Fuzzy Love

The Fourth Trimester

Back again the to doctor today (even the nurses were asking, "You haven't had that baby yet?") and again nothing is happening. No baby. No indication of baby coming in near future. No indication my body even knows what to do with this baby. But we did get the important question answered: how long will they let me go before an induction? Answer: not very long (I wonder if that has anything to do with the upcoming holiday).

So we have a plan, Stan. There is already a waiting list for inductions tonight (damn people in labor get to go first, then the list), and they don't do them over the weekend, so Monday morning will be baby day! November 21st. I'll go in to the hospital on Sunday night for various kinds of prep - I'll spare you those details - and then first thing Monday the drugs will be pumped in. With any luck, Baby Bee will be here by lunchtime. I've gone from feeling like the baby could come at any time to actually making plans for the weekend.

Funny thing: Mark's parents are due to arrive sometime on Monday. The plans were made with the expectation that we would have a baby home from the hospital. Turns out we'll have to leave a key under the mat for them.

D Day

That's right; today is my Due Date. Delivery Day. Whatever. Except nothing is happening. I'm up to my ears (or something) in little contractions, but nothing regular and nothing painful and nothing (I assume) productive. I have another appointment tomorrow morning to find out for sure; Mark is rather optimistically taking the day off so we'll all go down together. I have to go to the downtown office because I'm also scheduled for that non-stress test, which is a totally routine thing they do when you pass your due date. Honestly, I should have been more prepared for this; I did the math myself early in this pregnancy and estimated a date a week or two from now, so maybe they're just wrong. But for eight months now November 16th has had BABY! written on it, and I've gotten emotionally attached to the date. Not actually having a baby today is not good for morale.

Not that Liam minds.

We're Ready! Except...

Yesterday was a day of odds and ends, getting those little things done that could have waited until after Baby Bee's arrival, but they're nice to have done anyway. Mark was a wonder. I killed my back finishing the last of the alphabet wallies, so he washed and set up the pack-n-play (and swing, and bouncy seat, and gymini), and boiled bottles and pump parts. Today he made huge batch of spaghetti sauce for freezing. The house is clean, the laundry is done, my toes are red, and my legs are shaved. There's never been a better time to have a baby.

Except poor Liam is still sick. Right now he has a fever and a bit of a cough and some congestion, and he's not eating (not even when offered Cheetos - a bad sign). He's crabby and clingy. But he seemed so much better yesterday that we skipped the doctor and got him a haircut instead. Now, when the baby comes, our plan is to take him to our friend Jenn's house. Her two-year-old currently has the same illness. The good news: they can't make each other sick. The bad news: Jenn would get to take care of two sick kids, Liam will want to be with me, and Jenn's (lucky?) husband Bill is out of town on business Wednesday and Thursday. So the plan is to keep Baby Bee in until Friday. Wish me luck.

By the way, those alphabet letters put that song "Abra Abracadabra" in my head every time.

39 Weeks, 2 Days

And no action. We all trooped in for what we hoped would be the last doctor appointment, and got nothing but another appointment, downtown, for next week. And because my due date is Wednesday and my appointment Thursday, I'll get a non-stress test* to boot. Assuming Baby Bee waits that long, of course. But not having a baby today isn't all bad; Liam is sick. He has a low-grade fever and a touch of a cough. Well, the cough might be my imagination, actually, since three attendees of last week's play group have since come down with the croup. So I am imagining he has the croup too, and of course that means the baby will get it, and it will be horrible for all of us. So Liam will go to the doctor tomorrow if he so much as clears his throat. In the meantime, Liam and I are stuck together at the hip because he gets ultra-clingy (to me) when he's sick. Yesterday and today have been pretty much solid cuddles (can adults get the croup?) and I woke up this morning to a loud call of, "Mommy, get outta bed NOW!"

* Essentially what they did to me at the hospital a couple of days ago.

Unnecessary Drama

During my contractions the other night, I got to thinking: how will I know to head to the hospital? Now, it isn't even easy to tell normally, but with the circumstances of Liam's birth behind me I was extra confused. My labor with Liam did begin on its own; I was at work on a Monday morning when I first began to notice regular contractions. Fortunately, I had a doctor appointment scheduled that afternoon, where we heard, "Looks like you'll have a baby today!" Yay!

Well, the contractions slowly sped up, and by nine that night they were about ten minutes apart, but they didn't hurt very much. At that point I had some bleeding. I put a call in to the doctor, and she suggested that I head in to the hospital. So we spent the night there, I dozed in and out through more little contractions, and I generally thought the whole labor-pain thing was greatly exaggerated. Well, the next morning we found out my labor had stalled; those easy contractions were less than half as powerful than they needed to be to get the baby out (dammit). We also found out that the baby was in a bit of distress; his heart-rate had dropped, and I was put on oxygen. A bunch of inducement drugs and a couple of hours later, and Liam was out: a perfect little guy.

