Posts Tagged ‘pregnancy week by week’

OB Appointment Week 40

Monday, April 26th, 2010

Well folks, this is it. Today was our due date and the little monster wasn’t budging at all. I had six straight hours of contractions last night, about 6-8 minutes apart, and then they just stopped. So frustrating!

We visited the doctor today and he’s going to induce us in the morning. We have to be at the hospital at 7:00 a.m. and should start the petocin around 8 or 8:30.

Tonight is so surreal I cannot put it in to words. I want to cry, throw up, laugh, sleep, clean the house – I don’t even know what to do with myself. Shelton is a ball of nerves in his own way – head buried in a laptop all night.

We’re surrounded by family tonight, with my brother and his wife here, Shelton’s mom and mine stopped by for a brief visit. We’ll be surrounded by even more tomorrow.

I feel like it’s my last night in Vegas and I’ve got an early flight so I might as well just stay up and make the most of the time I’ve got!

Pregnancy Week 39

Sunday, April 25th, 2010

You want to know how week 39 was? It was awful. Oh, AND I AM STILL PREGNANT!!

Seriously, I spent the first four days of last week in so much pain that I was pretty much stuck in bed and Shelton stayed home from work three whole days to take care of me. When we went to the doctor’s appointment on Monday, I sat in his waiting room crying in pain. Only to go in there and tell me that there had been NO changes in my dilation from the previous Monday. By Wednesday, I’d decided that four whole days of that nonsense was enough and called the doctor; he asked me to go to the hospital. I spent one entire hour at the hospital and the resident basically shrugged, told me I was 39 weeks pregnant and I needed to go home. Thanks a lot.

He did examine me and the pain was such that I felt like my body was being split in half; because I wasn’t already in enough pain. Add to that that I had actually not bled in about a week, and since the exam Wednesday my little friend is back. Seriously, what gives?!

I’m trying to savor these last days (hours) of my pregnancy, because in all likelihood I’ll never experience it again. It’s a bitter sweet taste to have in my mouth right now. For as tumultuous as this has been, I’ve actually quite enjoyed being pregnant. I so desperately wanted this experience and to share it with my husband and I think we’ve gotten our money’s worth (literally!). It’s truly been amazing and eye-opening and surreal. I’m bursting at the sames (again, literally) to meet her, see her, smell her; and yet, I don’t want to let go of the somersault motion I feel everytime she stretches.

This morning we woke up and I thought to myself “This is the last Sunday morning we’ll have alone in this bed”. And I’m OK with that. We’ll carry her in there each weekend morning to snuggle with us, and one day that curly, ratty mop of hair we’ll figure out how to climb in all by herself. And it will be bliss.

We’re seriously in the any minute now zone. I still can’t believe we made it. This morning we hit 40 weeks and our due date is tomorrow. Six years ago to now has been a very, very long time. Time seems to be standing still suddenly. Sometime between now and really Thursday at the latest (we’ll induce Wed a.m. if we have to) we’ll have a baby. Wow.

Belly Pics

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

Thanks to my mom for coming over to take a few pictures of Shelton and I with the belly. We realized this weekend we didn’t have any decent “together” pregnant pictures and figured the clock was ticking if we were going to get any. These are my faves.

OB Appointment Week 39

Monday, April 19th, 2010

I’m not entirely sure what has happened in the last 24 hours, but I’m in so much pain I can barely walk across the room. I certainly can’t stand upright. My abdomen feels like it does when I’m recovering from a laparoscopy and it’s radiating in to my back. Add also that it feels as hard as a concrete floor. But I’m not having any contractions! There is no comfortable position, moving just shifts the weight somewhere else that hurts. So I’ve been in bed in my PJs since 2:30 this afternoon. It would be really great if I didn’t have to pee so much then I wouldn’t have to keep forcing myself to baby step to the bathroom.

I was in as much pain if not worse this afternoon at the OB. In fact, I cried in his waiting room I was in so much pain. Of course, got a shrug and told this is normal/part of it. I know it is. I know that’s a fair response, but damn, it sucks to hear it.

Do you want to know what else it sucks to hear?

That there was NO progress!!!!! NONE!!! I went last Monday, dilated to two. Went today and “everything looks the same.” I literally dropped an F bomb on the table and almost started crying again. How is that possible?!

He told me to basically hold on because the next week won’t get any easier. We’re due 4/26 and we discussed that he’ll induce 4/28 if she doesn’t appear by then.

For now I’m having a PJ-Chipotle party in bed and running down the batteries of all of my electronics. Tomorrow night my mom is coming over and she might make me vacuum!!

Oh, and I lost ten pounds since last week.

Pregnancy Week 38

Monday, April 19th, 2010

Can I just say that these last couple weeks of pregnancy should be classified under Ways to Make an Enemy Speak like Chinese Water Torture? For a type A personality like myself, this is about as cruel and unusual as it gets.

I couldn’t be more done. Over it. Finished. GET HER OUT! And I say that with an air of hesitancy because I don’t want to seem ungrateful. No one, NO ONE, appreciates this pregnancy more than me. I am thankful each and every day for the giant belly, the extra 30 pounds, the stretch marks, the completely irrational crying, heartburn, and every little somersault I feel in my gut. But man I’m done. I think it’s fair to say this wasn’t a “normal” pregnancy. It started all the way back in early July with a six-week fertility-drug roller coaster that turned into pregnancy, that turned into months of unexplainable bleeding, and the fear every day that it would be a fleeting moment and never come to pass.

