At 30-weeks pregnant, even I had to admit my health was disintegrating.

“How do you feel?” The nurse asked as she prepared to take my blood pressure.

“Terrible.” It was difficult to explain. I felt a massive pressure on my chest and it was so bad I slept propped on pillows to breath easier. Conversations were exhausting. Even watching a TV show was too much. I couldn’t focus enough to follow along. Anything physical, like walking from the couch to the bedroom, and I was sapped. A lengthy nap would follow.

The nurse placed the cuff on my arm, squeezed the bulb and released. She bit her lip as she watched the numbers.

“How bad?”

She hesitated. “Umm, not good.” On her way to the door, she paused and looked at my feet. They were so swollen I worried about getting stretch marks on my ankles. “The doctor will be in soon.”

Jimmy walked through the door next.

“Sorry, I got here as soon as I could.” He was still wearing his work uniform. “What did they say?”

“It’s not good.”

He sat down in the chair next to me and squeezed my hand. I slumped against him.

Dr. Oswald entered. He was reading a chart and talking. I wasn’t sure if it was to the nurse, himself or me until he looked up. “This isn’t good. No, no. I’m very worried.” He sat down on his stool. “You have elevated levels of protein. Your blood pressure is too high.” He flipped through the papers again. “What are we going to do?”

I wasn’t sure if question was rhetorical – so didn’t answer. When he finished reading his notes he took a long look at me. He didn’t like what he saw. “I think you need to go to the hospital. This is very dangerous. When it happens, it happens fast.” He was referring to pre-eclampsia.

I was almost too tired to talk, much less disagree.

“What insurance do you have?”

I couldn’t remember.

Jimmy said, “Blue Cross.”

The doctor rubbed his forehead and frowned. “OK, here’s the thing. You have to go to the hospital downtown. Your insurance doesn’t have a contract with St. Agnes.”

“Oh. I thought I’d be at the one in Clovis.”

He shook his head. “They won’t admit you unless you are at least 36 weeks. They don’t have a NICU either. St. Agnes does and I could treat you there – but I can’t at Fresno Community.”

That didn’t make sense. How could I be at the Fresno hospital if he couldn’t see me there? My confusion must have showed.

“Mia, call Dr. Howard’s office.” The nurse quickly left the room while he continued to talk. “He’s the specialist there.”

Panic fluttered like a baby bird in my chest. “You won’t be my doctor anymore?”

“If you make it to 36 weeks, you can transfer to Clovis and I can deliver the baby. Or you can check into St. Agnes and work with your insurance company later to cover the bill.”

It was too much to absorb. I was sick, exhausted and worried my daughter wouldn’t live to take her first breath. It never occurred to me I wouldn’t have my doctor. Regardless of how bad it got, I trusted him. If we were going to make it — he’d be the one to pull us through. … Maybe we should go to St. Agnes and fight the insurance company later.

The nurse opened the door and leaned in. “Dr. Howard is on vacation all week.”

“Who’s covering for him?”

“Dr. Terry.”

“Get him on the phone.” Dr. Oswald stood up and motioned for us to follow. We stood next to the nurse station and waited while she dialed the phone. The doctor asked, “What do you want to do?

Huh? What was there to do? “I don’t know.” I wasn’t really sure what he was asking about. Maybe it was about the hospitals. He talked some more but my brain completely spaced.

Next thing I knew, Jimmy was escorting me out of the office to our cars. I grabbed my keys out of my purse.

“What do you think you’re doing? You’re not driving. I already called mom — we’ll pick it up later.”

I paused. “What are we doing?”

“We’re going home and waiting for him to call us. He’s getting it set up for you to be admitted.”

“Oh.”

Jimmy opened the car door. I sat down and buckled up. I didn’t know how were going to manage with me in the hospital — but I knew we were in for a helluva a ride.

My daughter is a miracle. From conception to birth she battled to be born. Even now, as we gaze into each other’s eyes when she nuzzles and nurses, I’m amazed she is really, truly here.

Still, I can’t get enough of her and nibble her tender toes, cheeks and belly. Her skin is warm and sweet. I rub my face against her downy auburn hair and am thankful she’s alive. I’m relieved we both survived.

Getting pregnant wasn’t easy. I suffered secondary infertility after the birth of my oldest son and was diagnosed at 27 with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS). My odds of conceiving again were very slim – and that would be with the help of fertility aids.

One doctor told me it was a miracle I had my boy.

Another said, after ruling out Cushing’s disease, it was the worst case of PCOS she’d ever seen.

The syndrome did more than clump my eggs and prevent conception. It ravaged my health. In less than eight months I gained almost 100 pounds. My blood pressure skyrocketed to stroke levels and I was put on meds. My hair thinned to the point of embarrassment.

I went from outgoing and active to depressed and closeted. My only thought was another baby. I hated my body for denying me.

