Helloooo....anybody out there?
Lest you think that the month-long radio silence was due to my giving birth, and not updating you, I'm here to tell you, no.
Still pregnant. Hugely, scary pregnant at this point, although still 9 days shy of my official due date. However, at my checkup, on Thursday, the doctor checked things out and told me that I was already 2 cm dialated, and saw several mild contractions on the monitor. OK, progress! (More alarmingly, as I was leaving she said, "See you next week! Or sooner!" Yipes!
At this point, I am seeing them weekly, for a heartbeat check and then a 20-minute stint with the Non-Stress-Test machine. Ugh, I hate this test more and more each time. You have to sit in this big, leather recliner. (Like your grampa had in his den...) feet up, fully reclined. You know, the way they've been telling you NOT to sleep for the last 38 weeks....so your feet inevitably go numb. Then they strap two monitors on your belly, one for the baby's heart rate and one for something else. Two pregnancies and I'm still not sure whether the second monitor is for me or for the uterus or what....then you are handed a clicker. You have to sit there for at least 20 minutes, pushing the clicker every time you feel the baby move, or kick, or if you happen to feel a contraction. The machine records these clicks to make sure that the baby's heart rate is doing the right things. Increasing appropriately and recovering in the right amount of time. Now, while you are sitting there, you can't be doing anything. No magazine reading (even though there is a stack of them just within reach,) no talking on the phone or texting. Just being quiet. And if you don't get the required number of instances, you have to sit there LONGER. And if the baby isn't active enough, you have to drink a juice box.
I tell you, in two pregnancies, I think there was one test session where everything lined up correctly and I was off the machine in the allotted 20 minutes. Usually it's 45 minutes, with juice and sort of curling up on one side to get the baby to do his thing. This most recent visit, I had to sit there for over an hour. At one point things were so out of whack, the monitor was reading MY heart rate.
So, that's where things stand with us. Waiting. And cleaning. A lot. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me that the nesting urge hits when I am least capable of doing the work. Wouldn't it have made sense for this insane urge to scrub my refridgerator and organize closets came when I could still REACH THEM???
Still pregnant. Hugely, scary pregnant at this point, although still 9 days shy of my official due date. However, at my checkup, on Thursday, the doctor checked things out and told me that I was already 2 cm dialated, and saw several mild contractions on the monitor. OK, progress! (More alarmingly, as I was leaving she said, "See you next week! Or sooner!" Yipes!
At this point, I am seeing them weekly, for a heartbeat check and then a 20-minute stint with the Non-Stress-Test machine. Ugh, I hate this test more and more each time. You have to sit in this big, leather recliner. (Like your grampa had in his den...) feet up, fully reclined. You know, the way they've been telling you NOT to sleep for the last 38 weeks....so your feet inevitably go numb. Then they strap two monitors on your belly, one for the baby's heart rate and one for something else. Two pregnancies and I'm still not sure whether the second monitor is for me or for the uterus or what....then you are handed a clicker. You have to sit there for at least 20 minutes, pushing the clicker every time you feel the baby move, or kick, or if you happen to feel a contraction. The machine records these clicks to make sure that the baby's heart rate is doing the right things. Increasing appropriately and recovering in the right amount of time. Now, while you are sitting there, you can't be doing anything. No magazine reading (even though there is a stack of them just within reach,) no talking on the phone or texting. Just being quiet. And if you don't get the required number of instances, you have to sit there LONGER. And if the baby isn't active enough, you have to drink a juice box.
I tell you, in two pregnancies, I think there was one test session where everything lined up correctly and I was off the machine in the allotted 20 minutes. Usually it's 45 minutes, with juice and sort of curling up on one side to get the baby to do his thing. This most recent visit, I had to sit there for over an hour. At one point things were so out of whack, the monitor was reading MY heart rate.
So, that's where things stand with us. Waiting. And cleaning. A lot. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me that the nesting urge hits when I am least capable of doing the work. Wouldn't it have made sense for this insane urge to scrub my refridgerator and organize closets came when I could still REACH THEM???
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