Baby Journey -Part 12

Baby Journey -Part 12:  Final Preparations

(I've slacked in posting! Trying to catch up. Today while I post this we are at 38 weeks!)

Week 34

Weary. Cheery. Dreary. Steve had it right.

The last couple weeks have started to get rough.  I am back to being exhausted all the time. I am somehow getting even more emotional. And in general any and all pregnancy symptoms are intensifying. Heartburn = way worse. Back pain = all the time and awful.

Also our little guy has gotten big and strong enough now that sometimes his movements hurt me.  Over spring break Cody and I went to a Spurs game (actually a couple!) and at one game at one point, he kicked or punched or did some movement way far into the right side of my stomach area and it REALLY hurt and I gasped and said “Ow!” out loud. The lady sitting next to me turned and looked and seemed concerned. Our little guy actually really likes to stretch out into whatever part of me is over on this far right side that hurts so much.  He doesn’t do it to the left side, only the right. He also now does something where I think he pushes into a certain part of my stomach/uterus because it gets all hard in a spot and often times that hurts too.  It seems like we can distinctly feel him pressing up against me when that happens. Lately it has started hurting and I try telling our little man to please hurry up and adjust himself.

We have now completed a breastfeeding class, baby care class, and 3 out of 4 sessions of our birthing class. Cody said that the baby care class stressed him out and for myself the birthing classes have not helped but rather freaked me out even more.

I am finally at a point where I feel it is acceptable for me to park in these awesome spots.  Up until now I always felt like I should leave it for someone "more" pregnant than me.  Now I gladly take the spot : )

This week we are at 34 weeks. On Tuesday I had my doctor’s appointment.  I go back again in 2 more weeks and then at that point we start doing the cervix checks and I start going in weekly.  Crazy how close we are getting!  This week on Wednesday I started getting some new feelings that I don’t like. I have started feeling strong menstrual like cramps. I literally didn’t feel the first one until Wednesday evening during dinner. Since then throughout Thursday and Friday (today) they have started happening all the time. It’s not pain exactly but they are very uncomfortable. I wish I had started feeling them just a day earlier so I could have asked/mentioned it to my doctor. Also just this week my lower back pain has way intensified.  Often throughout the pregnancy I had back pain mostly only in the evenings after the whole day or after I had been sitting/laying in a position for a while. This week my lower back just hurts all the time, no matter what I’m doing, and it’s waaaay worse. I do not like it. 

Lastly the other thing to note this week (-this with the above two things put together has gotten me a little nervous) is that two people said they think it looks like I’ve dropped. Now, remember I’m clueless about all this. I don’t really know what that means (I mean I have an idea and I’ve since looked it up) and I definitely don’t know or trust that it “means” anything is happening. But on Thursday at work this week one of the ladies on my team told me she thought it looked like my stomach had dropped. Then that night at our birthing class the instructor said the same thing. I think all these “signs” or symptoms or whatever they are, are normal. And it seems like for some women these things happen and then they still don’t go into labor for weeks. Other people have commented that when these things started happening it wasn’t too much longer for them. I know there is no way to know, it has just started to get me nervous. In my head he’s not quite ready. I’d like to hit the 37 week mark to feel okay with him arriving. Also our house/duplex right now is literally a disastrous mess. We have no where to organize/put away all the awesome baby stuff we have been given. I had a dream the other night that we had the baby, I was walking around carrying him trying to calm him down, and then I tripped over bags and boxes of stuff all over the floor. So much to do. So little time. And I honestly don’t really know how to solve the problem of lack of space right now.

Sort of on that note - we found a house!  Yay!  We put in an offer and it was accepted. We are currently in out option period and have the inspection tomorrow. We are extremely excited and really love the house! The only downer is that our close date is April 23 and our due date is April 29. So we will either literally be moving with a newborn or I will be about to go into labor at any minute. Needless to say I am feeling stressed. Very excited about all the amazing things happening soon, but very anxious as well.  We could definitely use some prayers about it all. I’ll share more about the house once it all is more set and the inspection is done and our option period is over.

Weeks 35-36

Being very honest I have reached a point somewhere within these last two weeks of often being quite the complainer and grump.  Thankfully Cody can somehow usually tell the difference between times when it’s okay for him to slightly ignore my daily repeated comments about how uncomfortable and exhausted I am and times when he needs to step in and emotionally support me because I’m on the verge of a meltdown.

35 Weeks!

The farther along I get I even more so just cannot fathom continuing to get farther along each week if that makes sense.  I cannot imagine getting bigger, rounder, more uncomfortable, having more back pain, swollen feet, etc.  Everything just feels like it’s already at it’s max, yet I fear it likely isn’t unless I have our little boy in the next few days.  

Last Tuesday we had our 36 week appointment (a week ago as I’m writing this) and that started our weekly appointments and the super fun cervix checks.  I was 1 cm dilated and 60% effaced. My doctor has bluntly told me though that the numbers don’t necessarily mean anything. She said she’s had patients come in already way dilated and effaced and still don’t go into labor for weeks, just like she’s had patients come in with zero progress who go into labor the next day. (So then my question is why exactly are those extremely uncomfortable checks important?) I’m a little worried that already having some super slight progress plus having tons of people make comments that I’ve ‘dropped’ and look ready to pop and asking when my due date is and giving faces like “are you sure?” - is all going to lead me to believe that I’ll have him earlier rather than later. Honestly I am hoping for that : ) but since there’s no way to know and there’s a chance I could even be late and last for another 4 weeks… oh my goodness, please no, I’m worried I have false hope that it won’t be much longer.

