BrooklynGirl

Tempus Fugit

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the induction possibility--lots of interesting food for thought.  To be clear, the induction is being considered because of the Factor V, a type of thrombophilia with which I was diagnosed last fall.  This particular mutation means that I have a greater proclivity towards producing unwelcome blood clots, especially during pregnancy when blood volume goes up, and especially in the vascular nirvana that is the placenta.  I've been dosing myself with heparin twice daily to stave off this possibility, but at some point, apparently the clots become inevitable, and so before that happens, the doctor wants to make a break for it. 

It makes sense--it's just the potential soon-ness of it all that's mind blowing. 

In the meantime, we've kicked preparation up a notch.  The room is not only painted, but also contains a crib, a dresser, and a changing pad.  There is a car seat in the house (if not the car).

We took a newborn care class earlier this week that freaked us both right out.  I felt much more confident as a potential parent when I arrived than when I left, which I don't think is the way it's supposed to work.   We spent an inordinately long time talking about how one picks up a baby--something it hadn't even occurred to me to worry about.  And let's not even talk about the swaddling.  There should be Ph.D. programs in Swaddology.  And they shouldn't admit me.

How Much Intervention Is Too Much?

If you read this blog regularly, you know that I am a fan of medical intervention in general and for this birth in particular.*  As I see it, Mother Nature had plenty of time to dazzle me with her omnipotence in the getting me pregnant and keeping me pregnant departments, but Her track record in that regard is not so good.  So, in doctors, nurses,  and hospitals I trust. 

Not that the high intervention care has been perfect, mind you, but it has at least been...scrutable.  If I don't understand something the doctors/nurses are doing, I can ask questions and get answers.  Mother Nature has been a little less responsive. 

But here's the issue: from very early, my OB and my hematologist told me that they would not have me go past my due date.  Factor V carries with it some nasty birth-related risks that we'd all like to avoid, but we never talked specifically about what not going past my due date entailed.

Until today.

When my OB said she was thinking about induction.  At 38 weeks.  Or 2 weeks from now. 

Factor V stuff aside, I have to say that induction has its appeal: it would be nice to put aside some of those night terrors.  The baby would be here, actually here, instead of in the limbo we have now.

But induction 2 full weeks early?  I need some time to cogitate on that.  We'll decide next week, after an ultrasound and some gnashing of teeth.

Holy shit.

*Disclaimer: these are my choices for me--I in no way believe that this philosophy is appropriate for everyone.

Night Terrors

Despite the kick ass air conditioner in the bedroom, I'm not sleeping well.  There is a comfort issue, but more than that, I tend to wake up at 3:34 am with my mind racing.  Generally I'm obsessing about one of the following issues:

• Stillbirth
• Congenital kidney abnormalities (because of the SUA)
• Vaginal delivery
• C-section
• Having my water break in a public place, like say, the subway
• Going into labor spontaneously
• Not going into labor spontaneously
• The soap scum that will not come off the shower doors
• Figuring out when my family will come visit
• Being a terrible mother
• Going back to work
• Danae
• Not going out to drink too many margaritas and coming home to have loud, sloppy sex for a long, long time
• The Yankees' pitching rotation
• Breastfeeding
• The fickle wireless router
• $$$$$
• Karl Rove
• Answering the question "Where do babies come from?"
• The weather--is this global warming or what?
• Grocery shopping in NYC with an infant
• College tuition
• Adama, Starbuck, and the Arrow of Apollo
• (That including the preceding items makes me the biggest nerd of all time)
• Gefilte
• John G. Roberts

And you?

Okay, Maybe It Is The Heat....

It's apparently much less humid today--you can't actually see the air--but I'll tell ya, I don't actually feel that much better.  It serves me right to try and get all meteorological on the weather's ass....

*****

I survived my first internal exam today: my cervix is soft but not dilated or effaced.  The baby is head down, but in occiput posterior position, which means that the kid's back is facing my back instead of the other way around.  There's lots of time for that to change, and my OB gave me some stretches to do to facilitate that.

[If you've got some time on your hands, try Googling "occiput posterior" + "back labor" (my favorite: "Nothing can prepare a mother for the severe unremitting pain that accompanies labor when the baby is in a posterior position").  And let's not even discuss "occiput posterior" + "sphincter laceration."  I'm not seriously worried about this yet--just making conversation. ]

I asked the OB to explain Braxton-Hicks contractions for me because I didn't think I'd been having any, and she sort of laughed and said I'd had some BH contractions during her exam.  She could feel them.  Huh.  So, she explained what I should be feeling, but I'll be damned if I can figure it out.

35 weeks tomorrow.

It's Not the Heat....

My God, can we talk about the humidity?  In the greater NYC area, it's like there's no air--or if there is air, it's so thick you need to grate it into tiny bits before you try to breathe it. 

Yet somehow, the weather guys don't quite get this.  They report the weather as "84 degrees and humid," which almost sounds reasonable.  They should say "It's 84 degrees out, but unbelievably humid and if you're out in it for any length of time, you need to reexamine your priorities."   I'm just saying.

All hail the inventor of air conditioning.

Medically Speaking

I go to the doctor a lot: once a week for NSTs, plus occasional visits to the OB (after the next appointment, these too will be weekly), the hematologist, the ultrasound techs, etc.  Though the hospital where most of these appointments occur is rather inconvenient, the fact is that I'm happy to go--even if the appointment yields less than exciting news (like the SUA they somehow neglected to mention earlier, say).  I feel calm at the hospital.  I feel safe.

