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February 3, 2002
February 3,
32 Weeks
Just a warning before I start this entry, I have so many topics I’d like to cover that this may get pretty long. So, I am just going to label everything by topic, that way you can skip over what doesn’t interest you. Sorry to make this so long, but I guess I just had a lot to write about this week.
Doctor’s Appointment
I had my 2 week check-up and everything looks fine. I gained almost 2 lbs, my blood pressure was normal, and the doctor determined that the baby is head down, it’s back is laying up against my right side with its hands and feet, legs and arms pointing out toward my left. This would explain, I guess, why my right side feels like a brick and my left side feels like a balloon. Also, I only see bumps, rolls and kicks on my left, for the most part.
I asked my doctor about the fact that Comet was appealing to me and she laughed about it. She said that there was no cause for worry since all my tests came back normal. She said the only thing that was a little off was my iron, it was slightly low. I asked her how this could be as I have been taking an iron supplement for at least 2 months. But then I remembered how a friend told me last week that you should never take iron supplements with milk or milk products because it negates the effects of the iron. Of course, it just so happens that every morning I was taking my iron pill with chocolate milk so I guess that would explain why my iron was a little low, right? I asked my doctor about that and she said that yes, milk does take away a good portion of the benefits but that all was not lost, I still did get some benefit from it. I had never heard about this until very recently and feel badly that I missed out on a nutrient I really needed.
My doctor did comment on the fact that my fingers and hands are so swollen, not to mention my feet. She said that it was normal and nothing to worry about as my BP was fine, etc. Which sort of brings me to my next topic...
Man Hands
My hands are so swollen, the only thing I can compare them to is “man hands.” Honestly, they really look like man hands. Did you ever see that episode of Seinfeld where Jerry was set up with this very attractive woman? She had everything going for her - she was pretty, good job, fun person - but the first time Jerry eats dinner with her he is disgusted by the sight of her “man hands,” which are these big meaty paws, these really huge hooks. It is obvious that the show just substituted film of a man’s actual hands and not the actress’ hands, which was very well done. Anyhow, my hands look (to me) like these man hands, they are just so big and puffy. Honestly, I don’t care much that they look funny, I mean it’s only temporary, after all (I hope), and certainly worth the reward in the end but what really bothers me is that they hurt! They hurt so bad it is painful to bend them. Like holding my handbag as I walk through a store really makes my hands sore. Again, it’s only temporary so I realize it’s not a big deal. I guess I just never thought that swelling of this nature occurred this early in the pg, I thought that was more of a “last few weeks” event.
Swollen Feet
Naturally, if my hands are swollen it is only logical that my feet would swell too - and they have. But what I want to know is does anyone else out there have swollen feet that are slightly red or tinged with purple? I know this may sound strange but my feet (by the end of the day) are always a little purple-y in color. Attractive. But what was really astonishing to me is that the color of my toenails are changing color as well, and it’s not from nail polish because I only polish my toes in the summer. They have gone from that healthy pink fleshy color to yellow-ish - is this normal? I forgot to ask my doctor about it so I was wondering if anyone else has this? I remember seeing a girlfriend of mine before she went into labor and when she showed me her feet, her toenails were yellow too. Is this from swelling or some other deficiency? Sorry to be so graphic but then again, that’s what we do on this site, right?
If it sounds like I am complaining, I don’t mean to - I just want all this documented in my diary because I will NEVER remember any of this a year from now.
Fruit Roll Ups
And speaking of graphic, I just thought I’d mention a most recent discovery that may be of interest to some of you pg women out there suffering from the dreaded “Pregnancy Constipation.” Ever since my little fainting episode, I have been carrying fruit roll ups in my bag and have finally made the connection that they work great as a laxative. This said, be careful about eating them in public unless you have a nice, clean private bathroom to use. :)
The Baby
I just wanted to quickly note here that I felt my first real rib kick on 1/29 and it most definitely feels different than your average lower abdomen kick. It nearly took my breath away. It didn’t hurt at all and was actually kind of amazing, but startling when I wasn’t expecting it. The baby’s kicks in general are getting much more pronounced or defined, and when they start you definitely can’t miss them.
A friend of mine mentioned last week that his wife (who is due 4 weeks after me), just felt her first kicks this week. I thought that was very odd considering she is not a heavy woman or anything. I just assumed and from what I have read, thought that by your 28th week you would have felt something, right? But, I guess every woman’s body (and baby) is different.
