Clumsiness & a trip to OHSU's ER

On Wednesday July 29th I had spent my day at the office in the nice A/C. By 5pm I was finally satisfied that I had done everything that I had intended to do for my day. I packed up and grabbed my laptop, purse, notebook and a sheet of paper that I needed to do some more work when I got home. I went to exit from behind my desk and my feet got tangled up with some boxes that were awaiting UPS to pick them up. I am not exactly sure how I didn't see the two boxes stacked on top of each other on the floor set neatly next to my desk....but apparently wasn't paying an ounce of attention to the floor. I did quite the ungraceful trip and fall and landed extremely hard on the lobby floor of my office. My laptop went flying, along with my purse, keys, notebook, etc. Next thing you know I am lying on the floor trying to figure out what just happened. I at this point am of course in tears and begin trying to get myself up off the floor. I am pretty sure my boss heard the loud noise of the boxes and the profanities I am sure I yelled as I was falling to the floor. He came running up to see what happened, and found me trying to get up off the floor....talk about embarrassing!

He helped me up and said, lets go get the blood cleaned up, so of course I look down and the first thing I see is blood on the belly of my shirt and I immediately freak out (being 5 months pregnant and all, my first thought was that I hurt the baby)....my boss then assured me it was just my elbow bleeding and not to worry. But I was already worried and extremely sore from the fall. After cleaning up the blood from the floor, my elbow and wherever else I could find it....I went back up front to grab my belongings and head out. I got in my car and immediately called Jared (sobbing of course, which totally freaked him out). I wasn't sure what to do, didn't really know what I had hurt, but very worried about the baby. I couldn't find the phone number to the after hours office for the doctor and neither could Jared, so I called my mom...again sobbing who helped me find the phone number. Once I had the number, I called and asked what I should do...if they needed to check me out to make sure the baby was ok, etc.

The doctor said when you are as far along as I am in pregnancy that it was imperative for me to come in and be monitored to make sure the baby was ok. I was almost to Linnton right outside of Portland and turned around and headed to the Emergency Room at the hospital. I was feeling like everything was ok, but honestly would have been worried sick for weeks if I hadn't have gone in. Once I got to OHSU, they escorted me up to Labor & Delivery (apparently you go here if you are 20 weeks along or further to be monitored rather than ER). I didn't want Jared to have to drive all the way to town as I was sure I was fine, but had my mom meet me at the hospital since she is much closer. They put me on a contraction monitor for 4 hours (I didn't have any...thank goodness). They also checked the baby's heart rate, which was perfectly normal. They also did an ultrasound and found that the baby was moving around and everything looked just great. They did find a pretty bad bump/bruise on my hip/butt and also did an x=ray of my elbow as I think it got the brunt of the damage. After a lot of questions and being checked over, they found that I was just pretty badly bruised, no broken bones or fractures, ultimately nothing else was wrong and the baby was ABSOLUTELY PERFECT!

I guess mommy instinct was to land on my elbow and side so not to harm the little guy. I spent about 5 hours at the hospital on Wednesday night, which isn't always the most exciting experience...but overall I am glad I went in and had them check me out. Hey at least they have A/C....I would have been miserably hot at home. ;-)