Friday was supposed to be my last day at work, but I started feeling random sharp pains Thursday around 5:30 so I didn't go in the next day. I was afraid of having that progress while at work or going into full-on labor in the Bronx, over an hour from home. But it faded during the day Friday, returning Friday night and alternating with cramping. Then nothing most of Saturday except off-and-on intense pressure on my cervix. Same Sunday. I kept thinking labor might be imminent, and then nothing! But my sister pointed out that my body is preparing in a smart way - starting to get ready, and then relaxing so I can rest. Working its way up to the big task ahead. So I've let myself enjoy the sloooow lead-up, appreciating that at least something is happening to let me know my body is progressing.
Yesterday (Monday) was my due date. As planned, my mother and I celebrated by getting pedicures and lunch before going for the 40-week sonogram. The sonogram showed everything to be healthy and well. A week earlier, I had gone in for my weekly appointment and the doctor had said that if I hadn't gone into labor by my due date, we would schedule induction. I really don't want to be induced, on a practical level because it will make it more difficult to fulfill my wishes for an unmedicated vaginal birth and on an emotional level because I want to have "my story" about how it happened when I went into labor rather than memories of being hooked up to an IV. If there's a valid reason to be induced, then okay, but I don't want it taken lightly. I asked her if there was any way to avoid induction, and the doctor said she would give me a week after my due date if everything looked good with the gestational diabetes.
So yesterday, she said, "I remember that you don't want to be induced. Your sonogram still looks really good, fluid levels are good, and your sugar numbers are good, so I could let you wait until 41 and a half weeks. How does that sound?" Knowing that it's medically unsafe to let a baby go past 42, I thought that sounded quite reasonable, and I felt relieved that she remembered my reservations about induction, respected it, and brought it up herself with some flexibility. Then she did the cervical check and said, "You're over 2cm dilated and your cervix is stretched really, really thin. We'll schedule a sonogram for Friday, but I honestly don't see you making it that long." This made sense with what I've been feeling. I feel so much pressure that, even sitting, it can make me gasp and shift around in pain when the baby is moving. It feels like the baby is pushing right up against my cervix but just can't get out because it's not open enough.
The house finally feels ready, and now that I'm off work, I feel relaxed and mentally and emotionally ready. Instead of rushing around and trying to finish things up, I'm now just sitting and waiting. That impatience is so much better than the panic of "But wait, there's still so much to do!!!" I feel like I'm open and ready and waiting for this baby to come when it's ready, and that's a welcome feeling. Though the delicious torture of anticipation is very difficult!
wedding
Tuesday, May 19, 2015
Sunday, May 10, 2015
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
Baby preparation has been utterly overwhelming in the past few weeks. I've barely had time or energy to stop, think, feel, let alone write. It seems like we were coasting for a while and then suddenly had a deadline racing toward us (but an ambiguous one, which makes it even more stressful!). I feel disorganized, unfinished. stressed.
