38 Weeks - this is really happening!

I want to start this post by quickly mentioning how amazed I still am that this is really all happening.  I was playing with the baby's foot again today - she likes to poke it through my right side from time to time - and I couldn't help thinking, "any day now and she'll be here...any day...holy cow!"  I'm so terribly excited and admittedly a little scared.  It's just such a great blessing, and I don't know how it is that I could actually be here about to meet this little angel...
 

My 38 week midwife appointment today was a little disappointing...I greedily pushed for another cervical check, and my cervix, though softening, has not really made any progress in the last two weeks.  I know I should just be patient and not ask for any more checks, but then my curiosity and excitement gets the better of me.  The midwife gives me another week at least, so hubby and I are gonna go ahead and make some more plans for the coming weeks and try to stay busy so I don't obsess too much. 

The awesome news:  Baby is still doing great!  My little champ's heart beat is strong and healthy, and she is still pretty active even though she has even less room than before and has dropped a bit further down.   I also received a second box of clothes from my sister (stuff my niece and nephew wore early on), and after doing a ton of laundry, I now think I have enough clothes to change this baby three times a day and still not do laundry again for a week!  It is funny that I was so worried we'd have nothing to put her in.  I hadn't bought much clothes at all.  I didn't fully realize just how much accumulated clothes my sister has from her two kids (especially if I don't mind putting my little girl in some of my nephew's more boyish stuff). I will post some pics later when I'm home, just to give you all the full feel.

The nursery is still not really put together, but I just have to accept that it won't be - at least not for a long while.  We are keeping her in a Co-sleeper bassinet in our bedroom for as long as possible, so other than her changing table/dresser, there isn't really anything "baby" about the baby's bedroom - especially as we are also using it as a guest room and my husband's been spending many a night in there in order to not be woken by me ten times a night.  The crib is still in a box, along with the overpriced but beautiful bedding set my wonderful friends chipped in to get me from the Land of Nod, the swing and seat from my sister are leaning haphazardly against the wall, we can't paint in our rental so the walls are white as can be, and since nursery decor isn't really a necessity right now there just isn't a budget for it whatsoever.  It's sad not to have that "dream nursery", but really in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter to me all that much. 

The only bad news right now:  I seriously can't sleep.  Last night, I was finally able to really sleep (as opposed to drifting for a few minutes and then waking again) by 6am, and even then I woke three times to use the bathroom between 6 and when my alarm went off at 9.  I don't know what is going on.  I know I was nesting like crazy yesterday, so maybe that restlessness contributed to it.  I also wasn't feeling so great through the night (Restless Legs, Carpel Tunnel, leg cramps, nausea, stomach pain, overheated, etc.), so I'm sure that didn't help.  I joke about how it's getting me ready for the after the baby is here, but it is pretty serious when you think that I could go into labor at any moment, and I'd be starting out already way over-tired and sleep-deprived.   My midwife was a little concerned, and recommended I try to catch up on sleep as soon as I get home today - which should be around 3 - but then I worry that will make it hard to sleep again tonight and continue the vicious cycle.  Perhaps I should just take it where I can get it.  If my body lets me rest at 3pm, but is up again at 3am, so be it. 

To my cycle sister/due date buddies, Miss Mac and Foxy, I hope all our little ones come soon, easily and in perfect health and thanks for traveling this road with me.  And to Miss Elphaba, I hope the fact that we haven't heard from you in a couple of days means that your little girl has decided to make her appearance!

KerriK

Bad blogger

Hi Everyone,

I'm sorry for being such a bad blogger and commenter lately.  It's been such a whirlwind here these last couple of weeks - with my baby shower, birthday getaway, Thanksgiving, out of town guests, and just being tired a lot of the time - and I feel like time keeps getting away from me.

The shower was beautiful, though I did miss having my family there.  One of my close friends hosted it, and she did a whole book theme, including adorable book streamers (see photo below) and having each guest bring a children's book they love with a message to the baby inside.

