Baby Day

Tomorrow is baby day, as proclaimed by the doctors without the magic hands.

I went in today for a little no-stress test action, all while awaiting the results of Not Fun Impending Doom Relatively Useless Lab Test. When I got there they told me that they were showing the lab test results to a doctor (prescription pad happy nurse lady was not making this decision) to see if I needed to be induced ... protein levels are high again, and apparently that's not good.

And so they basically decided to induce me now-ish, and the only slot they had open for such fun is tomorrow ... and so tomorrow is baby day (!!!!)

The way it works at Madigan, however, is that if scheduled for induction you call the labor and delivery folks on your Baby Day at about 5:30 a.m. (aka TOO EARLY) to see if they have room for you to come ... if they are super busy you call back in a few hours. If they are not you go in right there and get the ball rolling.

And since inductions can take for-ev-er tomorrow could literally be the LONGEST DAY EVER regardless of whether I go in first thing or ... later. You may be hearing from me again tomorrow as my mind melts waiting .. and waiting ... and waiting.

Fortunatly Luke has the day off whether we get in early or not, and it's supposed to be nice ... so if we must wait at least we can wait while getting some sunshine. Awesome.

As soon as they said "you can come tomorrow to be induced" I started to freak out a little bit. I mean, I know I'm going to have a baby at Any Moment, but it's still scary when you sit down and really think about it actually happening. REALLY SCARY. I rushed home and started frantically cleaning things, and finishing getting the room in order (guess what??? The Army Crap got put away! Whoa). I put some flowers in a pot or two or three. I finished the dishes. I cleaned the bath tub. I made a list of stuff I dont want to forget tomorrow.

And Luke and I went out for dinner -- a kind of last hurrah, if you will. I mean, that's the last time we'll be able to go out for a nice dinner for like 18 years without worrying about a baby sitter or what The Kid is doing in our absence. Geez. Freaking. Out. Today was the day I could run errands without a child, was the last time I can drink copious ammounts of caffiene without worrying whether it will keep you know who up to all hours for at least the next 8-ish months, and so on and so forth.

I don't think I thought this whole have a baby thing through before I decided to do it. Sigh.

Anyway, please pray for me tomorrow. Now that it's here there's a lot of things I am afraid of ... I guess that's the beauty of NOT scheduling it -- no time to freak out. Among my worries:

-- Getting an IV put in. That HURTS!
-- A variety of other pain worries, including labor and needles and more labor and ... yeah. Pain.
-- What if he's ... not perfect? What if there's something really wrong with him? What will I do?
-- C-Section. I REALLY dont want one .. but what if I have to?
-- What if I get sick during? What will Luke do?

And so on ... fortunatly God is in control. Gotta keep reminding myself of that.

FYI ...

In case y0u were wondering, the energy was completely gone today ... and I got an intense allergy attack at the same time. *sniff* ... fortunately I discovered that I CAN take claritan after all, so we will be doing that tomorrow.

And p.s. -- I cut my index finger the other day so typing hurts ... in case you were wondering typing with your middle finger and thumb only is a highly inexact, taxing process.

Oh yeah, and no baby yet.

Yawn

So the energy lasted until about 12:30 p.m., at which point I burst into tears over something very minor and came home. And took a nap. I feel much better now. Groggy from the nap, but the energy is still there.

When I go to the doctor they tend to say boring things like "you're not ready to have the baby blah blah blah see you next week." Obviously, this is not my favorite conversation.

Today's was, of course (!), similar ... but a little more positive than normal. I am, as it turns out, ALMOST ready to have the baby, as his head is in the right spot (at last!) and things are thinning out for his exit. I'm not sure exactly what that process entails, but now you know, overshare or not. Basically, baby could come at ANY TIME ... or ... it could wait a few weeks. That is not the news I wanted to hear exactly but it's better than "$10 says Ill see you next Friday."

I did, however, have to see a different person this week, NOT the doctor with the Magic Hands. This was disappointing as Different Person is convinced that I AM GOING TO DIE AT ANY MOMENT with a random pregnancy sickness (I'm not ... magic hands guy doesn't think I am) and is making me take the world's stupidest lab test once more just for kicks and giggles, apparently. Ugh. But of course I'm obeying and doing it, because what if I AM going to die? I mean I want to be careful ...

