We just got back from the doctor's office and here is the update:
1. I'm still only at 1cm dialated, not really effaced at all and my cervix is still pointing back and kiddo is fairly high. So she swept the membranes around the cervix to see if that will do anything. Ouch.
2. We hooked me up to the fetal monitoring unit to see how Monkey is doing in there. All systems go. Heartrate and movement rate all look good, he is nice an cushioned too. I am having contractions pretty regularly but they aren't progressive yet. We have another one of these sessions scheduled for this Wednesday night to check him out again.
3. If nothing starts up on its own, we will be checking in to the hospital this Friday, New Years Day at 4pm to start the induction process. So at least we have a deadline to look forward to of getting something going even if it may still take a few days beyond that to meet him.
In the meantime I will be at work and continuing to scare the crap out of people by going to the Y for water aerobics and walking around the track. I think this week will be easier than this past weekend simply because I have the distraction of work to keep me (somewhat) busy. Thank you for all the support and good thoughts you have been sending. Our next post will include pictures of Monkey!
Monday, December 28, 2009
Sunday, December 27, 2009
The Waiting Game
Question - what would you rather do:
1. Wait in the airport for an 17 hours until the next possible flight to your destination with no place to lay down and only vending machine food available.
or
2. Wait for your baby to make his entrance.
Right now I'd go for option number 1 since it has a definitive end time, lying down isn't all the comfy and I'm not really all that hungry.
We see the doctor tomorrow to make a plan for the rest of the week. It could be interesting however because we have another holiday in the mix and this office doesn't seem to do well scheduling things around holidays. So my options to be induced may either be Thursday the 31st or Monday the 5th to begin the process - IF those times aren't already booked with other stuff which at this point I would guess they are. I am hoping they are more flexible than in the past with this stage otherwise they will end up with a very unhappy 41 week pregnant woman and her husband in their office tomorrow. We shall see.
Right now the hardest things is telling people that no, nothing is happening and yes, I feel fine. So if you call or email and I don't respond, please please please don't take it personally, I would rather just be alone with Russ at this point.
Here are some pics from our weekend with Jan and Anna. We spent Christmas Day at the Como Conservatory which was delightfully warm and open for business. I'll post an update tomorrow night after we know the plan for induction. Have a great night and safe travels if you are returning home after the holiday.
1. Wait in the airport for an 17 hours until the next possible flight to your destination with no place to lay down and only vending machine food available.
or
2. Wait for your baby to make his entrance.
Right now I'd go for option number 1 since it has a definitive end time, lying down isn't all the comfy and I'm not really all that hungry.
We see the doctor tomorrow to make a plan for the rest of the week. It could be interesting however because we have another holiday in the mix and this office doesn't seem to do well scheduling things around holidays. So my options to be induced may either be Thursday the 31st or Monday the 5th to begin the process - IF those times aren't already booked with other stuff which at this point I would guess they are. I am hoping they are more flexible than in the past with this stage otherwise they will end up with a very unhappy 41 week pregnant woman and her husband in their office tomorrow. We shall see.
Right now the hardest things is telling people that no, nothing is happening and yes, I feel fine. So if you call or email and I don't respond, please please please don't take it personally, I would rather just be alone with Russ at this point.
Here are some pics from our weekend with Jan and Anna. We spent Christmas Day at the Como Conservatory which was delightfully warm and open for business. I'll post an update tomorrow night after we know the plan for induction. Have a great night and safe travels if you are returning home after the holiday.
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Indicators
They say there are some indicators to tell you when you are about to start the process of having a baby.
1. Nesting - Cleaning and organizing everything in your house. Ok, so this isn't really all that different from my usual state of being so it is hard to tell when this might hit. I think it hit today. I HAD to dust and organize the cables coming out of the TV and DVD/VCR. I have no idea how I fit myself in the space behind the chair to do this but it had to be done. Right. Now. I feel much better.
2. Unusually cranky. I hope I've been a pretty upbeat and non-whiny pregnant lady the last many months. Until this week. Pretty much every thing thing either makes me really frustrated or so emotional I cry on the spot. The fact that there are 6 fantastic packages blocking my front door, it has snowed, I am sweating and hungry and exhausted made me just start bawling the other night when I got home. The delivery guys could have at least put them in a place where I could have opened the door and then brought them in, but instead stacked them all up in front of the door which meant I had to put all my other stuff down, unstack and move them, open the door, haul all of them in etc etc etc. Doesn't seem like a big deal does it? I pretty much thought the world was ending at that point ;)
As I'm sure you know, everyone will tell you what you should do to induce labor. Eat this certain thing, walk in this certain area of the city, clean this certain part of your house, balance on one foot for exactly 12.3 seconds etc. It appears to be whatever they were doing when theirs started. Which means there is a never ending list of things I should do to get this show on the road. At least I can stay occupied!
