Last Day of Pregnancy

I had an appointment with my midwife first thing in the morning yesterday, and she finally pulled the plug on my hopes for a med-free, birth center birth. I'm being induced at the hospital this evening. Sad face.

Things have been deteriorating over the last week. I have an awful, unbearably itchy PUPPS rash that started on my belly, but has spread to my arms and legs. A rash like this is sometimes an indicator that your liver is stressed and the toxins it is not able to cleanse from your blood have nowhere to go but up through your skin. Lovely.

In addition to being driven out of my mind by itching, there are some other indicators that things are not going well. For one, Snapdragon is still floating really high, not settling into my pelvis at all. She seems to be head-down, but was so far up that Joyce could not even reach her during my internal exam. I am a tiny bit effaced, but not dilated at all. Add that to the cyst, my low iron, and the fact that even Tufts thinks that she will be a 9-pounder, and there are just too many risk factors for the birth center. Snapdragon's eviction notice has been served.

Joyce gave us the option of being induced right away (Monday night) or waiting until Tuesday (today). We opted for Tuesday so that we have a bit of time to get our affairs in order, contact our families, and repack our bags for what will be a longer hospital stay than we were anticipating.

I was pretty disappointed about the whole thing and cried right after the appointment, but I am feeling resigned to the reality of it now. There are plenty of positives: We get to meet Snapdragon! No more waiting! No worrying about going into labor at an inconvenient time/place! Time to charge the camera and phones! Time for my parents to travel in a non-emergency fashion!

Still, I am feeling a little bummed that I have to go to the hospital and worried about the level of intervention I may be getting into. They'll start the induction with a 12-hr dose of Cervidil tonight. There's a chance that that will get everything started, but if it doesn't, they'll have to bring out the Pitocin. More worrying than the drugs is the fact that drugs mean constant fetal monitoring, IVs, etc. Not only will I not have the comfort of the birth center, where they have beds big enough for Pete to get in with me and whirlpool tubs for laboring, I may not even be able to walk around very much (depending on the monitor/IV situation). If I'm stuck on my back, I won't be able to make use of all of the pain-management strategies and positions that would allow me to cope with the pain and avoid the epidural.

I have to decide whether I am ok getting the epidural. While I don't want to abandon my plan, I also don't want to put myself in a situation where I have the worst of both worlds: all the pain of going med-free with none of the freedom to use coping strategies. There are lots of reasons why I don't want the epidural — groggy baby, higher risk of c-section, inability to walk — but I may need it if I can't use warm water and movement to get me through. If the induction goes smoothly enough that I can still have some freedom of movement, I think I'll be able to make it. If not, I have to be ok with accepting the epidural without feeling like a failure. I don't want it, but it may be the best option for my situation. I'll have to discuss this with the midwife and doula before they start the induction so that my final decision is not coming from a place of panic in the moment, but from reasoned, conscious choice.

So, wish me luck. I check in at 8:00 pm. If all goes well, I should have an outside baby by Wednesday night — Thursday morning at the latest.

Fun, Not Fun

Fun: Going to the grocery store and and telling people who ask when you're due, "Oh, last Wednesday."

Not Fun: Being 41 weeks pregnant.

Last Ultrasound? Please?

I have been wrong before, but I really do think that we are all done with the ultrasounds.

Joyce acknowledged that the radiology dept at Little Hospital is not really all that great, so she sent me back to Big Hospital to have a final growth estimate/fluid check/cyst update. We went yesterday morning.

The final weight estimate (@ 40 wks, 1 day) is 4,088 grams, just a smidge over 9 pounds. This is fairly consistent with Big Hospital's estimate from 38 weeks — they estimated 7 lbs 12 oz, with a rate of growth of 1/2 pound per week, so this is fairly consistent with that. I don't know whether it is accurate, but it is consistent.