My sister, who wanted to be a part of the event but couldn't, was able to Sky*pe in during the gift opening.  It was so nice seeing her and my beautiful niece and nephew peeping through the computer screen - almost like they were there in the room with us.

The following week we had a visit from one of DH's relatives from India, and then we were off for a last Baby-Moon weekend for my 30th birthday.  We spent two days in Portsmouth, NH, just a short drive from home, and probably the perfect low-key destination that I needed. 

It is so exciting to see so many fellow bloggers doing so well.  I was so happy to read that both AP from My Dusty Uterus and All You Knew Was Love, have both delivered healthy babies and are doing great.  Mazel Tov ladies!

Not too much to report over here.  I'm 37.5 weeks, and baby hasn't dropped, so I don't think things will be getting started too soon.  I'm having awful carpel tunnel issues from all the swelling, and also rib pain on my left side, but so far both have been fairly manageable with Hypnobabies meditations, Tylenol and ice packs.  The restless leg syndrome stuff is probably the worst thing, as it means even more insomnia, and nothing seems to help ease it.  I just have to wait it out, even if that means not sleeping till 3am.  It isn't so terrible, since I'm not working and can nap during the day usually, but it makes me worried that I'll be sleepy and exhausted before even starting labor and that it could lead to me needing medical intervention during labor that I don't want.  I'm probably just worrying too much and over-analyzing, as usual...

Anyway, for the time being I'm trying to get in walks every day, drinking Red Raspberry Lead Tea, swallowing nightly Evening Primrose Oil tablets, and practicing my squats, so now it is just a waiting game...the countdown to finally seeing the face of my little girl. 


Kerrik

35 Weeks...almost

One day till I turn 35 weeks.  It is kind of amazing, realizing I'm only 5 weeks from my babies "guess" date, and that she'll actually be here so soon.

Things have been crazy here, and I'm starting to get an inkling that the next five weeks may not be quite as much fun as the last 35...don't get me wrong, everything is fine, I just started getting a lot more late pregnancy symptoms that can be classified as less than enjoyable and sometimes quite uncomfortable.  The important things though: belly is still measuring right on track, baby is active and has a steady heartbeat, and overall everything looks great and completely normal.

I had a an embarrassingly emotional weekend over something I really shouldn't have been so emotional about at all...I'm blaming pregnancy hormones.  It started with my wish of having one of those beautiful maternity photo shoots that I see so so often on the internet.... 

The scenario:
After sorting through several local maternity photographers, and gathering some recommendations, I found what I thought was the perfect one.  She would come to our home, her photos were gorgeous, and she was well priced to boot.  I couldn't believe our luck...apparently, I was too naive to understand that the price did not include actually having ownership over our images and that the cost of getting those images would be astronomically high.  I never asked for a contract, we just made the arrangements by email, and about a week after our fun, Sunday morning photo shoot I received my beautiful pregnancy pictures in a little online slide-show I could temporarily share with family and friends.  

This is where it gets messy...It turns out the price just to get ownership of the high-res digital images: $3,000!  Now, I knew prints (if professionally touched up and everything by her) might be pricey, and an album might be altogether out of our price-range, but I seriously never thought I would not have the original digital images included as part of our initial package (nor did I know she would be touching up each of the 30 we received - hence the added cost for her time).  $3,000 is almost as much as we paid for our wedding photos, and we had thousands of those (over 3 days of shooting), plus a non-expiring slide-show and a giant, beautiful, professionally touched-up album of about 40 of our favorites.  Plus, when we paid for those, we weren't already majorly in debt and expecting a baby.

As I sat there, dumbly staring at the slide-show and evil shopping cart info, and realizing these beautiful images of my little family would be gone, forever, in just a few hours time, I completely fell to pieces.  Some part of me that was still holding onto the emotions of the past two and half years, the dreams that went into making the pregnancy possible, and everything we had been through, just pushed its way to the surface.  I was hysterical crying in a heap on the couch when DH found me, and I felt lower than I can remember feeling in a long time. 

