April 24 - Closer to Baby

Well, here we are on Friday instead of Wednesday. They gave me stronger medicine last night to help dilate me, and it seems to have made a little progress. It's 6:45 and I just started Day 2 of pitocin. Without the pitocin, I'm having contractions about every four minutes, so I think we're hoping that things get ramped up and they are able to break my water. Up until now, I've only been dilated 1 cm and that's not enough to break my water. After 12 hours of strong contractions yesterday, I was pretty deflated to find out we'd made no progress, but Dan's been wonderful even when I'm a mess. I sent him home for a little while to take a real shower and relax a little bit, but he came back feeling bad that he could leave and I couldn't. I think we're both feeling much more encouraged this morning than we were last night, and that in itself feels good. And I'm tired of hearing babies cry. :) So listen up, Baby Shute...come out come out!!

The positive things are that they let me eat dinner yesterday after only ice chips all day, and I slept pretty well on the Ambien they gave me. I'm trying to look at the bright side of things. :)

What We Know

We finally got a phone call from the hospital around 2 pm and got into a room around 4:15 or so. They gave me some medicine to make sure everything is ripe and ready to go, and they'll start the pitocin around 6 or 6:30 in the morning. The break in the day wasn't terrible, even though we had definitely thought the day would look differently. I was able to eat all day, and we slept for a few hours in the morning. We're probably in much better condition now than we would've been had we stayed at the hospital all day. Again, we have no idea when this kid will show, but we're hoping it's Thursday. We're here for the duration...

The Waiting Is The Hardest Part

We are supposed to be induced today.  I say "supposed" because we got up at 4 am, got to the hospital at 5 am, and were informed that their attempts to reach us at 4 were unsuccessful and that all rooms are currently full of women who can go into labor on their own!!  The positive side of this is that we live very close to the hospital, so they sent us home and I got to eat breakfast.  The down side is that the breakfast I so desired (albeit toast & coffee only) triggered my heartburn.  It was still worth it.  

So now we wait.  The Labor & Delivery staff have all of our numbers and will call when a room opens up.  If we don't hear from them by 10 am, we have a number to call.  The grandparents are on standby, but we may or may not meet this baby today.  

Making Room

I embarked on the annual "clean out the refrigerator" task & discovered our 4 basic food groups:

Seriously?  4 jars of grape jelly??  Our condiment to actual food ratio is unreal!  

38 Weeks

Dan and I sometimes will look up old retro things on Youtube...you know, theme songs from TV shows, commercials from the '80's, etc. It's basically anything that will trigger a memory. Well this week, I found this:  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5unAvwnOaYQ

Let me make this clear...I LOVED the idea of owning this dog. I BEGGED for this dog. I did not GET this dog. How can you not like a toy dog named Puddles?! Something about having a toy that peed, but whatever. It was so much fun to see the commercial again, but it also triggered the realization that someday I may have a child who begs for a toy dog that pees. And I will probably do the same thing my parents did...not buy it, and tell all of the grandparents not to buy it either. It's funny how life turns around.  I guess it goes without saying that we're in for the ride of our lives!

Our appointment this week turned into an impromptu ultrasound when I mentioned that the Nurse Practitioner last week thought the baby might be breech again. The u/s showed that the baby is definitely head down, and currently weighs 6 pounds, 15 ounces. The doctor said that babies typically don't gain more than a half pound per week, so we are probably going to be alright in terms of baby size with a week and a half until the due date.  The practice won't let us go past a week overdue, so we are assured of a normal sized baby (I hope).  We got to see the baby in 3D, but the stinker refused to turn his/her head and we only got a good shot of the forehead and ear.  Oh well.  It won't be long before we are looking into the actual face, not just a photo.  We did get to see the baby practice-breathing, which was pretty cool, and of course we are addicted to hearing the heartbeat.  

In terms of preparations, I think we're ready.  I bought the stroller this week, and am looking forward to some neighborhood walks together.  All of the clothes have been washed and folded, and the baby's bag is packed for the hospital (mine too, but the baby's clothes are cuter).  We are still discussing names, and we've got a few strong contenders.  Don't worry...we will have something to write down when we fill out the paperwork.  And we got the car seat installed last weekend, thanks to the Lexington Fire Department.  Now if we could just wrap our minds around the fact that we will be parents in a couple of weeks, we'd be all set!!