41 Weeks...

Let's start off with this morning's breakfast....Corned beef hash with two eggs over easy, two slices of sourdough toast, two chocolate frosted buttermilk donuts, lots of watermelon and pineapple a half a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice and a decaf green tea.

I had a doctor's appointment today. Getting bigger and bigger and no sign of labor. Minor contractions (having one right now actually), but nothing to call home about. I asked about being induced, he told me anytime I want, I said thursday and he said..."I'll see you on Friday to check the fluids if you haven't given birth by then". God bless the man for trying to maintain a natural state here, because I'm all for it, but I'm also for meeting this child and becoming human again. I've morphed into a monster. Just this last week, gratefully. I'm very happy I haven't been like this for say....months or weeks. I'm also grateful I didn't feel this way for the baby shower. I was a very gracious and happy showeree. Had we by chance had it this week or last week, I would probably be sending out apology notes along with my thank you notes. I'm really more defeated and emotional than actually mean. Before I can really fuss about anything the waterfalls begin....pitiful really.

I know the due date is a guestimate and the child was probably still incubating, but by my calculations, she is ready. Officially this week, even if the doctor's were off, it would be time this week. I would prefer to avoid a forced labor, but uhhh, errrr,, uhhhh, I'm willing to make an exception. I've walked and walked, worked and worked, moved and moved and still nothing. I know at the end of the day it's up to a higher power and I'm fine, I just need to feel like I'm putting my ducks in a row.

So I wound up with an appointment for thursday, to see if the fluids are all good because if not, my doctor and I will talk about inducing. They will have to induce by March 2nd not matter what, but again, uuuhhh, errrrm uuuhhhh. I as born on a Friday, I don't object to Friday. Hopefully this little one will show me and get me up in the middle of THIS night to take my trip to the hospital for delivery. I'm all for it. Show me up little girl.

OVERDUE

For real? I'm 40 weeks and 4 days pregnant. You've got to be kidding me. This child is apparently very comfortable. I've been to the hospital twice but no cigar. I'm hurting. It's one thing to have a growing child in the womb. I can take all she dished out. The nausea the exhaustion the bone pain and insomnia. But it's a whole other show Oprah, when the child is fully baked. It's time little girl, come on. There is a lot more room outside of my womb than in my womb. And I think i have a future soccer player in there because when she stretches and kicks...whoa.

Gratefully, she is still head down. That whole "Version" magic was insane. I've been walking and going walking today again, trying to use the laws of gravity to help speed the process. Plus the longer she's in there the more I worry. Even though when she moves it is uncomfortable and sometimes truly painful, I still try to wake her when I feel she hasn't moved enough.

Ease my mind and my body and make your entrance into this world, pronto. Due date of Feb 16 has come and gone. We have left Aquarius and are now in Pisces. Erykah Badu, Sidney Poitier, Harry Belafonte, Ron Howard, Bobby Fischer and Liza Minelli and Albert Einstein are all Pisces. Not bad.

38 weeks/5 days

My baby shower was last Saturday, January 30th. It was beyond wonderful. Good food, friends and fun and great gifts. About eleven family members and friends from the east coast traveled clear cross country to share the special day. We had two cakes..German Chocolate and Red Velvet and I can't wait until there is a occasion to go back and get more of these heavenly cakes.

i thought maybe I could will the child out the day after the baby shower while my family and friends were still here, but apparently she won't be rushed. And even though I'm quite miserable, her health and safety are first so if she wants to bake longer, Mommy will deal with the discomfort of having a full grown baby sharing my belly with all of my organs. :)

And speaking of "her", no less than twenty strangers have told me I'm having a boy, so I had the father come up with some boy names just in case. I was told girl during an Ultrasound in October, but hey, you never know. Most of the clothes are neutral as I love organic and neutral colors and loathe pink, but the child's room is painted lilac. If it's a boy he'll be like the recording artist Prince. :-) At the end of the day, boy or girl, doesn't matter to me...healthy and thriving child is the concern.

And though I say I'll just wait until she's ready I have tried, walking, eating lots of pineapple and I even went to a place famous for selling a salad that makes women go into labor. "The Maternity Salad", it was featured in several news articles. The salad was delicious, but no labor.

So I sit, pace, cry, moan, smile and wait to meet my upcoming bundle of joy.

37 weeks today - Breeched Baby

Oh yes, talk about neglect. I just couldn't do it. Blog that is. I haven't felt like doing anything constructive, besides eating and trying to find a comfortable position. I have started nesting, but because I'm very pregnant, the cleaning and organizing only happens in spurts. Most of it happens in my mind.

So, today I'm officially 37 weeks and due to my breeched baby (wrong position for birth) today I had an "External Cephalic Version."

