The Calm Before the Storm

I have been feeling a little more introverted lately. Yes, I think that's the word I'm looking for. I have been enjoying the quite time that I have been having with myself: reading, walking, doing yoga, and thinking. Lately I find that while I'm doing yoga, some positioning exercise for the baby, or just resting while my body is busy feeling nauseated or dealing with practice contractions, my mind sort of drifts off. I won't be particularly thinking about anything; everything just gets sort of soft and I feel like I'm peacefully floating in my own little cloud that gently moves with my breath. This has been happening more and more frequently. For instance, last night I was having a lot of contractions. They lasted about 3 hours, and although sometimes they were close together, other times they were 10-15 minutes apart. We were both excited; we are eager for the baby to be born. Robbie was so cute; I was resting after dinner while he graciously washing the dishes, when he peaked into the room and said, "Maybe I'm after I'm done the dishes and I put the trash and recycling out, I'll pack the rest of the hospital bags?" (The bags are packed, but we have a list of things we are still using to add at the last minute). I told him its probably too early to be thinking about that. Soon after I felt myself completely drift off, where I was still conscious enough to press the start and stop button on the Iphone contractions app I was using, but blissfully in my own little world. Robbie and I took a walk a little while later after it stopped raining, and I found that I had trouble paying attention to our conversation. Robbie didn't mind though, he thinks its great that I am able to fall into this harmonious state without even trying. I am peacefully observing the changes in my body, the feelings I am having, and the flow of my breath without feeling any sense of worry or feeling like I need to be in control. This makes me happy. I hope that when labor really starts that I will continue to be able to trust my body and stay calm because it is such a wonderfully peaceful feeling.

I am floating effortlessly on a calm sea,
knowing that a storm is coming
and my life will never be the same,
yet I am confident that I will not drown
so long as I don't struggle against the waves.

39th Week Appointment and Top 10 Lists

This morning I had my last scheduled appointment before my due date. Not much new to report, both the baby and I are doing well. She tried to work out his exact positioning today, and he is in a good spot still. But I have been instructed to not recline backwards anymore, not even to lean back against my chair, and to spend 20-30 minutes at least 3 times a day leaning forward or on my hands and knees to encourage the baby's back to lay against my belly. This will help prevent back labor. She said the menstrual-like cramps I have been having the past few days are practice contractions; so my body is getting ready. I wonder when the big day is going to be...we are ready for it!

Before I am no longer pregnant, I wanted to make a couple top ten lists about things I enjoyed about pregnancy and what I am looking forward to about not being pregnant. I think they will be interesting to look back on in a few months.

Top 10 Things I will miss about being Pregnant:

