Looking back now I see that my symptoms started at about 20 weeks. I was quickly gaining weight and getting puffy everywhere but I thought that was just par for the course.  At about 24 weeks I noticed my feet were fat when I woke up in the morning and hurt like hell which I knew was a bad sign but denial can be pretty powerful so once again I figured it was no big deal.  By 25 weeks I failed my first glucose test and had to lay on my left side at my doctor... Read more

Well, I was a 25 year old first time mom.  I went through my first three months of pregnancy normal just as anyone. My due date was March 28th.  By the time I was four months pregnant I started to notice a ton of swelling, even causing me to have to work less. The doctors didn't seem to think it was anything because my blood pressure wasn't going up. ... Read more

I am a mother who suffered from Preeclampsia with all three of my children. Malaysia born May 21, 2005 was born at 32 weeks gestation. I was 105 lbs when I first got pregnant. By the 29th week I was 160 lbs and bp was 150/100. I went back the next week and was 180 lbs, my feet were swollen to the point that I could not wear my regular shoe. My feet felt like they weighed 10 lbs each. I felt dizzy and had severe migraines every day. The doctor told me to stay off of my feet and ordered me to c... Read more

I've always dreamed of the day I would have my first child. I envisioned everyone waiting with anticipation in the waiting room...my husband by my side seeing the miracle of birth and then telling everyone "It's a girl" or "It's a boy". Well, it basically didn't go the way "I" had planned. Here is my story:First I'd like to introduce myself. My name is Kim. I have been married to my best friend for over 7 years. I have a beautiful 4 year old daughter and I'm a NICU nurse at a level III h... Read more

It was January 5, 2009.  I was 26 weeks pregnant and I had just had a blah day at work.  I bought something quick and easy to make for dinner, went home and took a nap.  Around 6:30 pm, right after I put dinner in the oven, the pains started.  I would have thought nothing of them, it was just a weird feeling at top of my abdomen, but something told me that it wasn't good.  I made a deal that if they didn't go away within ten minutes, I would call my husband and tell him ... Read more

I became pregnant very young at 18 years old. At around 5 months I was informed at a checkup that my baby was showing up a little smaller than she should've been on the utlrasound. The nurse told me that since I was small, it may just be genetic. But I was sent to a specialist anyway. The specialist informed me that I was going to develop preeclampsia and that my baby would most likely be delivered early, "But we're gonna try to keep her in there as long as we can" he said.Th... Read more

    Hello, my name is Natasha and I was 20 years old when I formed Preeclampsia. I had never even heard of this disease when I got it and I didn't know how bad it was going to get. It started when I was 33 weeks pregnant and I went to the hospital because I felt a rush of liquid go down my leg. I was frightened so I called my nurse and she told me to come to the hospital to get checked out. The liquid was just urine, I guess I lost control of my bladder late in pregnancy... Read more

When I was pregnant with my first son, I found out at 24 weeks he was missing half his umbillical artery, called "SUA" or single vessel cord. The fact that he was missing the cord was reason enough for alarm, as my body would have to compensate for the rest to get him through pregnancy. I was terrified and warned that chances for my pregnancy to continue were not good. The, at about 28 weeks, I started having unusual swelling of my hands and feet - so bad I could barely wear flip flops. I starte... Read more

I was 29 when I had my first child. It was an uneventful pregnancy. Not only did I not have any problems with the pregnancy, but he came at just the right time to suit my work schedule. I remarried and recently had my second child at the age of 38. I developed pregnancy-induced hypertension which slowly progressed to preeclampsia. I was put on modified bedrest and eventually admitted to the antepartum unit with the anticipation that I would stay at the hospital until the baby needed to be del... Read more

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My name is Carla and I have been a diabetic for 16 years.  Along with my diabetes, I also had trouble with my blood pressure, cholesterol, and iron thanks to my "wonderful" family blood line.  I was told in my early 20s that becoming pregnant was probably not possible and that if I did conceive, it would be a tough pregnancy.  When my husband and I decided we were ready to have a baby, I took all of the precautions that I could.  I had been using an insulin pump for over... Read more

My first pregnancy could not have gone more smoothly. I coasted along for months without so much as headache. All of a sudden in my 28th week, my feet began to swell horribly and I made an appointment with my doctor. My blood pressure was off the charts and they put me on bedrest inside the hospital where I would later deliver. For 2 weeks I lingered, as the protein in my urine increased and my blood pressure steadily rose. After several days of magnesium sulfate it became obvious my body was sh... Read more

The first 24 weeks of my pregnancy were perfectly normal. I was still able to exercise, I ate healthy and my baby was thriving in the womb. At 26 weeks I went into preterm labor, but luckily my Ob/GYN was able to stop the contractions. However, three days later, it happened again. I was then placed on strict bedrest, and was also placed on terbutaline. Within the next few weeks, I started to notice I was gaining weight. Up until that point I had only gained 14lbs. At 30 weeks I had already ga... Read more

Hello! I am a deaf woman who has had her first child, born 4 weeks early. I will share my experience of having had Preclampsia in my first pregnancy. Since I have developed a sudden case of White Coat Hypertension a couple of months prior to my first pregnancy, but since I did not have a family history of high blood pressure, I thought it would spontaneously resolve by itself. I was in graduate school and doing a full time internship at the same time. I even discussed it with my OB GYN ... Read more

Around July of 2007 my Fianc... Read more

My names is Heather, and I live in CA. I have two beautiful children, a girl(5) and a boy (3). In 2003 , I was 21 when I had my daughter and in the last month I started seeing a lot of swelling. I called my dr and he said that it was normal, but I couldn't walk. I continued to call him with my concerns and he continued to say that it was normal. By the end of my 38 week I was in the hospital with toxemia.The drs did no that I said it because my blood pressure was normal and there was no protie... Read more

I was one of the lucky ones.  Reading all the stories here and having some friends' experiences much worse than mine have confirmed that for me.My first pregnancy, I was 28 years old, working full time, and we lived a 35 mile commute from work and a 12 mile commute form my OB/GYN andrural hospital where I planned to deliver.  I had done BBT charting while we were TTC, and we got pregnant on the first month, although my ovulation date was off by over a week from the "average day... Read more

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In January of 2007, my husband and I started trying to conceive what was to be our last child. I found out in March that I was pregnant. In what was described as unrelated to my subsequent HELLP, that baby was lost at 8 weeks gestation.  By August 2007, I was pregnant again.  Everything went fine until 20 weeks, when I was diagnosed with preeclampsia, and was told to prepare for a delivery at 32 weeks.  Within 1 week of the diagnosis, I was rushed by ambulance to the hospital that... Read more

In August 2002 I learned that I was pregnant with my first child. I was working a tedious job in theatre and quit to work a more "stable" job. The job ended up being a nightmare and ended only after 2 months. The day I came home from that miserable job was the day I started to feel not well (much of my story will not match up with the stereotypical preeclampsia story). My mother had preeclampsia/toxemia with both of my sisters, I am the middle child. So, the holidays approached and I c... Read more