I knew soon as I’d been admitted that, ‘Oh right OK, this is probably quite serious,’ but I still felt quite calm at that point that, you know, you know I’m in hospital, I’m in the right place you know. You know I hadn’st finished work at that point but it was like, ‘Well whatever, [laughs] I don’st mind. I didn’st mind being admitted, yeah because I knew that they’d hopefully look after me and, you know within a couple of weeks’ time that’ll be fine; he’ll be 37 weeks or even though he’d probably only really be 35 or whatever I might have actually been able to tell someone that about that at some point before that that got to there but it was the real ‘Oh my god’ moment was when obviously I got my high blood pressure; went through the roof and I got told I was going down to labour ward that evening, that was the, ‘Oh right OK this is much more serious than anticipated,’ so.

Why did they how did they explain that you needed to go to labour ward?

Well it was the nice nurse again. While she was taking one of my blood pressures she said, “Oh I’ll just have to go and get the consultant,” and I think she went to talk to them and they obviously looked at the readings and then the nurse the nurse came back with a consultant and said, “Yeah we’re going to have to deliver your baby, it’ll be unsafe otherwise.” So, I can’t quite remember their exact words but it was yeah it was quite a shock so yeah.

It was just a 30, well, almost 30 weeks a routine antenatal scan and check-up at [local hospital] hospital and the consultant was sort of quite concerned with the scan that my daughter was still very small for dates, and my blood pressure was quite high and also I’sd protein plus two in my urine test. Things obviously, lots of weight, was carrying a lot of fluid, and he advised that I went to [another hospital] to have nine weeks’s bed rest. So I was obviously referred on a Thursday tea-time, put on the monitors, just general check-ups, and then it got to the Sunday afternoon where I just had a really bad headache, obviously still had the monitors, blood pressure checks every four hours and so one of the nurses had to get someone else to check my blood pressure, and it was obviously dangerously high, that they just took me down to the delivery suite, put me on a drip to hopefully get the blood pressure down, which it did stabilise by itself, but they said, you know, due to the risk with the pre-eclampsia that had set in, the only way, you know, to sort of, you know, stop the pre-eclampsia of getting any worse was to just do a caesarean for the next day, which they did.

I was in for the week that week. So, 37+5 to 38+5 I was in. And every day I was saying, “So, what are you going to do with me?” and they said, “We’re just going to monitor you.” I was like, “OK.” One of the consultants came round and he was like, “Most of the women in this hospital are because of pre-eclampsia, you know everybody on this ward right now, they’re only here because of pre-eclampsia,” and I was like, “Oh right OK,” and he’s like, “That’s what you’sve got,” and I know, you know I know [laughs]; I diagnosed that myself months, you know months ago, I know I’ve got pre-eclampsia. And he said, “Yeah, that’s pretty much all we can do to make sure you don’st do anything.” He was like, you know “We don’st want you going further than the bathroom; we just want you to stay still, don’st move and just wait to go into labour,” and I was like, “Oh right OK.” I had responded to lying still; my blood pressure came right down I think it was around a 133 it stayed high for a couple of days and then it came down to about a 133 and this was at 38+5, and he said, “You can go home if you want today.” I said, “OK yeah, I’ll go home now,” and I said, “Do I just continue bedrest?” He said, “Yeah, bed rest until you deliver.” Alright fine.

And so anyway, eventually on Monday, they decided to put me on medication. And initially they said like, We’sll put you on medication. We’sll just keep you in overnight, just to make sure the medication’s had an effect on your blood pressure. And then you can probably go home tomorrow morning. And so anyway I said, Fine. So I spent my first night in hospital and I was actually quite happy, because they had the electric beds and I call pull my bed head upright and I was actually comfortable sleeping, and I was like this is great actually. I’m quite happy to be here [laughing]. And then the next morning was when it really kicked off like, so I’m sure it was about 7 in the morning. I just had this army of doctors come in and say, You’sre liver function is so far off, we have to delivery your baby today. It’s going to have to be by caesarean, because you’sre too early for any of the drugs we’sd give you to induce it to work. So basically you have to have a caesarean and your baby’s coming today, and that’s it. So I was just [blerrr] [laughs] and then I wanted it, so obviously I’sd been anticipating that someone would tell me my blood pressure was better and I could go home. And that’s what happened, and so obviously I just immediately called Michael and said, Come here now, your baby’s coming today. And then we just, the rest of that day, I think, we were just completely shell shocked. We just had a parade of, you know, anaesthetists, neonatal specialists, just every single specialist coming in and giving us information that I’m sure didn’st sink it at the time at all, and we just, you know, we were flabbergasted by all these people coming in and out and everything that was going on and all of the rest of it, and its really funny actually. I look at, we have photos from that day, and like one of the anaesthetists came in and he, Michael was all dressed up in the blues to go into surgery, and like there’s this photo of us and we’sre both smiling about this day, and I just look back at it now and think how were we smiling?’s [Laughs]. And we’sre just, I think we were just shell shocked. We just had no idea of what had hit us, you know, it was so far from what we’sd anticipated for the birth of our child. It was just bizarre.