1. Feeling Mattimeo move around and stretch and kick inside me. I've gotten so used to being two people and feeling his presence, I think it will be strange going back to being just me.
2. Having so much time to myself (the easy pace of life). I have been really fortunate that I am able to spend as much time relaxing, exercising and reading books as I want. It has been wonderful to be able to really listen to my body's needs and take things at an enjoyable pace. Soon I will be a mom and I have a feeling I will never have that much time to myself again, so I really appreciate this time I've had.
3. Being treated so nicely. Not that I was treated poorly before, but in general people are so much friendlier, polite, cheerful, and generally helpful around me since I've been pregnant. Just yesterday some guy ran up to me on the rocks on the beach as I was awkwardly making my way down to the water to give me his hand to help me (but didn't offer to help my mom who was also struggling a little, though I suppose not obviously). Pregnancy has allowed me to see a different side of people that makes me happy.
4. All the back massages and scratching sessions. Robbie is always really great about scratching my back (it is like my favorite thing in the world) but since I've had occasional back aches throughout pregnancy, I have been even more pesky about asking him to help me out and of course he has been obliging me. I guess I'll miss being spoiled so frequently in this way.
5. My big, firm belly. Sure sometimes it gets in the way and at this point I have trouble finding shirts that completely cover it up without being to big everywhere else, but I think my belly is so beautiful and it just has been an amazing experience to witness the changes my body has gone through throughout pregnancy. I am also really lucky that I haven't gotten any stretch marks or pimples on my belly; it's just a big happy ball of baby.
6. My prenatal exercise classes. Both yoga and water aerobics have been so much fun throughout my pregnancy, and it has been really great to bond with the other pregnant women. I will miss that sense of comradeship and hope that I will be able to stay in touch with some of them after the baby is born. Plus, exercising so much has really made me feel happy and healthy.
7. My thick, healthy hair. My hair has gotten so much thicker since I've been pregnant, and I heard that as soon as the baby is born and those hormones are gone, my hair will start falling out and going back to the way it was. I am bummed about this, but my hair was really healthy before (just thinner) so maybe it won't be that bad.
8. Feeling so comfortable with my body. Before I was pregnant, I was often distressed with feelings of being too fat. Now that I look back at pictures of myself, I think that was pretty foolish of me. Now I am so comfortable and confident with my body. I feel healthy and happy. I hope that just because I am not pregnant anymore that I will lose those feelings. I hope that I continue to take care of myself really well and am happy with the body I have afterward. 
9. Not having to clean the cat box (as well as some of the other chores that Robbie has taken over because they have gotten too difficult or uncomfortable for me to do).
10. Just the overall experience of "watching" Mattimeo grow and develop all these nine months. I've loved learning about the changes that he goes through each week, and feeling so happy that he is healthy and strong. It has been fun wondering what he is going to be like when he comes out and who's features he's going to have. It just has been a really awesome experience growing a little person inside me, and I bet it will be just as amazing growing a little person outside of me too.

Top 10 Reasons it will be nice not to be Pregnant anymore:

1. To be able to do some of the activities I love to do that haven't been able to do for months such as horseback riding and riding my bike places.
2. To not have to go pee every couple of hours (especially at night- although I do realize I still won't get much sleep because I have to nurse the baby).
3. For my feet and hands to go back to their normal size! I have been wearing my wedding ring on a chain on my neck for months to avoid having to have it cut off my hand at some point. Fortunately I only have been dealing with swelling in my feet and hands for a couple of weeks, but I already miss my long slender digits and how flexible/dexterous my hands and feet used to be.
4. To not feel nauseous in the morning anymore and have more options of what I can stomach eating.
5. To be able to lay on my back and stomach! I'm tired of always laying on my side.
6. To go back to my normal weight. This past week I started to weigh more than Robbie, and I like it better when I don't.
7. To be able to breath more easily. The baby dropping down has helped, but I still get winded pretty easily.
8. To not be so hot during the summer. Usually I love being really hot in the summer, and for the first time the heat has slowed me down a bit.
These next two things won't really come into effect until after I am done nursing, but I am going to write them anyways:
9. To be able to drink coffee as much as I want. I've been restricting myself to one or two cups of decaf coffee a week, and trying not to drink any Pepsi (except as an occasional treat when we go out to eat).
10. To drink alcohol. I am by no means a big drinker, I probably only would drink once or twice month before I was pregnant, but I think it would be fun to be able to have a couple drinks with friends again. 

Of course, I am most excited that the end of my pregnancy means that I will be a mom, that I will get to meet Mattimeo, and  that I will get to spend each day watching him and helping him to grow and develop. These lists are intended to reflect the changes I am specifically excited about that only really affect me and my body.

32nd Week Update

Development at 32 Weeks

The weeks are going by much too fast as usual, now I'm already in my 8th month! I have gotten to the point where I am having appointments with the midwives every two weeks now. I had an appointment this past Thursday with the infamous Ellie. Whenever I talk to people who have had babies with Back Cove Midwives, they always talk about how great Ellie is, but I hadn't been able to have an appointment with her until now. She has been in the practice the longest, and is extremely knowledgeable and kind. It was great talking to her.

