Just Not Today

Seems weird to feel like I've been praying for this little one to come out forever, but right now, I don't want her to come out today.

I have lots of people telling me she's coming today and if she continues her streak of doing exactly the opposite of what mommy wants, she'll be here within 16 hours or so.  At my appointment today, cervix willing, the plan is to strip my membranes.  I was a fingertip dilated last time so hopefully the contractions over the last week have helped me get to at least 1cm and things will go smoothly, but not so smoothly that my labor is less than 12 hours.

Really if she is born on this 29th day of February, it won't be a huge deal, I will be happy to meet her whenever she decides to arrive.  I just won't be looking forward to explaining to her when she turns 5, 6 or 7 why she doesn't have an actual birthday.

So with the notion that she will hopefully be coming in the next day or two I've been thinking about how I want to handle things after labor.  After Lillian was born I had a bombardment of people in the room before I was even able to shower.  I refuse to let that happen again this time.  I actually have pictures of people other than me and B holding my baby girl in the same room that I gave birth to her in.  In my hospital the birthing rooms and recovery rooms are in different hallways.  So here's the thought I have...I have a list of people I (or some one) will be sending labor updates to.  Once the wee one is born I will send stats and a message saying we thank everyone for their support and patience.  We will start accepting visitors... (obviously this will depend on the time of day she's born).

My other thought is that I'm worried about how Lillian is going to react to her little sister and me having to be so attentive to her.  While I know that she understands there is a baby coming and that right now she's in my belly, I know she doesn't understand that it means she can't have all my attention.  I'm trying to decide on how I want to introduce them.  I think the best option is to just have the baby in the room and in the bassinet when Lillian arrives to meet her, not me or daddy holding her.  That way I can love on Lillian right away and let her know how much I've missed her.  Then introduce her to the baby.  And of course we have a gift from baby sister to Lillian and a shirt that says "Best Big Sister Ever" for her to wear.

Another thought I've had to help Lillian deal with not being the center of attention is to ask all visitors to come in and say hi to Lillian first and let Lillian introduce or show them the baby.  Let her say "see my baby sister" or something like that rather than them just rushing to the baby like many family members do.  Do you think it's rude of me to mention this to people who may visit?  I just really don't want her to feel left out.

Do you think any of this sounds unreasonable?  Or have a better suggestion on ways to introduce baby to siblings and stop visitors from invading?

39 Week Love

I certainly didn't think I'd be writing a 39 week post!  Especially with the amount of Braxton Hicks contractions I had starting around 20 weeks.

Right now I'm taking things day by day.  Last night B asked how I was doing and my response was "I made it through today, I can make it through tomorrow."  It's getting hard though.  My body aches, my muscles ache and feel week and the thought of doing anything other than sitting on my ass generally makes me cringe.

One thing I'm loving though is the love my baby girl has been giving me.  She got to stay home with her daddy yesterday, but when she woke up and realized I wasn't there too she was not happy.  She wanted to see mommy.  After lunch time she called to tell me how she was looking for me when she got and how she was going to hide when I got home so I could find her.

When I got home we played on my (thankfully King Sized) bed where she showed me over and over that she could summer salts and when she'd tip side ways she'd say "Ooops that wasn't a good one."  She helped me make dinner, well really all she did was press the buttons on the microwave, but I have found that to be very useful in teaching her what each written number looks like.  And we took a bath where she lined up all her letters according to color and told me she was putting this one on the right and that one on the left and even one in the middle.  I really can't believe how smart she is.

At 4 this morning when her daddy picked her up and put her in our bed I really didn't mind much.  She came right over to me and told me she loved me and cuddled with me until I had to get up at 5.  As much as I hate her sleeping with us this mornings love was great!  I'm really starting to feel the pull at the heart strings that I'm not going to be able to giver her all my attention soon.

And just to keep up, here's this weeks belly picture...

 Doesn't look like much change from last week to me.  But you sure can tell I'm running out of clothes that fit!

Fears

My fears this time around have generally been much different from my fears the first time around, and my fears about labor and delivery are no different.

Last time it was pretty much a fear of the unknown.  I wanted a natural labor in the worst way, but wasn't sure I would be able to do it.  I feared I was going to need a c-section, which would force me to have a spinal, which I have a huge fear of.  The thought of the possibility of not "feeling" my legs scares the shit out of me!

This time though, my fears have nothing to do with the actual pain and labor, it has to do with timing.  Granted there is nothing I can control about the timing, but maybe this is why it scares me so much.  I'm scared that I will be alone with Lillian when I go into labor, that my husband won't be able to get to me.  I'll have to drive Lillian some where while in labor and that I will then be alone.

