After a long night of reading, me and Eli hit the sack early, and woke up even earlier.

I was awoken by a soft kiss by Eli. When we broke apart, he held his forehead and nose up against the side of my head. I held him the same way he held me.

After that, we were in silence for a while with our foreheads pinned up against each other.

When he pulled away from me and turned the light one, he gave me a weird look, like he was worried…. But why?

"Are you feeling ok?" he asked, touching my cheeks. It's weird though… It didn't feel normal.

"Yeah, why?" I asked.

"You're all puffy," he said, gently poking under my eyes.

I pulled my hands up too feel my face, but they were puffy too!

I ran into the bathroom, and my face swollen up like a balloon! My hands were huge too!

"Eli, I think we need medical help," I said, looking at my hands again. It was like I was having an allergic reaction, but to what? I'm not allergic to anything.

"Like 911 or doctors?" he asked.

"Call the doctors, tell him what's going on, and if he says call 911, then call," I said, walking back to the bed to look through the pregnancy book and see if this was normal.

"It's like I'm having an allergic reaction," I said, while Eli stood over me, looking for answers too.

"Well, did you eat anything?" he asked.

"No! I'm not allergic to anything! That's why I'm freaking out!" I waved my hands in front of me unintentionally.

Then I found what I was looking for:

Symptom Danger sign Other reasons

Swelling of the Hands/Face Pregnancy Induced Hypertension (PIH) Swelling

We saw it at the same time.

I looked back at him, feeling a tear or two drip off my jaw bone.

"I think something might be really wrong," I said.

He pointed to the table in the book.

"Well, PIH is just high blood pressure isn't it?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said.

"Well, isn't that easy to take care off?" he asked.

"Yes Eli, but I already have an iron deficiency, plus high blood pressure, that's not good!" my hands were shaking again.

He placed a hand on my arm.

"Ok, it'll be ok. I'll go call the doctor," he said, looking into my pure blue eyes with his jade green ones. Then he layed a soft but intense kiss on my lips. Finally, he pierced his forehead against mine, ran his finger through my hair, and got up to call the doctor.

After about half an hour of talking on the phone, Eli finally told me to get dressed because we were heading to the doctors.

I was so worried at that point.

What if something really bad happened to my baby? What if she doesn't make it? Then what?

But I couldn't let that get to me. All I could do what to what the doctor says.

When we got there, the doctor said he was going to get the supplies to have an ultrasound.

I decided to lift my shirt up and sing to her a little, since I heard they can listen to you. I think it relaxes her… she doesn't kick as much.

Soon enough, Eli had his hand on my stomach, his head on my chest, and he was singing along to.

I couldn't help but cry.

I knew that everything would be alright, I mean, it's better then a miscarriage, this wasn't definite, but it was still scary.

Eli tried to calm me down, but eventually he figured it wouldn't do anything. So he layed back down how he was and hushed. I'm not sure if he was hushing her because she had started kicking a lot at that moment, or me because of my tears, but it soothed me enough to quite me.

After waiting a while, we found out worst case scenario was true: I had PIH.

When the doctor told me, I dug my swollen face into my huge hands and sobbed a little.

Eli sat up on my bed and held me a little tight.

He assured me everything will be ok.

"Yeah," the doctor said, shaking my so that I would look up at him.

"Clare, this is a dangerous thing to have in a pregnancy. I'm not going to lie. But I can tell you this. We will up your prescription," he said, scribbling some things down on a pad of paper.

"So that it will take care of your anemia and PIH, and I'm going to have you bed written, which means Eli, you'll be doing most of the work," he said, handing Eli the piece of paper.

"No problem," he replied.

"Ready to go?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said, getting up.

"Oh, one more thing," the doctor said.

"No strenuous activity, such as walking, running, laundry… whatever," I hoped he was joking.

"If you guys wanted to still have sex…" he said with a confused look on his face and making a hand gesture.

"I'd say no more then twice a week. Just lot's of iron healthy foods, and here is a page of website link if you wanted to get some online help with the PIH and high blood pressure," he said, handing us another sheet of paper.

"And that's it. See you guys next trimester!" he said, waving us bye.

I just smiled and we both walked out of the room.

When we got home, we found a packet from the doctor about epidurals in our mailbox.

"He really likes to save the trees, doesn't he?" Eli joked with his arm around me.

I took the packet out of his hand and walked inside.

"At least he's trying to help!" I said.

Eli stepped inside and closed the door.

We took off our layers of clothing and kicked on the heat.

"What does it say?" he asked, coming behind me and hugging me, looking over my shoulder to read the paper.

"Let's see…" I said, chewing on an apple.

"It says how it's done… through catheter… that it isn't supost to hurt. At about 4 to 5 centimeters dilated with regular contraction they'll give it to women. It also says that its continuous doses, and I may not feel my legs when they give it to me," I said, looking up at Eli. I hadn't noticed we had been moving and he was trying to get me comfortable on the couch.

I layed down with a blanket over me after switching into shorts and tee shirt.

Eventually, after getting us something to eat and kicking the heat up more, he said down under me.

"What else?" he asked.

"It talks about the advantages," I said.

"Like?" he said before putting a chip in his mouth and leaning back with his hands behind his back.

"It's very effective, and used throughout labor. And the doctors control it so I don't OD on it," I said.

"Nice. Go on," he said.

"It only goes to site of pain, and since I'll be pain free, I can sleep and then be more awake for pushing, and only a little goes to the baby," I said.

Eli took it all in.

"Disadvantages?" he asked, looking at me.

"It says that it takes 15 minutes for it to be put in and 20 minutes to work, but it doesn't seem that long since its hours a relief afterward," I said.

"Like I said, I may not be able to feel or move my legs; it requires frequent blood pressure monitoring and fetal monitoring, and an IV. It makes birthing longer. But everything on here doesn't seem that bad compared to what it does do," I said, coming up a giving Eli a kiss on the cheek.

He held me like he was going to carry me down the aisle.

"Thank you," I said.

"For what?"

"You did what you were supposed to do."

"I did?"

"Yeah."

I took his hand and put it on my chest.

"You were there."