So let's just all hope that Baby B makes his glorious appearance sooner than later, and by sooner I mean tonight. I just had a really great nap and have a lot of energy, so tonight would be dandy.

Energy ... but from whence?

I woke up this morning at 4 a.m. wishing I could go back to sleep ... by 5 a.m. I was all sorts of awake and by 5:30 a.m. I got out of bed. And emptied the dishwasher. And made muffins. And actually felt good and alive.

It reminded me of the days that I did that on PURPOSE (yes, those existed!). And it felt soooooo good ... I'd totally forgotten what it felt like to actually have a little energy.

Which brings us to: why the energy? Dare I hope this is that sudden burst of energy before evicting the mini human some people talk about? Hm .... I'm not getting my hopes up.

(But the muffins ARE delicious).
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I used my early morning energy to take pictures of the baby's room for you all. I've given up hope that it will ever be really picked up before the baby comes. I'm simply not in there enough to care and Luke still leaves his Army stuff on the floor. This will change, just not right now. Anyway, photos for you:

(you can see the army crap in the mirror ... and on the baby changing table). I love our green wall!
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Doctor appointment at 11 a.m. so I'll find out if I'm crazy about this baby thing or not. If not: baby! If crazy: wedding tomorrow up in Seattle land.

One Week Left

Ok, so I'm a little early with this post, since technically that one week starts tomorrow ... right? Or maybe it's one week including tomorrow? ... whatever. Close enough.

My point: I have one week left until the actual due date. And technically the baby could be coming at anytime .. any time in the last seven days or anytime in the next, oh, three weeks (boo!).

People ... and I really just mean person ... have called me "cranky." OK, fine, maybe it's true. Everyday is a little more uncomfortable than the day before. And I have this overwhelming need to get him OUT. Right now.

I know I should be "enjoying" my last days of decent sleep and childlessness ... but it's hard. I mean, I've been all sorts of excited about this for the past 9ish months so I'm obviously tired of waiting for it to get here.

I keep reminding myself, though, that I'm really not the person to be deciding when the perfect for the baby to be born is. That's a God job and I am (obviously) not God.

Just to check and make for sure I'm not God, I tried to create a mountain last night. It did not work out. I'm therefore absolutely positive that I am not the Almighty and therefore shouldn't be making decisions about these things at all.

It's just being patient for the actual God to decide it's time that's really hard for me. We all know I'm not the most patient person ever ... (hahahahaha whoa I don't even know if I will ever be patient at all!) sigh. God? ...
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Made Luke a ham tonight. ... that's awesome except he's not here to eat it. Maybe he'll be home by 7:30 or so. Who knows. Obviously the Army has no problem with 14 hour work days. My poor boy. He worked 15 plus hours yesterday. And on his four day weekend? Yup, worked some of that, too.

Hopefully we'll be finding out soon when exactly he's deploying. I will be WAY sad if he's deploying middle of next month and working all of these hours ... the other, more likely, option is deployment at the end of July. In that case I will NOT be upset. I will be happy. (Just so you know).
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Went shopping today at Goodwill for Patsy's birthday gift (I know, so awesome that I can buy her a bday gift at Goodwill) and ended up with some more baby clothes and some Luke clothes. Also hit up Joes, which is going out of business, and got the CUTEST pair of baby crocs! Oh man. So great.

Some pictures

A few pictures from Victoria and... other stuff.








In other news, in our quest to get the baby out, Luke has been looking for devices. ... scary looking things that he think may help later.

He found this one:
That's um ... disgusting. And REALLY scary.

Also, I'm very excited because today I went to Walgreens and got this:


Believe it or not, that's just under $70 worth of stuff. I know, crazy.

What's awesome, though, is how much I paid for it -- about $27. That's about the worth of the three or four things I needed that I did not have coupons for and could not wait to get .. (tums, etc.) ... so I feel pretty great about it :-). Go me!

Rainy Days and Sundays ...

... And, let's be honest, probably Monday too. It's Seattle area folks. What did you expect?

I am really not patient. I mean, that's not news, but it's worth stating again. The real problem here is that some doctor I've never seen again told me six weeks ago that I would be induced at week 37ish ... and that was a week and a half ago ... so now I feel like I'm WAY past where I'm supposed to be. Which I'm not. But still.

