40 Weeks

Well, we're here.  No baby yet, but tons of excitement.

Early Saturday morning, I was having a lot of "contractions" that were very close together (1:30 apart for about an hour).  I knew it couldn't be the real thing because the contractions were unpleasant but not painful.  (After conferring today with my midwife and a friend who is a doula, it's likely that the contractions were my cervix effacing as opposed to dilating). 

What was worse than the contractions was the nausea.  It was back in full force.  It's been so long since I've had nausea (and it was also 3 AM), that I couldn't remember what to do and I am the Nausea Queen!  My body's response to any stimulus is nausea!  I was embarrassed for myself.  After finally realizing I needed to eat, I had a few small pretzels and made myself a cuppa tea.  The pretzels didn't help much, but once I started drinking the tea, my stomach seemed to settle down.

I've worried that the nausea would return for labor, and I guess I have confirmation now that it will.  I've spoken with both JD and our doula about this concern, stressing the need to make sure that I'm hydrating enough so that we can avoid the need for IV hydration.  We're also going to make sure to pack a few things that help me with nausea to bring in to the hospital.

So, that brings us to today.  At the midwives' office today, my blood pressure was pretty high for me (142/90).  I had my first cervical check -- one of the most painful things I've ever experienced.  I was 50% effaced and not dilated at all (maybe that's why the check was so painful).  Baby's heartrate was steady in the 150s.  A second bp check was still high, so I got sent to the hospital for a non-stress test and bloodwork.

I got hooked up to a fetal monitor and blood pressure cuff and the nurse had me lay down flat on my back on the gurney.  I wasn't able to sleep (there were so many alarm bells going off all over the place - not from me) but I was able to just lay down and rest.  They had me laying down for so long that my left hip started hurting (as it has done throughout the last couple months), so I managed to flip myself over to my side.  Apparently, my bp stayed high the whole time until I turned to my side, when it came down immediately into the normal range and stayed there.  Yeah, so I guess what they say about avoiding laying on your back when you're heavily pregnant is true and maybe the labor/delivery nurse should know that.  You know, just maybe.

My bloodwork and urine dip came back normal, so the midwife thought this was probably just pregnancy-induced hypertension.  I think it was life-induced hypertension, as they are currently replacing all of the sprinkler heads in our building, and they were supposed to come this morning and tomorrow* and you have to move everything 2 feet away from each sprinkler head so my house looks like a tornado went through it, and it's a sucky thing to go through when you're in full-on nesting mode.  There's been a couple of crying jags due to the stress and emotions and the drama of it all.  Of course, the contractors didn't even show up today.  I'm going to go down to the office tomorrow morning and see if our unit can be put on the priority list to get done because we can't clean up the place until after they are done and it's at least a 2-day process.

So, I get to do a 24-hour urine catch (hooray) and go back in to see the midwives on Thursday.

The hospital was packed today (Snowpacalypse babies in da house!) and triage was especially swamped.  Given the crowd, they are booking an induction date for me in case we need it.  I'm hoping we don't.

*The scheduling of the sprinkler work was not my idea.  The process started around Labor Day and they should have gotten to our unit by the end of September.  Unfortunately, there have been a lot of hiccups in the process and they've only gotten to us this week.

39 Weeks

I'm alive and fine.  Baby is still on the inside.  I just haven't had much to say in the last month.  I think about stuff to write and feel terribly guilty for not posting more often, but it's like I only have little things to say and then it's not worth it and then I go hide.

What's been happening?

-My office had an extremely low-key shower for me with cake and a few gifts.  It was really nice and I appreciated my co-workers accommodating my wishes about not having a huge blowout party.  These gifts happened to be the first baby items that we brought into our house, so that was a big thrill too.

-My sister and my BFF threw a Celebration of Awesome for me in lieu of a shower.  This was a gathering of the women in my family at a local hotel for a high tea and we had a wonderful time.

-I have it on good authority from several people that based on the way that I'm carrying/the baby's heartrate/the date of conception/the angle of Venus that the baby is definitely a boy/girl.  I am confident that the baby is a boy/girl.

-The baby dropped about 2 weeks ago in order to spare me the horrible heartburn (or, cause you know that's how anatomy works) and now I just feel like a 10 lb. (uneducated guesstimate, whatever it's heavy) weight is swinging between my legs when I'm walking.