We finally put the nursery together two weekends ago. At 37 weeks pregnant, it was pushing it in my opinion, but we just kept not getting around to it. I felt great relief when the crib and dresser were put together and in place, and I was able to start washing baby clothes and bedding and set up the room. That relief was short-lived when I realized how much still needed to happen: putting together the changing table for downstairs, setting up both diaper stations, hanging things in the nursery, sorting out what toys and items we need right away versus which are for older ages and can stay stored in the basement a while longer, realizing we needed more bins and ways to store these items, trying to figure out how we re-arrange our own overflowing stuff in this cramped space so that we can fit in baby's stuff (WHERE WILL ALL THE BATH THINGS GO), figuring out where the litter box goes because we don't want it in our room where baby will be sleeping for a while and breathing it in yet we have no other good places, reorganizing the basement which we had just made into a beautiful guest area and now looks like a crazy storage zone after our baby shower, getting a carseat check which is apparently booked up at EVERY LOCATION until mid-June and then panicking about how well we were possibly figuring it out on our own, practicing buckling in a teddy bear, watching the infant CPR DVD my sister lent us, watching Happiest Baby on the Block my doula recommended and my parents had actually gotten us before we conceived, putting the cloth diapers through the mandatory five wash cycles (even though we don't need them right away, I won't be focused on that the first few weeks postpartum), putting finishing touches on the hospital bag so that we have everything we need, making sure we know what to do with the cord blood kit (free processing by the bank owned by our sperm bank so we just have to pay for the kit and shipping, $320!), waiting for our living room furniture which was supposed to be here in 3-5 weeks and the 5 week point just passed this weekend and WE HAVE NOTHING, bringing up the cradle from the basement and figuring out somewhere for it to go on the main level as a napping zone because we have no room upstairs, learning at 38 weeks that the glider that was going to be handed down to us no longer is and we now have nowhere upstairs (which is just bedrooms) to rock a fussy baby in the middle of the night until we figure out a new plan, choosing a mohel in case we have a boy, booking a newborn photographer, booking a maternity session which now at 39 weeks I'm just trying accept isn't going to happen.
On top of this, I have a stack of about fifteen pregnancy and childbirth books - most handed down and a few bought that I was really interested in - that I've barely touched in the "third trimester and birth" sections and feel super guilty about, like I'm not informing myself enough and not making use of these resources And my doula spent time teaching us all these exercises for keeping baby in optimal position and sent us a video for a routine that will help prepare my body for labor and I bought two prenatal yoga DVDs at 36 weeks so that I could relax and prepare my body in the last month, and I've had time for NONE OF THIS. Or maybe I don't MAKE time for it. I get home late from work, cook, feel exhausted, and just want to relax with TV the last couple of hours. If I have energy or time to do something more, it's one of the million tasks listed above (of which I've currently completed about 5%) and certainly not the self-care I claim to value so much, the ways I can soothe and prepare my body for labor and read and prepare myself mentally for it. Those get pushed to the wayside.
I broke down to my wife today and she was such an amazing support. Generally she is the one stressing about how the house looks and the tasks ahead, and it can make her irritable and snippy and unpleasant to be around. This time it's me, pregnancy-induced as it may be, and it helps me empathize with her because I can't imagine feeling like this about life all the time! I had gone upstairs to change into pajamas before she shut the lights to go to bed, and when I went to the bathroom, she called out, "Are you okay?" She really meant physically, because she's been worried about my exhaustion and near-constant Braxton Hicks (after only having like five ever in my pregnancy until the past week) and sudden inability to do much after making it 37 weeks being quite limber and active and comfortable. But I just said, "Cranky. I feel cranky and irritable and that's not like me. I don't like feeling this way. Is it okay that I'm feeling this way?" And she came out of the bedroom to meet me in the hall and hug me and said, "Of course it's okay, you're 39 weeks pregnant! Be cranky! What's bothering you?" And I went into all of the above. I love my wife to death, but she is not generally known to know the right things to say or to be the strong one in our relationship. But boy did that kick in when she saw I needed it, that I was the one who needed a rock this time. She reassured me while also not minimizing my stress, and gave realistic solutions to almost everything I said. Most of which were, "I'll take care of that this week/when I come home for a shower and to feed the cats while you're at the hospital/with Dad in the first few days after baby. It'll be okay and I'll take care of it. You don't need to worry about anything."
