So it is after midnight, which makes it officially Tuesday and me 41 weeks pregnant. I can’t say I’m all that excited to see this particular milestone. We’ll never know when I would have gone into labor with Devin, had he lived, though I was prepared to go overdue, being my first and all. Kate too, I was prepared to go overdue but had her in the week before my due date. So who would have thought that I’d be going past 41 weeks with Ember? Not I, not I.

The problem right now is that we are having a heat wave this weekend – hot and muggy and of course BBQs to go to. Den has been taking most of the toddler-chasing duties, but I still was getting food for us, trailing along after, chatting with family. It’s not as if I ran a marathon. Hell I sat most of the time. But my feet? Still pretty pissed at me. Just standing to do dishes make them hurt like they did after an 8 hour shift working at Subway (way way back in the day). I am hot and sweaty. And the amount of energy left in my body is approximately none. Kate asks me for something to eat, meaning I have to get off the couch to get something, and I kind of want to cry a little. I just want to stay laying down. Forever. With my feet up. And it would be really great if I could do those things without Kate jumping on me. Mommy is NOT a trampoline.

I do feel considerably better now that Kate has been asleep for a couple of hours, but there is no AC installed in our bedroom yet so I’m kind of roasting. I have no idea how I’m going to sleep tonight.

My interactions with people I don’t see very often quickly go from amusement when I tell them my due date was last week to annoyance when they ask when my induction date is. Because clearly no one goes past 41 weeks without setting an end-by date, right? They may be scheduling an ultrasound or non-stress test, which is fine with me, but induction is still not in my horizon. At some point the baby will trigger labor. It’s just a matter of waiting. (And it really shouldn’t be long now!)

Of course I am not exactly having any pre-labor signs. No coordinated contractions (and even the braxton-hicks are still random throughout the day and pretty infrequent), no cramping, no losing my plug or any of those other things people say. So unless you count getting very cranky as a pre-labor sign I’ve got nothing. I am still waiting for this one to start with a bang. (Hopefully not with my waters breaking, though.) I just hope to wake up in the middle of the night in full blown labor. That would be great.

Not only has this been a lesson in patience, but it’s also a lesson in how some things in life can’t be planned. Every day that went by would be, “Oh, May 18th is a great day.” “May 24th is a nice number.” “May 25th?” “How about the 28th, that would be good.” Okay so now we’re past the 28th. In fact we are looking squarely at June, something I didn’t even consider. (Which is only bugs me because the girls have a cousin whose birthday is within the first few days of June.) My plans? Clearly irrelevant. I swear everything about this pregnancy has been contrary to my plans and expectations. I ought to expect that by now. So yes. A lesson on letting go of plans and expectations, to be certain.

But baby? You can come out now. Please?

Den got the A/C units put in today and OH what a fabulous relief that was. I took a nap in my cool bedroom and it was blissful to not wake up covered in sweat. Our living room isn’t exactly cool, but it’s cut down on the humidity considerably along with dropping the temperature a couple degrees, to the point where it’s not totally obnoxious and I feel like I can function again. So hooray for air conditioning!

Every day for the past two weeks I’ve gone to bed thinking “Maybe this is it! This could be my last night!” I give Kate an extra kiss and cuddle, I make sure the dishes are all washed, I double-check a couple things around the house. And then I wake up still pregnant. I think I’m to the point now where I’m like, “Yeah yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow. Not like I’ll be going into labor or anything.” I had been getting nervous about labor, wondering how it was going to go, fretting about it being more difficult than my previous ones. Now I’m kind of all “I just hope it comes so I don’t have to discuss inductions or anything.” Which honestly is probably a good thing, labor goes better if I am calm and relaxed, not anxious and excitable.

Now I’m going to lay down in my air conditioned bedroom and try to meditate and fall asleep! Maybe tonight I’ll actually get a full night’s sleep… if Kate cooperates. She’s been all messed up from the parties… she’s been getting very tired in the evening and either being overtired and running around or going to bed too early and waking up running around. Then instead of sleeping in she’s up too early, crashes early for her nap, and the evening is a mess again. I need to get her back to sleeping normal hours at night so I know what to expect! And, you know, so I can get enough sleep.