-In other "Holy Crap, This Might Be Real, But Let's Not Tempt Fate" news, I have set up the Pack 'n' Play in our bedroom and my sister's boyfriend, a fireman, came over to install our car seat for us.  I am now driving around with an infant seat in my car.  I am praying that the fates are appeased by JD and I stubbing our toes on the much-larger-than-it-seemed-in-the-store Pack 'n' Play every time we walk by.  Prior to getting the car seat installed, we took the car to the car wash and they vaccuumed out the inside of the car and then we got to ride through the car wash and it's so beautiful now I don't even want to drive it.  Yes, I'm 5.

-Our house is a mess.  We are hopeless clutterers.  One day the crap will drown me in a tidal wave of junk mail and spare computer cables.  JD does not think my solution of burning down the house is a good idea (probably because he refuses to abandon our clutter-filled ways and/or wants to avoid being labeled an "arsonist."  He's small-minded like that).  Also, the front of the house has a weird smell that I'm pretty sure is not me because wouldn't I then smell the smell wherever I went and I don't so I think it's something in the house.  The smell might be from our houseplant; I don't think it's from stinkbugs cause they have a different smell.  I don't think we're hoarders, but I'm not as diligent as I could be about cleaning up and maintaining and JD won't do anything involving cleaning unless I'm cleaning at the exact same time (sometimes not even then).  I haven't found a solution yet, but I am ever hopeful.

-I love the show "Fringe."  I feel so good knowing that I hung in there through the stupid period because the show would come back to a place of even more awesome and it did.  I don't know why I'm still watching "Grey's" as it entered the stupid period long ago and it looks as if it'll never return.

-Will try to post more soon, even if it's just little things.  I've been following everyone's blogs, just not commenting very often.

I'm Not Discounting Ebola Yet

Finally back from all the High Holiday hoopla and the Bataan Death March that was our tour of the hospital where (knock on wood) we'll be delivering  [the maternity ward is a very short walk, but they made us hike over to the hospital wing 4,000 miles away where they'll be storing overflow post-partum cases.  They are anticipating an overflow due to all the babies who are about to be born because Keyzer Snowze happened 9 months ago, and apparently people who have sex during blizzards get babies.  (Silly rabbit, that's what cures IF)].

I had my second appointment yesterday with my new practice of midwives and it went really well.  Blood pressure is good; weight is good; baby is head down and is measuring right on time.  I'm spilling a little glucose, but the nurse thinks that's more attributable to the Starbucks Hot Chocolate I had yesterday morning, then anything to really worry about.

I also got a flu shot.  About three hours later, my throat started hurting and I started feeling really congested.  I've never had this kind of reaction to the flu shot before, so I'm thinking it's just the coincidental onset of a cold.  Or Ebola.  Cause you never know.  Now I have to hunt down whoever gave me this cold/Ebola  and kill them, since that's a proportional response.  (I just heard one of the admins coughing, so he and my MIL (who's had a cold since Rosh Hashanah) are now the prime suspects).

Speaking of the lack of proportional responses, my MIL and SIL seem bound and determined to keep me in the middle of their never-ending battle, with each complaining about the other to me.  I think they are both acting like immature hotheads, and I mean that in the most diplomatic way possible.  I do think that each of them would benefit from actually learning the lesson that it's possible to convey the same message in many different ways, some more offensive than others.  Given what I think is the generalized lack of understanding of conversational and social cues from undiagnosed and untreated Asperger's going on here, it's unlikely that either will learn this lesson, and that both people will invariably select the most offensive statement to use on any given occasion.

In other news, as I discussed with Calliope, LJ and Mel the other day, I'm now having nightmares related to my worries about SIL and her crazy intolerant very strong opinions on everything hand washing and the fact that her immediate family does not use any antibacterial products (which I'm OK with) and does not wash their hands with soap (which I'm not OK with).  One of the bloggers on Who Wants to Know recently did a post on these signs that you hang on a stroller or car seat to discourage random people with unwashed hands from touching the baby.  A little extreme?  Perhaps.  Would SIL respect the sign or my requests?  Given her previous behavior, that's a bit doubtful.  Suggestions for how to handle this would be appreciated.

Best Wishes for the New Year

After taking a realistic look (brought on by a vent of crazy) at the list of what I was going to make for the holidays and the list of what I would be able to make for the holidays, I severely pared down my cooking to-do list.  (Let us not mention that I now have ingredients for the former list sitting in my pantry -- maybe I'll cook some more next week).  Thank goodness that both my mother and MIL are understanding women whose price is beyond rubies.