But here we sit one entire week from our due date and I can hardly believe we’re here. The reality is looming and is unspeakably overwhelming. And I want her out. I want her out because I’m tired of talking about it and planning and thinking, I just want to hold her. I want to get this next chapter started. I’d also like to not cry when my husband holds up cutesy embroidered pillows at Hobby Lobby or I see a red-head in a magazine, or someone looks at me. (All true events.)

So this is the start of week 39. I feel like 38 was a blur. Shelton keeps teasing me for trying desperately to initiate my labor, and it’s all fair. Thankfully the weather is finally nice and we’ve been able to talk a walk every evening, on top of a couple “necessary” trips to Target, Sams, Hobby Lobby and others so that I could literally just wander around. We went to a movie Friday night (Death at a Funeral… hilarious!); I figured we’d watch one more in a theater as they will likely be introducing 9D technology the next time we make it out to one. I hoped the hard belly laughs would break my water. I also hoped that bypassing the slackers waiting on the elevator and climbing the three flights of stairs (then going back down one because we went too far) would start something. But it didn’t.

I did no less than a dozen loads of laundry this weekend. I did dishes. I grocery shopped. I cooked. I cleaned. Nothing.

I keep eyeballing the neighbor’s giant trampoline like a big piece of hot, gooey doughy pizza. They wouldn’t mind if the pregnant stranger hopped on and tried to shake out the baby, would they?

We’ve reached this point – the point of no return and the point of absolute uncertainty as to when she’s going to decide to show up. I take back what I said about flicking her in the bladder (because you know, payback sucks) if she’ll just go ahead and get out already.

Pregnancy Week 37

Sunday, April 11th, 2010

So we kicked off the week with a trip to the OB, where I was finally going to get an exam and finally hear that I’m dilated to a one… maybe two. But that’s not exactly what I happened. I went to the OB. I had an exam. And I was told that I haven’t dilated at all. NOT AT ALL!!! Dear God in heaven I’m going to be pregnant forever and six days after that. How can I have had contractions since FEBRUARY, my colostrum is in, I’m due in three weeks and I haven’t dilated at all! He did let me know that her head is down and locked in place, so that part is good. He said she didn’t float away when he pushed on her. So, good job baby! Way to hold up your end of the deal. Head Down!

On Wednesday I was just a ball of grump. For no reason at all, I’d had a really good day, nothing to complain about. But when Shelton asked why I was being so grumpy I responded, “Well, I’m nine months pregnant and I have a full-grown human in my abdomen.” Fair enough. I’m just achy and tired and nothing is comfortable and everything is uncomfortable. Nothing sounds good but I’m hungry. I’m overwhelmed trying to get work situated and squared away without feeling like I’m abandoning them. Let’s not forget the ever-growing nerves of pushing this kid out of my lady parts and then, in case you didn’t know, they’ll send her HOME WITH ME. FOREVER! It’s just a lot.

That night while sitting in the tub, the tub that 20 minutes before was covered in poison because of some really odd pin-dot bug infestation that my husband then scrubbed mercilessly to make sure we have an organic baby free of pesticides, I had one of those moments that makes you all warm and gooey inside and appreciate this whole pregnancy thing. I was perfectly still, letting the warm water envelop my achy, moose-shaped body. And then, her hiccups started. She usually has a session in the morning and a session in the evening and at first I found them kind of annoying (and she’s thinking, you should try it from this side!), but I’ve slowly kind of fallen for them. It’s just this uncomfortable little sign that there’s this real person growing inside of me and she’s a real baby now. Because babies get hiccups. And she gets hiccups! So I’m sitting there, water is still, the hiccups start, and with each hiccup a ripple rolls across the tub. Over and over and over. I just sat with my hands wrapped over my belly, feeling each jolt and watching each ripple and smiled. She’s not going to be in there much longer and I already know that for as turbulent as this pregnancy has been, I’m going to miss it so very, very much. Odds are, I’m not going to have a hiccuping baby bump ever again. And so I took a moment, in the chaos of everything that’s going on and the exhaustion I feel, and savored this one tiny moment between me and the daughter I’ve yet to meet.

Thursday was another doozy. I’ve already shared the nightmare it was here. If you want to hear how a soulless cop gave a crying pregnant woman a ticket and how later that night I nearly suffocated and died, it’s worth a read!!

Friday night was the exhale we both needed. We spent the evening on the patio of a favorite bar downtown where we spent a few hours chatting with friends, soaking up the blissfully perfect weather and stuffing our faces with bar food. But their bar food, it’s the best.

Saturday we slept in, enjoyed a killer breakfast of my french toast, hit the farmer’s market and then spent the afternoon doing this and that. We finished the evening by hanging out on the deck with grilled fajitas and homemade guacamole.

The week went to hell and back, and this side of it was so much better. We’re enjoying these last few moments of “just us” and trying to squeeze in as many as we can. I know soon we’ll look back on these days of sleeping in and lounging in the sunset uninterrupted with longing. My heart nearly stopped when I loaded the site a moment ago and the countdown said 14 days. I know it’s 14 days. I’ve been saying T-minus two weeks to myself all day. But to see it there in writing, Wow! It’s getting very real… and very close.