Since I have had approximately a million ultrasounds during this pregnancy, I feel qualified to offer a few suggestions to the techs/doctors who do these scans:

• If you are going to use the entire bottle of gel on me, the very least you could do is hand me an extra towel at the end. I have long since learned that you will not, under any circumstances, actually help me clean myself up, and I suppose that's ok, but the towel tucked into my underwear is already covered in gel, so it isn't really adequate for the full cleanup job.
• It is very uncomfortable for me to lie flat on my back at this point. Please get on with what you are doing in an efficient manner.
• It is also difficult for me to shift positions, especially since the "bed" is a flimsy, narrow gurney with no handrails, not an actual bed. With this in mind, please keep requests that I turn on my left side, then my right side, then my left side, then my back, then my left side, to the absolute minimum necessary for you to get the shots you need.
• Narrate. I know the techs are not allowed to say anything diagnostic, but a simple, "Now, let's have a look at the kidneys" would be much appreciated. It all looks like static to me, and I have been very pleased with the very few techs who have bothered to tell me what they are doing.
• Always give me a picture. I will feel better about being sticky and uncomfortable if you give me a picture of my baby at the end of the procedure. It doesn't have to be a shot of her face! Hands and feet make excellent ultrasound pics — even the heart looks pretty cool. Leaving me with no pics makes me grumpy.

I hope we have seen the last of Snapdragon's ultrasounds. It's time for us to see her in person!

Pregatory

pregatory: the time after your due date, but before your baby's actual birthday

All the week-by-week calendars have run out. All the tiny clothes and diapers are clean and ready. All the maternity clothes are worn out.

Seriously, baby. This has gone on long enough.

Due Date!

This date has been circled in bright colors on my calendar all year. Now, it's here . . . and it's just another boring day of waiting. Grumblecakes.

I'm actually trying to get some things done today so that I don't just sit around and mope. I wrote a 500-word summary of my summer research project, followed up on some work emails, went out to lunch with FB, and took a short (very short) walk. Honestly, it was pathetic. I walked to the library branch, which is a little over a quarter mile from my house, before admitting that my back was killing me. Unfortunately, at that point, I had to walk home. I walked less than a mile and feel like I need an ice pack.

FB has downloaded PuzzleQuest 2 on the Xbox for me, so that has killed several hours. It's my kind of video game — instead of fighting monsters, you defeat them by playing a version of Bejeweled. It's much more my speed than FB's shooting games.

I've been doing all I can to get ready, but there just isn't that much left to do. Yesterday, I made two playlists for labor — a mellow one and an energetic one. I don't know whether I'll want to listen to music while I'm in labor, but at least I'll have the option. I suppose I could vacuum again or clean the bathroom, but that doesn't sound like much fun. Perhaps I will write a letter to little Snapdragon that I can put in her keepsake box and give to her when she is older. It would mostly say,

Dear Snapdragon,
Get your butt out here. No, seriously, it is time.
xoxo,
pb

Getting Sick

FB had a bad cold last week and I fear that I am coming down with it this week. I woke up this morning with a sore throat and a groggy headache. Sad face.

I had hoped that Snapdragon might be born today (Talk Like a Pirate Day), but it looks like that is not going to happen. I still haven't had any noticeable contractions or mucus plugs fragments or any other signs of labor.

While I am impatient to meet Snapdragon, I'm not very excited about laboring or caring for a new baby with a cold as bad as the one FB had. Hopefully, whatever symptoms I have will run their course over the next few days and resolve themselves before Snapdragon makes her appearance. I wouldn't want her to get seriously sick in her first week of life because I have the sniffles.

Stupid Doctor's Appointment

I went to my appointment this morning, where the doctor checked my vitals, measured my belly, and shrugged at me. Yes, I have too much fluid, but there's not really anything anyone can do about that.

For the record, my belly is GIANT. When they measure it, the number of centimeters is supposed to correspond to the number of weeks (24 cm = 24 weeks pregnant, etc.). For most of the pregnancy, I was right on target, but around 35 weeks, I started measuring 1 or 2 cm bigger than expected (this was when they noticed the high fluid). Today, I measured 47 cm. For the love of all that is holy, get this baby out of me.