Over the next few hours, DH negotiated with the photographer while I cried on and off and just generally felt like a complete idiot.  They reached an agreement, we would get our images and it would only cost us another $400 dollars on top of what we'd already paid, plus the photographer would keep the money for the newborn shoot which now of course wouldn't be happening.  The cost was huge blow to our fragile budget, even at this far lower price point, but I got my images.

Why were these photos so important to me?  I don't know exactly.  I think somewhere inside me, I felt like these pictures made it all real.  They are shot after shot of this glowing pregnant woman, basking in her round body and in the love of her husband, and just being happy.  There is no evidence anywhere of what it took to get us to this point, of any pain or doubt, and there is nothing in any of these photos that isolates THIS woman or THIS pregnancy as different from any other.  It's just us; captured in this intimate, special moment of expectant joy and peace, and I truly love looking at them.

A stolen screen shot from the slide-show (sorry it's just a silhouette shot, but hubby still wants to keep things on this site as anonymous as possible):

Re-learning to trust

Today, while commenting on a fellow blogger's post about her recent BFP.  I realized something about my own fears, and probably the fears of many infertiles, when first getting that BFP after struggling with infertility for so long.  I think part of what makes our worries so strong, isn't just the terrible, gnawing fear of losing what we've worked towards for so long, but is also the lack of trust we have in our own bodies to do that which they were designed to do.

Infertility, for so many women, represents a failure of our bodies to be able to do something that it seems should be as natural as breathing in and out.  We begin to hate ourselves, doubt our femininity, and hate what we think of as our "broken" bodies, as month after month our hopes at conceiving are not just dashed, but stomped into the dust in a painful, bloody show.  We watch, helpless, as our bodies bleed out yet another month of beautiful dreams of a baby already so real that we can feel the curl of their little hand wrapped around our fingers.  It's a betrayal, a deception!  Our bodies look normal, but inside something is wrong, and we can't help but feel we have failed as a woman, a wife, a girlfriend, etc.

Furthermore, many of us have not only experienced first hand the pain of repeated chemical, ectopic, or blighted ovum pregnancies, miscarriages, cervical issues, preterm labor, and other losses, but we have watcher our sisters in the IF community going through them as well.  So really is it any wonder we find it near impossible to trust our bodies to do what they are supposed to do, once we do find ourselves clutching that positive pee stick?

After holding my own positive pregnancy test, watching to see if the tests would grow darker before even thinking to hope, crying in panicked relief over each successive beta test and then each ultrasound, I quickly realized I had completely lost faith in my body, and I was expecting the worst at every moment.  Doctors, midwives, family, books, all told me the safest place for my little one was and would always be, tucked away in my perfectly designed by nature womb, but it took daily affirmations, the baby reaching viability, and a lot of visits to the OB and midwife, to really begin to believe them.

There will always be fear, I know -- after all, I'm almost 30 now and my own mother and grandmother have never stopped worrying about me -- but at 32 weeks I prefer feeling confident that my body knows what it is doing.  Something could always go wrong, but I prefer to have faith in my womb, in my cervix, and in myself.  I prefer to believe, that regardless of what it took to get here, nature made me perfectly to carry this little one to term and deliver her safely into the world. 

I guess all I'm trying to say is, there is hope for us all, and we can learn to trust our bodies again but it is a long road for any IFer staring down at two pink lines.  In the meanwhile, don't let anyone tell you that you are worrying for nothing, that your fears are silly, or that you should just relax and celebrate.  Take your own time finding your peace with your body and your pregnancy, and enjoy what you can until you are able to enjoy more fully. 

A differet kind of moment

I have to write this message for a special blog friend, Miss Conception, who I found out lost her sweet baby boy and girl today at 20 weeks gestation.  I have already cried my eyes out in shock and devastation over this news.  I don't understand it, I can't understand it.  I can only mourn for her and and for those two angels whose journey I have felt so very much a part of, and whose birth I was so looking forward to celebrating. 

