Anna's Pregnancy Journal

Our son Daniel was born on August 22nd at 11:34 am, 7 pounds 7 ounces, 20 inches long. He is our joy, our light, and our sleepless nights. I don't have much time for LJ anymore, so this will conclude my pregnancy journal. It's been wonderful!

Just made eggplant parmigiana, we'll see if it puts me into labor in the next 48 hours ;-)

Yesterday was my last day of work, and it was kind of bittersweet. I am so lucky to be able to stay home with my baby. I thank God for that every day :)

Anyway, now it's all about "optimal delivery date". My husband's family says that anytime on or after next Sunday is perfect. They'll be off in North Carolina getting my sister in law all set for her freshman year of college for most of next week, so hopefully the little one will stick around for another week so that he can meet his grandparents on his birthday! Then again, I'd love for him to come now and get this birth thing over with!

No major contractions yet, I've had a few here and there that hurt - but I think they are more related to stomachaches from eating junk food. Oops ;-) I've had some shooting kinds of pain at night that feel cervix-centered, so hopefully some dilation is occuring too.

A couple of nights ago, I was having a very vivid dream where I was trying to get away from a huge spider. Apparently it was very vivid because I proceeded to roll *over* my husband in my sleep and fall off the bed on his side. No harm to the belly or baby, but I banged my ankle pretty hard on the dresser and it still hurts. It was really strange and kind of freaked out my husband, I'm hoping it doesn't happen again.

Well, we're enjoying our weekend now, and our last likely one without a baby! Holy cow!

It's been great coming home and staying home for lunch every day! Today I started training my replacement, she's really nice and I think she'll do well. They surprised us with a little party including an almond/apricot tart that was incredibly yummy! Plus they gave me a Borders gift card, so I'll be sure to pick up some more baby books.

Yesterday I had a doctor appointment, and it turns out that I'm not dialated but a Little Bit Effaced! Woo hoo! Hopefully we'll get this little one out soon, I am so ready. I am just so excited. I can't wait to meet him!

My back is starting to bug me so I think I'll lay down for a bit and watch some TV. Did I mention how nice it is to stay home??

Well, today my father-in-law is headed out to go on a week long vacation out of the country. It would be optimal for the baby to wait for his return next weekend, but I'm certainly not doing anything to prevent a littler baby :) We are now 37w 5d, well within the range of "full term baby" sooooo I've begun some of the old wives tales of ways to naturally induce labor. Lots and lots of pineapple has been consumed, and we've even tried the sex - though the mechanics are a bit mind-boggling. I am so big :(

This weekend I'm going to a party that involves swimming, so I'm going to be all over the frog jumps. Now that I'm done with full days of work (after today) I'm going to force myself to take walks in the early evening, and will go up and down the stairs at home a few times a day as well. I'm going to plan meals with spicier food next week, including the ever popular eggplant parmigiana that guarantees starting labor in 24 hours. I think this will be next Saturday's dinner, on the 18th.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to meeting the baby, looking forward to surviving labor, and looking forward to regaining the ability to bend down.

Had a doctor appointment on Monday with my first internal, no dilation or effacement or anything. She could feel the head of the baby, but my cervix was still way up there. I guess I'm not too surprised since the contractions I've been having are more of the tightening and not pain. Another appointment on Tuesday so we'll see what happens by then.

I'm so freaking irritated. My back hurts me all the time, bending over is nauseating. My husband is getting all testy about me asking him to do things, but it's not like I can do anything. I can't wait until I can move again so that I don't have to argue about things like laundry and picking stuff up off the floor. But for now I guess I just have to deal with the tension.

After today and tomorrow I'm through with full days at work. Next week I'm down to half days every day. Looking forward to that, but not looking forward to driving all around. I don't even like to drive anymore :( With my luck this baby will be induced 10 days after my due date. Why can't he just come now??

Well, the baby is now full term which means I have begun the "COME ON OUT!" chants. I had a doc appt on Thursday and she decided not to check me for dilation or anything since I haven't really had painful contractions or cramping or anything. I have had a bajillion of the braxton hicks guys, but I dunno what they do in terms of helping with dilation.