The doctor also told me that the weight estimate from yesterday's ultrasound was 9 lbs 14 oz, but that is bullshit. Snapdragon was moving around so much and was so uncooperative that I know that they did not get good measurements. Besides, the Tufts estimate from last Wednesday was 7 lbs 12 oz and I trust their staff and machines way more. The Tufts office specializes in obstetrical ultrasounds and sees all the high-risk patients, while the Cambridge Hospital radiology dept is an all-purpose unit that does everything from mammograms to gall bladder scans, so their technicians don't do growth ultrasounds all day long. I don't expect that Snapdragon is a tiny peanut, but there is no way she is a 10-pounder at this point.

The doctor did offer me a c-section, though. I declined.

So, I have a huge baby, extra fluid, and an itchy, stretched-to-the-max stomach. Still no progress with the whole effacement/dilation thing. Due date is in 5 days, but it is looking like that is not going to happen.

Side note: my blood pressure is 100/68. Does that sound too low to anyone else? I'm not running any marathons over here.

Itchy

Screw these stretch marks. I've never been much of a bare midriff girl, so I don't care if they are ugly, but they ITCH! All day, every day, and sometimes in the middle of the night, I have an irresistible urge to scratch all over. The three inches below my ex-belly button feels like it's on fire.

My skin is stretched so tight it is shiny and feels so thin. Worst of all, most of the area around my belly button is also completely numb, so I'm afraid of getting into one of those situations where you bite through your lip after getting Novocaine.

I have some Aveeno lotion that is usually good for 2-3 minutes of relief. I am considering duct taping mittens to my hands.

39 Week Appointment

My appointment with my midwife this morning was a bit more eventful than I was expecting. I have felt a difference in Snapdragon's movements these past few days — the kicking has been all over the place, rather than on the right side, where it has been for weeks now.

I was afraid that she may have turned and Joyce was suspicious as well. I got an internal exam (lovely), which revealed that I am 0 cm dilated, 0% effaced, and that Snapdragon's head was not within feeling distance. Since Joyce couldn't really tell whether the baby was head-down, I got sent over to the hospital for an ultrasound. Inductions and c-sections were mentioned.

I texted Pete, who had stayed home to get some more work done before Snapdragon's *hopefully* imminent arrival. He rushed right over, just in time to sit through the world's longest, most uncomfortable, and most boring ultrasound. All the poking and prodding made for an angry Snapdragon — she decided that she was not going to cooperate AT ALL, so everything took 3x as long as it should have. She would not stay still for a single second, meaning that I had to lie flat on my back for over an hour as the ultrasound tech tried to luck into the shots she needed.

Long story short, Snapdragon is still head-down, just twisted in a weird way. She should be good to go.

The ultrasound did reveal that I still have too much fluid, so I have to go to a doctor's appt tomorrow morning. It is unclear to me how this will help. What is the doctor going to do about it? I'm hoping that I will have less amniotic fluid soon due to my water breaking.

Cloth Diaper Delivery

I got my Bum Genius diapers in the mail today. They are so cute!

I love the colors. The Diaper Lab only had the x-small size in white, so I ordered other colors from Thanks Mama. Thanks Mama is only online, but it's a local company, so their free shipping arrives in two days. It will be super easy to get more if we decide we like these.

Ultrasound Update

I'm back from my unnecessary ultrasound, which (thankfully) turned out to be a super boring waste of my time. Everything looks fine/normal/the same, which is infinitely better than finding something new and exciting. Still, I had to get up early and drive into Boston for a test that probably didn't need to be done at all.

Snapdragon is up to 7 lbs, 12 oz (72nd percentile). The weight measurements from ultrasounds are notoriously unreliable, but since the 35-week ultrasound from this hospital put her in the 6-6.5 range, this recent estimate seems to be consistent. She's right on schedule.

It is getting really uncomfortable to stay on my back for any length of time, so I had to focus more on breathing than on watching the monitors, but I did get a few glimpses of Snapdragon's little face. Her feet and hands are definitely chubby — not the skeletor hands from earlier ultrasounds. The ultrasound technician even assured me that she could see hair on Snapdragon's head, though I couldn't see it. Plenty of babies are born at 38 weeks and look perfectly normal, but I still have a hard time believing that there is a fully-formed, ready-to-be-newborn baby living in my abdomen. It still seems rather abstract, even as I get my internal organs knocked around for hours every day.