All this leads me to the other night. My instructions have been to head in to the hospital when my contractions are five minutes apart, but seeing as I never got there with Liam, apparently I need new instructions. Otherwise Baby Bee might end up in distress or something while I'm still sitting around at home. So first thing yesterday morning I put a call in to the doctor's office, leaving a message that basically told Liam's birth story and explaining that the previous night's contractions had gotten me thinking. I didn't get a call back until 2:15 yesterday afternoon (about five hours after my call).

The call back was ridiculous. The nurse told me I needed to head in to the hospital as soon as possible so that the baby could be checked out. I explained that I had no reason to think the baby wasn't fine, that I was most definitely not in labor, and I just wanted the answer to a simple question. Well, she was not interested in my simple question. After a loooong discussion, I agreed to come in (after all, she was planting enough seeds of doubt that I couldn't just say no). Then she tells me that I can't go to the office; I have to head to the actual hospital where the proper equipment is. I can meet the doctor in Labor and Delivery, but I certainly don't have to check in or anything. This sucks: the drive in late afternoon takes about 45 minutes, and I am pretty sure this whole thing is pointless.

But in I go. I leave Mark and Liam at home, drive myself down, and park at a meter. The nurses in Labor and Delivery look at me like I'm nuts ("You are meeting your doctor here?"), but after someone is found that knows what's up, I am whisked off to a room. Great. We do the normal pee in a cup thing and the normal horrible gown thing, but then, instead of sitting quietly and waiting for the doctor, I'm put into a bed and hooked up to about five different monitoring machines. This is unexpected. I tell the nurses that I'm not sure why I'm there. The nurses tell me that, regardless of why I'm there, I have to check in. I don't want to check in. They explain that I have to, and they get Admissions on the phone. At least the admitting guy asked, "Are you staying?" so I could tell him "No!" But a nurse tells me that, depending on my state, I might just get induced that night. After all, why waste a trip downtown.

Forty-five minutes later, the baby monitoring machine-thingy has a long string of paper coming out of it and a nurse tears it off for delivery to a doctor. Five minutes after that, she's unhooking me from the machines and sending me home. Apparently, the baby is perfect. (Was there ever any doubt?) I did not see a doctor, I was stressed beyond belief, and god knows what sort of insurance bill we'll end up with. I spent exactly one hour there (the parking meter hadn't even expired) for absolutely no reason. And my discharge instructions? Attend my regular appointments. Call if my water breaks.

I didn't even get an answer to my original question, although the nurse suggested helpfully that I call my doctor's office today and ask. Well, I didn't feel like going in to the hospital today, so I didn't call. I have a regular appointment (must remember to attend it) tomorrow, so I'll ask my doctor then and give her an earful. What a waste of three hours of my life.

False Start

The contractions continued last night until I fell asleep. Now, just infrequent ones. So no baby; we're still waiting. <sigh>

And playing trains.

Just Waiting

No news on the baby front yet, so we've been plugging along doing more things to get ready. The house is spotless (well, almost), and check out the baby's room (well, Liam's room, and he likes it).

Pretty cute, huh? Too bad that's all I have done - in the hidden place behind the door where such projects are begun. The rest of the room still looks like this:

White stripe, thanks to Mark, but no letters, thanks to me. I can only stand for so long without back pain and I'm too much of a control freak to let Mark just do it. Not that he's volunteering: "I don't do wallpaper." Besides, I thought I could just slap them up there, but those little wallies are a pain (especially the C). They wiggle around and fall off and take much longer to apply than you'd think. But it turns out that we have some time, as I didn't do any calculations until last night and it turns out we're about eighteen wallies short. So I had to order some more, and they won't be here until late in the week (good news: they are on sale).

No wallies up today though, because Allison and Eric dropped by for a very nice afternoon. Mark and Eric and Liam wandered down to the park, while Allison did this to me:

Sorry to all of you who don't like looking at other people's feet (and ick, mine are even swollen). But now, as you can see, I have fully manicured feet and red toes. This is not something I could have managed myself right now. Allison has no children, but she understands that labor involves a lot of staring at one's feet (at least the pushing part), so she thought those feet should at least look nice. It feels very good.

As an added bonus, she and Eric brought down all the fixings for a meat pie, which they assembled here and will very soon be in our oven for dinner. It smelled so good while they were cooking it, and it was so sweet of them to understand that rest should be required right now.