I have to ask myself, though, what kind of a person I am if I am really this impatient about having a baby. Back in the day, and by "day" I mean, oh, around 10 months ago, when i was praying about whether or not now was a good time to have a kid, I told God I want to be a "living sacrifice." That's right -- straight out of Romans for ya.

Do living sacrifices spend this much time complaining? I mean, being a sacrifice isn't easy .. but you'd think they complain only if it was forced upon them. This bit I'm in is one that I "presented myself" for, if you will. Am I allowed to think it sucks? Am I allowed to ask God to make it stop ASAP?

I pray a lot about the whole having a baby thing.... and by pray a lot I mean ask God to make it end. Now. This morning the verse in Psalm 13 jumped into my head: "How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?"

That may seem kind of comical and dramatic, but the truth is that is exactly how I feel ... that this will NEVER end and that God has basically forgotten to make the human come out. I feel completely alone in this ... sigh.

So, dramatic though it is ...

How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?

Ok, God. When??

Food Therapy

Another doctor appointment today where he said things like "there are five things we look for to figure out how soon he's likely to be born -- you basically have none of them," and "probably no baby this week."

And it wasnt just magic xray hand this week .. he did an actual exam to prove his point. Sigh.

I don't know why this depresses me so much. I mean I know .. I KNOW ... he has to come out sometime. But I really wanted it to be today. I mean, it's raining. Luke is off (except that he is currently at work. Technicality). I have nothing better to do. And I'm really just tired of being pregnant.

On my way home from the appointment I stopped at the commissary to buy things for easter dinner (we are joining friends from our church small group) and ended up buying everything that looked delicious as a means of consoling myself -- including iced oatmeal cookies, iced animal cookies, Ben and Jerrys, poptarts ... you get the idea -- and proceeded to eat a truly impressive amount of animal cookies on the ride home.

And now I feel sick. But a little happier, all told. Probably the sugar.

Excuse me baby ... please come out now.

Will Strip For Safety

Two absolutely beautiful days in Washington land. These are the kind of days that remind me WHY I like living here ... because sometimes it is really nice outside!

Obviously having a baby on a nice day would be silly. Birthing really is a good rainy day activity, I think. So I didn't bother having the baby today or yesterday ... tomorrow is supposed to be cloudy but I have a hair cut and a final pre-baby massage, so obviously those are important and I don't want to do it then either. Thursday, however, it is supposed to rain, so that would be good.

The glorious weather warranted as much outside time as possible. These days don't come to us that often! Yesterday I walked about four miles with Abigail. Walking is supposed to help get the baby out (on Thursday, not tomorrow, like I said). And today we opted to sit in the sun and make a mostly futile attempt at tanning. Sitting does NOT help the baby get out, but if sure feels good.

We chose to sit in a lovely, sunny spot in Dupont, outside Forza which gave me the opportunity to drink a delicious frappe with way too many calories. Let's go over the good and bad points of this decision.

Good points:
-- Sunny and warm
-- Delicious beverages
-- Right under a speaker playing mostly excellent music. I'm not sitting in my house reliving the Dashboard Confessional days as a result (more about that in a minute).

Bad points:
-- High calories in that delicious beverage
-- Nature

I really want to focus on this last point because it provided what is likely the most entertaining moment of the month (the month is young, but still, this was fantastic).

There we were, sitting, minding our own business, when a Giant Wasp decided Abigail's shirt was the best possible landing spot. And if the shirt was great, well then obviously the INSIDE of the shirt was even better.

And THAT is how Abigail ended up with a bee/wasp IN her bra and ALMOST ended up stripping in full view of, well, everyone ... for safety.

The truth is that at times like that you don't really think about the fact that you're in full view of everyone, including a certain company commander of our acquaintance (and, more importantly, our husbands'), with a perfect vantage point from inside the coffee shop. You don't think about the fact that taking off your shirts is perhaps a BAD idea ... you just think about getting the wasp OUT of your shirt before it leaves bites in a very inconvenient place.

Fortunatly before the stripping (for safety!!) happened the little bugger made it's way out of the offending area.

But ... whoa. That was close. ...

At which point what was likely a relatively small bird splatted a REALLY big poop on the ground not so far from us. That totally could've been on my head.

