Gestational Diabetes Overview

Yesterday was the first appointment with the GD doctor. I wasn't really sure what to expect going into it, so I researched other peoples experiences and figured that they would show me how to test my blood sugar and tell me how to eat (or not eat). So it started out doing just that- showing me how to test my sugar. I got a 125 (this was 1hr after lunch). So that's a good sign. For lunch, I ate at Rubios. I had a California bowl with shrimp & also a side of pinto beans. So in the bowl, it had rice (a lot actually) and so I was worried it would throw the test off, but it was still good! That's a relief and definitely makes me feel better about the diet plan. So anyway, the actual first finger prick in the office was not the highlight of the appointment to say the least. I didn't expect it to hurt as much as it did. Maybe I'm a baby, but I always thought I had a high pain tolerance. I DID get kicked by the horse like 2 weeks ago and have been totally fine. That's another story. Haha. But anyways, so after that prick, they sent me into the ultrasound room and got that started. It was a decent length ultrasound, so I was a fan of that! They told me that he is looking very healthy and a bit big. At the time of the ultrasound, I was 30 weeks and 2 days. They told me that according to his size, he compares to someone who is 33 weeks and 1 day. So, that's kind of scary and exciting at the same time. Great that he's healthy and that we may see him sooner than we thought, but scary giving birth before your due date. During the ultrasound, she said that he looked like he was practicing breathing movements too, so that's reassuring in a way that if he was born early, he would have a better chance at breathing on his own. Also, he was facing with his head down, which is good.. that's where he should be at this point. Interesting that he's just sitting there in position ready to come out when the time is right! Crazy weird.
 After the ultrasound, we went in to talk to the actual doctor about the diet plan, his measurements and what they mean, and what to expect. So to start with his measurements, I can't remember exactly what the measurement was but it was between 4-5lbs at this point.  She explained that sometimes with the mother having GD, that the baby can plump up a lot faster.. so his belly would get bigger in diameter than his head.. causing potential issues during the birth if he got stuck. At this point, we're in the safe zone, but they want to monitor that to make sure we stay in the safe zone. They didn't actually change my due date. They told me that his size is COMPARABLE to someone who is about 2.5 weeks further along than I am, but that doesn't change how far I am. They just want to make sure he stays under 9lbs. If he gets too big, they just might induce or have a C-section. That's potential (if he keeps going at this rate) for him to actually be born at the end of September/beginning of October instead of October 20th as originally planned. Good thing I decided to have the baby shower like a month before the due date! I have it set as 9/12, so hopefully he's not born THAT early. With monitoring my diet and exercise, it should be able to keep it in control though. If not, they will put me on medication. They gave me a few papers that show me how much carbs that I should be eating per meal/snack. So I'm going to have to start reading labels like crazy. I asked my mom who in my family has had diabetes. That included my dad, my maternal grandfather, my paternal grandmother, and some of my paternal grandmothers siblings.  That's as far back as we know of off hand, but ya. It was interesting because when I walked into the ultrasound room, the ultrasound tech asked me how I ended up with GD because normally it's with larger patients. So that makes me feel better in the fact that I probably couldn't help a lot of the reasons why I have it. My mom also had GD with her first pregnancy. It hasn't been a surprise to say the least. Anyway, the doctor went over the information on how/when to test my sugar. Once first thing in the morning before I eat and then once after breakfast, lunch, and dinner. After the first test in the office, I was NOT excited to hear that I have to do it 4x a day, but then again, I kind of knew it was coming.
My mom worked at a doctors office so she hooked me up with a couple sets of test kits. Otherwise, we'll have to go through the insurance to get it. Eventually, we will have to get refill strips, so we will do that at some point after I run out of what we have. I didn't try to start testing till the morning after. Let me tell you how frustrating it was. I got it all set up, purposely taking my sweet time to do so.. trying to avoid the inevitable.. and the first finger prick we did, the test screen went idle, so it didn't register. So, we had to do another prick with a separate strip.. and it didn't register either. My hands were sweaty because they just do that.. AAAAND I was nervous. So, I'm thinking that had something to do with why it didn't work. Diluted blood doesn't work apparently. Who knew? So anyways, if I can ever get these sweat glands to chill the freak out, we'll get a positive test result. Ya, we ran out of time and had to go to work, so we'll try again a different day. One thing that was nice is that the prick on this tester didn't hurt as much. It felt like a smaller needle. But another thing that is nice about this tester is that it has a depth setting so you can have a shallow prick or deep prick.. so of course I tried it shallow. I had Adam do the prick because I was too squeamish to do myself. But the area that we did it was maybe not the best area of my finger.. as it could have been a less sweaty area. Let me also say that when I wash my hands to get rid of the sweat, it gets rid of it for about 2 seconds.. then the floods start flowing. So it's pretty much impossible to dry. Haha.
I go back to the specialist every 2 weeks for monitoring. They are 30 min appointments from here on out which is nice because the first one was like 2 hours. Most of that was waiting around in a room, but still. They did say that there will be more ultrasounds to make sure he's not too big as well. Not sure if that will happen at every 2 week appointment, but we'll see. So since right now I have my OB appointments scheduled for every 2 weeks, I am trying to schedule those within the same days so I don't have to get multiple days off. We originally did not want to get more than the 18 week ultrasound because of the radiation on the baby.. but we don't have much choice in this situation. I am excited that I get to see him more though!