I'm so, so, so excited and ready for this baby to join our lives. We both can barely stand the excitement. I love seeing my wife kissing and talking to my abdomen, saying, "Come let us meet you, we love you and miss you!!!" And yet the pressure of feeling my home, my nest, isn't ready is killing me. I'd like to write about the incredible baby shower our families threw for us, and the one my coworkers threw for me that incorporated so much about my personality and preferences and current dietary restrictions that I felt so known and loved. I'd like to write about the excitement of our temple community who are on the edge of their seats, waiting for the Friday night they DON'T see us and know it's time, checking in with us excitedly and happily every week. I'd like to write about the snuggly moments in bed with my wife and our baby-to-be nudging against her hand when she talks to it, moving around at the inflections in my wife's voice as she reads to our friends' two-year-old daughter, dancing as it listens to us singing to the radio (so much more active when we're singing along than when we're not). I'd like to write about finding a mohel, and my anxiety regarding circumcision despite my certainty about our decision. I'd like to write about the experience of working with our doula and all the amazing empowerment and support that has provided us already. But my head is swarming with tasks, to-do's, unfinished business, and I went over a month not processing anything here. Losing those moments that I would love to be able to relive in ten or twenty years through my descriptive writing. Losing the opportunity to revel in them and think through them in the way that only writing can help me do.
Is this what parenting will be like too? Will it feel like frantic chaos that I'm constantly lagging behind in preparations for? Will I always be stressing about the next thing I need to do, or the things I should have done but haven't? Or is this pregnancy-induced panic that is part of trying to prepare for something that is about to turn our world upside down, and then after the birth, I will let go of some of this need for perfection and just start enjoying it and realizing I have everything I need? I'm hoping the latter, because this way of feeling and being is out of character for me. I'm glad it didn't take over until the end and that I got to fully enjoy and revel in pregnancy for the vast majority of this journey. Now I need to let my wife be my rock, allow and trust her to lighten my load, and try to stay focused and calm on the transformative experience right around the corner.
We finally put the nursery together two weekends ago. At 37 weeks pregnant, it was pushing it in my opinion, but we just kept not getting around to it. I felt great relief when the crib and dresser were put together and in place, and I was able to start washing baby clothes and bedding and set up the room. That relief was short-lived when I realized how much still needed to happen: putting together the changing table for downstairs, setting up both diaper stations, hanging things in the nursery, sorting out what toys and items we need right away versus which are for older ages and can stay stored in the basement a while longer, realizing we needed more bins and ways to store these items, trying to figure out how we re-arrange our own overflowing stuff in this cramped space so that we can fit in baby's stuff (WHERE WILL ALL THE BATH THINGS GO), figuring out where the litter box goes because we don't want it in our room where baby will be sleeping for a while and breathing it in yet we have no other good places, reorganizing the basement which we had just made into a beautiful guest area and now looks like a crazy storage zone after our baby shower, getting a carseat check which is apparently booked up at EVERY LOCATION until mid-June and then panicking about how well we were possibly figuring it out on our own, practicing buckling in a teddy bear, watching the infant CPR DVD my sister lent us, watching Happiest Baby on the Block my doula recommended and my parents had actually gotten us before we conceived, putting the cloth diapers through the mandatory five wash cycles (even though we don't need them right away, I won't be focused on that the first few weeks postpartum), putting finishing touches on the hospital bag so that we have everything we need, making sure we know what to do with the cord blood kit (free processing by the bank owned by our sperm bank so we just have to pay for the kit and shipping, $320!), waiting for our living room furniture which was supposed to be here in 3-5 weeks and the 5 week point just passed this weekend and WE HAVE NOTHING, bringing up the cradle from the basement and figuring out somewhere for it to go on the main level as a napping zone because we have no room upstairs, learning at 38 weeks that the glider that was going to be handed down to us no longer is and we now have nowhere upstairs (which is just bedrooms) to rock a fussy baby in the middle of the night until we figure out a new plan, choosing a mohel in case we have a boy, booking a newborn photographer, booking a maternity session which now at 39 weeks I'm just trying accept isn't going to happen.