The technician was not able to see whether my cervix has progressed at all, but my guess would be that it has not. I have felt no contractions, so I would be surprised if I am dilated much at all. I have an appt with my midwife tomorrow, but I don't know whether she will do an internal exam to check for progress. I could still be looking at up to a month more of this, so I'd better settle in.

Cloth Diaper Extravaganza

On Saturday, FB and I went to a cloth diapering workshop. We got to see all of the different types of diapers — there are so many options! — and ask questions about laundry.

I feel much more confident about cloth diapering after actually seeing the diapers. Originally, we thought we might try pocket diapers — either gDiapers or cloth pocket diapers — but the prefolds and fitteds with covers looked so much more straightforward. Perhaps we'll try the cloth pockets when Snapdragon is a little older and wetting more, but for the newborn stage, they just seemed too finicky.

We aren't going to be cloth diapering fanatics — I've got a big box of newborn-size disposables that I plan to use whenever I feel like it, whether it's because we're traveling or behind on laundry, or just lazy.

I imagine that the cloth diapering will get easier as we get more practice and once we figure out what size/style/brand fits our baby and our lifestyle. For now, we bought a variety of kinds so we can try them out and see what we like. For starters, we have:

• 6 conventional cotton prefolds
• 6 organic cotton prefolds
• 4 Thirsties Fab Fitted diapers (2 xs, 2 sm)
• 2 organic cotton fitteds (sm)
• 1 OsoCozy all-in-one (sm)
• 4 Bum Genius all-in-one (xs)
• 3 Thirsties duo covers
• 2 Thirsties sized covers (size 1)
• 2 Bummis covers

Obviously, that is not enough to exclusively cloth diaper a newborn who needs 10-12 changes per day (unless we want to do the diaper laundry every single day), but it should be enough to give us an idea of what we like. If we find ourselves cursing the fitteds or wishing that we had more of those wonderful all-in-ones, we will know what we should invest in. The diaper store is only about 2 miles from our house, so it's no trouble to get more of what we need once we know we need it.

We decided to spring for the newborn sizes rather than trying to go right for the one-size diapers that supposedly fit from birth to potty training. I don't believe that the leg holes that fit a 2-year-old will also fit a newborn's chicken legs and the whole multiple snap system was a bit too daunting for us to jump in right away.

Our current stash (plus whatever we decide to add in the next few weeks and some disposables) should last us through the newborn phase. By the time Snapdragon is 3 months old and ready to move up to larger sizes or one-size diapers, it will be Christmas, and we can ask our families for cloth diapers as Christmas presents. So exciting! But really, a 3-month-old doesn't need anything and has no concept of Christmas, so I'd rather our parents channel their baby-shopping enthusiasm into useful things. Besides, cloth diapers and covers are so cute! It should be fun to shop for them!

I Love Blankets

Last night was the first night in months that was cool enough for blankets. It was glorious.

After suffering through a week of hot, sleepless nights, I was able to fall asleep and stay that way for two 4-hour sessions, broken only for a bathroom break. It has been weeks since I slept for 4 hours at a time, and it felt amazing. I woke up feeling refreshed.

Of course, 3 hours after I got out of bed, I was tired again and napped the morning away. I guess one night of good sleep does not make up an entire month's sleep debt.

In other sleep news, FB and I put a waterproof mattress cover on our bed today. I'm not all that worried about my water breaking during the night (though that certainly could happen), but I imagine that there are many other types of leaks in our immediate future and I'd prefer not to have to clean our mattress all the time.

The co-sleeper is all set, with sheets and everything. It just needs a baby.

I'm 37w4d today, so she could come any time. I am beyond ready, both materially and emotionally. Come on, Snapdragon.

Though, if the weather stays cool and I can keep up this sleeping thing, a few more weeks wouldn't be so bad.

Baby Shower

My mom will be Snapdragon's Naunie, so my Naunie needs a new name!

