Charmaine, here's a short version of my story.

I woke up at 30 weeks (to the day) and thought I'd had an allergic reaction to something. My face was completely swollen, including my eyelids, and I could hardly see. I went to the doctor who sent me straight to the hospital once my BP was taken. He refused to tell me what my BP was.

Once I got to the hospital, I was given some Labetelol (sp?) and some IV medication (not sure which) immediately after my BP was taken, and told that if my BP didn't come down within 4 hours I was going to have a c/s.

It did go down, not a lot though, and I was stabilised at the highest doesage of labetelol that they're allowed to give, and my BP was still 140/90 on a good measurement. It was often more like 160/110. I was on bedrest until 34+6 when my son was born. He weighed 1.9 kilos and was IUGR.

It turned out that the severe swelling that I had had since 20 weeks was actually the early onset of PE. I couldn't see my ankles from 23 weeks and had no kneecaps from 28 weeks. I had my rings cut off my fingers at 23 weeks because I woke up one morning and couldn't take them off. By the time I was hospitalised, I had sausages for fingers and could hardly bend them (I certainly couldn't type for example.)

I later found out that when I turned up at hospital, both BP measurements were over 200, they didn't want to tell me what they were because they'd freak me out and they were really afraid I'd have a stroke. In fact, my records show that they'd called the ICU to check if they had a bed, just in case. (I found this out by reading my records later!)

They estimate that I'd had PE from about 22-23 weeks, from the swelling and the past history. My BP is normally low, about 100/60, and at my 26 week appointment was 130/90, which was high for me, but in the normal range for pregnancy. So despite the signs, nothing was done at that stage. I should point out that I was in a base hospital in the country, seeing the midwives, who don't necessarily have a great deal of experience in this sort of thing (in the country, not generally, because in this town anyone with anything severe is sent to the city, they don't take babies before 36 weeks, so they don't have the experience of dealing with people with severe PE). I'm not bagging the midwives, in fact they were wonderful, it's just that I don't think that they had the experience to deal with someone like me who was so sick.

Anyway, with my second, I was on labetelol from 12 weeks until 36 weeks, also cartia (mild dose aspirin) for the same time, and managed to get to 41+1 before the c/s (I wanted to have a VBAC but DS#2 had other ideas).

PE is also genetic, my mum had it, and her three sisters had it (see the other post in this forum about "Is it hereditary?".

Best wishes.