And that, friends, is the danger of being all out in nature -- even if that nature is within five feet of a coffee house. This is soooo why I don't go camping. Stripping for safety, even in the woods, is discouraged.
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Good point of the coffee house was the fabulous music they were playing. I don't know who put that together (ok, there was an overuse of Straylight Run, who I love, but not THAT much), but it was fabulous. And it got me thinking.

I have these incredibly great memories of listening to really good music with my dad while driving to church when I was, oh, about 6-years-old. And that music still makes me smile (and it helps that it wasn't terrible so I'm not embarsssed to be all "I love this song!").

I need to intentionally shape the musical memories I give Baby B. Will he grow up thinking his mom has/had good music taste? I am not embarassed that I love LOVE the Shins and Coldplay and ... etc. Will those artists still make him smile when he's 20-odd years old and I have way more wrinkles than I'd care to think about now? ....

Blender Problems and Giant Humans

Two doctor appointments last week: ultrasound and check up.

The ultrasound was nice ... got to see the kid ... until the tech said, and I quote:

"Looks like he's about 7 lbs 9 oz."

Wait, what? Let's all remember he isn't technically due until April 23. That's three weeks from when she said that. And he's ALREADY 7.5 lbs?!

And then I went to the doctor who did not actually look at anything except the outside of my stomach. He used what I call "the magic hands" to feel over the pregnant belly for a few seconds and then, in the saddest part of the day ...

"I don't see this baby being born in the next week."

Noooo .....

Fortunately he did seem mildly concerned that the baby is the size of a five year old before even being born. Next week he will do more than just magic hands and check out the actual situation down there to see about getting this kid OUT asap. Holy mother ....

Oh, and did I mention I gained 7 lbs in the last week? ONE WEEK! How is that even possible?!
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In an effort to be preemptively healthier (I say that because the real diet starts the moment baby comes out) I decided to eat a delicious healthy smoothie for dinner.

At which point my blender suddenly stopped working. With half blended smoothie in it. Awesome.

Exactly How Much WOULD You Pay?

At this point in time I don't think you could pay me enough to EVER be pregnant again.

I know I complain a lot about being pregnant, and honestly I don't think I've had that rough of a pregnancy, compared to some. I think I just complain more than others and have you all fooled about how bad it really has been.

If this is "not that bad," then, I feel like there must be people much more sacrificial than I out there repopulating the earth. Because this is NOT comfortable, NOT fun and NOT something I want to do ever again. Let me name the reasons it sucks ... and ignore the occasional over share.

-- Heartburn from eating any chocolate, anything tomato based, anything high in acid (think OJ, lemonaide, etc.), anything with a strong broth base, and more ... frequently heartburn for no reason at all, for the last six plus months.
-- Gaining at least 25 lbs -- and thats WITH gym visits almost everyday for the many of the months
-- Stretch marks
-- Excruciating hemorrhoids so bad they needed minor surgery ... and p.s. they still hurt, just not as much all of the time.
-- Over 18 hours total spent in triage at the hospital per the instructions of the doctor for what appears to have been no reason at all
-- Zero energy to do anything most of the time
-- Back pain, ankle pain, abdominal pain ... pain in general
-- Feeling like barfing at the smell of food in general for 3.5 months ... made me want to curl up and die
-- Feeling like barfing at the smell of certain foods for the remaining 6 months

I could go on. ... this kid had BETTER be worth it. If willpower made children be born, I would so not be pregnant anymore. Pleeeeeeeease God make it come out!
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I was supposed to bring muffins to PWOC this morning, only after yesterday's "I want to die" experience I bailed. When the pain killers aren't killing anything and you have what amounts to a portion of the stomach flu at the same time... you kind of kill plans.

The result: 12 ... ok fine, less than 12 now, muffins that need a stomach to live in. Mmmmm.
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Before the evil hit yesterday afternoon I cleaned the baby's room, well, started to at least. It always seems to somehow get filthy again, mostly because it's the place both Luke and I throw stuff that we dont want to deal with. And then ... it doesnt get dealt with and simply stacks up. Awesome.

I also packed my new diaper bag yesterday (Luke: "with what?" Me: "with diapers!") .. so that's done ... and found a home for the very large stack of diapers I've been stocking up over the last few months (solution: Abigail's garage. Excellent!).

To do: figuring out a way to get the baby out NOW.