Anywho, only two more weeks of work, and my doctor wrote me a note saying that she wants me on half days my last week. I'm all over that! It's getting close and we're at the stores like nuts trying to buy everything we need.

Now all we need is baby!

I feel like such a bad mom-to-be, I am so impatient about the baby coming it's nuts! I feel guilty every time I talk to someone who's like "oh, just enjoy the moment! Your body is producing a miracle! This is the closest you'll ever be to your son!" Am I selfish to just want the baby here now? Well, I guess I am, but whatever. :-) I've got 25 days until my due date, and it could be up to 10 days after that before the baby arrives! Just feel like ranting because there isn't anything I can do about it, I'm TIRED and really back-achy not to mention HUGE and uncomfortable.

I know in a couple of months it'll seem like nothing, and I'll be cuddling my cute little baby boy and all the waiting will be worth it. I guess I just need to keep my eye on the prize!

Well, it's a full moon, and they say that L&D wards are rather full on days like this. As much as I'd like to see my little guy in person, I know that it's best for him to cook for another week at the least. It's tough to wait though, because I've started to have all kinds of signs of impending labor.

* More Braxton-Hicks contractions - They aren't at all regular, but I've had several of them every day. I begin to feel my abdomen tighten, and I put my hand on my belly to feel a rock hard uterus! Lately it's even been hard to differentiate the contractions from my baby moving. He's moved a bit less lately, likely because he has less room, but he still bops around enough to drive me nuts with jabs of pain and stabs of anxiety!

* Cramping pain at night - When I lie on my side in bed, the last few days I've had pretty bad lower abdomen pain, just like a period cramp. Hopefully this is my cervix getting all ripe and ready!

* Back pain - More and more lower back pain, more and more fatigue.

* Le poop it is more frequent. TMI, yes, I know.

Every day it gets closer and closer and more real. I can't wait to meet my son. I just can't wait!

This feeling has washed over me, more and more in recent weeks. I am going to be a mother. This bumping around that I feel in my belly at this moment is my child, he's already expressing his personality. I wonder what he'll look like, what his smile will look like, how much hair will he have? This is just such a precious time, a time I'll never experience again. The few short weeks before becoming a mother, before becoming responsible for another human being. I feel such a sense of excitement, fear, and pride. I'm trying my hardest to be physically ready for him to arrive - the room is almost complete, and the diaper bag is even half packed. We'll probably even install the carseat this weekend, just in case. When I'm home, I look down at my feet and imagine a 14 month old tugging at my shorts to be picked up. I gaze into the empty crib and imagine a tiny 1 week old baby sleeping soundly if even for a moment. I peer from my kitchen window at the toddler swing already in the tree, and I see my husband pushing his son higher and higher. We are so very excited. So very scared. And so proud of this family we're about to have.

So yesterday I had a bit of a scare. It was a normal day at work, maybe a bit more physical because I was up using the paper cutter and putting up a bulletin board, so I was on my feet a bit. I went to the bathroom, one of many times, and all was good. I walked back to my desk and a minute later, I felt fluid. Ran back to the bathroom and I had indeed leaked a reasonable amount of fluid. I freaked out and called the nurse, who told me to just keep an eye on it. Nothing else happened the rest of the day, nor today - so hopefully it was just the normal stuff. Very scary though.

Today I had a doctor appointment, again. Did the Group B strep test, so we'll see how that turns out. Everything seemed ok with blood pressure, baby heartbeat, etc. so I guess it's just the waiting game. We just want another 2 solid weeks, then he can come whenever he wants. Just hold out for two more weeks, baby!

Well, we got back from our vacation Saturday night and I'm still pregnant! Woo hoo!

