37 weeks

I came across a comment recently, asking me to post daily, as I'm getting close to b-day. While this is a fabulous compliment (I think that means people are enjoying what I'm writing) I'm afraid that would be terribly boring! Unless I have appointments, most of my days are very dull at the moment. I stay at home, dressed in what Tim calls my koala suit, and my day basically goes: sleep in, eat, toilet, eat, shower, eat, nap and/or read, eat, cook dinner, eat, go to bed. If it's a particularly productive day, I might empty the drainer and do some dishes, write a blog post or do some work on my quilt instead of reading. I really don't have much energy or inclination to do anything more than that! Which is why the nursery is still full of boxes!

The 'koala suit.' Pregnancy fashion at its best.

I have now finished my Clexane injections, as per the anaesthetists instructions. Since my haemoglobin levels are still low, I want to minimise any bleeding during birth, so it's now time to lay off the anticoagulants. I'm now on aspirin instead, which is easier for the hospital to counteract.

I have been going to see my (awesome) GP and nurses twice a week to get the sore on my butt checked and dressed. While I'm quite comfortable in knowing when a would is doing what it's meant to do and when it needs to be seen by the doctor, I can't see this one, so I've left it entirely in their care, instead of doing every second dressing myself. Much to my surprise, it has healed much better than I expected and I was sent home with instructions to remove the dressing in a few days and it should be completely healed! They photo they showed me looked like it basically was. Sorry, not sharing butt pics here, you'll just have to take my word for it! So that is one less thing to worry about, one less would to risk getting infected. I'll still put another dressing on it though, since it's on an area that can get bumped easily. I don't want to open it up again, so I'll give it a bit of extra time to strengthen up.

For those of you on the other side of the world, poor little Tasmania has copped a bit of a beating the last few days. We have had a storm system move down the east coast of Australia causing almost cyclonic conditions. As a result, a good portion of Tassie has been flooded. We were ok at our place, (our creeks flooded, but they often do), but Launceston was flooded to almost record levels and a lot of the roads around our place were impassable, with several bridges being closed. Most of them are still closed now as they are structurally unsound. Anyway, as a result, the hospital called us to push our ultrasound back a day, since the sonographers couldn't get to work.

The (new) day of our ultrasound, I woke up at 4am in a big puddle. I got up to go to the bathroom and before I could get my catheter our to pee, there was a big gush of fluid. For those of you who are a bit naive in the area of childbirth, a gush of fluid, or waters breaking, is one of the big signs that baby is on its way. So I had a drink and went back to bed, then woke Tim up and told him. Of course we both tossed and turned for the next hour (or two, for me). After we had gotten up and had breakfast, I called the hospital and told me to come on in. Remember, we were still dealing with floods at this point and had to negotiate washed out roads and bridges. I had had some Braxton Hicks (practise contractions) over the past week or so and I was pretty sure I'd had some contractions that morning, though not very long or often. So I had a quick shower and we headed off to town!

In the middle of all this, Mum had headed to Hobart for the day, so she was at the other end of the state, with neither of us knowing what was going on. I told her to wait and I'd let her know what they said when we got to the hospital, but she headed back anyway. I can't say I blame her, it's not much fun, that feeling of helplessness, knowing there is nothing you can do, but desperatly needing to do something.

Once we arrived in at the hospital, they whisked us off to one of the birthing suites and hooked me up to a monitor. They took my blood pressure, heart rate, oxygen levels and monitored baby's heart rate. They also had another monitor on to measure any contractions I was having, and how often and strong they were. The results? Baby was happy but I wasn't having any contractions! They left the monitors on for half an hour, but it was showing nothing labour-ish. Dr D was on the ward and came in and checked on me. Another OB came in and did an ultrasound to check bub's position, then she did a physical exam, not unlike having a pap smear, except they use a speculum (is that right, the duck bill thing?) with a light on it and get you to cough, so they can see if you're leaking fluid. I couldn't feel anything, but I'm thinking it wouldn't be a particularly enjoyable sensation.

By this stage, they were feeling pretty confident it was a false alarm, but they weren't going to push me out the door if I wasn't convinced. Tim and I decided that since we had an ultrasound that afternoon, there wasn't much point in us going home, especially since we didn't know what was going on with the flood waters, so they put me in a room on the maternity ward to wait. Since I'd lost a bit of sleep that morning, I had a nap, while Tim went for a walk into town.

Monitoring baby's heartbeat and my (lack of) contractions.

Our ultrasound went well enough. This baby is a monster! It's weighing in at over 8 pounds already! 8 pounds would be fine if it was b-day already, but I'm only 37 weeks! It's head was measuring at 40-42 weeks! I'd been holding out hope that our last ultrasound had been right after a growth spurt, but I think I've just got a baby with a big head...

After our ultrasound, Dr D came to see us again. The ultrasound had shown normal levels of amniotic fluid and I'd not had any more leaking, so she was satisfied I'd had a 'false show' and nothing was going to happen as a result. She'd also got the result of my swab, showing I don't have strep B, so won't need antibiotics throughout labour, which was good. One less thing to worry about! We had a clinic appointment with her booked for the next morning, so we didn't have to go to that, but we will go in next week instead.

We also spoke about how long I might need to stay in hospital for (she couldn't really give me an answer, just when baby and I are both healthy and I'm feeding well etc) and about the option of switching to the private hospital after the birth if it looks like I'm going to be in for a while.

After all that, we made it out of the hospital just in time to go to tea and the Uni Review, as planned. All's well that ends well! Until next time!