The "Pregnant" in" Pregnant Bipolar Knitter"

I haven't talked too much about the "pregnant" in my blog title, mainly because other than the rampant depression/psychological problems I've had, the pregnancy has been healthy and uneventful.

Today, though, it's hard to ignore. I've been in the "PicU" (which I think stands for perinatal intensive care unit) since yesterday. My due date isn't until April 17, but I started getting pretty regular contractions last week. I've been having Braxton-Hicks contractions for about two months, but these were different. I came down to Labor & Delivery on Friday night, and they ran a few tests and checked me for dilation; despite the fact that I was 1 cm dilated (admittedly, not much) and 50% effaced, the doc on call opted not to do the fetal fibronectin test which can give an idea if you are going to go into labor soon or at least not for the next two weeks.

(Note that the doc on call was the doc that delivered my first daughter...which is a whole other story, but I told the nurse that I would drive home and have my baby there rather than have him ever touch me again. But I digress.)

Anyway, yesterday the contractions started getting stronger and more painful. My ob told me to come down to get checked, and lo and behold I was now 2 cm dilated AND the fetal fibronectin test was positive. So my doctor admitted me and started me on a course of muscle relaxers to halt the contractions and steroids to help the baby's development. They'd like to delay at least a few weeks. Seems like things are going according to plan, as the contractions are getting better. Hopefully I get to go home tomorrow.

That's my current story. I will say that the maternity ward is far preferrable to the psych ward; they don't care if I have ballpoint pens or drawstrings, AND I have internet access. Life is good (well, other than the fact I'm in the hospital).

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Back to the point, part 2

In my last post I started detailing the issues I've had during pregnancy with getting mental health care, which is the whole reason I started this blog in the first place.  I will continue the story with this post.

In late October/early November, I went to my general practitioner because my mood had started getting really bad since going off my meds (Seroquel and Lamictal) in August.  After talking to me, -- which involved a lot of crying on my part-- looking at my medical history, and looking at the cuts I had made on my arms, he put me back on a low dose of Seroquel.  For about a week, I felt not great, but functional, but then things continued back on their downhill spiral.  I was crying all the time, just wanting to sleep, having anxiety attacks, and doing a lot of cutting.  I called my GP back and talked to a nurse, who in turn talked to the doctor, who increased my Seroquel dosage. 

The increase in Seroquel didn't seem to make much difference, other than to make me more tired (something not particularly desirable when you're trying to chase a four-year-old and a two-year-old).  I called my ob/gyn's office to see if she could help out at all.  She put me on Vistaril as needed, which is pretty much just an antihistamine but can kind of mellow you out at the same time. Both my ob/gyn and my GP suggested strongly that I see a psychiatrist, but not wanting to go back to my prior psychiatrist, and with nobody recommending a new one, I was sort of at a loss for who to see.  If you've ever tried to get psychiatric help in Dayton, Ohio, you understand what I'm talking about.  There aren't too many psychiatrists, and those that there are often have a 3-6 month waiting list just to schedule an initial appointment.

In early December, after a few more weeks of generally decreasing mood and functionality, I called my family doctor again and the nurse recommended I go to Kettering Behavioral Health Center, a facility located in Centerville (I think) that has both inpatient and outpatient care.  They also offer walk-in assessments.  I drove myself over there and talked to the admitting nurse for about a half hour.  I explained I was about 21 weeks pregnant (in case she couldn't tell), was cutting myself daily, crying all the time, and generally feeling like utter crap.  I was worried that my mood was hurting the baby, and I needed psychiatric help to look over and manage my medications. She asked the $64,000 question:  "Are you suicidal?  Do you have specific plans?"  I told her that I frequently thought about suicide, but didn't have a specific plan to follow.  I thought about taking pills or slitting my wrists, but hadn't written a suicide note or anything.

At this point she assured me that the facility had an ethical responsibility to help me out, since I was a danger to myself and my baby, based on my suicidal thoughts and cutting behavior.  They wouldn't just send me home and tell me good luck.  She asked me to step out while she called the psychiatrist on duty and talked to him about what to do next.  My sense of relief was tangible -- finally, someone was going to help me.

She came out to the waiting room a few minutes later and told me that the psychiatrist wanted to admit me to try to regulate my medications.  I didn't particularly want to be admitted -- it was close to Christmas, and I wanted to be home.  But, I knew I needed help, so I agreed.  She went back to her office to talk to the admissions people to get the process started.

About 15 minutes later, she called me back in to her office.  As it turns out, they couldn't admit me to their facility, because I was more than 20 weeks pregnant, and they didn't have the medical facilities to help me in out in case of a problem (they are not on the same grounds as the actual hospital).  What they could do is prescribe Klonopin for me, a powerful anti-anxiety drug, increase my Seroquel again, and suggest if I was still having problems to either call my old psychiatrist or go to Miami Valley Hospital's ER.

And with that, despite their "ethical obligations," they sent me on my way.

Next post:  a new psychiatrist and the ER.

Oh happy day -- school's in and the drywall is almost done

This has been a long week...we had workmen start Monday on removing paneling and putting up drywall in our fourth bedroom; we're going to move our little one over there and put the new baby in her room, since she already has the crib and changing table there.  We went ahead and had the "drywall guys," as they've affectionately become known, paint the room while they were at it.  Strangely, I got their name out of one of those coupon magazine things that everybody gets, and their "special" was a free bathroom painted with any estimate.  So they also painted our master bathroom  -- why not??