The plane ride there was terrible. First we had a 1.5 hr drive (starting at 4:30 am) to get to the closest international airport (why do we live in the middle of nowhere??). Then we had two 1.5 hour flights, landing us in Norfolk. Then a bunch of waiting at the airport to meet up with family, then off to Sam's club to buy food for the week (~1 hr) then a 1.5 hr drive to the vacation house. We arrived at about 6pm. My fingers were sausages. My ankles ceased to exist. I. Was. Exhausted. Very cranky, and very pregnant. Luckily the rest of the week involved just laying around the house reading, relaxing in the pool, and EATING. I swear I gained 5 pounds. The trip back didn't seem as bad, and now it's Monday and I'm wrapping up a day of work. Four more weeks of work!

The baby has been super bumpy lately, and I'm just hoping he's still head down. Doctor appointment on Thursday (we're on every week, now!) where I get my group B strep test (woo hoo), and next week they start poking me to see my dilation. SO EXCITED!

Almost everything is set for the baby. One more load of laundry to do to finish up the sheets, and I think I want to buy some more waterproof blankets for the crib. We bought a diaper pail and I need to figure out a way to jerry rig it to better hold the Meijer bags we'll be changing daily. Might require some engineering skills. In just under 2 weeks, our baby will be considered full term - and then it's any day! So scared. So excited. So happy :)

Just got back from the doctor with great news, my baby boy is head down! This explains all the movement we've been feeling, I am so thrilled. Plus we got to double check that he's a boy. His growth is in the 49th percentile, seriously how much better can you get?

And most importantly (hehe) I got the ok to go on our trip tomorrow! We're headed to the beach for a week, and I can't express how excited I am to have seven days to relax!

Lots of good news for a Friday the 13th! *knocks on wood* :-P

I guess what bugs me the most is that I feel a bit out of choices in my current situation. I need to keep working for both the income and the insurance, but I also need to be able to lay down every once in a while during the day to get some of the pressure off of my back. I may just have to be trashy and lay down on the futon in the lobby, as ghetto as that is - but hey, it's my health, and I don't really care anymore about how I'm perceived!

I've been making efforts to lean back in my chair as much as possible, usually I lean forward at the computer but my physical therapist says that it causes too much strain to keep doing that. So when I can, I lean back. That and I'm trying to walk around every 15 minutes, just to change positions and do some of my stretches. I have a back brace, but I feel like it's doing more harm than good because it irritates my belly so much. Today I'm going without it to see what all these changes do for my well being. We'll see.

In baby-news, I've been feeling what I think are braxton-hicks contractions a lot more lately. Yesterday I felt tightening in my uterus about once every 2 hours during the day. It didn't hurt, just made my belly feel rock hard. Then at night I had one that actually did hurt - felt a bit like a menstrual cramp, low in my abdomen. It stressed me out, but that was the only one I felt yesterday. The baby was very active yesterday and already a little bit today, so I'm feeling good in terms of his health. Hopefully he's working his head down!

Well, the baby has been moving around quite a bit which is really fun to watch but less fun to feel. As he grows and I grow, my back has been hurting pretty much non-stop. It seems to be agitated the most by sitting in my chair at work - which is *just perfect* since I need to keep working until I'm 39 weeks. It's getting very difficult for me to get up in the morning and head off to work where I know I will be in physical pain with not much I can do about it. :-/

The water aerobics help my back but I'm too tired to go after 9 hours at work, so I've skipped days here and there when I know it would be helpful to go. I wish I had the energy to work a full day, cook dinner, go to water aerobics, do dishes, and finish the laundry - but I just don't. I can't bend down anymore, heck I can barely walk at this point for more than 20 minutes without my back killing me. The only thing that seems to make it feel better is either laying down to rest or getting into a pool.

I really pray that I can go on vacation this upcoming week, but I have a long week ahead of work until then - and four more long weeks once I get back. I'm just so very tired. and all I want to do is sleep.

This child has moved more in the last three days than I could have ever imagined. I will very frequently not only feel major kicks and turns, but I can see it all too! It's the weirdest thing to see your belly distort. Mostly it feels fine, but the downward kicks and rib kicks are pretty bad. I think he's feeling a bit squished in there!