On top of this, I have a stack of about fifteen pregnancy and childbirth books - most handed down and a few bought that I was really interested in - that I've barely touched in the "third trimester and birth" sections and feel super guilty about, like I'm not informing myself enough and not making use of these resources And my doula spent time teaching us all these exercises for keeping baby in optimal position and sent us a video for a routine that will help prepare my body for labor and I bought two prenatal yoga DVDs at 36 weeks so that I could relax and prepare my body in the last month, and I've had time for NONE OF THIS. Or maybe I don't MAKE time for it. I get home late from work, cook, feel exhausted, and just want to relax with TV the last couple of hours. If I have energy or time to do something more, it's one of the million tasks listed above (of which I've currently completed about 5%) and certainly not the self-care I claim to value so much, the ways I can soothe and prepare my body for labor and read and prepare myself mentally for it. Those get pushed to the wayside.
I broke down to my wife today and she was such an amazing support. Generally she is the one stressing about how the house looks and the tasks ahead, and it can make her irritable and snippy and unpleasant to be around. This time it's me, pregnancy-induced as it may be, and it helps me empathize with her because I can't imagine feeling like this about life all the time! I had gone upstairs to change into pajamas before she shut the lights to go to bed, and when I went to the bathroom, she called out, "Are you okay?" She really meant physically, because she's been worried about my exhaustion and near-constant Braxton Hicks (after only having like five ever in my pregnancy until the past week) and sudden inability to do much after making it 37 weeks being quite limber and active and comfortable. But I just said, "Cranky. I feel cranky and irritable and that's not like me. I don't like feeling this way. Is it okay that I'm feeling this way?" And she came out of the bedroom to meet me in the hall and hug me and said, "Of course it's okay, you're 39 weeks pregnant! Be cranky! What's bothering you?" And I went into all of the above. I love my wife to death, but she is not generally known to know the right things to say or to be the strong one in our relationship. But boy did that kick in when she saw I needed it, that I was the one who needed a rock this time. She reassured me while also not minimizing my stress, and gave realistic solutions to almost everything I said. Most of which were, "I'll take care of that this week/when I come home for a shower and to feed the cats while you're at the hospital/with Dad in the first few days after baby. It'll be okay and I'll take care of it. You don't need to worry about anything."
I'm so, so, so excited and ready for this baby to join our lives. We both can barely stand the excitement. I love seeing my wife kissing and talking to my abdomen, saying, "Come let us meet you, we love you and miss you!!!" And yet the pressure of feeling my home, my nest, isn't ready is killing me. I'd like to write about the incredible baby shower our families threw for us, and the one my coworkers threw for me that incorporated so much about my personality and preferences and current dietary restrictions that I felt so known and loved. I'd like to write about the excitement of our temple community who are on the edge of their seats, waiting for the Friday night they DON'T see us and know it's time, checking in with us excitedly and happily every week. I'd like to write about the snuggly moments in bed with my wife and our baby-to-be nudging against her hand when she talks to it, moving around at the inflections in my wife's voice as she reads to our friends' two-year-old daughter, dancing as it listens to us singing to the radio (so much more active when we're singing along than when we're not). I'd like to write about finding a mohel, and my anxiety regarding circumcision despite my certainty about our decision. I'd like to write about the experience of working with our doula and all the amazing empowerment and support that has provided us already. But my head is swarming with tasks, to-do's, unfinished business, and I went over a month not processing anything here. Losing those moments that I would love to be able to relive in ten or twenty years through my descriptive writing. Losing the opportunity to revel in them and think through them in the way that only writing can help me do.
Is this what parenting will be like too? Will it feel like frantic chaos that I'm constantly lagging behind in preparations for? Will I always be stressing about the next thing I need to do, or the things I should have done but haven't? Or is this pregnancy-induced panic that is part of trying to prepare for something that is about to turn our world upside down, and then after the birth, I will let go of some of this need for perfection and just start enjoying it and realizing I have everything I need? I'm hoping the latter, because this way of feeling and being is out of character for me. I'm glad it didn't take over until the end and that I got to fully enjoy and revel in pregnancy for the vast majority of this journey. Now I need to let my wife be my rock, allow and trust her to lighten my load, and try to stay focused and calm on the transformative experience right around the corner.
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