Saw the doc on Friday morning and again not much going on and we both appear to be doing well. She said she'd like me to come in next week of course so I go to make my appointment and guess what - there aren't any available. That's right, I'm out of luck. I said, do you realize my due date is Tuesday? And the receptionist said the best she could do was schedule me with the on call doctor but if that doc needed to be called away then no, I couldn't see anyone. What really irks me about this is that when we started shopping around for doctors one of our first questions was hey, we're having a holiday baby. What does your office and staff do to make sure we are taken care of around that time. And the nurse practitioner that we asked this question of was really put out that we'd even consider asking it. She became quite condescending and short with us like we had asked her to clean our toilets while we were at the hospital. She assured us that we wouldn't have a problem receiving any aspect of care over the holidays. HA! How about a better answer like 'well the office is closed on certain days so you may want to schedule something for that week now but there will always be a doctor available on call when you need them in the hospital.' Now that would have been a helpful answer. I plan to call back tomorrow morning and try again.
I'm sure when I walk in the door tomorrow every other person will ask what I am doing there. I could sit on my butt at work and get some productive things done or I could sit on my butt at home. At least at work I get paid so I plan to go there.
Stay tuned for the week to come. Most likely you'll get a call or an email from someone when there is anything to tell. You can also watch Facebook as we'll have internet in the hospital and can update my facebook status when we can.
Happy Holidays everyone - travel safe, be well and think contracting thoughts for us!
1. Nesting - Cleaning and organizing everything in your house. Ok, so this isn't really all that different from my usual state of being so it is hard to tell when this might hit. I think it hit today. I HAD to dust and organize the cables coming out of the TV and DVD/VCR. I have no idea how I fit myself in the space behind the chair to do this but it had to be done. Right. Now. I feel much better.
2. Unusually cranky. I hope I've been a pretty upbeat and non-whiny pregnant lady the last many months. Until this week. Pretty much every thing thing either makes me really frustrated or so emotional I cry on the spot. The fact that there are 6 fantastic packages blocking my front door, it has snowed, I am sweating and hungry and exhausted made me just start bawling the other night when I got home. The delivery guys could have at least put them in a place where I could have opened the door and then brought them in, but instead stacked them all up in front of the door which meant I had to put all my other stuff down, unstack and move them, open the door, haul all of them in etc etc etc. Doesn't seem like a big deal does it? I pretty much thought the world was ending at that point ;)
As I'm sure you know, everyone will tell you what you should do to induce labor. Eat this certain thing, walk in this certain area of the city, clean this certain part of your house, balance on one foot for exactly 12.3 seconds etc. It appears to be whatever they were doing when theirs started. Which means there is a never ending list of things I should do to get this show on the road. At least I can stay occupied!
Saw the doc on Friday morning and again not much going on and we both appear to be doing well. She said she'd like me to come in next week of course so I go to make my appointment and guess what - there aren't any available. That's right, I'm out of luck. I said, do you realize my due date is Tuesday? And the receptionist said the best she could do was schedule me with the on call doctor but if that doc needed to be called away then no, I couldn't see anyone. What really irks me about this is that when we started shopping around for doctors one of our first questions was hey, we're having a holiday baby. What does your office and staff do to make sure we are taken care of around that time. And the nurse practitioner that we asked this question of was really put out that we'd even consider asking it. She became quite condescending and short with us like we had asked her to clean our toilets while we were at the hospital. She assured us that we wouldn't have a problem receiving any aspect of care over the holidays. HA! How about a better answer like 'well the office is closed on certain days so you may want to schedule something for that week now but there will always be a doctor available on call when you need them in the hospital.' Now that would have been a helpful answer. I plan to call back tomorrow morning and try again.
I'm sure when I walk in the door tomorrow every other person will ask what I am doing there. I could sit on my butt at work and get some productive things done or I could sit on my butt at home. At least at work I get paid so I plan to go there.
Stay tuned for the week to come. Most likely you'll get a call or an email from someone when there is anything to tell. You can also watch Facebook as we'll have internet in the hospital and can update my facebook status when we can.
Happy Holidays everyone - travel safe, be well and think contracting thoughts for us!
Monday, December 14, 2009
What not to say - part two
When Heiser said this will be the slowest 2 to 3 weeks of your life, she isn't kidding. It's only Monday night??? WHAT? It feels like it should be Friday already.
39 weeks ahoy. And no, I haven't had the baby. "Well of course not, we hadn't heard you had." A ha! If only everyone thought that! Today was the first day I had more than one person come up to me and ask me "Have you had the baby?" And none of these people were blind or visually impaired. And even if they were - WHY ON EARTH WOULD I BE AT WORK IF I DID? So I just have started answering 'yup, this morning' to see where it goes.