The searing grief was eventually numbed under the thick callus of time. Only, the pain didn’t truly dissipate until the birth of my youngest son. He joined our family through adoption.

After a few years hemming and hawing about adopting again, Jimmy and I decided we were content with two.

So, as you can imagine, it was a heart-jolting surprise to find out 15 years later I was expecting again.

When a tubal pregnancy was ruled out, everyone — but me — rejoiced. The protective callus I thought was gone had come back.

“I thought you’d be happy. This is the baby you wanted for so many years,” Jimmy said.

“No. That baby is down the hall, sleeping in his room.”

Jimmy gave me a perplexed look.

“It’s going to take me awhile to wrap my head around this.” He was right. I ought to be shouting with joy so loud the neighbors heard. Instead, I was terrified.

What I wouldn’t tell Jimmy … what scared me so badly … women with PCOS had high early-pregnancy miscarriage rates. I wouldn’t feel better until I could hold the baby. I promised myself I’d at least relax if I made it to 12 weeks – the time when the fetus would take over my faulty production and produce its own hormones.

As that milestone passed, I still felt the yarn of worry knotted in my stomach. I didn’t need the doctor to tell me this pregnancy was going to be rough. I could already feel it.

And each day was more difficult.

My prediction was confirmed at 15 weeks. My blood pressure was out of control and I was referred to the cardiologist. Every week or two, my meds were increased with the hope I’d stabilize.

It didn’t work. At 27 weeks I was placed on strict bed rest. By my 30-week appointment, the deterioration of my health couldn’t be denied.

Nostalgia. Growing up I didn’t understand the hurtful twinge, wistfulness and soft yearning for time gone by — or the need to connect with someone who could relate.

More so, I was irritated with my mom’s frequent attempts to share her memories of Fresno. Because, gawh, how many times did I need to hear that Fulton Mall was ‘the place to be’ before Fashion Fair? Or that’s where Harpain’s Dairy used to be?

And she’d already mentioned, like every time we were on it, that the drive from Fresno to Clovis on Herndon was all orchards. That it felt like forever to get from one city to the next.

Of course, I couldn’t imagine it being that way. By the time I knew Herndon, it was a six-lane speedway and I was an eyeball-rolling, sarcastic tween.

When my husband, kids and I moved back from Modesto – after living there five years – I excitedly pointed out to my tween the house I lived in on Ashlan street when I was six.

It was there I first felt the pain of loss. Our cocker spaniel, named Freckles, escaped the yard and was hit by a car. My mother found him on the street divider wrapped in a blood-splattered white cotton t-shirt.

That was also the home I told my first big whopping lie. (Mom and Dad, there never was an escaped prisoner wearing a black and white outfit, with a ball and chain on his foot that followed me. I broke the ‘stranger’s house’ rule because that nice neighbor lady gave me a cookie. Not because I was afraid of being kidnapped.)

Not only that — I learned to ride a bike there, felt an earthquake, discovered Daddy Long Legs and roly polys, wanted to be a ballerina, developed a passion for the piano and got a pea stuck in my nose.

I also explained to my son, the place we fondly call Tar-ghetto, on First and Shields, used to be a Gemco. My parents didn’t have a Gemco card, so I only got in as far as the optometrist’s office.

Of course, he did the same kind of eye rolling I had done and said, “Mom, how many times are you going to tell me this?”

Hmmm … why was I telling him this? It wasn’t until I felt the shock of seeing a gaping dirt lot where Walgreen’s, on First and Ashlan, used to be that I understood.

That squatty building, with its wide overhang, wood shingled roof, green vegetation and trees was quintessential Fresno. At least the Fresno I grew up in.

Now it was being replaced with a building that looked like every other new one being constructed: Tan stucco, cheaply built and box-shaped minus shady entrance that should be a requirement for this summer-sizzling town.

My son is going to grow up with a different flavor of Fresno. He’s going to think that north of Alluvial is the good part of town, instead of north of Shaw. He’ll ask for a ride to River Park to watch movies with his friends at Edwards and never experience “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” at Tower Theater before the re-vamp. (Not that I ever did, but I soooo wanted to.) He won’t know the agonizing wait for Valentino’s to get in a new shipment of Doc Marten’s – with the only alternative being to drive to San Francisco to get them sooner.

He might remember being dressed up as a puppy on Halloween when he was four, hanging out with his dad and I at Java Café — but then again, when he thinks coffee he probably only thinks of Starbucks.

I know as time ticks on, things change. It’s inevitable. However, that doesn’t stop me from looking for my great-grandma — who never learned how to drive — pushing a shopping cart to Country Boy on Willow, near Shaw, even though neither has been a fixture in Clovis for many years.

Really, just because it’s gone doesn’t mean we should forget. The memories of Fresno should be shared. It matters, because we were here and it shaped our lives.

And hey, son — Fashion Fair was ‘the place to be’ before River Park.

For more “Lost Fresno” stories, check out FresnoFamous.com