The little girl, seemingly as stubborn as her mother, had not moved into the proper position for birth. She was completely head up. Painfully head up. She had her little head wedged in my chest and didn't seemed concerned about being a few weeks away from entering the world. So my doctor wanted to do this external version to attempt to get her into position to avoid labor complications and avoid a c-section.

There is a 50/50 chance it works. I am in the "it worked" percentile. It was very strange and now that my adrenaline is subsiding I can feel more pain. I'm just sore, as if I did one hundred too many sit-ups (As if I can do more than five on my best day). The nurse told me to focus on one thing. I sang Whitney Houston's remake of For the Love of you, in my head as the doctor coached me to breathe and used his fist and all of his strength to flip the child into position. YIKES! The nurse told me I had a high tolerance for pain. I do, but I'm certain I won't think so when it's labor time. But today, because I wanted this to work, I tried to remain as quiet as possible, when I really wanted to jump up and run out of the room, but not before kicking someone. Instead, I was grown. It probably took all of five minutes. But it felt longer.

It's insane to suddenly feel the baby kicking me in the spot where her head was just a few hours ago. But the relief of having her head lower instead of in my chest is wonderful. I had wicked, wicked, lava like heartburn and pain when she was head up, but I didn't know why. I just thought it was par for the course. But after the ultra-sound at the doctor's office and learning she was up, no further explanation was needed. Ahhh a little relief and a chance to have a natural birth. There is a a chance she may flip back around , but the doctor explained if the baby is hard to flip into position, it will be less likely for her to flip back. My little stubborn girl did not flip without a fight. So that is good news, because if she flips back. I will go ahead and reluctantly schedule a c-section. Though, so far so good.

Other news - I've gained 40 pounds for this pregnancy so far. I can't believe it's not more, because I've taken to cooking and baking brownies with brown sugar toasted pecans (i toast them myself). But I think I'm pretty active. If nothing else, I have to walk up and down a flight of stairs several times a day.

3 weeks to go before I meet this bundle of kicking joy.

23 weeks/5 days

Well, well, well. Yes I semi neglected my blog. But I should be excused because I'm pregnant. A lot has been happening. I officially relocated, had a pre-term labor scare and now know the gender of my child. And have been a writing fool on deadline as well. Whew!

So....three weeks ago, after trying to will away 4 days of intense pain, I was instructed by my doctor's office to go to the hospital. I say doctor's office because I don't have a specific doctor at this practice. They insist on making you see at least six or seven different doctors so the chance of one of these folks being available on the day of your delivery increases. Well they can have that plan, because when something goes wrong and you need to talk to someone, there is no accountability because you are "everyone's" patient. I was already raised as everyone's child, but no one's child, now I'm supposed to be experience the same in childbirth. No thanks. After calling several times, trying to get "my" doctor or the last doctor I had seen to talk to me, I was in too much pain and too frustrated to call again. So I just limped around in pain for a few days, before my boyfriend demanded my doctor's information. Well, he called asked for the office manager, told them all off, and I got stellar attention after.

So...my man left work early and off to emergency due to my severe cramps and tenderness to the touch. It was hella scarey. Turns out, I had done too much moving and lifting and yadda yadda, upset my fibroids and strained something, but thank GOD no pre-term labor as the chances of survival of such an early birth were about 10 percent. Yikes! So they gave me a prescription to some anti-inflammatory pain killers. I stepped out of the hospital and promptly tossed that little piece of paper away. I'm sick of these pill pushers. After two days of rest..no more pain. And I took none of that crap they tried to give me. They tried to tell me it would help calm the fibroids..well, rest did that and I have to tell all you people who take all these pills for strains....relax, think relaxing thoughts and wait it out. Get off those pills. I wasn't doing that to me or my child.

I will say this, emergency for pregnant women is on a whole different floor and it's very well run. I was in a hospital room and connected to a contract machine in less than five minutes. We tried to find out if we were having a boy or a girl and the child literally shows us buttcheeks and a foot. It looked as if they were sitting on a copy machine..mooning us. Scandal. So we didn't find out on that visit.

BUT.....one week later I went for a "structural" and ....drums please....it's a GIRL!!!!. I'll admit, we were hoping for a boy as I have no idea how to do hair and what am I to do with a girl. But a healthy, happy baby is the ideal scenario and so far so good.
Plus, I've embraced having a girl. Excited even. I hear they are easier to potty train and hey, a mini-me won't be so bad. I just hope she's not obsessed with the color pink because Momma don't go for pink. :-) But she will for her daughter..sigh. :-) I also feel it's a blessing to be able to give her my Great-Grandma's middle name as her middle name...Pearl. My Great-Grandmother was the best influence and blessing a child could ask for and I miss her deeply, so I'm thrilled to be able to share her name with my child. My Great-Grandma, straight from Virginia is Minnie Pearl..whew! Can you believe it. And I love my Grandma so dearly, that it really is a struggle to not actually name my child, full on..Minnie Pearl. :-) But I won't do that to the baby. I know it is a southern name and my Grandma was born in 1913. :-)

I'm showing, she's kicking and it's amazing. Even though she sometimes rests on my bladder and it feels quite miserable, I welcome all movement and kicks. Keep on kicking baby, Mommy likes to know you're there. I also get a strange thrill out of watching my belly move like I'm on the space shuttle in the movie "Alien". Unreal.