Well it completely changed it. So, within a few hours I was suddenly in hospital. You know I was worried I we didn’st even have a Babygro you know, let alone having any kind of preparation. I had no stuff with me; I’d only gone for an assessment, so I had nothing; I had no clothes; I had no night stuff; I didn’st have a toothbrush. So those were all brought to me, and yeah it just felt like it just felt like my life completely changed. I had to get in touch with my work and tell them I wasn’st coming back and, you know so things just changed verya lot very quickly.

Mm. And what did you tell them at work?

I told them at work I had pre-eclampsia and I was having and I was going to stay in hospital until I had my baby and I wasn’st going to be back for a year.

I thought I was going in for a check-up and actually I was all dressed to go to work and I, I kind of knew the routine by then, because I’sd been in there a few times for check-ups so I knew they were going to check my blood pressure, I knew they were going to take blood. I knew they were going to ask for a urine sample. So we did all that and I sort of sat there, and I had my book, because I know that it takes a little while, and when the midwife checked my, my urine sample, and there was a, I think she said it was a plus 3 reading of protein which is like, I think is like the highest they check. I thought to myself then, okay this is bad. And she said to me, you know, We’sll get the doctor to come and see you. And one of the registrars saw me, looked at the blood pressure, looked at the blood results and the urine sample and she said, you know, You’sre got pre-eclampsia and we’sre going to admit you. And I think even then I just thought, oh I’sll just be in for a couple of days and I said to her, Oh you know, how long am I going to be in for? And she said, Well basically until your baby’s born. At which point I was, I was I like, I just sort of went oh okay and I don’st know, it just didn’st seem quite real. And I suppose it’s one of these things were you just kind of get on with things. So I thought okay, well I’sd better ring my husband and let him know and then secondly, I’sd better let work know, because I have quite, I have a job with quite a lot of responsibility, quite a lot of stress I manage a team, and there was a lot going on, that I needed to look, look after before I went on maternity leave. And I just thought, that was one of my first thoughts actually was, what are we going to do about work? And I rang my boss, and I could tell that she wasn’st very happy, but, and because there was, I suppose what was wrong with me, was slightly intangible. It’s not like, I could point to something and say, oh you know, I’sve got to stay in hospital, because I’sve got a broken leg or something like that. It was, you know, high blood pressure and pre-eclampsia and unless you know what it is, I suppose it doesn’st feel like something that’s very serious. And when they sort of said to me, You know, you’sre going to be in here for a long time. I thought, I just thought, oh God that’s going to be awful.

He’s older and, he’s old enough because he’s five to understand and we’sve been quite honest with him and he’s come to some of the hospital appointments so he knows that, you know, he has to be a bit careful with mummy and all the rest of it because, you know, mummy’s growing a baby and, you know, needs lots of monitoring and I could be sick and I could end up in hospital. So he knows that, you know, it’s not going, if I do end up in hospital, it’s not going to be a sudden shock to him and he know, understood that part of you know, mummy being a little bit poorly with the pregnancy, was, you know, she’s going to have to monitor her blood pressure and do a test, sometimes he’s actually reminded me [laughs].

When I received the diagnosis there was I still feltI didn’st feel as bad because to me it felt like that they could do something, like they could bring my blood pressure down and everything would be OK, because when I spoke to when I got to the ward and the midwife was there and I said, “How long am I going to be here?” She said, “You’ll be here for as long as till we deliver the baby,” and I thought, ‘OK, that’s fine. She’s like, “We’ll get your blood pressure down, we’ll deliver the baby, it’ll be OK,” and I thought, ‘OK, that’s not too bad. I go, “It’s a small thing and I’m in a hospital and in the best place for it and I might have to” And I remember I said, “Realistically, how long will I be here?” and she goes, “You might be here for a few weeks; if you need to be here for a couple of months,” and I thought, ‘Actually that’s not too bad, I can do that because I will have a baby at the end and if it’s a little bit sooner than I expected but there would be a baby at the end of it. And I thought it’s not until I had that ultrasound scan later on that day, in the afternoon/evening time, I think that it really set in that I’ve got a really sick baby and that if he’d had a brain haemorrhage, he really wasn’st going to make it.