Just wanted to take a moment before tonight to wish everyone a sweet and happy new year.  The poem below always moves me, so I like to include it each year in my new year greetings.

In the new year which now begins, these are my wishes for you:


May you experience no earthquakes, no hurricanes, no floods, and no dinnertime phone solicitations.
And if they come, may you have a flashlight, a radio, a cell phone, water, food, and a siddur [prayer book] ready, just in case.

May you see a good play, hear a great opera, and see no flashing police lights behind you.

May strangers greet you with smiles, and little children with sticky kisses.

May you have enough wealth to be able to give to tzedakah [charity], and enough left over to provide you with necessities:

May you have bread to eat and cake as well,

May you have a roof over your head and clothing to wear,
And may you help provide them for the hungry, the homeless and the ragged.

May your stocks come back,
And may your bank stay open,
And may your interest rate fall,
And may the IRS leave you a full 30% of what you earn to call your own.

May you banish all thoughts and conversations about the coming elections
For these next ten days,
So that you avoid fights with members of your family and your friends,
And may you remember that, no matter who is elected,
According to Hebrew National,
They all have to answer to a Higher Authority.

May you forgive the candidates for what they say about each other,
And may you remember that no one is as perfect as he claims to be,
And no one is as terrible as his opponent claims he is,
And forget the promises that they all make -- because they will, as soon as they are elected.

May you be able to decipher your electric bill, your telephone bills, your credit card bill, and your income tax forms,
And the tiny, tiny print at the bottom of all these documents,
Which says in essence that they don't mean what is written above in big print.


May you live long enough to be able to drive automobiles which do not run on fossil fuels.
And may this happen before you become an old fossil yourself.


May those of us who drive SUVs be blessed with enough wealth
To be able to fill them with gasoline enough,
To get to the corner store and back,
And may we not have to choose between having enough money with which to buy gas with which to get to the grocery store,
And having enough money with which to buy groceries when we get there.
And may our children, for the sake of whom we bought these vehicles in the first place
Never yell or fight but sit quietly buckled up, with their hands folded,
And never once ask us: Are we there yet?


May you learn how to control your television set,
And may you learn to cope with all the new buttons on the controls,
And may there be something worth watching when you finally figure out how to start your TV.

May neither you, nor your computer, ever be infected by a virus.

May peace reign over Israel,
And may its children not have to sleep in bomb shelters any longer,
And may all of its leaders, like Natan Sharansky, be people who have gone to prison BEFORE they ascended to high office, and not afterwards.

May the world become safe to live in for all of G-D's children,
And may some parents learn that it is not necessary to strap explosives onto the bodies of their children in order to attain paradise,
But that instead paradise can be found here on earth, if people will only learn to live together in peace.


May you stop rushing long enough to realize
How blessed we are
To be able to enjoy this amazing planet on which we live,
And may we try hard not to spoil it.


And whether you pray in the words of the machzor [a Hebrew prayer book],
Or in your own words,
May you feel the presence of G-D around you,
And may you love your G-D, with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your might,
And may you know that G-D loves you too,
And may G-D give you a shana tova u'metukah,
A good and a sweet new year.


Amen.
--Rabbi Jacob Pressman

50/50

Dizziness and nausea started last night and continued all through most of the day today.  Blech.  I'll mention it to my OB when I see her tomorrow, but she had told me that it was possible that the nausea might come back, so I'm not sure there's much to do beyond taking some Zofran if I need to.  (Also, her office called me today to let me know that the copy of my files was ready for pickup.  Yay!)

On the good side though, I was able to start cooking for the High Holidays.  Yay me!  I mixed together two batches of MyMahtha's Honey Walnut Coin Cookies and put them in the freezer.  I'll defrost the dough and bake off the cookies next week.

I Heart Lists

Because I just can't go into how infuriating my OB's office is (current threat level: firebombing = proportional response), I present you with a List of The New Classics as seen on books i done read.  I've probably done this before, but I heart lists.

If there's any that I haven't read that you recommend, let me know!

