24 Weeks, 5 days

Another Frenchy doc appointment and Hellish Frenchie labwork down, two more to go.  Mrs. French OBGYN freaked when she took my blood pressure… “It’s not even 10!” she anxiously proclaimed.  “No wonder you’ve been so tired!”  First of all, WTF does 10 mean?  Did she mean 110?  I asked her what I should do about it and she said, “Eat more salt.”  What?  Eat more salt?  Are you crazy woman?!?! I’m pregnant and last time towards the end I blew up like the bitchy gum chewing chick in Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory who turned into a blue berry!  I’d like to try to avoid having swollen feet, face and eyes again not to mention kankles and sausage fingers.  Plus, I do eat salt anyway, just not piles of it.  Concerned by her reaction, I walked the few miles back to the villa and called my doc back in Florida to ask her opinion on the matter.  A nurse from home called back and explained to me that my blood pressure is normally 100 / 64 and that I just have low blood pressure.  Nothing to be concerned about and as a matter of fact, something I should be happy about.  This is not the first time a strange doctor has freaked out about my blood pressure being low, but this IS the first time I was pregnant when a doctor freaked out about my low blood pressure.  So, I had to get a little reassurance from my comfort zone back home.  To add to the drama, on every Frenchie OBGYN visit I am forced to go down to this sketchy lab to get blood taken since I apparently have no immunity to toxoplasmosis and this time they wanted to check my iron levels too.  After struggling to communicate with the staff who don’t know even one word of English, I was stuck with a rather large needle in my right arm by a glove-less woman who reeked of alcohol.  She must have had a few glasses of vin on her lunch break.  As it turns out, my low blood pressure is NOT the reason I’ve been exhausted so much in this pregnancy.  Nor is it because I am chasing a toddler around 24/7 with little to no help and working my butt off for two clients.  Apparently, I am also anemic!  Yes, fucking anemic.  Can you believe it?  I actually suspected low iron could be the culprit this time due to my strange cravings of grapefruit juice, seaweed salad and spinach.  Unfortunately seaweed salad is impossible to come by in So France and so I am devouring spinach lately like Popeye on steroids.  Spinach salads, spinach in my pasta, spinach sandwiches, spinach ravioli, spinach in my eggplant parm… why so much spinach you ask?  Because I am NOT going to consume dead animal flesh from an innocent cow or lamb just to get iron and risk heart disease and other health concerns for me and my unborn child.  *Hummmm… maybe that is one reason I have low blood pressure.  Just a little food for thought*.  Ok, so there is a more simple way to combat iron deficiency, I know, take iron pills.  Well, I tried that too.  The doc prescribed to me an iron pill a day to go with my prenatal vitamins.  I took it the first night and the next day I felt weaker and dizzier than before plus had a raging headache.  And I NEVER get headaches!  And sorry to mention this but I was constipated for 24 hours and when I finally pooped, not only did it cause my poor little butthole to bleed some, but the poo was tar black!  Disgusting.  Me, personally, I’d rather eat loads of spinach, drink extra grapefruit juice and throw in some seaweed into my diet than suffer from more weakness, headaches, constipation and bleeding black tar poos.  But, hey, that’s just me.  I hope you enjoy these pics of my ever growing belly.  George laughs when he sees me naked.