We had our doctor appointment on Friday and learned that our son is sitting with his bottom in my pelvis and his legs pointing up towards his head! We've got some work to do to turn him around, but he's got 8 weeks so I'm not too worried...yet. He looks great in terms of size and everything. My weight gain is up to 25 pounds now for the pregnancy, BOO! I'm going to be so huge, if I'm not already... Anywho it was kind of scary because our OB was really busy on Friday and the nurses kept shifting everyone around in the rooms. We were first put in a normal room and then put in a room with a fetal monitor, and we freaked out. Luckily it was just a space issue and not a we're worried about your baby issue. Still caused heart palpitations, though.

I'm feeling huge. I'm feeling tired. I'm feeling lots of kicks and bumps from the baby. Only 8 weeks left!

It's been a wild and crazy week. My in-laws came over the weekend and brought along both a full sized crib and a mini-crib. They're both white and the full size one is GORGEOUS!!! I'm so excited :) We'll probably put the mini crib as a bassinet next to our bed for the first few weeks, then use it as some kind of display later. David's cousin apparently used it as a stuffed animal zoo once she got too big!

Yesterday we went out for Indian food to celebrate our anniversary (two years!) and I ate way too much. Well, I should correct that - I ate less than I normally do at Indian places, but that ended up being WAY too much for my shrunken stomach. This ended in sickness :( I was hoping we would go shopping afterwards, but I felt too icky so we just went shopping online for baby stuff. We ordered our stroller and I'm so excited because once we have that, we're pretty much ready! Now all we need to do is decorate the nursery. Maybe this weekend we'll do some painting....so much fun to be had!

I just had about a cup of regular coke so we'll see how I feel - normally I don't have any caffeine. Three more weeks until our family vacation to the beach and I'm so psyched! This friday is another ultrasound, so we'll get to double check the baby parts. Pretty sure it's a boy though :)

More pregnancy symptoms - VERY itchy feet over the last week. Little red bumps sometimes show up, sometimes not. All I know is that I'm crazy itchy.

That's enough of an update for now, we'll talk about the ultrasound on Friday!

Hey there BF mods,

I would appreciate an answer to this question. I read through the user info for breastfeeding, and it seems to be mostly to support currently breastfeeding women who might be experiencing difficulty. Am I right about the goal of the community? Anywho, where does it say that posts from members like these are ok:

* rants about people they know IRL who formula feed
* rants about doctors daring to suggest the supplementation of formula
* articles that equate formula to death
* articles about declines in breastfeeding in foreign countries leading to death
* petitions to ban free formula samples in hospitals
* sample letters to congressmen to ban formula in hospitals
* boycotts of companies that sell formula among other products

Aren't those all more anti-formula than pro-breastfeeding? It seems to me that there are many people who, like me, are pro-their-own-breastfeeding but not anti-other-people-using-formula. Those posts seem all meant to be inflammatory and starting drama, which is explicitly against your user info.

There seems to be another faction who strongly believes that formula feeding is dangerous, irresponsible, and akin to slowly feeding a child poison over the course of his infancy. For those people, I direct your attention to the user info for boob_nazis:

**In exchange for being a part of this uber-cool gang of knowledgeable hot mamas who have boobs and actually know how to use them, you're going to have to deal with periodic rants against non-boob things like formula or pacifiers. If you can't handle that or the community title without being offended, than this is not the place for you.**

Shouldn't we be directing those types of posts and comments to that community instead of a support community? I think these posts alienate members who have either used formula in the past, have found it medically necessary to use formula at any time, or simply find it rude and nonsupportive to overexaggerate the harms of formula feeding.

I didn't post this publicly even though I really wanted to because I didn't want to be labeled for "inciting drama" and I respect that goal of the community. Please feel free to let me know if it is acceptable to repost this, I think it's a conversation that is becoming increasingly important to have.

Thanks,
Anna (tensilvercoins)

I tried not to get involved. I need to take my husband's advice and stop reading communities. They just get my blood pressure up when I'm normally a very chill person!