Now here is where it all gets interesting, doesn’t it – at least in terms of the hospital model. I knew we were going to discuss plans today and schedule some testing and such. My appointment was at 2:45. It was a midwife I’d never seen before. She was very nice, but didn’t feel as warm and chatty as all the ones I know. She said the normal plan at 41 weeks is to go for a NST the same day, a NST and BPP (bio-physical profile ultrasound) half a week later, and then an induction at 42 weeks. I’m totally fine with the NST and BPP, but I am really not thrilled with walking in for an induction at 42 weeks just as a matter of course. I asked if I had to. Short answer: no, but highly recommended and she’s going to make the appointment anyways. I ended up also making an appointment with the midwives for next wednesday, and she scheduled an induction for thursday. I’m not saying I would absolutely refuse it, I just want to see how the testing goes and talk to one of the midwives first and decide then, not now.

Then the NST. *sigh* Well I had a bunch of NSTs when pregnant with Kate, but those were early morning pre-scheduled appointments. This was not. I really don’t know what was up with the whole thing, but I had to fill out paperwork and answer a million questions that they usually ask on hospital admittance (when did you last eat, what meds are you on, do you have any of the following diseases, and on and on). I was also asked to change into a hospital gown, which had me perplexed. (A later nurse seemed surprised to see me in a gown for a NST and said the nurse who took me in worked nights, where everyone does actually get into a gown, so that explained that.) I waited and then got hooked up to the belly monitors. It was supposed to be for 30 minutes, but over an hour later….

Then it took a while to wait for a midwife to come look at the strip. I liked this midwife a lot more than the one I had for my appointment, she actually chatted with me, acknowledged my prior loss and my desire to avoid an induction and epidural and such. She asked if I wanted my cervix checked (since at the appointment it hadn’t been brought up) and I said yes. I am approximately 1cm and 50% effaced – a definite change from last week. She looked at the heartrate strip and said it was almost perfect, all the things she wanted to see were there and normally she would just release me, but just because of my history and her wanting to be extra cautious with me she was going to send for an ultrasound to check my fluid levels. Just to be extra sure.

That meant more waiting. But finally someone came to do the ultrasound (on a very fuzzy machine) and we saw that there is indeed a lot of fluid around baby Ember. Her heart was beautiful, her position is great, and… she was sound asleep. (I could have told them that – she was active for the NST and then after me laying down for several hours she zonked out in there.) It took quite a while to get her awake enough to do some practice breathing. But finally she did rouse and she scored perfectly and I got to go home.

Well, after getting changed and waiting to sign papers before leaving. I finally left at 6:30. That’s nearly 4 hours for a quick appointment, NST, and ultrasound. I was quite hungry.

What I learned is that triage is not the place where people move quickly (unless there is an emergency, I assume, but I was certainly not an emergency). This makes me quite nervous for when I’m in labor. It’s also not really a nice comfortable place. You’re in a pod with other people in labor (or other complications), with a shared bathroom. When I contract I have to pee. How am I going to sit on monitors and run to the bathroom every contraction? With the back of my gown open, of course. I really hope I can get in and out quickly when I’m in labor. Laboring at home sounds like a much nicer plan. (Homebirth is sounding like a better and better option. And no, it’s not on the table for us.)

In any case it was a learning experience and I know what to expect a little better. They were all very nice, though. But there was such a feeling of due process there. That’s what wigged me out. I was written on the board, I was hooked up to machines, I was asked all the same questions as everyone else. It is not a place for humming and meditating and moving freely about the room, not at all. (My first labor, in a hospital L&D room, was very different. Well, it was very different for many reasons, but privacy and quiet was a pretty big one!)

In any case the end result is that Ember herself is doing fabulously in there and hopefully, hopefully, will be coming very soon. I would very much like it to be before Monday and another triage experience, but most certainly before next Wednesday and Thursday when I’m going to have to deal with some tough decisions. (Though, like a commenter said, at this point it would probably take very little to push me into labor, so by 42 weeks it probably wouldn’t be a horrible experience – no guarantees, though.) I just really want to go into labor, that’s all. Nice healthy, normal labor, on her own time, in her own way.

Edit: Also wanted to add that the midwife I saw in triage checked baby’s size and position (by feel). Baby’s head is super low and appears to be in good position – I believe she is LOT, for those of you who know what that means. Everyone around me says I’m still carrying high and need to drop, but she’s down. Because of how low her head is the midwife said she couldn’t get a great feel for her size, but she thinks around 7 lbs (like Kate was).