MC, we've gone through so much of this journey together, yet today I feel I can offer you no comfort as I simply can't know your pain.  My heart is aching for you, and I just wish with every fiber of my being that I could somehow give you back your little ones.  In truth, I never knew how connected I have felt to you through this blog, till I found myself hysterical crying over your words.  I am so sorry A, I truly am. 

31 Weeks & New Beginnings

I am truly amazed to be 31 weeks and two days pregnant as of today.  My little girl will be here so soon, and in the meantime I am just enjoying the realization that I am happy.  I don't know why I've been so afraid of that word, "happy"...as if putting that word out there in the world could cause everything to crash down around me.

I want to let go of this fear, I need to.  It isn't fair to myself or my baby to be always waiting for the "other shoe to drop".  Why do it?  Is it so that when something painful happens you can stand on the side and say, "I knew this would happen, it was only a matter of time"?  The craziest part of that is that you aren't actually protecting yourself from potential future pain, but you are missing out on enjoying the present moment...and I intend to continue experiencing every single moment of this pregnancy and this life.

Things are definitely getting tighter in my tummy, sleep is becoming more elusive, and back-pain and heartburn are now my constant companions, but it is all part of the is wondrous thing that is happening in body and I love that.  Every day brings me closer to meeting my daughter - MY DAUGHTER - and that is still so surreal and special and miraculous that I get teary just thinking about it. 

To my baby girl - I love you more than you can possibly imagine.  You are the greatest gift, and there are simply are not enough words, in English or any known language, to express the joy in my heart or the strength of my love for you.  Thank you for coming to us, for being a part of our lives, and for restoring a part of me that I thought was gone forever.

Last week's bump photo:

Can they smell my fear?

 After attending my second prenatal yoga class yesterday, I managed to work up the courage to ask two of the other ladies in attendance, who already seem to know each other, if they would be interested in meeting for some un-caffeinated coffee at some point in the near future.  This may not sound like a huge deal to many of you, but I assure you that for me this was a true milestone in my move back to the Boston area. 

You see, it's goes kinda of like this...I'm new in town, but I have lots of old friends here from when I lived her before.  The problem is that they are mainly working professionals, none of them have children but one, and only one other friend is even married.  Actually, of all my friends all around the globe, my only other pregnant friend lives in India, half a world and a major time zone difference away, and having her own lonely time of it. 

I yearn to talk to other 1st time pregnant women, to share stories, compare notes, meet up in for lunch in our beautiful little town center, and shop for baby stuff without the inevitable groan of misery I have received from every friend or family member I've convinced to go with me, etc., but I just don't know anyone and I've never been the best at starting a conversation with new people.  Usually, in my nervousness, I talk way too much and feel rather silly moments after the conversation ends. 

The craziest part is I moved into Stroller City, USA, where meeting other new moms should be a cinch.  Seriously, how many cities/towns do you know of where almost every store on the local Main Street has a play corner with toddler toys and books?  All I have to do is walk outside my apartment to see moms, dads, grandparents, etc. pushing strollers on all sides of me - often in groups of friends (moms happily chatting, kids playing together...).  I want that too.  I want to be an active part of the new mom club, badge, stickers and all.

I've thought about starting a Meetup Group...still thinking.  Would anyone attend?  I don't know?  I know I will eventually meet friends through play groups, but that is still way off in the future...what about now? 

So, returning to prenatal yoga...I did it, I started the conversation, I asked if they would like to meet up sometime.  Both kindly said sure, and we exchanged phone numbers.  Now I don't know what to do.  If I call too soon, will I seem desperate?  But if I wait, will I lose my opportunity to maybe make some new friends?  An email would have been easier, cause I could float a suggestion about meeting up, or just check in to see how they are doing.  A phone call is so much harder, so definite, and what if they were just being nice and don't really want to meet up at all...Do you see my dilemma?

In other news, I wanted to share a great blog post from my dear sister who lives in NY.  It is kind of a continuation of the discussion of baby shower taboos: http://wrathofthemammagoddess.blogspot.com/