It's almost 7am and we have been at the hospital since about 2:45 this morning. Depending on how things progress I may be induced at 8am with Pitocin. We're going to have a baby today!!!! Let me back up to the beginning...

I have been so discouraged lately about feeling like I'll be pregnant forever, so when Justin told me our good friends Scott and Melisa were coming down to visit for the evening and spend the night, I was thrilled! Something to break up the monotony. We went out to dinner and then Melisa and I settled in for a girlie movie night while the guys went out on a last "guys' night out" kind of thing I guess. We watched "Diary of a Mad Black Woman" which was hilarious and made me laugh, and gave each other foot massages which felt heavenly. Around midnight I started to feel cramping that was different from the contractions I had been feeling all along, but it was too irregular and they weren't strong enough for me to think anything of it.

Around 2am we decided it was too late to keep waiting up for the guys and went to get ready for bed upstairs. I was still in my sweats and helping Melisa pop up the trundle bed in the guest room- and when I stood up my water broke!!! It was THE weirdest feeling in the world. Then we had a few minutes of panic when I tried to call Justin and his cell went straight to voicemail (we found out later it had gone battery-dead just minutes after leaving home that evening). Melisa got a hold of her husband though and we grabbed our bags and she drove me to the hospital where we would meet the guys.

When the nurse checked me in triage I was still only dilated 3.5 cm and said I had a "high leak"- my water hadn't broken at the bottom of the uterus like normal, so she said they would monitor things through the early morning hours and we would see how far I'd come by 8am and then decide if they needed to help mother nature along with some drugs.

This has got to be the MOST uncomfortable experience of my LIFE!!!!! Not only do the contractions HURT like CRAZY (and they're coming every 3 minutes now), but it's mostly the constant gushing of amniotic fluid that bothers me. I won't go into too much detail here, but please feel free to talk to me about it further if you are soon to experience this! Let's just say I am LOVING whoever invented adult diapers right about now...

Well anyway, I got a few minutes of sleep here and there, but I'm too wired to be sleepy I think. We sent Scott and Melisa back to our house to try and get some sleep before things get really exciting, and Justin's parents have been summoned to come collect the dogs and take them for their "grandma vacation" while we are here. Poor Justin is exhausted- he is out cold on the couch in our room!

Check back later- we'll have a baby soon!!!!!!!!!!!

Here it is- February 29th. It only comes around once every 4 years, and I thought it would be SO cool to have the baby today. Alas, no signs of impending delivery.  The weirdest thing- I haven't even had a Braxton-Hicks contraction since early on Monday! I know we're still technically a week early, but at this point I'm convinced I'm never going to have this baby!!!! I told Justin I was going to be in the Guiness Book of World Records for longest pregnancy- as in like forEVER long!!! And it makes it even harder when my doctor is absolutely "convinced" that we'll have him before our due date. If you can't tell already- I'm skeptical. The irony of this is that he'll probably decide to be born tomorrow when my mom has what she calls "the perfect storm" brewing- we have some missionary friends coming into town, a presentation being given at my parents' house, plus mom's college roommate coming to Indy and wanting to visit for a little bit. My sister-in-law starts spring break so she and my brother will hopefully be in town- and oh, my dad's flying to San Francisco today for meetings all weekend! Haha- yes I'm sure if he comes early it will be tomorrow when it's "not convenient" for anyone else.  Now if he can just hold on till Sunday, cause I want to see everyone too!

Oh- we picked a pediatrician this week, finally! The office is literally just around the corner from our house (how much more convenient can you get???) and the doctor is really nice. He sat down with me on Tuesday for about a half hour to just talk about anything and everything. I felt really comfortable in the office and everyone was so friendly. The doctor even reminded me of my dad!!!! He was very straightforward but laid back as well (and even had a beard to match, haha).

Other than my moment of self-pity for still being pregnant, there's nothing new to report on. We have our usual doctor's appointment on Monday afternoon, so I'll post more then!

Ciao!

This entry has lots of good stuff from our doctor's visit today!!!

1. Weight gain = 38 lbs, which means I only gained a pound since last week's visit. Miraculous, considering my diet this past week has consisted mainly of burgers, chicken nuggets, rice, ice cream, and oranges.