The moral of the story is, please don't ask me if I've had the baby and don't tell me it's time for me to have the baby. I get it, everyone is excited. However, I can already see this line of questioning stressing me out. So thanks in advance. Let's talk about skiing instead - where to go this year... or how many weeks until it's biking season...
Here is a pic of 39 weeks and all decorated for the holiday. This is our cute, squat and fat little tree. There are many cute, squat and fat ornaments on it which makes it just perfect. And I'm not squat, but I sure am cute and fat (in a way) so I fit in perfectly in the photo.
Have a good week!
39 weeks ahoy. And no, I haven't had the baby. "Well of course not, we hadn't heard you had." A ha! If only everyone thought that! Today was the first day I had more than one person come up to me and ask me "Have you had the baby?" And none of these people were blind or visually impaired. And even if they were - WHY ON EARTH WOULD I BE AT WORK IF I DID? So I just have started answering 'yup, this morning' to see where it goes.
The moral of the story is, please don't ask me if I've had the baby and don't tell me it's time for me to have the baby. I get it, everyone is excited. However, I can already see this line of questioning stressing me out. So thanks in advance. Let's talk about skiing instead - where to go this year... or how many weeks until it's biking season...
Here is a pic of 39 weeks and all decorated for the holiday. This is our cute, squat and fat little tree. There are many cute, squat and fat ornaments on it which makes it just perfect. And I'm not squat, but I sure am cute and fat (in a way) so I fit in perfectly in the photo.
Have a good week!
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Two weeks people, two weeks. At least until the 'due' date science gives us. Today I have definitely started to feel kiddo making his way lower - my maternity pants are becoming more like window blinds (only rolling over right in front where he's at) which is NOT very attractive or comfortable. I'm awfully pleased however that the same few pairs of pants have gotten me to this point. I may be wearing skirts and dresses a bit more to work - or at least changing out of my long underwear into them when I get there because:
MN is getting it's first actual winter storm of the season at the moment. They say we could have 6 inches or so by the end of tomorrow which naturally causes everyone to FREAK OUT. I'm not nervous about getting to the hospital if we should need to go, (I have a very good driver here and a very large truck with 4 wheel drive sitting outside) it's all the other drivers who forget to slow down you have to be freaked about. Ok, stepping down off that soap box...
This past weekend was Cookingathon 2009. Momter came up Thursday night and we spent Friday shopping for important things like nursing bras and bulk items such as frozen chicken tenders. Costco is a wonderful place - for the bulk items, not the nursing bras.
There is no way I would have been able to make the amount of food we whipped through in two days without her - lasagna, stir fry, veggie sides, crepes, enchiladas fantasticas (their real name), taco fixings, meatballs, mac and cheese, stuffed shells and probably 6 other things I can't remember right now. If kiddo has an appetite like his ma then this should last us about a week ;)
Momter also got to experience the Holidazzle parade for the first time and helped us cut our cute little Christmas tree which is up and lit and decorated. And I made her go to water aerobics with me.
After all that excitement over the weekend, Monkey spent all of Monday during the day wiggling and twisting and generally making his presence known. Momter speculated that he was so happy with all the movement that happened throughout the weekend that he wasn't pleased when I sat down all of Monday - let's hope he gets used to sitting still at some point!
This week I'm trying to stay active which helps the sciatic and hip pain be less intense and am continuing to make plans to keep myself motivated and perhaps a bit distracted. We'll take some more pictures next weekend and add them in here including ones of the freezer(s)!
MN is getting it's first actual winter storm of the season at the moment. They say we could have 6 inches or so by the end of tomorrow which naturally causes everyone to FREAK OUT. I'm not nervous about getting to the hospital if we should need to go, (I have a very good driver here and a very large truck with 4 wheel drive sitting outside) it's all the other drivers who forget to slow down you have to be freaked about. Ok, stepping down off that soap box...
This past weekend was Cookingathon 2009. Momter came up Thursday night and we spent Friday shopping for important things like nursing bras and bulk items such as frozen chicken tenders. Costco is a wonderful place - for the bulk items, not the nursing bras.
There is no way I would have been able to make the amount of food we whipped through in two days without her - lasagna, stir fry, veggie sides, crepes, enchiladas fantasticas (their real name), taco fixings, meatballs, mac and cheese, stuffed shells and probably 6 other things I can't remember right now. If kiddo has an appetite like his ma then this should last us about a week ;)
Momter also got to experience the Holidazzle parade for the first time and helped us cut our cute little Christmas tree which is up and lit and decorated. And I made her go to water aerobics with me.