36 Weeks!

36 weeks belly shot : )

Week 37

Today officially is 37 weeks!! Whoop! I am READY for him to arrive whenever he chooses to : ) Cody has politely asked me to wait until this Thursday as he has a project at work that started today and ends tomorrow, and after that he is on board with as soon as possible. So one more day… then I am whole heartedly rooting for our little man to get so uncomfy in there that he’s ready to meet us.

Part of me feels so ridiculously ignorant about all of this stuff dealing with labor and it’s caught me off guard.  I literally did not expect there to be discomfort like this until labor started. I mean, I knew at the end women are super uncomfortable due to being huge and exhausted and swollen… but I did not realize that there would be pre-labor things like cramping and that the whole Braxton Hicks false contractions could be so uncomfortable.  The other day Cody and I were walking around Target and (*Note: Please do remember because I am very open about this - that I am a huge wimp and seem to have a much lower pain tolerance than other people - but nonetheless, this is true to what I feel.) I was making quiet moaning noises with the Braxton Hicks and grabbing my stomach and Cody made a comment like “Aren’t these the fake easy contractions? What are you going to do about the real ones?” Seriously. Pretty sure I made a face that clearly read "You might want to slowly take back that comment, Mr."  But seriously -the cramps are awful! The worse cramps I’ve ever had and they just stick around and don't leave for hours.  Usually by the end of each day my feet are swollen (which grosses me out for some reason), my back is killing me, I am beyond exhausted, and the cramps are constant and awful.  I am usually about ready to burst into tears when I roll onto our bed each night and then spend 5 minutes trying to get comfortable (or rather finding the least uncomfortable position).  There are a couple things that I’ve found help some: a massage on my lower back, a heating pad on my lower back, sometimes sitting and moving on a birthing ball helps, and then my favorite choice (often after some of the massage and heat) is going to sleep for the night. I will say that Cody has been awesome about massages and encouraging me to try the birthing ball and get the heating pad for me. Thanks Loves : )

Besides just being ready to be done with this stage and being so uncomfortable all the time, I am also finally ready at work.  I feel like if I didn’t go back tomorrow I would be leaving things in a good place. Which is a really nice feeling that I am not worrying about anything there (unless obviously I’m overlooking something huge … which hopefully is not the case). I have a long-term sub binder all prepared with at least everything I could think of that would be helpful or necessary information for the sub to have. I have things organized in my room (at least more so than I normally do just for myself) and also have the writing plans done for my team for the rest of the year. Short of being there myself to explain plans for whenever that first day ends up being, I don’t know what all else I could do.

My Long Term Sub binder and my Writing Plans for the remainder of the year.
I was SO relieved to get these items ready for my sub and team : ) 

Hoping I didn't miss anything!

And lastly our house is finally at a point where I feel like it’s ready, or as ready as it possibly could be considering the move.  (Have I mentioned that officially? I think I’ve said we were looking for a house… well we found one! Yay! We are closing on a house that Cody and I love on April 23rd! And our due date is April 29th! So … it’ll be a toss up which happens first.) But for where we are now at the duplex, we have a Pack 'n Play all prepared and a Rock 'n Play sleeper as bed options, a dresser crammed full of baby stuff, a changing area on top of the dresser with diapers and wipes easily accessible, and our car seat installed in our car. And we are so fortunate to have such amazing friends that spent part of their Saturday last weekend over at our duplex helping us (and by helping I mean doing at least 80% of the work) get organized with all our baby stuff and packing/moving mess. Seriously until they came and helped I felt like our house was a disaster zone and actually had a dream that I’d had our baby and came home and was tripping over things while trying to walk around with our newborn. Thanks to their awesome direction and help I now feel like our house is ready and safe!

Cody installing the car seat.
It was a frustrating experience - but that's his fun story : )

Callie patiently waiting during the car seat installation process.

Dresser and changing area. 

Even though I know we won't actually be really bathing him at the beginning, I like having all our bath items organized and ready to go.

The Rock 'n Play sleeper and the Pack 'n Play.
We've had the Pack 'n Play set up for weeks now so it's covered with the sheet to shield it from the amazing amount of dog hair that collects in our room.

So overall everything is ready whenever our little guy is : )  Despite the discomfort and anxiety about not knowing when everything will happen, I am so, so excited to be able to see him and meet him and hold him soon. It is sort of surreal that we are at a place where we could not have a baby today, and have a baby by the end of the day tomorrow. It is comforting though to know that the Lord knows when his birthday will be : )  I had a friend say that months ago when she was pregnant and waiting and it stuck with me. His birthday is already known and planned and the Lord has had this all in motion since before we even knew we were going to have him.

Maybe this will be my last pre-baby post! Maybe not. We will see : )