Well, well, well. Should we somehow managed to have a child within the next hour and 20 minutes, we will be part of the 5% of people who actually give birth on their due date. Damn! I thought we would be part of the five percent!! I really did. And I was hoping we could manage it because today is Saby's dad's birthday, and I wanted to give him a grandkid for his 71st birthday :-) Alas, it is not to be...
Last night, the scenario seemed to suggest that things would go as we hoped. We had what we considered our "last meal" - taking into consideration things like protein for the long run, ease of digestion, and for me... what might be thrown up the easiest. Ate beautiful take out from Logan's Roadhouse - Saby had salmon, I had a half rack of ribs (see my thoughts in a previous blog about eating ribs in the birthing tub). And a salad, and grilled veggies... that was my justification for the rather unhealthy rib rampage. But it was indeed delicious, and after watching some tv we took a mini-walk (and saw the beautiful full or almost full moon through the clouds) and then retired to the bedroom for potentially a long night.
I was rubbing my handy dandy Palmer's Organic Stretch Mark Massage Cream into my giant, dropped belly before officially climbing into bed, when I discovered that it was turning all skanky on the far side of the belly. You know, the "lee" of the tum... the part I can't see... the proverbial dark side of the moon. I had itched, scratched or somehow made contact with that part of my body and discovered that a nasty sticky film was forming on my taunt but supple belly. I was grossed out. Utterly disgusted. I had trusted that junk all through my pregnancy and suddenly it turned on me. Bastard lotion! That inspired a shower, at about midnight, which was turning into every birthing story we've read... "my husband woke up when I was in the shower at 3am with contractions..." laaa la laaa, yada yada yada. Well, while being extremely relaxing it also got the skank off my belly.
Now, after getting out of the shower and applying a new coat of a different species of Palmers Organic (tummy butter kicks massage cream's ass!!), I came back to bed in my little shorts and sleep bra and started to read. At some point while we both intermittently watched my tummy tighten and move, Saby noticed that every single hair on my body was standing up. Including (and where he initially noticed) the little peach fuzz hair on my belly. And that made me realize I was super sensitive, and a little cranky. Boo-ya! "PMS-like symptoms" - a sign of labor or pre-labor or something or other. But it was not to be.
This morning we woke up, still pregnant but optimistic, and moved through the day watching every little twinge and cramp with great interest. I went for a swim in the late morning and basically paddled around the deep end (all 5 feet of it) for awhile and then did these strange, frog-like squats back and forth in about 4 feet of water. Somewhere between the swimming and jumping (and not contracting or cramping or anything, much to my dismay) I did get a few instances of "very hard baby" belly, which is either Braxton-Hicks contractions or just our baby deciding to push as hard as possible against the outside world. Felt the pressure in the belly itself, and reached down to feel it with my hands, marveling at how hard the little bugger gets. Continued my froggy jumps across the pool. Subconsciously reach down for my belly as another skinny girl walks into the pool, and realize it's gone completely - COMPLETELY - soft. Like, smushy, gushy, barely seeming to be there compared to how hard it was. In a little panic, I looked around and reached down to check if there was a baby floating nearby somewhere. Whew...
We ate Thai food this afternoon, and after a delicious 2 or 3 hour nap in the afternoon, we had smoothies, installed the car seat, went to Meijer, got dinner from Wendys (hehehe) and watched some of the Espy's - very entertaining, by the way. We took a long walk (by our standards) around the apartment complex while hearing about how the skydiving adventures of some friends went. That walk certainly seemed to help - I've been sort of consistently crampy since returning home, whooo hooo! Now we're simply back to waiting... tomorrow at 9am I have a midwife appointment, and she'll tell me fun things like how dilated I am and all the cool things that shoving a hand up my hoo-hoo can relate... Saby's coworkers threw him a party on Friday with a card and a delicious cake with a baby face on it. They aren't expecting him back Monday, but it looks like he'll make an unexpected appearance.
That's life on our due date. More news whenever something newsworthy happens.
No comments:
Post a Comment