THE NEW CLASSICS

1. The Road , Cormac McCarthy

2. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling
3. Beloved, Toni Morrison
4. The Liars' Club, Mary Karr
5. American Pastoral, Philip Roth
6. Mystic River, Dennis Lehane
7. Maus, Art Spiegelman
8. Selected Stories, Alice Munro
9. Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier
10. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami
11. Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer
12. Blindness, José Saramago
13. Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
14. Black Water, Joyce Carol Oates
15. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers
16. The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood
17. Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
18. Rabbit at Rest, John Updike
19. On Beauty, Zadie Smith
20. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
21. On Writing, Stephen King
22. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Díaz
23. The Ghost Road, Pat Barker
24. Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry
25. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan
26. Neuromancer, William Gibson
27. Possession, A.S. Byatt
28. Naked, David Sedaris
29. Bel Canto, Anne Patchett
30. Case Histories, Kate Atkinson
31. The Things They Carried, Tim O'Brien
32. Parting the Waters, Taylor Branch
33. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion
34. The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold
35. The Line of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst
36. Angela's Ashes, Frank McCourt
37. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
38. Birds of America, Lorrie Moore
39. Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri
40. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
41. The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros
42. LaBrava, Elmore Leonard
43. Borrowed Time, Paul Monette
44. Praying for Sheetrock, Melissa Fay Greene
45. Eva Luna, Isabel Allende
46. Sandman, Neil Gaiman
47. World's Fair, E.L. Doctorow
48. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
49. Clockers, Richard Price
50. The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen
51. The Journalist and the Murderer, Janet Malcom
52. Waiting to Exhale, Terry McMillan
53. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon
54. Jimmy Corrigan, Chris Ware
55. The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls
56. The Night Manager, John le Carré
57. The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe
58. Drop City, TC Boyle
59. Krik? Krak! Edwidge Danticat
60. Nickel & Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich
61. Money, Martin Amis
62. Last Train To Memphis, Peter Guralnick
63. Pastoralia, George Saunders
64. Underworld, Don DeLillo
65. The Giver, Lois Lowry
66. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace
67. The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini
68. Fun Home, Alison Bechdel
69. Secret History, Donna Tartt
70. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell
71. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Ann Fadiman
72. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon
73. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving
74. Friday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger
75. Cathedral, Raymond Carver
76. A Sight for Sore Eyes, Ruth Rendell
77. The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro
78. Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert
79. The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell
80. Bright Lights, Big City, Jay McInerney
81. Backlash, Susan Faludi
82. Atonement, Ian McEwan
83. The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields
84. Holes, Louis Sachar
85. Gilead, Marilynne Robinson
86. And the Band Played On, Randy Shilts
87. The Ruins, Scott Smith
88. High Fidelity, Nick Hornby
89. Close Range, Annie Proulx
90. Comfort Me With Apples, Ruth Reichl
91. Random Family, Adrian Nicole LeBlanc
92. Presumed Innocent, Scott Turow
93. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley
94. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
95. Kaaterskill Falls, Allegra Goodman
96. The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown
97. Jesus’ Son, Denis Johnson
98. The Predators' Ball, Connie Bruck
99. Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman
100. America (the Book), Jon Stewart/Daily Show

More on Records and EFM Stuff

So, I didn't have to get all lawyer-y on my doc's office - I just asked if a letter requesting my records for my own use would be sufficient, and they said yes.  Thank goodness.  I faxed in that letter yesterday afternoon, and I plan to follow up with them first thing tomorrow morning.  (I'll be picking up the records myself and delivering them by hand to the midwives' office to avoid any screw ups.  Well, to avoid screw ups by other people -- never discount my own ability to mess things up).  After getting off the phone, I basked in my utter rebelness, did a victory dance and told my assistant that "I fight for the forces of justice and goodness."

In answer to a few commenters' questions regarding the availability of a compromise with my doc, unfortunately, there really isn't one.  My doc wants me to be on continuous monitoring from the second that I walk in the hospital doors.  She wasn't even thrilled with the idea of my getting off of the monitor for bathroom breaks, let alone only being on the monitor for 10 or 20 minutes out of every hour.  Also, as I mentioned yesterday, at my hospital, if you're on the monitor, you're in the bed, and that's that.

I've got some issues with the whole idea of continuous monitoring in general (e.g., the monitors are notoriously inaccurate, and are even more so for overweight women), but am willing to do continuous monitoring with a wireless system, that would enable me to move freely during labor, while giving my care provider the information that they would like.

Hopefully, this will all work itself out in the coming days.