So that's the update.

19 weeks and counting..

I was trying to wait until I found out if he is a he or she is a she to post again, but.....

I had a doctors appointment yesterday. The precious one's heartbeat is 150 and his (or her) precious Mother is gaining weight. I've officially gained eleven pounds in less than three months. I can't blame it on the child because he (or she) is about the size of a mango right now. It's okay. For the love of the child.

My stomach is tight. I can feel the stretching. It's like I'm trying to digest a basketball. Hope that's normal.

No longer experiencing morning sickness THANK GOD!! but the newest invasion of the body snatchers issue is bellyaches. Terrible and long lasting. It's gas that does not move or go anywhere. It seems to just like staying right in my stomach, totally unconcerned with escaping. Yesterday it was so bad my stomach was actually sore to the touch.

I haven't felt the child kick yet, or maybe I have as they say it feels a lot like gas in the early stages, like a fluttering. And I've certainly had fluttering. I'm looking forward to feeling the baby kick. So strange to actually look forward to being kicked. :-)
I'm working, writing, packing and feeling very lucky and blessed that I am feeling well enough to do all of these things. Because the first few months I was useless.

The doctor told me even when I get the ultrasound and they guess the sex of the child, she would suggest going with a neutral color on the walls in the nursery because the ultrasound might be wrong. Sigh. Sorry but I'm probably going to go with the guess. Purple for girl, brown/tan for boy. Or I may cop out and do the "neutral" thing. Hopefully not. She suggested green. No way! No green walls.

16 weeks

Can't believe I'm four months pregnant. I'm starting to believe what everyone keeps telling me "The time will fly by". Very happy to NOT be in Los Angeles where the air quality is extra horrendous from the fires. I'm still in Germany and it's lovely but I know the cold will be moving in soon and I'm sure it will hit fast and hard. Can't speak a lick of German yet but can count to ten in French and ask you how you are doing and tell you how I'm doing and tell you it's a very sunny day, and that's about it. Must learn these languages, wish I had started a lot younger. My child will speak these languages, so.....Mama needs to understand if her son (or daughter) is cursing her out or not. :-)

I'm happy I will be going for another check-up a few days after I get back because I have been sinning it up out here. But here's my thing, French and German women give birth to healthy babies every day and they eat all this meat, bread and cheese regularly. :-) That's how I'm justifying NOT having oatmeal for breakfast and truly eating meat, cheese, bread and jam EVERY morn, for breakfast. Though I could go for a nice bowl of oatmeal. Don't get me wrong, it's delicious, but my system is taking extra long to digest all this food and my beau had to go find some prune juice for Mama in Germany. It was not easy. But alas I have some..."Pflaumesaft". It helps, probably saving my life along with some "Lactulose" I have been given, but it will really be about getting back to eating less meat, bread and cheese and eating oatmeal and veggies.

Everyone is drinking delicious coffee and I'm drinking some stuff called"Caro."


It's good, but it ain't coffee. I take a few sips of my beau's coffee and mmmmm, but alas it's back to Caro.
Unfortunately I'm still gagging these horse pill pre-natal vitamins up. I've forced about three down since I've been here. I'm gonna have to look into a liquid version because...seriously. I'm failing.

I learned how to make a delicious cucumber salad and can't wait to try it myself when I get home. Though I'm in no rush to get back to reality. I'm living a fantasy life, besides the growing child and hormones slowing down my system and causing me dizzy spells. Sigh! But I continue to have a great time and fall asleep every moment I get. It's 3:30am here as they are nine hours ahead and after eleven days I'm still not used to the time difference. I'm a bit delirious most of the time.

Thank GOD the morning sickness has subsided. I'm still a bit sensitive, but not pitiful as before. By the way, I don't know who opted to call it morning sickness, it should be called...."All day or if you're lucky" morning sickness. I truly would not have been able to do a thing on this trip had my first trimester fell on these dates. I still can't stand the sight or smell of onions, garlic or chicken. Though the cucumber salad has a few pressed cloves in it, this is the extent of my garlic tolerance. It's insane to me as I used to eat raw onions on my burgers and raw garlic in my salad. The horror, of the thought now.

Okay, I'm going to stare at the wall like a zombie until I lose consciousness. I can't watch tv until I fall asleep (even though I don't really do that anyway) because it's all in German and will frustrate me and keep me awake. It would be nice if I felt like working on a screenplay...but I don't. So off to stare I go.