I'm not big on baby showers and didn't think I would have one, but my family decided to throw a joint pre-birthday party for Snapdragon and Giuliana last Sunday. When I was growing up, we always had get-togethers every month or two to celebrate all the family birthdays that fell in the same season, so it was not a big deal to call this one "baby shower." It was essentially the same as our regular family gatherings, with a few special touches. I brought cakes from Pastiche in Providence and there was a pile of pink presents as tall as a Christmas tree, but we mostly just sat around chatting and catching up.

We finally got to meet my cousin C's girlfriend, M. Since their little Giuliana will be just two months younger than Snapdragon, it makes good sense for us to try to get to know her and be nice. She is very . . . young. I suppose she must be at least 22, but she just seemed very young to me — brash and self-confident, telling stories that went nowhere. It was good to see that she was not shy around our big, loud family, but I'm not sure that genuine friendship is in our future. Still, she and C seem to be getting along well, which is a good sign. We will be glad to have a little cousin for Snapdragon, though we are still unsure about how permanent their relationship is. Of course, C will always be Giuliana's dad, but if they are not together, there is less of a chance that Snapdragon will see much of her cousin.

Of the 10 cousins on that side of the family, my sister is the youngest (14). One of my aunts has a brother with three little girls under 7 — we see them infrequently, but they were at the shower. They were very excited about the gigantic pile of presents and did not need to be coaxed into helping us open them. It was a whirlwind of pink paper and blond curls:

They were very sweet. I doubt anyone could see anything we opened, but what can you do?

It took most of last week to get all of the gifts sorted and washed and all of the thank-you notes written, but I managed. Luckily, sorting things into piles and pairing tiny socks does not take much brain power. I am TERRIBLE about thank-you notes — I always put them off until they become this huge, embarrassing, insurmountable task — so it felt good to have them all written and mailed less than a week after the event. Victory!

Updates

For the past few weeks, I have been struggling to overcome a bizarre mental paralysis that has made it difficult for me to do anything other than watch trashy TV and play computer games. Anything that involves mental exertion — even something as simple as updating this blog — has seemed like an huge, unmanageable task. Is this the much-talked-of "pregnancy brain"?

Anyway, a lot has happened, but it would be tedious to write a dozen posts, so I'll do bullet points:

• On the night of 8/18, I started having extreme pain just above my right hip. That's right where my ovarian cyst is, so I was worried that the cyst was twisting or rupturing. I tried to sleep and wait until my scheduled appointment with my midwife the next morning, but by 3 a.m., I was in so much pain that I decided to go in to the hospital. I called my parents, who were on vacation in Maine, woke up my sister, and drove myself to the hospital. I thought I would vomit in the car because the pain was so intense, but I made it to L&D. Of course, as soon as I got there, I felt much better, but they kept me for monitoring. I had an ultrasound in the morning, which showed that my cyst was fine, but I have a kidney stone. I don't think that was what was causing my pain because my kidneys are up around my ears at this point and the pain was just above the hip, but that's everyone's best guess. The ultrasound tech estimated Snapdragon's weight at 6 lbs. 13 oz.
• They also diagnosed me with polyhydramnios (too much amniotic fluid). The cut-off for this diagnosis is 25 somethingorothers and my fluid measured 25.8, so I had to see an OB to be checked. More on that later.
• I felt terrible about interrupting my parents' vacation, even though they were planning on coming back on Thursday morning anyway. They raced down from Maine — there is no traffic at 3 in the morning. Though I hated to bother them, I know that they would have been pissed to find out later that I hadn't called them right away. Everything turned out fine, but they would have been upset if I hadn't told them.
• After sleeping for less than an hour and a half on Wednesday night, I drove home to CT with my family. My mom rode in the car with me in case I needed to switch drivers. We ended up hitting a HUGE traffic jam — it took us almost 4 hours to make a trip that usually takes 2 hours or less. That was the real low point of the whole thing — I was on the verge of tears, tired, and missing Pete. It sucked.
• On Friday, 8/20, I spent the day shopping for the babies with my mom and sister. Our family threw a joint baby shower for Snapdragon and Giuliana on Sunday, so we needed to buy presents for the babies from our family and from my Naunie. It was lots of fun, but we were out for 6 hours and my feet were throbbing by the end. We spent all evening wrapping, which was easier on my feet. We wrapped Schnappi's things in animal-themed paper to cut down on the explosion of pink and pastel.
• Our baby shower was 8/22. I'll write a separate post about that.
• In general, August has been much more pleasant, weather-wise, than July, but these past few days have been brutal. It's so hot and humid that it's hard to breathe. I've been getting by with cold showers, drinking gallons of water, and taking air-conditioned car trips to run unnecessary errands. I know that it is not an earth-shattering revelation to note that August is hot, but pregnant hot is a whole new kind of gross.
• I'm pretty annoyed with my midwife. I had an appointment yesterday (8/30) during which she went over my ultrasounds and NSTs from my trip to the hospital. I am measuring "big" (39 cm instead of 37 cm) and she is concerned about the discrepancy in the measurements of Snapdragon's weight (6-6.5 lbs on 8/17 (63rd percentile), 6 lbs 13 oz on 8/19(82nd percentile)). I asked whether the discrepancy was really that big a deal — after all, don't those late ultrasounds have fairly wide margins of error? She looked at me blankly and just said that she was concerned because Snapdragon "grew so much" in just two days. WTF? She didn't grow — two different ultrasound techs made slightly different estimates, both of which estimated her weight as "biggish, but totally normal." Long story short, the midwife wants another growth ultrasound next week. Whatever. I think it is completely unnecessary, but at least I will get to see how she's doing. My next appointment with my midwife isn't until 9/9, so it will be nice to have some reassurance sooner than that.
• No matter what the ultrasound says, Snapdragon is BIG. Very big. I can tell you that without taking any official measurements. She moves around ALL DAY LONG and it is very uncomfortable. Between the vigorous stretching and the pelvis-pounding hiccups, I am feeling pretty beat-up. My skin is so stretched that the skin around my ex-belly button is numb. Come on out, Snapdragon! There is so much more room for squirming on the outside!
• Tomorrow is Sept. 1st, and Snapdragon will be full term! That means she is welcome to come at any time! I've got my fingers crossed for sooner rather than later. Obviously, she will come when she is good and ready, but I can't even entertain the idea that I could still be pregnant on October 1st. I am mentally prepared for 3 more weeks, tops.
• I've got my money on Sept. 19th — Talk Like a Pirate Day. Various nerds among our friends think that Sept. 22 would be a cool birthday because it is Bilbo and Frodo Baggins' birthday.
• My guess for birth weight is 8 lbs 12 oz, but I would be unsurprised if she turns out to be a 9-pounder.
• I am not scared for labor. I am awkward, uncomfortable, hot, bored, and tired. There is very little left to do to get our house ready for Snapdragon, so I don't even have any little projects to keep me busy. I have tried to do dissertation work, but that's not going so well. I am impatient to get started on this whole parenting thing!

That's it for now.

My First Pedicure

FB is on a business trip and has been gone for almost two weeks. It is a long time to be apart, especially as we move into the end game of this pregnancy.

I have been trying to find little ways to pamper myself in his absence. My sister is visiting for a few days, so I took her to get pedicures. I've never had one before. It was quite nice, especially considering that I can barely cut my own toenails at this point. If it were up to me, I would have skipped the nail polish in favor of more massage time, but it was still lovely.

I also got my eyebrows waxed while B got her pedicure. I always forget how nice groomed eyebrows look — every time I get them done, I resolve to do them more often, but, invariably, I forget to go back. I have a Mediterranean unibrow, so the waxing really opens up my face, but I'm just too lazy to keep it up.

After the spa, we went shopping and bought B a dress for the first day of school. It's a lovely dress and she looks very sweet in it.

We've spent the afternoon watching TV and enjoying our clean, polished feet. Tomorrow, I have an appointment with my midwife, then a meeting for the course I'm teaching for in the spring, and then B and I will go home to CT. I'll be very glad to be with my family, rather than hanging out here, all alone.