Everything is still going really well with me and the baby. My blood pressure is excellent (92/60) and my fundus measurements are right where Ellie wants them to be...slightly under 32 inches. She said that it's good if it's slightly under for me at this point since I am so petite. Mattimeo's heart rate was a steady 130 bpm, and this time she was able to figure out his exact permission in my womb. He is now head down (Yay! This means I don't need to worry about him being breached). At that moment he was laying with his spine against my spine, but he is still turning around in circles quite frequently. His bum is up just under my right rib cage.

When he moves now its really cool because I can feel the big bump which is his butt, and sometimes I can feel the curve of his spine at the same time towards the middle of my stomach. He has also been doing some pretty crazy frog kicking where he kicks out his legs simultaneously and I can feel him on both sides of my tummy, or sometimes, of my ribcage. He seems to be most active right after I eat something. More recently he has started to be wiggly while I am walking, which makes walking dogs even more interesting/challenging.

I have still been feeling top notch. Perhaps the only minor annoyance is sleeping at night. Now I have to get up frequently to go pee, and I have to have a snack at least once during the night or I will feel too nauseous to fall asleep. I also wake up at least every hour to switch sides. Since I can only lay on my side now (being on my back for more than a few seconds really makes me sick), my hips start aching if I don't switch sides regularly. Since I have to stuff pillows in between my legs to keep my hips from crashing into each other, I have to hug pillows against my chest so I don't wake up with intense chest muscle aches, and I have a much harder time of gaining enough momentum to move, rolling to the other side is quite the task. I have to move all the pillows and myself and quickly get comfortable and relax so I can get in some sleep before I have to either switch sides again, eat, drink, or get up to pee. Lastly, I've been finding that I get dehydrated really quickly at night now and will get headaches if I don't drink continuously through the night. This means even more peeing and waking up! On the bright side, my body seems to have adjusted to my weird sleep schedule and I still feel like I have a good amount of energy throughout the day.

So far I have only experienced swelling in my feet once (thank goodness!). At Jessica's (Robbie's sister) graduation from MassArt a couple weekends ago the temperature went from quite cool to really hot very quickly. Before the ceremony, Robbie and I took a nice long walk around a park in anticipation of having to sit for a long period of time. But I still ended up sitting for about 3 hours straight, and I think that in combination with the extreme temperature fluctuation was a bit much for my pregnant body and my feet swelled up substantially. I was pretty grossed out because my normally lean toes looked like sausages, and the sides of my feet were squeezing out my sandal straps. Thankfully they went back to normal after graduation. I really hope that doesn't become a normal occurrence for me!

One final pregnancy symptom to note is that I felt my first Braxton-Hicks contraction the night after we went hiking. These are just "practice" contractions that are completely normal and healthy that help prepare your body to know what to do when its time for labor. During these contractions my uterus (aka my whole belly) tightened up substantially and moved upwards a bit. I actually thought it felt pretty cool and gave me a little bit of a head rush. It happened twice in a row that night, but I haven't really noticed any since then.

I hope everyone is enjoying this fabulous weather! At least in Maine, the nonstop raining has ceased, and its really starting to feel like summer. This means there are more delicious fruits and vegetables available for us to eat, dog walking is a lot more enjoyable, and now I am able to eat breakfast outside with my 2 cats surrounded by the beautiful flowers on our balcony. Life is good!

P.S. I had a maternity photo shoot yesterday, but I am going to wait until I have the pictures to tell you about that

Dogs I walk enjoying the nice weather: Casco and Cooper

Me walking some of the east end dogs

Dogs I walk enjoying the nice weather: Cooper

Dogs I walk enjoying the nice weather: Gander

Me, Jess and Robbie at Jess's graduation from MassArt

Delicious summery meal: Quinoa, fresh mozzarella cheese, Maine tomatoes and fresh basil