Handicapped Parking

When you’re not pregnant and you fall down in a public place you quickly get up, look around and hope no one saw you.  When you are pregnant you slowly get up, look around and hope no one saw you and then call your OB…

I’ve been feeling a little guilty lately because my work assigned me a pretty cushy handicapped parking space.  In Alaska, since there is so much ice, walking to work can be treacherous, even for non-pregnant people.  My work very sweetly offered me this parking spot and I was excited until I realized that the guy next to me is in a wheel chair and legitimately deserves his parking spot...  I felt guilty every day until yesterday when I rolled my ankle and fell on my face on dry pavement walking to my handicapped parking space.

I quickly triaged myself and realized the only thing wrong besides being super wet (did I mention I fell into a puddle?) was a scraped knee.  Then I waddled the rest of the way to my parking spot and called my OB. 

I ended up talking to the on-call doctor who asked me all kinds of silly questions like “did you jar yourself when you fell or was it more graceful?”  I resisted the urge to reply with “have you ever seen a pregnant woman?  We’re not exactly graceful!”  The truth was I had no idea how I fell, I didn’t even know if my belly hit the ground, it happened fast and then it was over.  Luckily I was able to tell her that I have an appointment for and ultrasound with a perinatologist today so she agreed that as long as I didn’t start bleeding I didn’t have to go to the hospital.

I’ve had no problems since the fall except a slightly more swollen than usual ankle.  Little man / Andre is still moving and shakin’ like normal, but the moral of the story is I no longer feel guilty about my handicapped parking space because clearly the shorter distance I have to walk the better!

Also, I’ll write more on this later but our appointment with the peri today is to make sure that the baby is just big and not too big, which may indicate a genetic problem.  We feel confident that he’s just well fed but I’m still a little anxious.