Are we there yet?

in ,

It's been a bit of radio silence over here the last few days, mostly because there's not much to report other than I'm still pregnant. When my mother was pregnant with me, I was born right on time, but when she was pregnant with my older brother Perry he came late. Very late. "Oh my God I may stay pregnant forever will no one believe me this has to be a world record for pregnancy he's going to come out eating solid foods" kind of late. It's still hard for me to wrap my head around, but my brother was supposedly due in late November and was born January 12. When my father lamented recently that Perry was "born under a bad star" because of all his poor luck, I pointed out that he was supposed to be Scorpio and ended up a Capricorn.

My mother says that she went to the doctor every week and they would continue to pat her on the head and tell her she must have counted wrong. And every week she would go home in tears, still pregnant. I find it ironic that recently that I've been going home from my doctor visits in tears because I am trying desperately to remain pregnant.

To add insult to injury, for the two months from November to January, my mother's mother would call every day to ask if the baby was coming that day so she could go get her hair done and not look like a "booger bear" when she came to visit Mom at the hospital. Every. Day.

My mother told me that little tidbit in an email earlier this week. She has also called me every day this week with some random question or another just to see how things are going. When the phone rang today, Rich looked at the caller ID and said it was my mother asking if she should get her hair done.

So no baby quite yet. But I promise to let you all know when we get close, so you can call your local salons.

Counting the hours until we meet

in , ,

Yes, I'm still pregnant. Thanks for asking. It's been a bit of an emotional day for me as I really didn't want to have to walk back into the doctor's office with a baby still on the inside versus outside of me. I had been given the approval to go to my due date (which is Tuesday officially, so I still have a few hours) but no one was quite sure if I'd be allowed to go past it.

I brought Rich with me for moral support. I'm not sure if I have a note in my chart now (WARNING: May burst into tears! Ixnay mentioning the ueday ateday!) or if bringing the 6'5" dude with me helped, but everyone there was super nice to me and treated me with kid gloves.

Baby boy has a great heart rate, plenty of amniotic fluid, good movements, lots of hiccups and a mommy with stellar blood pressure (seriously - 120/77). But he still hasn't made any motions to come out quite yet.

I'm still 80% effaced and 1cm dilated but not much more than that. The baby has dropped quite a bit, though, so all those squats have been helping. Dr. D did a bit more "encouraging" of my cervix to dilate so we'll see what happens.

My OB obviously has been rooting for me to go into labor on my own this past week. And she obviously is doing everything she can to give me the birth I want without chemicals or surgery. But the longer he stays in there, the larger he gets and the more concerned she gets.

I've been given the go ahead to stay pregnant for another week until my appointment next Monday. If at that point he hasn't dropped significantly more, I'm not more dilated and we still don't have a baby in our arms, we will cross the bridge on what to do next. I'm hoping that isn't the bridge to Cesarean Mountain without at least trying over the one to Induction Valley, but I'm trying not to think about that yet and focus on the seven days I have before then.

So light a candle, say a prayer, sacrifice a chicken, spit over your shoulder or do whatever else you can to convince our son he wants to come out this week. Rich and I are doing our parts as Operation Squat, Walk and Screw continues apace. Wish us all luck!

Living Out Loud volume 10: When I grow up

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On Friday, Rich and I took my parents on a bit of a field trip to Richmond. As we were leaving the neighborhood, we passed a street sweeper and my father wistfully said, "maybe that's a job I could do." At 68, he's constantly looking for some sort of job that he could do that would keep him busy and bring in a few extra dollars. Sitting in the car, it made me wonder if he ever had his ideal job his whole life and if he even knows that that job would be. My mother and I believe that the jobs he claims he should have had when he was younger he would have hated. I also marveled that a job like driving the street sweeper is one of those jobs that would be great to tell little kids about. What 2nd grader wouldn't want that job?

Pondering the dreams of childhood (or adulthood) with the reality of earning a paycheck reminds me of the 1999 Monster.com commercial:

Which brings me to this month's Living Out Loud project. What did you want to be when you "grew up"? Did you get that job or become that person? Do you think that's rare or not? Has your idea of what you want to be when you "grow up" changed since you were a kid and how? Do you think you'll ever be that person? How important is it to you? How would you explain to a kid about choosing what to be when he or she grows up and attaining that goal?

Details include:

  • Write something personal about yourself using the previous paragraphs as a guideline. Do not feel that you have to address each question above. The spirit of this project is to share something about yourself; I'm just throwing out ideas.
  • Once you have completed your entry and posted it, please email me the link at genie [at] inabottle [dot] org.
  • If you do not have a blog to host your story, you can email me the story directly and I will add it here as a guest post giving you credit. The more the merrier!
  • The due date for entries is Sunday, November 1st (the first Sunday of the month) at 5pm Eastern.
  • Once I have collected all the entries, I will post a wrap-up to list them all and announce a winner. The winner will receive some sort of prize to be determined but all participants will receive fame and glory and a link on our Living Out Loud blogroll.

I'm probably going to write my entry sooner rather than later since at some point between now and when this is due, I will have birthed a person (God willin' and the creek don't rise). Just remember to send me an email to your own entry, and we should be good to go.

Looking forward to reading them all!