“Man” Hands

I just don’t seem to have enough time for everything all of a sudden. The visit with my cousin is going well, but with her here my mom is over almost every afternoon/evening and my sister Julie stops by on a regular basis. This means I have had really no personal time. It is starting to take its toll. Work has been really busy and I haven’t had time to post/blog during work time. None of this stopped me from getting the new Harry Potter book read in 3 days. It helps that I am a fast reader. In grade school, we had to take a speed reading class each year. They would take a story and scroll the sentences by on a screen at a progressively faster pace as the year went on, each year increasing it. At the end of the story you had to take a test answering questions on the content. A real pain at the time, but a skill that has stayed with me and is very valuable as an adult.

Throughout all of the chaos on the home front, including my plumbing backing up on both bathroom floors and into both tubs requiring someone to come clear the sewage pipes (a mere $358 later), and a busy work schedule where I rushed out from meeting with one of my bosses where we made significant updates to a salary plan to go to the OB without saving the file to come back and find out that my computer had crashed and I lost all of the updates and they need to be recreated and into the tool by tomorrow for a meeting that we need to have with our other boss. In the back of my mind with all of this going on was the realization that I am afraid that this whole baby thing just isn’t going to work out. That it is too good to be true. I’m not afraid of labor anymore. I have never been afraid of bringing the kid home no matter how hard everyone keeps insisting on telling me that it is going to be and why don’t I have help lined up. I’m afraid that the baby is just going to die in utero before I go into labor or will die through complications during labor. Purely irrational, I know. I was worried enough that I snuck into my office and did a fetal heart monitor check the other night just to be sure. I have never felt the kid move as much as I am told that I should and it seems like it has been even less lately. If I happen to comment on this fact, I am told it is just because I am “too busy” to notice. I just bite my tongue to prevent myself from snapping back that they must not realize how obsessively I monitor this behind the scenes. I haven’t said anything about my worries because I don’t want to either 1) worry anyone else for something that likely won’t happen and even if it did can’t be controlled 2) make anyone think that I am crazier that I am.

I have been feeling my body change over the last week or so as it prepares itself for labor. This part is actually kind of cool. I feel more pressure in my pelvic and hip area. I was really, really horny there for a few days/week or so. I can’t tell you how tempted I was to act upon the increased libido. Only fear of bringing on preterm labor and contractions convinced me to behave myself. I have had a lot of clear cervical mucus on and off each day. Sometime in globs. Sometimes just a little when I wipe. My vagina and cervix has been really itchy on and off. I wouldn't be suprised if I was a bit more dilated, but glad the new OB didn't check at today's appointment. And, my nice pregnancy sleep pattern seems to be going by the way. I have heard people say at the end of their pregnancy that they have trouble sleeping, mostly this comes with the statement because they are so big and uncomfortable. I am not really THAT big or uncomfortable, but still having trouble either falling asleep or staying asleep this last few days. Must be a hormone shift.

I have been intermittently crabby the last few days. I had a whole post written in my head about all of the little things that have been bugging me that I wanted to get off my chest before I went off on someone, but I didn’t have time to write it. Lack of privacy/alone time, lack of sleep, and hormones are taking its toll.

My OB appointment yesterday went fine. Turns out the Dr. covering for Dr. P isn’t a contractor like I thought, but going to be joining the practice. She was nice enough, but only did a quick check of the baby’s heartbeat saying it “was strong” without counting the beats per min. I was glad I had done it myself the night before or I would have been upset. She also pressed on my lower abdomen really hard to see if the baby’s head was done. I have to say that this really hurt. I was still hurting an hour or so later enough that took some Tylenol and I could feel it at 2:20 am when I woke up for what might be for good tonight. I told Dr. T (covering OB) that I could have TOLD her that the baby’s head was down because that is why Dr. P had put me on bed rest (in other words, look at the F’ing chart). When I went to make next weeks appointment, they kept trying to schedule me with Dr. T saying that Dr. P was so book and that is why they were bringing on a new Dr. I said (in the nicest possible way), look, I will be 3 weeks away from my due date and I want to see MY OB. Finally, they scheduled me with Dr. P at a time when I have a work meeting, but I will just have to miss it. I’ll be going out on leave the next day anyway so work will just have to get used to my not being around a bit earlier.

