Philippa

Age at interview: 33

Age at diagnosis: 33

Brief Outline: Philippa was pregnant with her second child. She was invited to join the BuMP study as she had pre-eclampsia in her first pregnancy.

Background: Philippa was pregnant with her second child. She is married, a business systems analyst.

More about me...

Philippa had had pre-eclampsia and an emergency caesarean section with her first pregnancy. So her second pregnancy was classed as high risk and she was under consultant care. She was happy to monitor her blood pressure, and this time around, did not develop any symptoms.

Philippa’s early understandings about pre-eclampsia were based on her Mum’s experiences of having the condition.

My mum had pre-eclampsia when she was pregnant with me.

Okay.

So it was something we’d kind of been told about when I was little and then, when I was pregnant with my first child, obviously, having high blood pressure and eventually, having pre-eclampsia symptoms, at that point as well, I did learn quite a lot. I knew it was a very dangerous condition and, thankfully, everybody in both cases was fine so yeah, I did we did know quite a bit about it. I was quite.

Pre-informed.

Philippa saw a research midwife who explained about the BuMP study.

She said it was a pilot study looking at whether monitoring your blood pressure throughout pregnancy would allow symptoms of pre-eclampsia and high blood pressure to be picked up earlier and be treated earlier and, because of my past pregnancy, I was quite interested in taking part just for my own peace of mind as well. So, yeah, kind of killed two birds with one stone really.

[Laughs] 

Did them benefit and for me as well.

Philippa talked about the difficulties of fitting in blood pressure monitoring as part of the BuMP study when she was pregnant and after she gave birth.

I must say, that was probably the hardest thing actually remember to do it because I had another child that was quite demanding of attention and having to get that sorted and get off to work, everybody where they were meant to be and dressed and everything as well as finding kind of ten minutes to do this three times a week was a challenge and there were times that I’d get to work and I’d have the reminder on my phone and I’d suddenly think, oh, I haven’t done it today. Which I felt awful about but I think that was, it wasn’t by any means often.

And what about after the baby was born, did you find it easier or harder to manage?

Harder. Much harder. Much harder. I had a, the service on my phone that would remind me if I hadn’t done it. It didn’t remind me to do it. It would remind me if I hadn’t done it but I’d put my own timers on my phone right the way through so I would remember on Monday, Wednesday and Friday to do the set times. But then after the birth, I do remember several times when the alarm on my phone would go off and I’d think, right, I need to do that and then suddenly something else would happen, the baby would need a feed, need a change, be sick, my older child would need something else and kind of an hour would pass and then I’d get a reminder and think, oh, I forgot to do it again and, by that point, it was too late in the day.