Right now it is still bowling season and my husband is gone every Tuesday night from about 5 to 10 pm give or take a half hour or so.  Normally I go to my mother's while he is gone and this is great, but due to circumstances she can't control, she hasn't been able to be home.  On top of that my back up person has been attending high school basketball playoff games, which wouldn't be so bad if you could actually hear a phone in the gym.

I'm hating that I live a minimum of 15 minutes from the hospital and no one lives between me and the hospital.  Should I need a ride to the hospital while B isn't home I'd have to wait at least 15 minutes for some one to get there and then it's another 15 minutes to the hospital

I really liked how my labor progressed with Lillian and I pray for the same thing again.  My water broke, I went to the hospital and labored there.  I feel safe with that happening, I know that I will have time to take Lillian some where and get to the hospital, or at least take her there with me and have her picked up.  But this whole "call me when the contractions are 5 minutes apart and you can't walk or talk through them" crap is not cool.  Obviously I should do something with Lillian before my contractions get to that point, but at what point do we know that they are going to get there.  The other night I had pretty decent contractions 10 minutes apart for 2 hours and it went no where.  I can't expect everyone to put their life on hold because I might go into labor.

38 Weeks and Then Some

So I've tried to write this post a few times, but apparently blogger no long supports the version of Internet.Explorer I have on my work computer and I can't very well call the IT people and say "Hey, I need to blog so you need to update my internet.  One thing about working for a fortune 500 company is that you pretty much have no control over anything you use and can't download anything.  I've been using google.chrome at home for quite some time now and I love it so I decided to try and download it at work this morning fully expecting to get an error, but guess what, it worked!!!  Yay!

So anyway, here I am at 38 weeks and 3 days.  This little girl has officially baked longer than her big sister did who was born at 38 weeks 2 days.  I'm feeling it, I'm feeling very over due even though technically I can still go 2 weeks and then some before my midwife will do anything forceful.

After my 37 week appointment I had a break down, but this week I wasn't so bad.  I have accepted the fact that it's now just a sit and wait game.  She will come when she is ready to come and hopefully like her big sister, it will be once I'm completely convinced she won't be here until after her due date.

At this weeks appointment my mw did check me and I'm barely dilated a fingertip.  Not that it really means anything.  I'm just hoping that by next Wednesday I'm dilated enough for her to strip my membranes and hopefully get this show on the road.  I'm starting to have the fear that the saying "If I had my second one first, there wouldn't be a second" is going to hold true for me.  I was blessed with an easy pregnancy, delivery and baby with Lillian and I'm just thinking things aren't going to be so great this time.

Speaking of Big Sister Lillian, she really is getting so big.  I'd like to believe that she is fully potty trained.  At home anyway.  The only time she wears a diaper with me is bed time and when we are in the car at bed time and she may fall asleep.  She doesn't even wear one for naps at home anymore, although she doesn't take many naps at home anymore either.  The only thing close to an accident we've had in a long time is the little dampness she got when I couldn't get her to the bathroom quick enough at the store.  I haven't even had a change a poopy diaper in a long time!  And this week she's even pooped on the potty at the sitters all week!  This is a great accomplishment since she was waiting for her diaper at nap time to go.  I'm so very proud of her!  She also does lots of things by herself now like wash her hands and button her shirt and all those "Big Girl" things!

And the one that kills me...

Buzz in her new Booster Car Seat

She's big enough to sit in a booster seat in the car now.  While this is great for extra room now that we have an infant seat in there again, it wasn't something I was totally prepared for.  She loves it though and it makes her feel like such a big kid.


For now I will leave you with this, my 38 week belly picture.

These were my last two pictures with Lilian.  I don't think I look quite so big this time and although my thighs feel huge, I don't feel as big this time.

37 Weeks

Yes I've made it to 37 weeks, full term! While I am very happy about this, I am not happy about the thought of there still possibly being 3 weeks left, or maybe even 4! I can't imagine how painful things will be then! Don't get me wrong, I want my baby girl to stay in there until she is nice and healthy to come out, but I also want to have my sanity too. 

Right now I'm functioning on a day by day basis and while this may cause a disappointment every day it causes less anxiety than the thought of how I may feel in 3 weeks should I not have a little girl to hold.

At my appointment today my MW informed me that she won't check me, let alone sweep my membranes until I'm 39 weeks.  I'm really frustrated by this, I'd really like to know if the 2 hours work of contractions I had 5 minutes apart yesterday did anything.  Of course, even if it did do something you can be dilated 3cm for weeks, so I guess it doesn't really matter.

