Appointment #13

I just got back from my latest appointment. According to the doctors, I'm a week away from my due date so that means we had to discuss various things. The exam part was quick as always. This time Katarina went with us and she got to hear the heartbeat. She got this huge smile on her face when she heard it.

Dr. G said that if the baby doesn't come on it's own by next week, we had to talk about testing and "intervening measures". Basically, next week after my appointment I have to have my non-stress test. (Where I sit and watch tv and press a button when the baby moves and they monitor contractions.) Early the week after that, I have to have an ultra-sound to look at the baby's size and amniotic fluid. They would like to induce me on the 12th but I flat out refused and Dr. G was very understanding. I told him I would prefer early the next week because of the due date descrepincy. He agreed so at this point, it looks like if Baby S 2.0 doesn't come out on his/her own, it will be arriving around the 17th. For the sake of the pool, I hope it comes out by itself to make it fair for everyone!

Induction would consist of me having to go in to labor & delivery the night of the 16th to get something to help me start progressing.

37 Weeks

I figured it's been awhile since I posted a picture of my belly. Don't mind the sunburn - today is Memorial Day so we were at the beach! We are in the final stretch - 3 weeks to go!

Appointment #12

Had my weekly appointment today. Nothing to report! Blood pressure is good, heartbeat sounds perfect. The doctor felt around (basically squeezed parts of my stomach) and it seems to be in the right direction. As she put it, it's just a waiting game!

Names

I don't think Baby S 2.0 is going to have a name. It has been 30+ weeks now of talking about them and still not coming up with anything definite. It is a constant discussion between Nick & myself. So much so that the other night at dinner Katarina asked us to stop talking about baby names. I guess she is tired of hearing our indecision.

Ok, we have the middle name for a boy picked out. That is definite. We have 3 possible names for a boy, but only one that we really like, but we aren't sure we see us having a son named that, if that makes any sense. For girls, we have 3 names we also like, but I like one, Nick likes another. The one I like is a longer name, but I don't like any of the possible nicknames for it, nor does Nick, which scares us away from it. I mean, we basically always use Katarina's full name so we'd probably do that if we chose this name also, but I'm sure other people would shorten it, and I wouldn't like it. We have a couple of middle name options.

So, everyone just cross your fingers that when this kid is born, it looks like a certain name!

Appointment #11

Today I left my doctor's office just sort of shaking my head. Sometimes they are just so in their zone of what they tell every patient, I just have to roll my eyes and nod my head.

I didn't have any sugar in my urine this time - no brekkie of Trix and Pepsi like last time. Ha! My blood pressure was my normal low self. They don't do internals weekly anymore like they did with #1, so unless I'm overdue or having contractions, it's just going to be very basic appointments the upcoming weeks. The heartbeat was 129 - so between the way I'm carrying and the heartrate, the old wive's tales are shouting "boy!". I told Nick we better get cracking on boy's names!!

And at this point is when I started tuning the doctor out. He looked at my chart and said that with my history, it's likely I'll go overdue again. So he said that in the next couple of weeks we'd have to start talking about "doing something" before the baby gets big, eats it's meconium, that sort of stuff. It's funny because with #1, even at my 41 week appointment, all this same doctor said was that they wouldn't let me go past 42 weeks, but we never discussed the "i" word. (Induction.) So, when the doctor started talking about it this time I said, "Dr. L, I understand what you are saying, but you know I don't agree with the due date so I'm not going to volunteer for anything until closer to the middle of the month." I explained that I'm sort of viewing 6/16 as my own personal cut off date. He nodded and said he understood, but we'll see what happens when the time comes because I feel like I just talking to the walls. Anyway, the funniest part is when I said something about work he asked me incredulously if I was still working. I said, "of course". Seriously...he just told me I'd go overdue and by their schedule I'm still about 3 weeks from my due date. Does he really think I'm just sitting at home?

One Month To Go...

Until my maternity leave starts! Well, that is unless Baby S 2.0 decides to come a little earlier. Right now though, I wonder how I'll get through another month. I am just getting so uncomfortable. My back has started killing me at work - I'm sure it's this large mass I'm carrying around in front of me! I get exhausted by 2.30/3.00 and can barely keep my eyes open the rest of the day. But, I'm muddling through! I really wouldn't want to take off early anyway since what am I going to do? Sit around and still be uncomfortable and waste my time I could be with my new baby.

The other day Katarina told me she wanted her baby sister to come out. She's ready! I said that the baby didn't quite want to come out so she said she wanted to go into my tummy to play with it. I had to explain that it was a one way ticket and once you are out you stay out! It's fun to see her so excited about her new sibling though.

Appointment #10

Today was the first of my weekly appointments. Same old stuff - told him about my hip pain, my contractions the other night, the less baby movement, etc. Said it all sounded normal. He said that since (according to their chart) I'm 36 weeks, that if the baby decides to come now, they'll let it. I said that won't work for me - I'm not ready and I need it to come in mid-June!

I got the Group B Strep test done and he checked to see if the contractions had done anything. I had no dilation and a little bit of effacement. So, things are starting, but not in a major way (luckily). He also said there was a little sugar in my urine, but decided my healthy breakfast of Pepsi & Trix was probably the culprit.

Getting Close!

