Thank you all for your comments yesterday! You definitely made me feel a lot better about accidentally mangling my baby.

After a long Wednesday and long Thursday, I was really, REALLY looking forward to finally being able to catch up on my stories. But the lack of sleep, residual stress, and guilt over Annie’s arm left me exhausted and I climbed into bed early (for me) at 11 pm with a borderline migraine. Mike came home from the gym as I was laying out my nightly prescriptions. He rubbed my shoulders a little bit, then I rolled over and went to sleep.

I woke up at 1 am with some confusion. The drugs I take at night make me sleep like a rock (finally!), so I couldn’t figure out why I was awake. But then I realized I was having MAJOR cramps, and I became more confused because I’d just taken my first dose of the anti-contraction medication. After blinking a few more times, I realized my cramps were of the gastrointestinal variety. After I used the bathroom, I got back into bed and started absentmindedly rubbing my eye. I laid back down and tried to go back to sleep, but a few minutes later I needed to use the bathroom again.

When I was washing my hands, I noticed my left eye was really itching, so I looked in the mirror to see if something was in it. The inside of my left eye was a bit red and swollen – it reminded me of when I’m around cats (I’m terribly allergic). Right then the left side of my nose started running like mad, as if a switch had been thrown. Add all of this to my migraine and I was an unhappy camper. I got back into bed, only to get up to use the bathroom again ten minutes later.

This time, I called to Mike to come look at my face, because now both eyes were itching. He got out of bed and looked at me and said, “Yeah, your eyes are a little red.” I looked in the mirror and was like, “UM NOT JUST A LITTLE!” Both of my eyes were swelling and my nose was non-stop running. I took a picture of my face to show my mom in the morning.

1:30 am, 2.5 hours post-ingestion
Even my nose is swollen.

I sat up in bed and watched some TV and felt my nose close up. And was like, this is the weirdest migraine I’ve ever had. I went to the bathroom again and my face was like WHOA.

2:30 am, 3.5 hours post-ingestion
That’s not my left cheekbone – that’s my SWOLLEN JAW.

Finally, FINALLY something in my head said, “YOU ARE HAVING AN ALLERGIC REACTION DUMMY.” I woke Mike up again and said, “I am having an allergic reaction to my contraction medication. Call Dr. Risky while I call my parents to come stay with Annie.” Dr. Risky’s answering service told Mike to take me to the nearest ER. The nearest ER…hmm…where was that, oh yeah, we’d just spent four hours there the night before with Annabel.

My mom opened our front door and almost fainted when she saw my face. But there wasn’t time to linger because my throat was itchy and it was getting hard to swallow. Luckily we live about a 90-second drive from the ER. If you want to be seen instantly when you walk into an ER, an allergic reaction when you’re 22 weeks pregnant definitely works. I was in a bed with an IV in less than five minutes.

The doctors were actually really grateful that I’d taken pictures documenting my facial swelling. Right before they pushed the drugs into my IV I took one more picture:

3:15am, 4.25 hours post-ingestion
I AM QUASIMODO!

I’m not sure how long I laid there before the medicine started working, but it definitely got worse before it got better. My lips started to swell (my lower lip split), my tongue was tingling, and my ears were ringing. I was clearing my throat every few seconds and the ER nurses were all hovering around me all, “Can you breathe?! CAN YOU BREATHE?!” The Acrobat, meanwhile, was kicking away like it was the greatest day ever.

When I was finally released, my face looked like this:

5am, 6 hours post-ingestion, post treatment

There was a woman in labor checking in when we were leaving, and she and her husband literally backed away when they saw me. I wanted to say, “oh, this is NOTHING, you should have seen me a few hours ago!”

The rest of the day I was really uncomfortable. My face ached in ways I didn’t know possible, but the worst was the full-body-itching. I was on a steady stream of Benedryl and it couldn’t touch the itching. Luckily, it made a difference to my face:

5:30 pm, 18.5 hours post-ingestion, post treatment

We are all baffled as to why I would suddenly have such a strong reaction to a drug that I took without incident when I was pregnant with Annie. I have a call in to my former pharmacy to see if I was given a different generic three years ago. Dr. Risky (obviously) told me to stop taking Indocin, and I have an extra appointment to see her this week to check on the baby and figure out a new course of action. In the meantime, I will continue popping Benedryl and randomly texting pictures of my face to people to scare them.