My cousin keeps saying she hopes I go early while she is still here. I repeat that I don’t want to go too early with my shower this weekend and my OB on vacation until next Tuesday. Probably, it doesn’t matter what OB you get (or so I have been told), but I went to a lot of trouble to get an OB I feel comfortable with and whose style matches mine.

I still don’t have my birthing “plan” done. I guess I need to do that sometime soon if it is going to happen. I think of it more as a birthing preference list as opposed to a plan, but whatever. Just not enough time right now.

I am probably most happy about getting into my hair dresser for highlights (or partial weave as she likes to call it) and a hair cut. I hadn’t been in since the beginning of my second trimester. It was long over due (we calculated it had been 5 months since I had been in) and my hair was really out of control. I was tempted to just get it all chopped off I was so hot, but she convinced me to not be so hasty. LOL.

I am getting a few more things done off the “list”. My bedroom curtains are down and at the dry cleaners. Not a must have, but something I wanted to get done before the kid arrives. My shower is this weekend. I will be really happy to cross that one off of “the list”.

I could do a whole blog entry on how my sister Julie has been driving me crazy in general and specifically how she has annoyed me around the shower where she keeps committing to things and to help out and then dishing them off to someone else to do. It would be less annoying if I didn’t know that she will for the rest of our lives take credit for the great baby shower that “she” threw me. I am trying to let it go.

She was here when I got home for getting my hair done last night and I just groaned as I drove in. She didn’t comment on how nice my hair looked or ask how my OB appointment went (at least not at first). I was starving and making a quick dinner for myself. My stomach was still sore from the OB “baby head down check”. I was tired after a busy work day and running around afterwards. What is the first thing my sister says to me? ”Oh, your hands have changed. You now have “man” hands like Kris (my youngest sister) and I.” I civilly replied, that yes, my fingers were really stiff and swollen right now. (They have been this way for awhile, remember the carpal tunnel blog awhile back?. The tingling has gone, but they are stiff and swollen and it is worse at night.) At least, I think I was civil. She said, “It’s not just that your fingers are now stubby and swollen, but your veins are all raised” and something else about her 40th Birthday and a picture of her and Kris and hands on hips and “man” hands. Truthfully, I stopped listening and tuned her out for my own sanity. Once my pasta was done, I hightailed it into the office saying I had some work to finish up, which really was true, to escape.

My sister Cindy is in town, but I will likely only see her on Saturday at the shower and at the “after” shower swim party at my house since she is hiding out at her friend Audra’s house for the weekend because Julie is annoying her too and all the beds/rooms at my house area already taken by my cousin and her family. Julie told her that she was responsible for doing fruit salad and party favors for the shower yesterday (Thursday) for the shower on Saturday. Rather than arguing and making it more stressful for me, she agreed (but, we did have a nice phone call to complain about it and Julie in general). Have I mentioned recently about how I could have lived without a shower? I am sure it will be nice, but it is stressful and I am not even doing anything for it except trying to keep the peace. I would have liked to spend a little one on one time with Cindy while she was here. She is the sister I consider myself closest to and we haven’t seen each other since last Christmas, but it doesn’t look like that is in the cards. She’s already pitching for me to bring the baby out for Christmas, because it will be much nicer to spend it with her and her kids. LOL. I told we will see, but probably I will want to spend my first Christmas at home with the baby. And, that a lot would depend on how the whole sleep through the night things is going. She is funny. She will keep pressing her point until then, subtly of course. Again, I wish that we would have some quality alone time while she is here. Sigh. But, at least she is having fun with her friend and enjoying being away from her kids.

The highlight of my day? Being told I have “man” hands, of course. Just what every woman wants to here, right?

Bottom line is that all is going well. I am feeling 9 months pregnant, but think that what I am feeling is better than what most are feeling at this stage of pregnancy. All and all, I am really not that uncomfortable and am feeling pretty good.