Want to see Nick panic a bit? Well, besides waking him up in the middle of the night to tell him you are having contractions, remind him that we don't have a name for the baby picked out yet. I think all of our conversations end with, "so, what are we naming this kid?" Yes, we had a girl's name picked out awhile ago, but now we aren't sure if we're sold on it. And boy's names...well, we've tossed a few around but nothing definite there either. I am not sure how this is going to get resolved, but obviously Baby S 2.0 will have a name (eventually).

Contrax Update

I got about 4 hours of sleep after waking up at 11.30. I did a lot of walking around and finally the contractions started coming less frequently until they finally stopped. That was good, but then my hips really did hurt so bad I did start crying. It was like I was paralyzed from the waist down because I couldn't move properly. I took two Tylenol and went down to a recliner in the basement and got about 2 hours sleep down there. But, I had to keep peeing and climbing up the stairs to the main floor was painful so I eventually got to the couch and I think I collapsed in exhaustion.

Guess I better get to work so I can start organizing stuff a bit better. I keep thinking I have at least a month to go, but maybe not.

Contractions Already?

I'm not sure what is going on here and I'm not sure what I'm going to do about it. It is midnight right now. I went to bed an hour and a half ago. I woke up about a half an hour ago because I'm having contractions. They aren't really timeable, they seem to be coming every 30 seconds and last for only about 15 seconds. They hurt though. I haven't called the doctor yet because well, to be honest I'm scared. Scared that they are going to tell me to come in so they can monitor me - what am I going to do about Katarina? I am not ready for this yet! Scared that they are going to tell me that I am indeed having contractions - it's a month too early by THEIR due date, 6 weeks early by mine. Right now, I'm going to keep drinking water and walking around...that seems to be helping.

I'm downstairs on the couch - I tried sleeping in bed tonight but my hips are hurting me so bad that I almost cry every time I try to turn over or get up to go to the bathroom. I came down here as to not disturb Nick but now I disturbed him anyway to tell him about this new turn of events.

Ok...it's 15 minutes later and the contractions seem to be subsiding. Back to just having more of a Braxton-Hick contraction like I've been having all night. Still having regular contractions too, but the pain is a lot less.

Wow. Contractions. I didn't have any prior to going into labor with Katarina so let me tell you, being on the couch in the middle of the night having them sure reminds me of that night I ended up going to the hospital to have #1. And I'm sure not ready for that just yet!

Baby Clothes Addendum

I wasn't going completely crazy! I unpacked the box of 0-3 month clothes and found a ton of non-pink stuff. So now I have drawers and a closet full of orange, yellow and green things. Plenty of stuff to last through the summer! Whew. I am glad to know I wasn't imagining the fact that I didn't buy a ton of pink things!

Six More Weeks?!?!?

My due date is in 6 weeks, 1 day. Well, according to the doctors it is closer to 4.5 weeks, but I am still going by MY due date.

I wish I could say I was excited. I mean, I am super excited about the baby joining our family, but right now, six weeks seems like a lllooooooonnnnggg time. I have officially reached the point in pregnancy where I am miserable. Nothing fits me correctly anymore so I'm uncomfortable in all my clothes. Physically, I'm a mess. I don't want to go into gory details, but the thought of feeling like this for another month and a half depresses me. Actually, more than that because I know post-giving birth isn't a picnic either. Mentally, I'm starting to definitely getting more scared of delivery this time around. I'm also scared of the sleepless nights and other things that come along with having a newborn again.

I know plenty of people have children, and a lot more than just two. My co-worker just had her sixth child and she seems like she's surviving. I just find it so interesting how I literally was fine last week at this time and now I feel like I've been hit by a truck all of a sudden.

On another note, Nick finally pulled down all the baby stuff from the attic. I got to go through all the newborn clothes and accessories. It was fun. Except I didn't realize we had so much pink! I really thought I had a lot more gender neutral stuff. I told Nick that carrying all the pink clothes back up to the attic, when they might have to come back down again, is his "punishment" for me not finding out the sex. The other problem is that the seasons aren't matching up very well - Katarina has a lot of fleece jammies where this kid is going to need more just onesie outfits. But, it gives me something to look forward to do once the baby is here - shop for little baby clothes, possibly little boy ones! And I never turn down a reason to shop.

Nick sent me flowers to work on Thursday - "just because". Just because he's glad he doesn't have to go through all this physical stuff himself I'm thinking!
Nick is going to start giving me acupuncture treatments. Hopefully that will relieve some of the stuff I've been feeling.

Appointment #9

I wish I had something exciting to report from my doctor's appointment. It was the usual: sugar test, blood pressure, chit chat about how I was feeling, measure the belly, listen to the heartbeat. I am starting to like the midwife more now that I'm getting to know her. Next week I start my weekly appointments. I can't believe it!

Getting Uncomfortable

I've reached that point in pregnancy where I'm just plain old uncomfortable. Wasn't I just posting earlier that I can't complain too much? Well, this week, something seems to have changed and now I'm just blah. I'm having various physical problems that I won't get into but let me just say my sweet husband sent me flowers today because he feels so bad about what I'm dealing with. I do see an end in sight, so that is a relief. Well, not really since I'm scared to death to actually give birth and have a newborn again, but that is a whole other post. I'll save that for next week. ;-)

Tomorrow I have a doctor's appointment. I think that since they think I'm closer to 35 weeks, they'll start seeing me weekly.