Baby length: 19.75 inches
Baby weight: 6.8 lbs. - the weight of a mini-watermelon
Bump size: 42 inches (down half an inch from last week)
Weight: +35 pounds (+1 lb. from last week)
Cravings: Apple crisp
Wow. A lot has happened during my 38th week and I'm not about to sugar coat anything. Things are about to get real on my life as I know it.
Not to say that I've ever really censored my blogs before but I'm about to be even more graphic than ever. Why? Because someone needs to talk about this stuff so that all future moms can say they were warned.
Let's start with the fact that I am once again using a watermelon this week to illustrate the baby's weight. We still haven't eaten it, obviously, and I don't know what a leek is and it was a long week/day when this picture was taken so I just stopped caring.
Besides, my What to Expect When You're Expecting app used the watermelon comparison for two weeks in a row so why can't I? Don't be surprised if you see it in next week's picture, too, since I am 39 weeks tomorrow and currently don't have anything else to use.
Maternity Lessons
"No one said pregnancy was going to be easy," Pat said to me as I was sitting on the toilet checking my underwear for the second time in 20 minutes. I confirmed that yes, I had peed my pants for the second time that night, immediately after using the bathroom and despite the fact that I didn't even feel like I had to go nor did I feel it coming out until it was too late.
"No one talks about this s#!& before you are pregnant," I responded. "And no one prepares you for this shit before you get married," my dear husband said as he was helping me change out of my underwear for the second time since not only is it super uncomfortable to bend over to put on clean underwear, it actually physically hurts.
Touche, Patrick. Touche. Needless to say, my husband is taking very good care of me.
I had a doctor's appointment at the beginning of this week and my doctor checked me for progress for the first time. Remember how excited I was to get checked for progress? Take note, friends - it is not all it's cracked up to be.
First of all, it hurts like h#%%! It was more painful than any pap exam I've ever had. Second, in my case anyway, you don't get the answers you're looking for. You want your doctor to say, "wow you are really dilated, completely effaced and you are going to have this baby SOON!"
But instead, you hear "You are 1 cm dilated, 80% effaced, but this means basically nothing because you could still be a week late." Awesome. In addition to that great news, my doctor also reminded me of how tiny my bone structure is down south and that he really doesn't think I am going to be able to push out a baby.
Most people have about a 10% chance of having a c section - he told me I have about a 50% chance and that knowing this, he will be much more quick to "throw in the towel" during labor. He still will let me get in there and try and he hopes that I prove him wrong but he's been doing this for a long time and I believe he knows what he's talking about.
The good news I got out of this is that he's not going to let me spend 24 hours waiting for me to dilate to a 10 and start pushing, only to prove that he was right and ultimately give me a c section anyway. If he sees that my body is really struggling to dliate, he will take this as further proof that my body just can't get the baby in the position it needs to be and he will call it a c section.
I find this oddly comforting because I know he's not a big c section guy and I just really trust him. Now let's just hope he is actually the doctor that delivers my baby and not someone I've never met (the odds are about 1 in 9 that he will be the on rotation doctor when I deliver).
He also told me that Baby R is "sunny side up" meaning it's back is facing my back and it's face is facing my belly. This is not good. He suggested I start getting down on all fours at least once a day. Which I've been doing, but then can barely get myself back up.
On Sunday of this week, I got a huge burst of energy. I was cleaning our house, doing laundry, going shopping, etc. Everything was fine and I was feeling great. Until midnight Sunday night/Monday morning when I woke up with extreme cramping and some contractions.
This did not go away. I also started to lose my mucus plug on Monday morning. I ended up working from home that day because I was exhausted from not sleeping at all and was in miserable pain. On Monday night, I went to bed and woke up at midnight again with even worse contractions.
These contractions were actually timeable so at 3 a.m. I started to keep track. They were anywhere from one minute to two minutes and were coming every 5 minutes. From 5-6 a.m. they were actually coming every 3-5 minutes. I was starting to think this was going to be the real deal.
I got out of bed at 6 a.m. and decided to shower to see if that helped. It didn't. In fact, the pain was so strong that when I got out of the shower, I thought for sure I was going to throw up from the nausea. My doctor said this would be a sign that it was the real deal so I called the office.
The on-call doctor called me back and told me to head to the hospital and that she would notify them that I was coming. So I called Pat who had already been at work since 5:30 a.m. and he headed home. While I was waiting for him I decided to bounce on the exercise ball for a little bit and then I went and laid down.
By the time he got home, I was almost falling asleep in bed and the contractions weren't coming as frequently. I started to suspect it was a false alarm because the contractions I had been feeling for the previous 3-4 hours were not contractions I could have slept through even if I wanted to.
But we decided to head to the hospital anyway. I stayed for an hour and they told me I was dehydrated and that could be one cause for the contractions. They monitored the contractions and even though yes, I was having them, they were 6-8 minutes apart and not 3-5 like they should be.
The nurse checked me and said I was still only 1 cm dilated (and that was being generous, she so nicely added) so they sent me home with a pamphlet titled, "Ready. Set. Not yet." which really annoyed me for some reason.
When I got home, I was in serious, serious pain for the rest of the day. Cramping and contracting so that even when the contractions ended, I found no relief because I was still having such bad cramping.
I was also feeling flu like symptoms all day - feeling feverish even though I didn't have a fever and feeling like I was really cold even though my cheeks were bright red and my head was hot. My whole body felt really sore and achy.
So after 48 hours of constant pain, I decided to take Tylenol last night - something I've been avoiding this entire pregnancy - just so I could find some relief and get some sleep. It worked.
I slept like a baby (a metaphor I might find more similar to an oxymoron in a few weeks) and so did Pat. I went to work today and made it through the entire day before the pain got bad again and I headed home.
So here is what I now know about false labor.
The contractions can be just as painful as real contractions and can be coming regularly for hours, only to suddenly become sporadic and less intense
There are ways to find relief from these contractions which if you do, indicates they aren't the real deal
So here is what I plan to do the next time I think I'm in true labor, just to make sure I don't get to the hospital again only to be sent home. I will wait until contractions take my breath away before I even start timing them. Once they are five minutes apart and one minute long for an hour, I will try the following to see if I get any relief:
- Take a shower
- Bounce on the exercise ball
- Walk around
- Chug water
But please can't my water just break so that I know for sure? Did you know that only 1 in 10 women will have their water break at home? I didn't either until recently. I just always assumed that is how this whole thing worked. Your water breaks and you know you're in labor. None of this time the contractions, think you're in labor only to find out you're actually not.
What is the worst thing about false labor? That I experienced it for 34 hours only to find that it did absolutely nothing to get my body any closer to having this baby. That is just downright depressing. I do not enjoy pain and I certainly do not enjoy pointless, unproductive pain.
On a positive note (yes, I'm still trying to be positive), the pain I experienced on Tuesday really made me appreciate the lighter pain I experienced today. Pat and I have also gotten lots of practice with breathing through contractions and we are definitely packed and ready to go to the hospital now that we've already been there once...
Weight Gain
I gained one pound this week, bringing the grand total to 35 pounds - the weight my doctor would like me to not surpass. Another reason why Baby R needs to come SOON!
Gender Prediction
Have you made your gender prediction yet? Click here to enter the pool and pick when you think the baby will be born, how much it will weigh and whether it will be a boy or a girl. You just might be running out of time (I hope!) or you may have at least a week left. Time will tell....
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