I'm not sure exactly why I have this confidence in the hospital--I just know that I do.  It's not that the staff has been 100% foolproof because of course they haven't.  There was the progesterone problem they never really understood, the subchorionic hemorrhage the RE didn't see, the 20-week ultrasound that took 3 visits to complete, and of course that whole "unexplained" infertility thing.  Mistakes happen.  Doctors aren't infallible.  I know this. 

And I do do my fair share of second guessing.  As a graduate of Google Upstairs Medical College, I spend a lot of time doing research...and jumping to (often unnecessarily) scary conclusions.  Yet, overall, I trust my doctors and hospital.  I do what they tell me.  I might ask them to explain why, but generally speaking, I follow orders.

But lately, I've encountered a lot of women who don't follow orders--and who seem to think that those who do are merely pawns in the medical system.  For example, these women question why everyone admitted to labor and delivery at my hospital gets an IV and can only eat ice chips and clear liquids.  "There's no way I'm getting an IV," they muttered under their breath at the hospital tour, as they plotted with their husbands about how to sneak in food to eat during labor.

And I have to say, I don't get it.  I mean, I understand that some people don't want to follow these rules.  There's lots of evidence that women should eat during labor to maintain their energy levels, but this hospital doesn't subscribe to that particular theory and is more worried about the potential threat of aspiration should general anesthesia be necessary.  So no food it is.  Since I am more concerned about aspirating during emergency surgery than being hungry during labor, this rule works for me.

But if you really don't like the rules, then why not pick a different medical option--another hospital, a birthing center, a home birth?  Going to a high-intervention hospital and expecting low-intervention treatment seems a little like going to a French restaurant and ordering Eggplant Parmigiana.  Or am I missing something?

I'm Baaaaaaaaaaaack!

...and on a sporty new laptop to boot.  Ain't life grand?

I had been a little concerned about how my last post would be received.  I was worried that I was maybe minimizing someone else's feelings, which was not, of course, my intention.  Thanks for getting what I was trying to say. 

Also, about 24 hours after posting, I proved myself to be a hypocrite by having one of those doctor's appointments--or series of appointments--in which I experienced all the things Karen had talked about: I had the reassuring NST with plenty of unprompted heart rate accelerations; I had the ultrasound where the kid did some unbearably cute waving and kicking that I could actually see; and it was all accompanied by lots of fetal movement, as though the kid had read my post and knew that more reassurance was required.   

This being me, of course, I couldn't bask in the glow of all this miraculousness without having at least one thing to freak out about, and this is it: apparently I have a two-vessel umbilical cord, also known as a single umbilical artery.  They have known this for some time, but did not feel it was "clinically significant" so no one bothered to mention it.  They feel the biggest risk is IUGR, but since the estimated fetal weight was 4 lbs., 12 oz. at 33 weeks, they are not concerned at the moment.

Until I got back online, I wasn't particularly concerned either, but now that I've Googled the shit out of this particular anomaly, I have to admit that I'm perturbed.  I'm not going to post the links to the scary stuff here, but suffice it say there is scary stuff--and though none of that scary stuff has been suggested by any of the ultrasounds to date, that doesn't mean it's not there.   Once again, it's always something....

Very Superstitious

We spent the holiday weekend painting.  Or more specifically, my husband painted while I "supervised"--on account of the fumes, of course, not the unrelenting laziness.  We are still somewhat unresolved about what to call the room that was painted.  Sometimes it is the "small bedroom;" sometimes it is the "other bedroom;" and sometimes it is just "the room." 

I thought I might have grown out of the superstition by now, but no, it's still there.  It's different now, and less understandable to others, I think.  This weekend we had dinner with some friends who were chattering away about whether we had picked names (no), thought about child care (not really), decided when my parents would come visit (no), or bought a lot of baby clothes (not a single outfit).  None of this crew has kids, but it seemed clear that we were fast becoming a model for completely unprepared parenthood. 

I wanted to explain that there were some things I was constitutionally unprepared to do until the kid was actually here.  There is a part of me that doesn't believe this can really happen. 

Karen posted recently (eloquently as always) about her feelings towards pregnant women, and I have to say that I was jealous of the pregnant women she described too:   

I am jealous that these women get to carry their child with them wherever they go. When they doubt that she exists, they can touch their growing bellies. When they need reassurance, they can hear a heartbeat. When they want a picture, they can have their doctor print one out. There, there is the baby, nestled safely, with them. They have living proof.

Yes, I do have the moments of reassurance when I feel a kick or a squirm, and I breathe a sigh of relief, but I also have the moments of sheer terror when I wonder when I felt the last kick or squirm.  Was it an hour ago?  Two hours ago?  Last night?   

And yes, I do hear the heartbeat at the weekly NSTs, but just last week there was the new doctor who couldn't find the heartbeat and insisted on making small talk with me as she moved the receiver across my belly and shaved several years off my life trying to find it.

Finally, yes, there are ultrasound pictures, but the experience of obtaining them was, I have to say, traumatic.   

Maybe I'm ungrateful not to find solace in these things.  Maybe I'm paranoid.  Maybe I'm plain crazy.  These are all possibilities.   But I think we're all "playing mom" until we hold a child in our arms.  And maybe even then.  Maybe especially then.

P.S.  The new computer's not here yet.  Praise be for air conditioned Internet cafes.