Last Ultrasound (I Think)

I had my last ultrasound today. At least, it should be my last ultrasound — the perinatologist has decreed that my cyst does not need to be checked anymore. Once Snapdragon is born, I will go back to see whether the cyst persists. If it does, it will need to be removed surgically.

Snapdragon is looking good. Her head is still down and she weighs between 6 and 6.5 pounds. If she gains half a pound a week and is born on her due date, she should weigh between 8.5 and 9 pounds. That's pretty standard for babies in my family, but is certainly on the larger side. Who knows how big she might get if she goes late. I feel reassured, though — if she is born in the next couple of weeks, she should be a healthy size.

Since FB is gone, my parents and sister came up to take me to my appointment. The doctor only lets one person in the ultrasound room with the patient, so my sister came in with me. I felt bad that mom and dad came up and didn't get to see the ultrasound, but, in all honesty, it was a pretty boring ultrasound. Snapdragon is so big that you can only see squashed parts — an elbow here, a femur there. The ultrasound tech could barely get her whole face in the frame. Most of the time, we couldn't really tell what we were looking at.

My parents are headed up to Maine to celebrate their anniversary. They're leaving B with me for a few days while they are gone. We will probably do something girly, though I do not know what. It can't involve much walking — my back cannot handle it anymore.

So Many Baby Girls!

It's been a big week for baby girls around here.

Congrats to Shoeless Pete and Jess on the arrival of baby Helen on Sunday, August 8!

Congrats to my cousin A.J. and his wife on the arrival of baby Ariana Eveline on Tuesday, August 10!

Add these to Lesley and Shaun's little Maya (born 6/30), Emily and Jeff's Lizzie (born 7/3), and my cousin Carlo's little girl (due 11/8), and it looks like my friends and family are working on producing an entire troop of Brownies.

On My Own

On Sunday, FB flew out to San Francisco to attend a friend's wedding and start his new job. I was bummed that I couldn't go to the wedding (Congrats, T & I!), but he texted me photos and updates so I could follow along.

Yesterday, he started his new job. He will be working out of the San Francisco office for the next two weeks, meeting new people, catching up with old friends, and getting up to speed with his new project. It's an exciting time for him.

I'm not too worried about being here alone. I am expecting Snapdragon to linger past her due date, so I'm not really nervous about going into labor before he gets back. If I do, I have plenty of family and friends around to support me.

As much as I dislike being alone, I am enjoying some things about this solitude. I am in 100% indulgence mode — I eat and sleep when I please, watch whatever trash tv I want, and have no regard for the needs and schedules of others. I have one or two minor work obligations, but mostly, I am watching movies, working on another quilt for Snapdragon, and dabbling in dissertation work at a leisurely pace. It's not so bad.

One thing I have to remind myself to do is talk to Snapdragon. Since I don't have FB to talk to, I go most of the day without saying much. All the baby books say that she can hear pretty well, and I want her to be familiar with my voice, so I've been making an effort to talk and sing to her/myself throughout the day.

The best thing about this 2-week trip is that it is refocusing my attention. Instead of counting down days until September 22, I am counting down days until FB gets back. Two weeks is a much more manageable time period to deal with than 6-8 weeks. When he returns, I will be almost 36 weeks, and really entering the final phase of this pregnancy.

Chugging Along

I haven't posted in a while, but everything is pretty much fine here. I've been sleeping a bit better — not really comfortably, but enough to feel rested in the morning. My lower back has been hurting more often and I have had some bad headaches, but my blood pressure is fine (110/72) and I'm staying well hydrated, so that's all that can be done.

I'm 33 weeks along, which is either terrifying or frustrating, depending on whether you express it as "You could deliver 4 weeks from today!" or as "You may have as many as 9 weeks left to go!" I have mentally prepared for 6-7 weeks, but anything less is unfathomable and anything more makes me want to crawl out of my increasingly swollen skin. My ticker says 48 days to go, and I am just trying to get through each one of them. Accomplishing anything work- or house-related is strictly over-achieving at this point.