, since it looked like all the techs had gone home. At the last minute, he found one and I was walked over to a different room with a different machine.

She briefly looked at the baby and then also focused on the placenta. Took some pictures, and we chit-chatted, and then I got dressed. We stood in the hall together waiting for my doctor, and she told him it was not covering the cervix, but is very, very close.

The condition is called placenta previa. It can cause bleeding, sometimes heavy bleeding. The previa can be partial, where it partially covers the cervix, or it can be total. What I have is not technically placenta previa, but is actually just a low-lying placenta, where it is very near the cervix. This is almost as bad, because the risk for bleeding is still pretty high. In cases where previa or low lying placenta persists until late stages of pregnancy, a C-section is necessary. However, most previa, and especially low lying placenta conditions, resolve on their own through the pregnancy.

You can read more about it here. There is some freaky stuff here, like placenta accreta and what not, but I don't think that is my situation at this time. I think there is some higher concern that I have had bleeding this early in the pregnancy, but it still remains nothing but brown smudge, probably less than a teaspoonful at this point.

But I'm on bed rest for the weekend. If nothing dramatic happens over these couple of days, I can, in my doctor's words, "Tiptoe into work on Monday." He wouldn't have approved that if I did anything except sit on my butt all day for work. And no sex, heavy lifting or strenuous exercise for the rest of my pregnancy, or at least until ultrasounds confirm the placenta has grown away from the cervix.

No heavy lifting means no lifting Caetlin. I cried over that last night. Not that I- or my back- like lifting Miss Moose. But, especially in the throes of my fears last night about being on bed rest for the rest of my pregnancy (which I now think is unlikely in the cold clear light of day), I mourned the loss of closeness with her. I worried she will think I don't love her. I have 16 weeks until the baby is full term, and that's a long time to be without holding my girl.

I hate being so helpless. I hate not being able to help Bruce more. I hate how quiet it is with no one here. Any other day I would revel in it. It's something about being told, "You can't" that makes it very difficult.

So I have my computer here and I feel like I might have read everything there is to read on the internet. I have a stack of unread books here next to me that I would have jumped at the chance to read last week. Now they don't interest me. I might go blind playing Mystery Case Files. And Caetlin and Daddy are out having fun at Kindermusik and will be off to the park afterward. There might be a hay ride and bonfire tonight for her. I think they are going to be gone all day.

I just stew here, lonely, worried, obsessively checking to feel Segunda moving. I'm sure I'm overreacting. I'm not good at bed rest, I don't think.

Stupid brown smudge.