Colds/Infections and Breast Feeding
Quick question for anyone who is willing to advise - this may sound like the dumbest question on the face of the earth and I realize I could probably just look it up in a book but it’s so much easier just posing my question here: Let’s say you are really sick, with the flu or bronchitis or something really infectious/debilitating. How is it that you don’t pass this on to your baby when BFing? Is it just because the immunities are so high in the milk that they negate the effects of the infection? I was wondering about this because clearly you don’t stop feeding your child breast milk simply because you (the mother) are sick, right?
When I worked in a maternity ward one summer in college as a nurse’s aid, I worked in the Nutrition Center preparing breast milk brought in by mothers whose babies were in NICU. I don’t ever remember this issue arising so I was curious...
Becoming Clumsier by the Day
Remember how I just mentioned that my fingers are so sore it hurts to hold things? Well this also means that I have become clumsier with each passing day, dropping things left and right. It also means that my feet aren’t as stable as they were even a month ago and just this past week, as I was walking through the mall with a girlfriend, my feet sort of gave way and I fell flat on my face in front of the whole mall, basically. And yes, it was mighty embarrassing but, the reason I REALLY felt bad was because not only did I fall, but I instinctively grabbed for my friend’s arm to stabilize me and ended up pulling her all the way down to the ground as well. Nice sight we must have made, huh? I felt really horrible though my friend was just concerned that I had hurt myself. I reassured her that I had plenty of padding and that I was fine. My pride may have been a little dinged, as I am sure I looked like a complete moron falling to the ground, but other than that, I was fine.
Round Ligament Pain
On Thursday morning I awoke out of a deep sleep (one of the best nights I have had in awhile actually), by a sharp, shooting, intense pain in my lower abdomen. It hurt so badly that I immediately sat up and started moaning in agony. I got out of the bed and grabbed my stomach because I felt like I had to pee and I noticed that my stomach felt as hard as a rock. Naturally, I was convinced that I was going into pre-term labor or something and that my water was about to break. I then went to the guest room to get Charles (he had left our room earlier that night because his snoring was keeping me up) and shook him awake saying “Charles, get up! Get up! I need you.” Well, the whole scene that followed was like something out of a sitcom where the wife says’ “Honey, it’s time,” and the husband rushes around madly trying to put his clothes on and get the wife to the hospital.
After I was able to calm Charles down and explain what was going on we decided we had better call our doctor to see what we should do. This is where we learned that we were about as unprepared as we could be and was actually a good lesson for us. So, as I’m sitting there in the dark, still moaning, Charles asks me who he should call and my only response was “I don’t know.” I don’t know?!! Can you believe that? I was in pain, but still, I should have been able to come up with that much. I mean, I figured I should call my doctor but I didn’t have any number but the doctor’s actual office which I knew was closed. So Charles suggested we call the office anyway, that they must have an answering service, which thankfully, the office listed a number to call to get the answering service. (I forgot to mention that it took me about 5 minutes to locate my doctor’s number in the first place - another mistake). The answering service asked me who my OB was and then informed me that they would have the doctor get back to me right away. Within 2 minutes my doctor called me back, I explained exactly what the pain felt like and she immediately said that it was round ligament pain. I told her it felt like what I would imagine appendicitis to feel like, except it was on my left side. She asked me if I could feel the baby moving at all and when I told her I could feel him/her a lot, she reassured me that everything was fine, that I only needed to take a Tylenol and lie on my left side. I did exactly as I was told and the pain was gone by mid-morning. So, it turned out to be nothing at all, thank God. But what a scary episode! The whole time it was happening I couldn’t stop thinking (in my usual optimistic fashion), - “I just knew it, I just knew I would never make it to term, something bad just had to happen, etc., etc.”
All of this was a very good lesson for me though. It showed me that I need to be more prepared, that I need to have my doctor’s number and the answering service’s number handy and ready to go just in case something terrible were to happen.
The other thing I learned is that if the pain I experienced is anything like the way labor feels, I am dead. Labor pain is not something I ever give a second thought to only because if so many women have done it, and keep on doing it, it must be somewhat bearable, right? Now I am beginning to worry that I may have been a little bit naive and hasty in my assumptions.
Lamaze Class and the Prolapsed Cord
In Lamaze class this week, one of the many topics we covered was the prolapsed cord. As I am sure most of you already know, cord prolapse is what happens when “...the amniotic membranes rupture, the cord slips (prolapses) through the cervix or even well into the vaginal canal, carried by the rush of amniotic fluid. It then becomes vulnerable to compression by the baby’s presenting part as it passes through the cervix and down the canal during delivery. If the cord does become compressed, the vital supply of oxygen to the fetus can be reduced or even cut off. Prolapse is most common in premature labors or when a part other than the head, especially a foot, presents first. Prolapse is also more common when the membranes rupture before labor begins, rather than after.” (From “What to Expect When You’re Expecting.” Page 360).