Here's this week's lovely picture...

What do you think of the new design?  It's not really what I wanted, but for the time being it will have to do until I have time to change it to the one I want when I'm home. 

Mentally Preparing

I wish I was referring to birth, but I'm not. I'm trying to mentally prepare for the fact that I will only be 37 weeks tomorrow and if this little girl doesn't want to come out for another 3-4 week she doesn't have to.  The thought of this to me is very depressing.  I am emotionally done.  While I'm actually doing ok in the physical aspect of things, mentally, I'm exhausted.  I don't know how much more of the rollercoaster of emotions I can take.  My patience is about down to nothing and I constantly feel like I'm on edge.  Every time I stand up, sit down, roll over, whatever, I'm praying my water breaks.

I can't think of any better to spend Valentine's Day than giving birth to our 2nd baby girl!

L&D: Act II Scene 1

I figured my first trip to L&D with Lillian was Act I so this may as well be Act II. I was really hoping not to have to go to the hospital until I was in labor, but alas I was a little worried and the doctor wanted to be on the safe side.

Tuesday morning about 1am I woke up with a horrible headache that had me almost in tears for 2 hours.  Tyle.nol didn't help and I was only able to fall back asleep with a cold washcloth on my face.  Then when I woke up to get ready for work my hands were all swollen and my gums were bleeding bad when I brushed my teeth.  Bleeding gums can be normal, but the most I've ever had is a little pink when I rinsed, this time it was red.

When the headache was still lingering around 9 and my hands were still swollen I figured I better call the Dr and at least let them know what was going on.  The OB decided I should go to the hospital to have my BP monitored and some labs done.  My first BP was 147/60, which normally wouldn't be considered high, but considering it went all the way down to 110/60 within an hour the nurse said it is considered high because it's more than 20% over my normal BP wich is around 112/60.  So after sever BP reads, blood work and the pee test they sent me home with a red jug and a hat to pee in for 24hrs.

Everything has come back normal!

Yesterday at my 36 week appt my midwife actually told me "I'm surprised you actually made it to this appointment, I was afraid you weren't going to.  But she can come any time she wants now so give me a call when your contractions are 5 minutes apart or your water breaks."  Those are the best words I've heard!  And I have started having the "real" painful contractions so I'm just biding my time until they become regular and I can call.  I'm nervous about being at work though, I really don't want my water to break here.  And I know the protocal for call the Dr about contractions, but what about when to leave work?

36 Weeks

Hair Cuts and Hospital Bags

Last night Lillian kept pushing the hair out of her face and B looked at me and said "when are you finally gonna get her hair cut, she looks horrible. I don't see what the big deal is?"

It isn't really a big deal I suppose, but it's one of the last "firsts" she's going to have besides school and such. Yes you have firsts until you leave this earth, but this is one I can control and if you've read long enough you know I like control.

The thing is, her hair, to me, isn't that bad when she pushes it out of her eyes to the right place.  Last night she was just taking a sweeping hand from her right ear all the way over to her left ear and pulling her hair across her colic which I agree looks horrible.

In this lovely (insert eye roll) picture you can see where she has a strand of hair across her forehead trying to go across her colic.  Last night it was admittedly worse with her forehead covered in hair.

I suppose this is a little closer to what her hair looked like last night.

 But I don't think she looks bad at all in this picture where her hair is actually parted.

I'm just in no rush.  Plus I remember what my poor sister looked like when my mom gave her bangs, because her hair was all still growing forward half her head was bangs, literally, from the center of the top of her head forward was bangs cause the hair wasn't heavy enough to weigh it down on the sides and Lillian's hair is quite thin, I don't want it to be the same way.

As for hospital bags, the baby's is packed...  Not that the baby really needs much, but I finally found a going home outfit that I can't wait to see her in, a few diapers, pacifiers (just in case, I really don't want to use them) and her Pooh Pram because I'm assuming it will be cold.

Mine on the other hand, I kind of started... I got the travel sized bathroom stuff this weekend and put in all in a little makeup bag to take, including a toothbrush for B, aren't I a nice wife?  Besides that B knows I want my own pillow and my phone, kindle and charges are always in my bag that are always by the door anyway.  Who needs clothes and other niceties???  OK, OK, I've got my list together and have a few things to pick up, hopefully I'll have a bag packed tonight since I'd really like to have this little girl in a week!

And just because I think she's adorable...