Hey Hey Hey blog friends!
I of course stayed home yesterday because I was up all night with random contractions and I had a doctor’s appointment so I just didn’t even attempt it.
Contractions
Contractions are horrible. They feel like you are holding the biggest bowl movement and having menstrual cramps all at the same time. They also come on randomly and I break out in a sweat and try really hard to stop breathing and not move because I think it helps, which every book says it doesn’t. Apparently no one remembers their first stage of labor contractions being this bad-but as I told my doctor yesterday, you might as well write “Big fucking whiner” on my chart now because I have zero tolerance for pain.
The scariest ones are the ones when I’m walking, they just hit all of the sudden and I’m usually walking around people and I don’t know what to do and I don’t want to freak people out by doing what I would do if I’m at home which is start clutching my lady bits and huffing and trying to curl into a ball. So I pretend to lean against a wall and talk on my cell phone.
The next scariest ones are at night because they wake you up in a panic and it takes you a minute to figure out what’s going on.
After that the sitting ones are okay, although yesterday I was waiting in the doctor’s office with no pants on and peed on the table a little bit when I had one.
Speaking of the doctor’s appointment
So I’m at 1 centimeter and 25% effaced. basically moving along slowly. Nothing to get excited about here. For those of you not down with the pregnancy terms, you have to dilate to 10 centimeters to push and you have to be 100% effaced. Dilation is how much your cervix opens and effacement is how thin your cervix is (when it is thinned all the way your water breaks, usually). Needless to say I was disappointed because of all these contractions, I really didn’t think it could get more painful, just more frequent. Hopefully she keeps moving along though.
I probably ended a med student’s career yesterday. We didn’t have our normal doctor, we had the backup doctor again. The nurse said she had a med student and it was male and was it okay if he came in. Now usually they threaten this all the time with my normal doctor, but my normal doctor knows I scare people and say inappropriate things when I’m uncomfortable so she usually doesn’t ever bring the med students in, just threatens it. Since I didn’t have my normal doctor, in came the med student. He was the most effeminate dude I had met. He talked very softly and smacked his words. He came in to do the “interview” and literally, the first thing he asked was “So how (smack) is it going?” I was like “Um, well I’m hugely pregnant” and he goes “(smack) okay and how’s that going for you (smack)?” and I looked at my husband and did wide eyes like “can you believe this is happening right now?”and then he did wide eyes back and shook his head like “don’t you dare say anything weird!” and so I looked at the med student and went-“Um, did you even look at my file before you came in here?, I have everything wrong with this pregnancy…” to which he replied “oh (smack) well (smack) sometimes the files are hard to interpret, so why don’t you just give me a list (smack)”
Seriously, he wants me to give him a mothertrucking list of things wrong with my pregnancy? So down the line we went, and he pretended to know what I was talking about, which it was obvious he didn’t. I showed him my diabetes log and he smacked his words and nodded. Finally after about 20 minutes he said he was going to go report to the doctor.
You know I complain a lot about being left alone in that room for 20 minutes before you actually get to see the doctor, but if this is the alternative, I’ll just wait it out alone, alright?
So the doctor comes in and by the way I have no pants on and just a sheet over my bottom because they are going to check me, and as I said before while I was waiting I had a contraction and peed on the bed a little bit. So the doctor comes in, the backup doctor, and she hasn’t really read my file either. And she bitched about us asking her to fill out FMLA paperwork, even though she is actually the doctor on file with our insurance (they bill under her name) so she would have to fill it out anyway. So then she starts checking me out, asking me the same, but more relevant questions about the stage in my pregnancy, she asks me to describe the contractions because apparently she didn’t really think I knew what I was talking about, but I did, and then she believed me about them.
Then she said that we were going to do a test, and I’m sorry but I can’t remember the name of it, but I had read about it and thought maybe it was just going to be a blood test. Something about how you can test positive on this and it means you have it and it’s okay if you have it but it’s bad for the baby so when you go into labor you get a special medicine to keep the baby from having it. It’s something like strepoccauous B positive or something like that. Anyway it’s not a blood test, it’s a swab test. So then I think, oh okay it’s going to be like a pap smear. Nope. She swabs my “perineum” (the skin between your lady bits and your rear end hole) and then she puts the swab in my butthole real quick. So of course I jump and go, “hey you can tell a person before you sneak up on them like that lady, this isn’t college and you aren’t drunk”. And Seth shook his head in shame.
Next she asked the med student if he measured me and he said no because apparently this is his first day on the gynie squad or something. And my backup doctor is visibly annoyed with him. So she gets the tape and starts to show him (and you can tell that it was like the fifth time today she showed him) and she makes a comment about how low my pelvis bone is and at this point I just want to get the whole uncomfortable experience over with. She keeps trying to have him feel where my bone is but keep me modestly covered and apparently his lady hands didn’t get it so I rip down the sheet so he can feel properly. My husband seriously considered jumping out the window at this point.