Anyway, I had heard about cord prolapse before so none of this was shocking to me, but what was rather disturbing was my Lamaze instructor’s method of presenting the topic. Basically what she said was that if your water should happen to break outside of the hospital and if you should happen to notice a “telephone cord like object dangling out of you,” you need to get to the hospital ASAP or your baby will most likely die. While waiting for the ambulance you also need to get into a fetal position on your left side with your knees as far up to your chest as they can go.
I know the instructor meant well and was only doing her job in informing us of the remote yet possible dangers, and I don’t fault her in any way for that. But, the whole thing just sounded so incredibly horrible, the way the instructor said “...your baby will probably die,” it just ripped right through me, I guess because I always thought cord prolapse was pretty common -and fixable. Now I have this intense fear of my water breaking before I get to the hospital and what may happen. I know that if it does happen that way, I will be constantly checking for the umbilical cord to make sure it is not hanging out of me. Since this class, this whole scenario has really been tormenting and worrying me like nothing else. I know it does no good to worry about something like this, but I can’t help it.
Another thing my instructor mentioned is that we should all ask our mothers what their labor experiences were like, how long, how painful, etc., because that is a very good indicator of what ours will be like. So, I asked my mother about her labor experience and she said that from the time her water broke at home, until the time she delivered me in the hospital, was a total of less than 4 hours. No drugs. Is this something I should be happy about?
Getting Ready for Baby
This week I bought some more things in anticipation of the baby’s arrival. I bought a nursing gown which I actually really like. It’s sleeveless and comes to my knees and has two slits around the breast area for “easy access.” It’s not frumpy or frilly at all, just plain, simple and functional. I also purchased a few nursing bras. As I am currently wearing a 38 DD, I purchased size 40 E nursing bras to give some room for my (hopefully) incoming milk supply. I hope I bought the bra big enough but that size seemed huge enough already. It is still amazing to me that I started out pre-pg as a 32 B. I wonder if I will go back down to that size?
My mother came up to visit for a couple days this past week and while she was here, we got a lot accomplished. First we went to April Cornell in the mall to buy the bedding I liked. Mind you, I have been eyeing this bedding ever since I became pg back in June/July and every time I would go to the store, there would be a lot of this bedding in stock. I kept waiting and waiting to purchase it, 1) because I wanted to make sure it was what I really wanted and didn’t find something better and 2) because I kept hoping it would go on sale. So, it was only typical that the minute I am ready to buy the set, of course there are none left - only the matching pillow was still there. This was very disappointing as I have truly seen nothing else that I liked anywhere and with the furniture arriving this week, I really wanted the bedding in order. To make a long story short, the salesgirl was nice enough to call around to a bunch of different stores and finally located the set at their Georgetown store. They are sending it directly to my house so I didn’t even have to go pick it up. The best part of all, and the reason they were sold out of the bedding in the first place was because the bedding was marked down to 50% off! What luck, huh?
I guess I should mention what the set looks like. It consists of bumper pads, crib sheet, duvet and duvet cover and pillow. The pattern is mostly blue with some periwinkle, violet and raspberry thrown in - essentially, blue and red. I thought that it was definitely a masculine enough looking pattern that it could be used for a boy but would also be nice for a girl.
After getting the bedding in order, we left to go to Crate & Barrel to choose the fabric we want to be made for the glider we bought. The glider is basically an overstuffed armchair that looks like it doesn’t move but actually both rocks and glides. It is a super comfortable chair and I love it. As we were actually able to buy the pillow from the bedding set, we brought it with us to the store and chose a pattern that we liked that we think would match well with the bedding. We ended up choosing a raspberry chambray with striped blue piping. I know, it sounds rather weird but I think it will look nice, at least I hope it will.
