Jasmine Stalker-Firth

Today is delivery day. The man has been and we have reorganised the bedroom to put all the dialysis stuff in it and the living room, since the new babywalker and baby highchair are taking up lots of room. I am lounging on the daybed and Jasmine is snoozing next me. We are having a quiet moment and later, I am going to make some cookies – they are from my Sivananda Yoga cookbook and do not contain any animal products so we can stuff our faces with them as they must be good for us.

It has been a busy week. On Wednesday, we went for the 20 weeks scan. We were trying not to get stressed about it, but we were kidding no one least of all ourselves. The lady who led us into the room asked us at what point during my last pregnancy were the problems with Jasmine’s kidneys identified. It had been the 20 weeks scan. Trying to say that made me burst into tears, at which point I gave up trying to behave like I wasn’t besides myself with worry. Everyone was very nice and got the hankies out.

The sonographer began by saying, “Let’s do the important things first.” To us that meant the kidneys, but to her there is more to a baby than a pair of kidneys, so she started with the head and worked her way down to the heart. It seemed like a very long time until we finally got to the kidneys. The sonographer said that there were two. In my pretence of being non-stressed and not worried for the last two weeks (hysterical) the scenario of only one or possibly no kidneys hadn’t even entered my mind. So it just shows you, I don’t have half the imagination I think I have when I give myself over to a good worry. So, really what is the point?

The scan was fine. The picture isn’t great because the baby was moving constantly and giving the sonographer a really hard time in getting all the measurements she needed. However, the baby appears to be healthy. There were no visible boy bits, so it seems that we are having a girl! We are thrilled. We would be thrilled if it was a boy. With Jasmine we didn’t know at all until the minute she was born that she was a girl and had called her Stanley all the way through. It is a bit strange to know already but it is lovely. We are booked in for another scan in four weeks as Jasmine’s kidneys didn’t appear damaged until 35 weeks so they are going to monitor us all the way along.

Jasmine was asleep all through the scan and woke up just in time for the receptionist to tell us that Jasmine and I look very similar – same eyes and eyebrows, apparently. Neil felt quite left out, but Jasmine has his long eyelashes and gentle nature.

Last week my urine looked and smelt a bit strange. I waited a few days as I thought it might be dehydration and then eventually I looked it up in the pregnancy book you get given when you first go to the hospital. The book said that it could be a symptom of many problems: dehydration, kidney infection, liver complaints, and UTIs, which undetected and untreated can damage the kidneys of your unborn child. When your baby has ESRF that is not something you want to read. In fact I am tempted to throw the stupid book in the bin as it tells you not to get stressed as it could stress the baby out – My Godfathers, who writes this stuff?

I got myself into a complete state and almost ran out of the door to the hospital in my pyjamas. Neil said that I couldn’t go anywhere by myself so we all went. I handed in my sample and had a big stress about it for three days. THREE DAYS. Part of me thought that if it takes three days to get the results back then obviously it isn’t urgent but then the other part of me kept imagining all sorts of nonsense.

Everything was fine, probably dehydration, but most likely hormones and the midwife told me to drink 3-4 litres a day. Now, I like to drink water and I drink a lot of it. I rarely drink anything else (well apart from tea and coffee – now limited due to my pregnant status) as most drinks are too sweet. I just like my water : fizzy and still (but none of those horrible fruit flavourings), but I have to say, I am struggling to get four litres down myself. I really am. But I obviously need it because I keep getting blinding headaches and feel parched. So there you have it! I am glad to have got that off my chest (which like the rest of me is getting rather large and I am running out of clothes including maternity ones as I am getting to be a big lass).

Anyway, Jasmine has a cough. Poor thing! I suspect her throat might be a bit sore too. She drank down all of her sytron today which is normally a big struggle and she pulls faces and gags and throws up and screams. Not today, she kept opening her mouth ready for more, probably because sytron is sweet and syrupy it eased her throat. And she is a bit whingey today – very unusual, as she is so normally easygoing. I am going to google about in a minute and see what else I could give her if that is the case. I have a sore throat too and a bit of a cough so sympathise.

Her latest thing is to blow raspberries at people on the tube. I have no idea where she got that from. And, she waves sometimes when you say ‘hi’ and ‘bye-bye’ at her but a lot of the time she waves at inanimate objects. The other day she was waving at my laptop when I was emailing Jen. This morning she was waving at her cup when I was feeding her milk – since the last time her tube went down, she doesn’t feel the need to hold it, unless she wants to push it away. And sometimes she waves at her catheter after you wrestle it out of her hand.

Her other trick is that she is good at undoing her own nappy and pulling really hard on her catheter so that the dressing actually lifts up from her tummy. So now we have to leave her dressed all the time – no more lying on the floor kicking without her nappy, it is just too dangerous. My girl is just so clever – too clever for her own good.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 9th, 2009 at 3:39 pm and is filed under home. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.