2. Blood Pressure = 120 / 70 which is awesome!!! We had a bit of a scare on Saturday when my hands swelled up so much that I couldn't get my wedding ring off, and I looked like the Michelin Man. Dr. Priddy said that swelling like that in the later weeks of pregnancy is normal, and usually comes and goes. She would only be worried if my BP had gone up, which can signal preeclampsia, along with a severe headache that won't go away with Tylenol and a piercing pain around my diaphragm (I've had none of these symptoms). FYI- the swelling has since gone down and my wedding ring is safely on my finger again instead of on a chain around my neck.

3. Baby's heartbeat = 140 bpm, give or take a few beats. This is good- it's fast enough to indicate good health for an unborn child, but slow enough to show that there's no distress. He gave quite a show, however, when she was trying to read it on the Doppler machine- it took us about 5 minutes to get a clear steady listen because he was doing his usual acrobatics! He is still small (my belly measures only about 35 cm "long" when it should be 38 cm now) but not underweight.

4. I'm now 3 cm dilated and still 50% effaced. YAY!!! This is super thrilling news because I'm progressing faster than expected. I have my next weekly appointment next Monday and Dr. Priddy said she would be surprised if I actually made it into the office because she thinks he will most likely come this week. I jokingly told her we were holding out for a birth this Friday (Leap Day!) and she told me that was a reasonable expectation.  PS- "effaced" refers to the thinning of the cervix for the birth. At 100 % effaced it will be completely flat and open.

5. I've been having major Braxton-Hicks (or practice / fake) contractions for a few weeks now, and they're starting to get more persistent. They are mostly centered around the lowest part of the uterus though, whereas with real labor the contractions start at the top of the uterus and squeeze downward. I've been told it feels like massive stomach cramping, but at this point I seriously can't wait to experience them! The doctor re-stripped my membranes this visit, which she said should start the prostiglandin (that's the hormone I couldn't remember last time) flowing and get labor started soon. We'll see.

Well, Justin's still sick with the flu or a cold or whatever, so combined with his hacking up a lung every few minutes at night and my bladder being squeezed into oblivion, I haven't been sleeping very well. I've come to rely on my afternoon naps again, which are soooooo nice. I'm trying to get as much sleep as possible NOW, before the baby comes. And no, I don't feel guilty about being lazy.

Also, I made an appointment to meet with a pediatrician tomorrow, and he happens to be about a mile from our house. Hopefully it goes well! I have two backup choices just in case. The birth plan (or "birth preferences") has been written and is tucked away in my hospital bag, along with a list of people to call from the hospital when Baby is born. Don't take it personally if you get a call from our parents instead of us- I expect we will be delegating some of that responsibility to them!

In the meantime, I am still doing the ellyptical machine every other night for about 25-30 minutes each time, and stretching every night. I can still bend over and touch the floor without straining!!! I've also added in a few lunges with hand weights, as well as squats, which are supposed to help with the pushing stage of labor. I've been paying bills like crazy, and have scheduled all the rest for the month of March already, so finances are in order- and I'm so glad that money will not be something we have to worry about for a little bit once Baby arrives. We started paying things off and getting a budget squared away months ago in preparation for this, and I definitely recommend that all pregnant couples do this.

Lessons Learned Since Last Blog:

1. Patience is not only a virtue, it should be cause for sainthood!

2. General discomfort is definitely on the rise. I can't sit or stand for long periods of time without feeling like I'm going to DIE. We were watching Apollo 13 at my parents' house on Saturday (one of the best movies of all time) and I had to keep getting up off the couch to walk around or stretch because sitting was just killing me. The biggest things about sitting are that my back and legs start to hurt, and also I get sick of being kicked in the ribs. I find that if I get up and get Baby to shift position, when I sit back down again he isn't quite as far under my ribs and the kicking doesn't hurt so much. Church yesterday was like medieval torture! 75 minutes of sitting through Sunday school followed by 90 minutes of church service... yikes.