Next they wanted to check my status. This is what I was looking forward to, I wanted them to be like-okay you are ready, let’s go to the hospital! And then I could do the part I’ve been dreading and this would be over. Backup doctor gets up in my lady bits and I mean CLEAR UP in my lady bits and feels around and goes “okay you are about 1 cm and 25% effaced. You are moving along” and I seriously almost started crying. Then she asks if med student can check. I’m like yeah whatever, because I grew up in military hospitals and it wasn’t a doctor’s office experience unless five different people check you out and I’m all for the learning. So ladyman med student gloves and lubes up and barely puts the tips of his fingers inside me. Then he pretends that he can feel what the doctor did. I’m so frustrated at this point I go, “yeah you are lying because she was clear up here” and then I reach between my legs and shoved his hand up there further. And he goes “Oh, oh okay I feel now” and my husband ran away screaming with his arms over his head. Not really but I know he wanted to. I could see it in his horrified eyes.
The backup doctor laughed though.
It was weird because when they were feeling on her head and stuff, which was right behind my cervix I could tell they were. Then Evie got mad because she was tired of being jacked with.
They looked like they were packing it up and I said, what about her heartbeat? So they let med student do it while backup doctor observed, and by observed I mean she yelled at him some more for emptying half a bottle of lube on my stomach.
I thought her heartbeat sounded fast, but they said it was because they were pushing on her and stuff.
Needless to say I miss my doctor. But I have no more scheduled appointments with backup doctor. So that’s good. Of course I only have three more weeks to go, which is terrifying and exciting all at once. It’s terriciting.
Here’s something fun they don’t tell you, at this stage in the game, after internal exams or sex, you bleed. Which we all know, the last thing I like seeing is blood down there, since I spent the first trimester crying over blood in my underpants. So just an FYI.
Nesting?
I got home and immediately went into Evie’s room and started freaking out. When I realized that my husband couldn’t help me as much as I wanted, I called my Mom and arranged for her to come over Saturday and bring my brother and hopefully my mom will help me organize (if I get the armoire back Friday) and put away her clothes and pack my hospital bags. And also clean my bathrooms and kitchen because I can’t get on my knees to clean it and it is making me sick. Seth is taking off work on Friday to hopefully get some stuff finished around the house because like backup doctor said, it could be any day or weeks from now, and I refuse to be caught off guard.
Baby stuff is confusing
Last night we took out all the bottles sets we got and were going to wash them but then I got tired so I just separated all the pieces into piles. We are using Dr. Brown’s bottles at the suggestion of some lovely blog readers. Those things are freaking complicated! Every bottle has like 45 pieces and it all needs to be washed. And the nipples have to be boiled for three minutes. I couldn’t figure out what the plastic disc was for (apparently it’s to keep the nipple on the bottle and travel with the bottle) when they had given us “storing” lids. Seth figured it out though, and he even got the bottle back together when I had taken it apart. It’s good to be married to an engineer.
Then we got out my breast pump because next Wednesday I have that class and my mom is going with me because I think Seth needs a break. But he was all into the actual machine and figuring out how it worked and dinking around with all the pieces. Ahh engineers. He made it fun though and cracked me up and made it a little less scary. What a good man I have.
Work
Work is on and off right now, depending how many contractions I have in a night and how much sleep I get depends on if I go to work anymore. I’m pretty sure next week will be my last week, if not the following week. I’m trying to hold out as long as I can because Seth threatens to shut the cable off all the time. Stupid Cox, charging and assload for cable. Haven’t they seen the satellite commercials? And you know, long time customers should be rewarded for not jumping ship, not charged more every month. So anyway I’m here and there.
Tomorrow
Tomorrow I have my PT appointment in the morning and then I’m coming to work because my old group is throwing me a baby shower at work and then there is a mandatory meeting until four. I hope I last that long! Usually after a contraction I’m exhausted and nauseous and I don’t want to be at work anymore. Since my first one of the day (not counting the one at 3:41 this morning) was on my walk in, I almost just turned around and walked out. But tomorrow I have to be here, so I will be!
Peace out Peaches
Alright friends, I’d better get my work on. Maybe I will be back later, who knows?
Have a great day everyone!
Love (for this to be over already and my baby girl to be here),
Carrie
okay seriously. i choked on my coffee reading what you did to that poor newbie!! while you're on maternity leave, i would like for you to seriously consider writing somewhere professionally - you are so witty and people would LOVE to read what you have to say because you're so effing funny.
ReplyDeletelove you.