39 weeks and counting

I am really ready for this baby to be born. I feel like my body is continuing to deteriorate, and will start to improve as soon as I get this little kiddo out. I’m tired, swollen, congested, and carrying an extra 40 pounds. I have been the same amount of weight as I did with Maren at this point, and I lost all that weight so I am not too concerned and neither is my obstetrician. But all the extra weight is making it harder to balance and get around. Also, I think I may be developing carpal tunnel syndrome in my left wrist in addition to the cubital tunnel syndrome that I’ve had in both arms for a while. So I’m feeling pretty ready for this pregnancy to be done.

At the same time, I want the baby to wait until it is ready to be born, and I am hoping that labor is a little bit easier this time than it was last time — last time my water broke but contractions didn’t start, my blood pressure shot up and there was protein in my urine, so they were concerned about preeclampsia and I was induced with Pitocin, which led to a long and challenging labor. I have been offered induction due to the baby measuring very large, and I don’t want induction if I don’t have to have it. So I just want labor to start spontaneously very soon :-)

Maren is doing well, and having a good week, despite me being tired all the time. Also despite some seriously cold weather that has been keeping us all indoors most days. It is shaping up to be the coldest February on record in Saskatchewan. Yesterday we decided to try to go outside and go to the sledding hill at the warmest point in the afternoon. When we left the house all was fine, but within several minutes it became clear that we were heading into a snowstorm with high winds. So Jeff and Maren went down the sledding hill one time and then we turned around and went home. We were near frozen by the time we got home and had some hot chocolate. It was one of those moments where hot chocolate had never tasted so good, and a fire in the fireplace had never felt so warm. Every once in a while I think it’s worth it to go out in terrible weather just to have those experiences :-)

Head down!

So long story short, I didn’t have to go through the ECV because the baby turned head down on its own. Hooray! We went to the labor and birth unit at the hospital where the doctor was to perform the ECV. There were many delays, but as I was finally being prepped, they did an ultrasound to get the exact position of the baby. And at that point the procedure was called off because baby was already head down. Yay! As Jeff and I left the hospital, the song Head Down by Soundgarden was playing on the car stereo, just by chance. 

I have spent altogether way too much time at labor and birth in the hospital this week. Yesterday I noticed a marked increase in the puffiness of my legs, and my blood pressure was really high at the pharmacy with repeated tests. I called the nurse hotline and was told to head to the hospital. My blood pressure was substantially lower at the hospital, but still borderline high. Several hours later I was sent home, but told to come back today for repeat testing. So this morning my blood pressure was down into the normal range, but it still took a couple of hours for them to clear me to go home. Adding it all up, I’ve been there a total of about 9 hours this week, all to be told multiple times that the baby and I are healthy and fine. Ah well. So goes the end of pregnancy. 

Maren has been really good throughout all this. I think it’s hard on her, having mommy disappear to the hospital for hours at a time, and I know that in many ways it’s about to get harder. Everything about her life and routine is about to be disrupted. I just hope this baby hangs on a little longer, so that my mom is here to give Maren some attention when the baby comes. Due date is March 1. My mom arrives on February 26 late at night, so fingers crossed that the baby doesn’t come until at least the 27th! 

Brunch today, ECV tomorrow

Today we went out for brunch — it was really lunch for us as we had eaten breakfast, but we had waffles, so sort of brunchy. It is a restaurant with limited hours and limited menu, but quite nice.

Tomorrow I go to the labor and birth unit at the hospital and try to get this baby to turn. The procedure is called an external cephalic version, or ECV. It works to turn the baby head down about half the time. If it doesn’t work I may be required to have a c-section, if the final resting position of the baby poses a safety risk to me or baby to birth it the old fashioned way. I will be fine with a c-section if it comes down to that, but it isn’t my preference. So fingers crossed that things go well tomorrow!

Turn baby turn

According to my ultrasound on Friday, the baby was transverse — head to the left, butt to the right. Just before the ultrasound I had experienced some low abdominal pain on my left side, which I also experienced several weeks ago, and was sent to the hospital to have checked out. No cause was determined at that time. But I think that periodically the baby has been going into that transverse position and it stretches my uterus side to side and hurts! Unfortunately, later that night I felt the baby go back to a head-up position. So now tomorrow we see the obstetrician and talk about options.

 By the way, my obstetrician solved my  waking up breathless problem. She recommended that I try nasal spray at night because basically everything in my body is swollen which might include my sinuses. As soon as I started using nasal spray at night my problem essentially went away so that is awesome!

In the meantime, I have been trying to spend some quality time with Maren. Her imaginary play keeps getting more sophisticated, and most recently has been centred on Paw Patrol, a television program for preschoolers that is extremely popular among Maren’s peers, and which she gets to watch sometimes at daycare. I have never seen an episode. But recently Maren has been setting up “laptops“ for us to watch episodes on. It is pretty awesome :-)