Tuesday, 30 April 2013
I had a visit with the midwife last night. Basically, my lack of sleep makes my general feeling of dizziness and weakness hard to diagnose, but it could also possibly be due to dehydration or not taking enough iron supplements. She thought dehydration seemed likely, especially given that I improved dramatically after drinking 2.5 litres (she said I had a beautiful urine sample, with no traces of anything, including infection), but she also said that I could increase my iron supplement intake. At the moment, I’m taking around 20mg daily, and I can safely increase this to 100mg. While I don’t intend to increase my supplement this dramatically (as iron makes me feel nauseas), I will if my feeling of well being doesn’t improve. I actually had a reasonable night’s sleep last night, although I still feel like I could go an have a nap quite easily, so I might try increasing my supplement by 15mg and see what happens. However, it is quite normal to feel tired at this stage in pregnancy, and the midwife said that my body is just preparing for disrupted sleep patterns due to the baby (I had a feeling she’d say something like that).
Last night I was also given my second Anti D injection, and I submitted a swab to be tested for Group B Strep. My blood pressure was a little higher than it has been previously, but not high enough that the midwife was worried (and she also figured that my dizziness was due to low blood pressure so the higher blood pressure was my body compensating), and the foetal heartbeat was 140bpm once again.
My next appointment isn’t for two weeks. While I look forward to hearing what the midwives have to say about my pregnancy and hearing the foetal heartbeat, the time between visits at this stage also means that they’re happy with how my pregnancy is progressing.
Wednesday, 1 May 2013 (Day 1)
I feel like crossing into May is yet another milestone. The baby’s hospital bag is packed, my hospital bag is a work in progress, and I’m hoping to be able to pack the majority of my labour bag today. The baby’s bag was fairly easy, as everything is provided for the baby while we’re in hospital. I only need to take a going home outfit or two (in case of accidents). My hospital bag is a work in progress because I’m wearing most of the clothes that I need to pack. I put all the clean clothes in the suitcase and pull them out as I wear them and then repack them again once they’ve been laundered.
I had a reasonable night’s sleep last night, only waking twice to go to the toilet. I think I’ve hit on something with the blocked nose. Heartburn, and particularly reflux, makes my body produce excess phlegm as a defence mechanism. This means that I get pregnancy rhinitis as well as a post nasal drip and cough. I think the blocked nose is part of all this, so I did a little experiment last night where I dosed up on Gaviscon before I went to bed – not that big an issue as my oesophagus was burning as a result of all the heartburn I’d been suffering during the day. It certainly seemed to do the trick, so I might have to incorporate that one into my evening routine.
Alright, that was an afternoon of turmoil I’d rather not have to repeat. Basically, the company who were supposed to be supplying our stroller (Best Baby Pty Ltd) have gone into receivership, so I was trying to find out how to get my money back because they were uncontactable by any means. I ended up calling my bank (St. George) because I’d paid for it by credit card, and it turns out that this is my saving grace. MasterCard have this lovely anti fraud system which means that because I paid for a product that I haven’t received AND the associated company has gone into receivership, then there is a very good chance that my claim will be successful and I’ll get my money back. Yay! The bad news is that it will take 4-6 weeks to process.
After spending hours this afternoon researching companies that sell the Love n Care Capella Compact in pink (don’t read anything into the pink – we hated the lime), I’ve finally found one that has one in stock, so I’ll be ordering that tomorrow from baby-direct.com.au, and hopefully it will be here in a week.
Thursday, 2 May 2013 (Day 2)
I think my experiment with controlling the heartburn to control the blocked nose is working. I only woke up twice again last night, sleeping for four hour stints and only waking to go to the toilet. Now I just have to solve the problem of temperature control. I don’t understand how I can wake up feeling so hot, and yet so cold at the same time. Anything that is in contact with anything (mattress, pillows, or Brad) is hot and sweaty, and yet everything else so cold to touch. The blessing is that unless I actually touch the affected limb, I can’t feel how cold it is. I was also having problems with circulation last night, because I kept on waking up with fingers having pins and needles.
I do find amusement in all this “discomfort”, and yes, the baby is the source of this amusement. I woke at 4am and I was struggling to return to sleep, partially because of a slight discomfort caused by my rapidly growing child. The baby couldn’t have been anymore stretched out if s/he tried, with head against my left hip bone and feet against my left rib bones. In trying to relieve this tiny little discomfort, I unfortunately woke the baby, so I spent the next half hour playing with his/her feet across my belly.
I have ordered my pram from baby-direct.com.au (dum-dum-duuuuuum), so we’ll see what happens now. Watch this space for further reports.
I’m feeling a little more settled and prepared for labour. Everything is either packed, on layby, or coming with tomorrow's groceries, and I've written notes as to where everything that isn't packed is currently located, just in case it's hubby that's finding them.
I'm full term (37 weeks) next Tuesday...
Friday, 3 May 2013 (Day 3)
My Braxton hicks contractions have been getting a little bit serious. Over the last few days I’ve noticed that they’ve changed. They used to just make me feel like I need to pee, right now, but they now have a definite “push” feel to them. I can feel my whole uterus clamp in a downwards motion. They’ve also become much more frequent. I actually got woken up twice this morning with BH contractions.
Saturday, 4 May 2013 (Day 4)
I actually got 5 hours straight sleep this morning, from midnight until 5am. As that is the best I can expect for the next couple months, I’m pretty happy with that. Apparently I started snoring after I got back to sleep at 5am, which Brad thought was probably suitable pay back for all the time he’s snored in my ear.
The nursery is almost finished. The only thing remaining is a few covers and the towel rack. It’s very exciting! I even brought one of my laybys home so that I’d have something to do in the nursery, otherwise my nesting instinct was going to go crazy.
Monday, 6 May 2013 (Day 6)
So, we can call the Gaviscon heartburn non-stuffy nose experiment a failure, but that’s alright, because I’m full term tomorrow! If contractions start now, they won’t attempt to stop them, so yeah, baby, you can get out now LOL. Let the stair walking and squats begin to help baby engage and become a coconut between my legs – a fair swap from the high baby stopping me being able to breath properly discomfort.
My belly button appears to have finally popped. It points downward still, but it is definitely all exposed (I’ve pulled it upward for the photo). The underside of my stomach is rather sore, partially because of the stretch marks, and partially because I end up resting it on every bench or table I stand in front of.
I think I just got hit with a bit of the nesting bug. Floors vacuumed. Washing machine seals cleaned. What shall I do next? Why, I should clean the bathroom sink and the toilet bowl of course!
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