Before my experience I never understood how a woman could not know she was pregnant? Surely it must be some sort of denial or mental block right? Well, my story taught me differently. I have PCOS so I do not get my periods regularly. At the time I also was having issues with my health insurance so unless it was an emergency I was not going to my regular checkups. For months I had swelling in my hands. Over the course of the day it would go down. I thought it may have been something with my type 2 diabetes. Ignored it hoping the issue would resolve itself. The next few months I would wake up with tingling in my left arm. Again, I brushed it off because if would go away shortly after I got up and since I slept on my left side I thought that was the problem. I began being concerned when my feet started swelling and my scale saying I gained 5 pounds overnight. I trusted my instincts and my husband took me to the ER. Upon arrival they did many tests on me and could not figure out what was wrong. I then demanded a pregnancy test and it came back positive. This concerned me since my oldest sister has HELLP syndrome with her first son and she had PCOS as well so I knew I was at risk. Despite my blood pressure remaining at 180/130 the ER doctor told me it was not life threatening and sent me home with no further testing. I didn't know what to do because I knew he was wrong but since he didn't listen I went home and decided to monitor my blood pressure myself and go in to another hospital if I needed. I went to bed that night with my blood pressure getting lowered to 150/120. I had a headache but I decided to try and sleep it off. At 6am the next day I felt something wasn't right and checked my blood pressure. This time the readings were all in the 200s. We went back to the same hospital hoping they would help us. When I arrived they quickly got me into a room and the doctor this time was much better. I found out I was 27 weeks pregnant with a boy. I was admitted into the labor and delivery unit. Throughout the day various scans and tests were done on me. I was exhausted and could not stay awake. I was not urinating much and I felt sick. I was monitored throughout the night and at some points they got my blood pressure to safe levels but the next morning they started becoming uncontrolled again. Overnight they had found fluid in my lungs and that morning I was told I needed to get an emergency c section and that they might have to intubate me. At the time I was so exhausted and sick that I did not care what happened. I was gowned and prepped and they began the C-section. During it I was so tired and desperately wanted to fall asleep, I was also vomiting and the nurse had to hold my head to the side into a vomit bag. I clearly remember saying to the nurse 'I'm so tired" and she replied in a calming tone "it's ok you can go to sleep." This scared me so I fought my hardest to stay awake. My son was born at 10:44 am and was rushed to the NICU after I gave him a kiss. I began feeling better shortly after. I stayed in the hospital for 6 days. Three of those days I was on oxygen. My lungs were ok but my kidneys has taken a bit and needed to be monitored for a year after the birth and probably for the rest of my life. My son stayed in the NICU for 87 days and luckily had no complications and is now a very healthy happy 1 year old. I have to take cholesterol medication, blood pressure medication (I had hyper tension before the birth so this was nothing new) and a medication to help my kidneys heal. I am extremely lucky to be alive. Severe preeclampsia is a monster. I hope that as research continues lives of mothers and children will be saved.