After leaving Crate & Barrel, we headed out to Buy Buy Baby to buy the bassinet/Moses basked that I wanted. It will be my mom’s shower gift to us so we really wanted to buy it and get that out of the way. For a long time now, we have been debating where, and in what we wanted to put the baby in for his/her first month or so of life. I always liked the idea of a bassinet but hated the real frilly white girlie looking ones. Not that there is anything wrong with them, I just prefer more plain bassinets. But then again, I also wanted a Moses basket but didn’t care for the idea of putting the baby that close to the floor in my bedroom. I am so paranoid that in my sleep (or being just plain clumsy), I would step on the baby and really hurt him/her so whatever I got, had to be high up. Finally, I saw the bassinet for me in BBB and that is what we ultimately decided on. It is a light wicker bassinet that sits on a rolling stand. The stand has two levels of little shelves (I guess for wipes, diapers, bottles, whatever). The bedding (which actually comes with the bassinet), is all white but not frilly, just plain and simple. The thing I like best about the bassinet is that the bed part comes off the stand just like a Moses basked and has two handles for carrying around with you. Essentially, I couldn’t have created a bassinet more perfect for me. So - you can imagine my disappointment when we went to buy it and they told us it was out of stock AND that it would take 8-12 weeks to deliver! Of all the dumb luck!! Again, to make a long story short, after calling several stores on the east coast and discovering all the stores were out of this item, we asked the store manager if we could buy the floor model and amazingly enough she let us! Thankfully the floor model looked like it came right out of the box but I wonder how exactly I am going to clean the bedding before the baby comes? You can’t put that type of stuff in the washing machine, can you?
Finding Out the Sex
This past week, one day after swim class, a couple of the girls in my class and I were getting dressed in the locker room and were all talking about how we decided whether or not to find out the sex of our babies. I was the only one out of 4 who decided to wait. I was explaining that even though I am glad I waited, sometimes I really regret my decision because it would definitely be a lot of fun to know beforehand. I also said that it probably doesn’t matter one way or another but I guess for me, I just wanted to go the traditional route for at least my first child. Well - out of nowhere this older woman pops out of from behind the next row of lockers and demands of me “Why don’t you just go and find out already? Why is this always such a big deal with you girls? You have the technology - just find out already!” Now, I mention that this woman was older, perhaps in her mid 50’s, because it surprised me that someone of her generation would want to know the sex beforehand. Most older women are the ones who have advocated to me waiting to know. Despite this, I was so taken aback by her attitude! She wasn’t even a part of the damn conversation and no one was even asking her opinion! And it wasn’t as if any of us were saying one way were better than the other, we were just discussing an innocent topic.
I simply told the woman that I just preferred to wait to find out because I thought that was the best decision for me. I didn’t say anything else because what would be the point? She just shook her head in disgust and walked out the door. I actually thought it was pretty funny.
Discomfort While Pregnant
I think I may have mentioned in my last entry that I complete underestimated how tough being pg would be, that I thought I would simply breeze through it like a trooper and that I would go completely unaffected by it all. Well, I was definitely wrong on that account, because honestly, this is the toughest physical discomfort I have ever had to endure and I don’t even think I had even a remotely difficult pg. On the contrary, I believe mine has been pretty great as far as pain and discomfort goes. Again, I am not complaining, just documenting for future reference. But though there has been some discomfort, I still think it has been for the most part a great experience and I wouldn’t change a thing about it.
That said, I can’t help but admit that I feel like it will be impossible to ever feel “normal” again. I can’t imagine having the energy I once did, nor the spring in my step. I feel like I will forever be tired, dragging and sore. Of course, I realize none of this is the case, it’s just that it is hard to imagine what it felt like not to be pg. Does anyone else know what I mean? I can’t remember what it felt like to be thin or to enjoy food or run up a flight of stairs without being winded. I can’t remember what it felt like to be able to walk all day and sleep well at night. It’s strange how quickly you forget all of that and even more unfortunate is how much we take the simple things for granted.
The only time I really feel like my old self is when I am in the water. I have to be honest, I can totally see why a woman would want to give birth in a birthing pool because being in the water is such a relaxing and rejuvenating experience for the pg woman.
Shocked that I actually wrote that, aren’t you? Yes, I admit it, the water is great and there are undoubtedly many benefits to the birthing pool. Still, I couldn’t do it because I am too paranoid that something would go wrong, even if chances are they won’t. I am just too much of a chicken when it comes to stuff like that. So - here is my nice pat solution (as if this could ever happen): why can’t they simply provide birthing pools in the hospital with a midwife AND a doctor handy, just in case something goes wrong? I know the answer obviously is lack of funds, but wouldn’t it be nice if that were possible? Because I can honestly say that if I knew I had a doctor right there to take over in the event of some unforeseen tragedy, AND I was in the hospital, I might just consider that birthing pool.
:)
Until next week,
Corinne and her baby
EDD 4-1-02
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