3. If I'm hungry between meals now, I will drink a tall glass of milk instead of snacking. This gives my stomach something to digest without taking up too much room, which means I think I've finally found a way to get around the constant heartburn! Because then when it is time to really eat a meal, I have room in my stomach for actual food. Haha- I beat the system! I have had to get rid of one favorite nighttime ritual though- eating 2 oranges. I had been doing this every night around 9pm for the past 2 months, and now it's just too much acid before laying down to try and sleep.  Oh well.

It's weird thinking every day could be my last day pregnant! Hopefully not too much longer- keep checking back because I'll be posting more often as we get closer!

Well, yesterday was my last day of work! And yet I still woke up (and got up) much earlier than I had planned for my first day of freedom! It feels weird- not knowing how many more baby-free days are left. Nothing too exciting going on yet (sadly), but I keep telling myself I should appreciate this time and use it to get tons of stuff done before Baby arrives, because, as my dad wisely put it, "he's much easier to take care of where he is NOW."

I mentioned a few entries ago how I've been having "baby" dreams now instead of just "being pregnant" dreams- well, last night I had the "birth" dream. It was amazingly real, in fact, I was shocked when I woke up actually still in my bed this morning. Usually dreams are semi-reality with a little (or a lot) of weirdness, but this was weirdly only real. I dreamt that we went to bed, then I woke up in the middle of the night and we went to the hospital. They checked me in at triage, then we moved to a birthing room and had the baby (okay, so the one strange part is that I don't remember the actual labor part). The details were so amazingly real- down to the part where Justin had grabbed our bags and laptops (??) on the way out the door, but a friend had to come back to our house to get the power plugs for the laptops, haha.

Well I'm not exactly sure what to do with my first day of temporary unemployment. I normally don't work Fridays anyway, but this one feels different. I keep adding to my list of things to do before Baby comes (I thought the list was supposed to SHRINK as time went by!!!) so I'll probably tackle things like interviewing a couple pediatricians (still haven't done that yet), cleaning out some closets here at the house, and laundry as usual. Every night before we go to bed I have this funny moment of panic where everything has to be cleaned up and put away in case this is the night when my water breaks and we have to leave at a moment's notice. It's also nice to know I don't have any leftover dishes to do in the morning!

Really quickly- in dog news: Summer hasn't peed on anything else since the bed incident (that we know of, at least), but we also don't let the dogs on the bed anymore... So things with her have been good. But Hercules now has an intestinal parasite (Giardia) that I guess is extremely hard to get rid of an can be passed on to humans if we're not careful. Great. So now both dogs are on medication, PLUS an extreme diet. Well not so much diet as "kibble only." They are both 2-3 lbs overweight (a lot when you're only supposed to weigh 11 lbs!) and are already developing slight back problems, which can be common- and deadly!- in dachshunds. Summer has a "soft" disc (basically swollen) just below her shoulder blades, and Hercules has always had a slight hump near his lower back that gives him problems, and the vet said that it's getting a little worse. So we have to get them to lose 2-3 lbs a piece in 2 months basically, or they could jump off the couch or something and break their backs and DIE!!! Aaaahh! I can't handle that right now. So to anyone who is reading this who might have contact with our precious pups- DO NOT give them any "people" food!!! It's so hard to not even let them lick our plates or give them a little piece of orange (a favorite treat, believe it or not), but we have to stick to this so they can lose the weight quickly and then we can be a little more lenient later when we're just trying to maintain their healthy weight.

Anyway, didn't mean to make this a blog about dogs, but the issues have been a big part of our lives as of late.

Lessons Learned Since Last Blog:

1. Tiny squishied stomach = heartburn pretty much 24/7. It doesn't matter if what I eat is considered acidic or not. I'm trying to eat little bits at a time, practically once an hour, instead of full meals which now make me miserable.

2. Actually, pretty much everything makes me miserable these days. I feel like such a grouchy whiner, and I REALLY try not to be, but it's hard when I'm just so uncomfortable all the time! It's not like anything specific really bothers me (except my back is getting there), but nothing feels normal and I'm ready to get this pregnancy thing over with.

3. No matter how much I cross off my list, there's always something more to do. Or buy.

4. Finally, I've discovered that not only can having money not make you happy, but not having it (or a ton of it) doesn't have to make you not happy. I know it sounds confusing, but just think about it.