After all that excitement over the weekend, Monkey spent all of Monday during the day wiggling and twisting and generally making his presence known. Momter speculated that he was so happy with all the movement that happened throughout the weekend that he wasn't pleased when I sat down all of Monday - let's hope he gets used to sitting still at some point!
This week I'm trying to stay active which helps the sciatic and hip pain be less intense and am continuing to make plans to keep myself motivated and perhaps a bit distracted. We'll take some more pictures next weekend and add them in here including ones of the freezer(s)!
Friday, November 27, 2009
36+
They tell me this kid is due in less than a month. I really hope that is true because other than us not having a finished kitchen I feel just about ready. Nursery is set up, I've read what I need to read, we took infant and child CPR last week, the car seats are getting inspected this week (amazing!) and the hospital bag is about 70% packed.
But, Ann, do you know that many time first babies are later than their due date??
Yes, thanks. We have been told that, just about 5 times less than we're having a Christmas baby. Either way it's fine, I am just thankful that we had the opportunity to get this prepared for Monkey and that he and I are so healthy thus far.
Starting on Monday I see the doc once a week until we see her in the hospital. So far we're still measuring right on track and kiddo has a fantastic heartbeat and activity level. 4am is now his new favorite time. I am still sleeping really well except for waking up every few hours to turn over as my toes are going numb. I don't start out sleeping on my back, but I sure do end up that way. And then on my back, I'm rather stuck. Try getting up with a 28 pound weight on your tummy - it's a lot harder.
We had a great Thanksgiving yesterday - spent the day relaxing at home and then headed to the Browns for an awesome meal. I really do love traditional Thanksgiving meals. Mashed potatoes, turkey and gravy...mmmm....oh, and Russ's pumpkin pie. I am really thankful that we didn't have to drive a great distance or spend a lot of time cooking all those wonderful things this year - thanks, Kat! We have some leftovers too and Russ managed to catch me in a common location these days, looking for them:
Mom is coming up this next weekend to help me finish up a few things (and get pedicures) and COOK. We'll fill up the freezers with meals we can use in the weeks after kiddo arrives. If you have a favorite freezer meal recipe, send it along.
I also enjoy this picture - note how kiddo enters the room first these days...
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Oddly enough feeling a bit lighter...
You know how when you finish a project or a paper and suddenly feel a large sense of relief just because it's done and you are ready for the next thing = finally? That is how I feel this weekend now that we have the nursery just about totally ready for kiddo to come home to. Each day I'm feeling a bit slower and less energetic so I was really hoping to have that big piece of preparation done before week 35 hit - and I just made it ;) Here are some pictures as we circle his room!
Very important - toys.
Feeding corner.
Notice that the crib is on wheels...it did NOT come that way...
And the changing/clothing corner. Russ was thinking ahead and added one helpful piece of information as well, I hope you can read it:
Russ is still busy working on the kitchen - this weekend he assembled most of the cherry faceframes and is working on the beading that goes around. I'm not sure what is after that but hopefully we're near to starting to put some of them INTO the kitchen. Dishwasher here I come!
Monkey has been a mover and a shaker in the last two weeks - much more so than I noticed at all before. On Thursday the doc said he is head down and most likely will stay that way from now on. Instead of funny flutters it is starting to feel much more like stretches - a hard little bump in one spot that sort of feels like a fist. I am very thankful that things have really been very easy so far - I'm still sleeping like a champ and my feet are normal sized yet.
A few days ago I also had my first of the 'prep' contractions known as Braxton Hicks. It doesn't hurt but just feels like my abdomen is really tight for a few seconds - and you can't relax it. Now if only the real contractions felt that way...
Very important - toys.
Feeding corner.
Notice that the crib is on wheels...it did NOT come that way...
And the changing/clothing corner. Russ was thinking ahead and added one helpful piece of information as well, I hope you can read it:
Russ is still busy working on the kitchen - this weekend he assembled most of the cherry faceframes and is working on the beading that goes around. I'm not sure what is after that but hopefully we're near to starting to put some of them INTO the kitchen. Dishwasher here I come!
Monkey has been a mover and a shaker in the last two weeks - much more so than I noticed at all before. On Thursday the doc said he is head down and most likely will stay that way from now on. Instead of funny flutters it is starting to feel much more like stretches - a hard little bump in one spot that sort of feels like a fist. I am very thankful that things have really been very easy so far - I'm still sleeping like a champ and my feet are normal sized yet.
A few days ago I also had my first of the 'prep' contractions known as Braxton Hicks. It doesn't hurt but just feels like my abdomen is really tight for a few seconds - and you can't relax it. Now if only the real contractions felt that way...
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