Long story short, even without the lovely snow and ice we haven't really been able to go anywhere because they've been here solidly since Monday.  I have to say, these guys are amazingly hard workers, and they do <i>beautiful</i> work -- but beautiful work, as usual, takes time.  I thought they'd be done Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday morning, but it's Thursday afternoon, and they're still here.  I think they'll be done this afternoon (fingers crossed).

The girls and I have been going a little bit stir crazy, being stuck in the house.  School was cancelled Tuesday because of the weather, and I can't tell you how hard I was praying for school to be back in today.  God bless the Jewish Center, it was (that's where they go to preschool).  I think they were as excited to get out of the house as I was for them to go -- they barely glanced back at me when Daddy took them out the door, and he told me that neither one of them even put up their token resistance when he dropped them off. 

The good news is, it's a lot easier to appreciate them and think they're wonderful and adorable and brilliant when I get away from them for a few hours.  When we got home from school, we all three snuggled on the couch for a little while and watched TV to settle down before nap time, and I didn't even mind them crawling all over me and wanting to sit on my lap (small as it's getting).  Is this horrible parenting?  Maybe, but that's the way it is.

Is it really that hard? - Prescriptions

Disclaimer:  I stole the title for this post from my friend Megan who writes A Right Gapesnest (and does a wonderful job, too, by the way) and periodically has a "Is it really that hard?" post.


After being in the hospital a few weeks ago, I finally got all my meds more or less straightened out; I went from six different prescriptions prescribed by four different doctors to four prescriptions prescribed by one doctor.  Much improved.  However, when I went to get them filled Saturday, turns out the scripts were made out to "Amy King" rather than "Amy Krug."  I know I'm a new patient and all, but still.  A tad annoying.  The pharmacist told me he couldn't fill them without calling the doctor, and he wouldn't call the doctor until Monday morning.  Lovely.  Luckily, I had some leftovers of some of the meds from before my hospital stint, so I muddled through, but hopefully the doc and the pharmacy will work things out today.  Apparently we're supposed to have some sort of snow/ice storm tonight and tomorrow, so I need to be able to pick up these pills today.

On a knitting front, I just started this cute little set called "Sweet Pea," which is a baby bodysuit and hat.  We'll see how it turns out; I'm not so good at stuff that has to "fit."  I need some sort of tutorial on gauge, yarn types, and the like.  Oh well.

Hobo bag blues and the stomach flu

So last week I was going like gangbusters on my Noni hobo bag, until I realized I misread the pattern and was only decreasing by two stitches every three rounds instead of four. I did this for probably 60 rounds of the bag body. Talk about frustrating. I am eternally indebted to my mother, who actually went ahead and tore out the rounds for me and re-balled my yarn. I'm sure she did this because she loves me, but also because she knew how much money I spent on the kit and couldn't bear the thought of me not finishing it.

In addition to my knitting woes, the entire household came down with the stomach flu last week -- the two-year-old on Tuesday, the rest of us on Thursday. It was that awful stuff where you projectile vomit till you think you going to see your shoes coming out; at least it only lasted about 24 hours for all of us -- except me, of course, probably because of being pregnant and generally down in immunities.

My mood, knock on wood, is slowly improving. I think the medication changes made while I was at the hospital were a step in the right direction. I even managed to take the kids to story time today at the library, and that's the first time I've taken the kids out by myself in quite a while. I'm still not good, but I'm much better than I was, and any improvement is welcome.

Pregnant Bipolar Knitter is knitting again....

Well, I didn't post last week at all because...(deep breath)...I was in the hospital. Yep, finally bottomed out and ended up in the psych ward from Tuesday through Friday. The worst part? Well, there were a lot of bad parts, but maybe one of the worst is that I couldn't knit. I understand, of course -- needles, string, psych ward...don't really go together. But it was rough, since that's my form of therapy. I did a lot of drawing instead, the only catch being was that I couldn't use any writing instrument other than one of those little tiny pencils like they give you to keep score when you're playing mini golf. I went through five.

Anyway, I'll get to the whole sad story later, but for now, I'm glad to be home with my family and, yes, my knitting needles.

Why won't my brain shut up?

I will continue with my story, but I thought I'd save that for another day.

One of the brutalities of bipolar disorder (in case you didn't know) is that your brain never shuts up, unless you're heavily medicated -- and sometimes not even then. (In fact, if you don't know a lot about bipolar disorder, suspect you or a loved one has it, or just want to read up, here is the link to the information on bipolar disorder from the National Alliance on Mental Health.)

Lately this has been an issue for me, even though I am heavily medicated. In fact, a long time ago one of my coworkers told me that I "thought more than anyone she knew." Now, note, she didn't say I was "smarter than anyone she knew," just that I thought more than anyone she knew

These days, I just keep bouncing from idea to idea and can't seem to get a grip on one thought enough to evaluate it and act on it, or discard it as necessary. Then I sort of end up shutting down because there's too much going on up there to deal while I'm conscious, so I just go to sleep if I can. I think in some ways it's worse in pregnancy because, let's face it, just about all pregnant women have a lot on their minds and have at least some level of anxiety. In a way, that's why knitting helps, because at least it gives me something to concentrate on. I'm also trying to keep lists, which at least gives me the illusion of organization.

Oh, and my Noni hobo bag is coming along quite well -- though I've decided that in the future, no matter what, if I'm buying a hank of yarn (rather than a machine-spun package), I'm going to have someone ball it for me. I thought I was going to become homicidal trying to get my yarn into neat balls last night, because everything ended up in a tangled mess.