Also, send some positive thoughts to Washington state: my friend Kelly is stuck in the hospital on bed rest, trying to keep in her 33-week baby. Kelly is quite active and all this bed rest is going to drive her crazy, but of course she'll do whatever it takes for her baby. Hang in there Kelly. <positive thoughts, positive thoughts>

Another Baby Bee Update

Another week, another appointment. Doctor reports there has been no further baby-related action, nor is there likely to be this weekend (or so he thinks. Do you think he can really tell?). He did fill me in on the on-call schedule for the next week, however. That was helpful, even though I obviously don't get to pick when the baby comes. I do like all three doctors, but one of them is my age (or a tiny bit younger), and that freaks me out. Give me one of the other two, thank you very much. And of course it would be nice to have the same guy who delivered Liam for this birth too. But anyway, all is well with Baby Bee. She is well, she is done, she is ready for the world.

For Baby Bee's sake I took a belly shot with my head on it, since I haven't done that the entire pregnancy and she might like to see one someday. Too bad it turned out so seriously; believe me, I took a whole bunch of pictures and this is the best one, but it's tough to take a picture in the bathroom mirror while hiding one's horrible hair and trying to remember to smile. Something had to give.

Note the Tilex in the background. And speaking of smiling, I discovered something recently about Liam. Here's the smile I get when I ask him to, "Show me your teeth."

Pretty close to a normal one, isn't it? And here's the smile when I ask him to, "Say cheese!"

Crazy.

We Might Not Go All the Way

That's right folks, this baby may show up sooner than expected. Last night I was woken up by some major contractions. Painful ones. Three sets of them. Mark was sound asleep, lying on his side and facing away from me, so I sort of clawed at his back with one hand and said, "This is a real one, honey!" No response, but I was too occupied to care. A few minutes later, another one came on, and then another. I fell back asleep, so I assume nothing else happened. Mark didn't even wake up. I guess all that extreme pain I was feeling was a quiet pain. I must correct that next time.

Anyway, it was helpful today that I had my weekly appointment and could find out if those contractions had been productive. They were, a bit: I'm dilated to 1cm. Now, a person can walk around for weeks like that, but my doctor tells me that multiple painful contractions usually indicate that something's really going on. In other words, get her number in my speed dial.

Funny, the first thought through my head was, "I can't have a baby right now, I have plans this weekend." Very similar to equally irrational thoughts had when in labor with Liam, such as "I can't be in labor, I have to go to work tomorrow." Well, I guess I might not. But we do have many plans: this weekend is to be the last big push to get things off the to-do list; things like finishing up painting the baby's room and buying a few more clothes and going to Halloween parties. Plus I have book club next Thursday and I've already finished the book (I told you these thoughts were irrational).

The important news, however, is that this baby is cooked, and if she were to come tonight she'd be perfectly fine. My handy-dandy baby book tells me she's probably about six and a half pounds and 21 inches. Hopefully she is, as the ice cream before bed has paid off on my end: I gained three pounds this week (keep that in mind next time you reach for the Haagen-Dazs).

Look!

Check out all those girlie things! In soft girlie shades of lavender, pink, and yellow! In soft girlie fabrics covered in little embroidered flowers!

My friends were wonderful enough to throw a shower/dinner out on Saturday night. We ate lots and had fun and they all brought little girlie things along for Baby Bee. And what a good feeling it is to have them all those little things washed and hanging in the closet. Oh yes, first thing Sunday morning I was cutting off tags and (ever so gently) stuffing the washing machine, even though, as Mark pointed out, none of us planning to get dressed that day had any clean clothes. Whatever. I also went yesterday to pick up some unglamorous baby items we needed, like newborn diapers, breast pads, and well, stuff like that. Feels good. So there isn't much left to do before Baby Bee gets here, but I can't rest until they are done.

Well, that's not entirely true. I am getting more rest, and am I eating more, and I am feeling a bit better. Mark has really stepped up. Yesterday he took Liam out on a couple of errands, plus they did some yard work together (yard work makes for a happy Liam that naps well). And this time they actually picked the leaves up; Liam and I just moved them around.

And Mark cooked a great dinner and generally let me keep my feet up all day. He's done the same thing today since getting home from work and, as I write this, he has just presented me with a cup of hot tea. If this baby is undersized, it won't be Mark's fault.

By the way, did you know that wool mittens are great for picking up bugs? They just seem to stick on there. Liam found an earwig outside and was determined to bring it inside to show me. It kept jumping off the mitten, but Liam would just touch it and up it would come again, stuck. Liam was so fascinated with the bug that I tried to take a picture. The earwig is on his right mitten, but that's as close as I was going to get, thank you.