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	All babies need to have their first doctor's appointment within a week after birth

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Baby has arrived!

Pregnancy Journal

2008-08-21 (38 weeks)

Sleepless night...
Wednesday night after our walk, i felt that the baby descended even lower - i was getting crampy feelings at the bottom of my abdomen and even Bilal said that my belly looks quite low now! It's not too hard to feel baby's head up there now (eek!).
So tonight i woke up at 4 am with contractions that seem like my usual Braxton Hicks but are more painful (esp. in the lower abdomen). I haven't been able to sleep even after Bilal got me a snack and i read some of the Golden Compass Sequel book :( I got up and decided to be productive - made the two beds for our moms who'll be coming next week so that's all ready.

I'm still a bit annoyed with the creaking board in the baby's room (esp. when my mom's here i have a feeling we'll hear it all the time!) but i don't want to nag about it...

Well - i can't got back to sleep still :( Don't want to get my hopes up about labor coming soon (impatience impatience) so i'll just surf the web!

2008-08-19 (38 weeks)

yay - another cousin is born!

So i'm still here almost at 38.5 weeks waiting.... but our sister in law just had her baby boy! And she was due 3 weeks after me :) i guess you never know when the baby will come!! He was a bit early, but sounds like he's doing great and she also had a natural birth without any big complications - thank God! We are both very very happy!

Bilal and I just went to our weekly O/B appointment and i'm about 80% effaced and baby is at -1 station, which is pretty low! While this does sound like progress, it does not mean that i'll be going into labor anytime soon since women can stay this way for weeks! So lets wait and see :) The good thing is that we got an u/s appointment scheduled for next week - hooray! Last time my o/b did u/s was almost 20 weeks ago! It'll be good to get an estimate of baby's weight and the appointment is only 1 wk away next Tues now (originally we were supposed to see my o/b not until Fri next week!).

Well.. i'm going to keep hoping that our baby comes soon too - never thought our sister in law would have her baby first :)

Sleepy now ... have work tomorrow!

2008-08-17 (38 weeks)

Still waiting... at 38 wks and another heat wave
Now we've made it to 38 weeks and I don't see any signs yet that baby will be coming soon but it's getting quite uncomfortable! I think he must have dropped lower because there's a lot more pelvic pressure and i get mild stretchy like cramps in my lower abdomen. Also i started getting more belly aches in general - after i eat sometimes (e.g. oatmeal) or just like that my belly starts hurting :(
On the positive side, the baby seems to be kicking regularly, although i haven't felt hiccups in a while now. Last week dr. visit everything was still normal and we have another appointment tomorrow to check up on things. I'm just praying that tomorrow we'll hear that i'm at least a little bit dialated but probably not (or else i may have lost the plug already...).

We had another heat wave this weekend - it was up to 94 degrees yesterday! We were lucky enough to get invited for bbqs on both Friday and Sat nights - first at Bilal's manager's house and then at his mento'rs house and both of them had A/C :) :) :) So i don't think it was too uncomfortable, given that we stayed out of the house whe it was the hottest! Also the bbqs were lots of fun - wish we could reciprocate soon but i don't think we'll be able too until the baby's older. We also got a free breast pump from his mentor - that's going to save us like $250 (we just have to get the kit that touches your skin for it either from the hospital or the store and that's waaay cheaper!). It's also the medellla pump we were going to buy anyway.

Now i feel like we are definitely prepared for everything! We've done even more this week:
-Friday we had extra insulation put into our attic, which should help keep the house warmer and bills smaller during the colder seasons
-Yesterday Bilal (the hero) spent all day cleaning the house and he even steam cleaned the carpets!! We also got the futon into baby's room for when my mom's visiting
-last minor thing to do today is to wash all the bedsheets and prepare the beds for the two mothers; if we don't end up having enough linens, we'll need to borrow some from Bilal's cousin probably (or may even ask some friends who live closer... hmmm :))

So come on baby - we're ready to meet you!!! Hope that you decide to come out soon ;)

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