I get this when I'm pregnant. It's not nearly as bad as lots of the gestational nasties you can get. It basically just means that over the course of 9 months I make a tad too much plasma which dilutes my blood a bit causing my platelet count to be low. Platelets are the small, sticky stuff in blood made in the bone marrow that help give vessels integrity and seal small wounds. Without enough platelets, blood doesn't clot rapidly enough. The question is: how much is enough?
Some holistic practitioners don't think it's anything to worry about at all. But doctors and hospitals feel differently. My small-town hospitals have cut-offs and if your platelets fall below 100,000 they won't deliver you there and you get transferred to a bigger hospital over an hour away. Mine were 101,000 when I went into labor last time. The risk of complication is quite low. It's all a bit overkill and designed to protect providers against malpractice suits.
So in an effort to keep my platelets up and to keep from getting transferred from my local hospital, my midwife has sent me to an acupuncturist/herbalist. I'm pretty happy about it. I had my first appointment yesterday and it was great.
I got acupuncture in my hands and feet and he sent me home with this stuff...
I have to boil it and drink the water twice a day. I'm not so excited about that, but he's had a ton of success treating women with gestational thrombocytopenia, so drink it I will.
The other thing I like is that he's not just giving me gunk to keep my platelets up, he's treating general imbalances with the pins and herbs and says that when you do that, the platelets just naturally stay up.
Anyway, I start the "tea" on Monday. I have a feeling it's gonna taste like shoe.
UPDATE: It's worse than shoe. Far worse.
