click here: http://thistlesworld.blogspot.com
there are new postings every weekday at our new location! this blog will not be updated again. see you at the link above!
announcement: this blog is moving!
hey all! I’ve heard from a number of you that you’d prefer a blog that allows commenting, which tumblr does not, so I’ve moved this blog to blogspot. please update your links as all new posts will appear only on the clickable blogspot location above (http://thistlesworld.blogspot.com).
xox, Leila
yesterday was a nice, but tiring, day. I had a prenatal visit and also saw my acupuncturist. I even managed to get to prenatal yoga class before my morning was over. in the afternoon I took Carter to therapy and then we went to get him a haircut at this adorable kid’s place near the Mission Street Safeway. we waited over an hour but it didn’t seem to matter because there were so many cool toys to play with. during his haircut Carter watched Tom and Jerry and it was fun to hear him laugh at loud during the parts he thought were funny. a sweet kid moment in the middle of a rather peaceful afternoon. I realized how low-stress my life is these days—there are things that have to get done but it’s not like grading papers or preparing for a lecture.
as far as the medical stuff, everything seems to be fine. the midwife checked the baby’s heartbeat (fine), my blood pressure and urine (fine), the size of my belly and my weight (fine, although terrifying to me), and my dilation and effacement. that was pretty interesting—I asked about having an internal exam, and she explained that they don’t routinely do them since they aren’t very predictive of labor. she said I could be 2 cm dilated for weeks without entering labor or neither dilated nor effaced and go into labor three hours later. still, I was curious, so she did a quick check. I’m effaced (she didn’t say how much) but not yet dilated, and the baby’s head isn’t fully “engaged,” though she is pointing downward and, according to the midwife, unlikely to turn.
the midwife was a bit concerned about the baby’s position, however—while her head is down and her butt is up and centered, her spine is curving over to the left of my uterus. hands and knees position and child’s pose could help her move a bit, in the midwife’s opinion, but since I do those poses so often in my daily life I’m not so sure. I’ll keep trying and I’ll certainly keep swimming, which may also help. we also talked about what would happen if we went past 42 weeks. Gavin and I would like to avoid pitocin if possible, and luckily the midwife said we could sign an “AMA” (Against Medical Advice) and go longer than 42 weeks if we wanted to (and of course, we wouldn’t make that choice if the baby were in any kind of danger). she also said that we could use acupuncture and sex to encourage the baby’s arrival. why is it that sex prescribed by your caregiver just doesn’t sound as much fun?
later that day, my acupuncturist tried more points for both my dizziness and for encouraging my body to move toward labor. it was a very pleasant treatment and I fell asleep on the table until a contraction woke me up. I’m really happy to be getting treatment and it may be helping me manage the faintness quite a bit, because I certainly haven’t been getting worse. she also has me on a herbal formula for “strengthening the pulse” which I’m still a tiny bit nervous about for the baby. still, I’m trying to just have faith and rely on her expertise. it’s three natural and whole herbs including jinsing and two others I’m less familiar with. in her opinion, I should be taking these during labor also.
I spoke to my mother’s sister last night and she told me a bit about her three deliveries and we tried to remember more about my mother’s. it doesn’t sound like any of it was terrible for either of them, so that’s nice news. she also made me laugh by telling me about her fondness for “American Idol,” (!) and you know what they say about laughter. I have missed my mother terribly during this whole process and feel so lucky to have my aunt and my best friend’s mom who have been my surrogate mothers in so many ways since my mom’s death.
early this morning before Gavin got up for work, we were goofing around in bed when I got a little too close to the edge.. and fell off! I don’t think I really realize how heavy I am and how much my center of gravity has changed. there was a moment of suspended time when I realized I was going over and then there I was on the floor. we laughed so hard I was worried we’d wake Carter. luckily for me, I did not fall on Astro (our german shepard who sleeps on one side of the bed), Thistle (I landed on my outer hip), or any of the various pieces of furniture (chest of drawers, side table, bed frame) nearby. our bed is actually quite low to the floor and my hip landed miraculously on an edge of Astro’s dog bed that she wasn’t using. but I scared Astro so much that she jumped on the bed, cuddled up with us, and started shaking. poor little thing.
almost exactly three years ago, an important trip to Seattle coincided closely with the due date of a friend’s son. this friend had invited me to attend her baby’s birth, and I truly wanted to, but I knew that birth days are hard to predict. I went to Seattle for the weekend hopeful that I would not miss the big event, and indeed she went into labor as we boarded the plane to come home. I arrived in time to be part of the final twenty-four hours of labor and delivery, and at the end of it saw a sweet little boy come into the world.
a year and a half ago in January, Gavin and I were visiting Hawaii in what will probably turn out to be our last solo trip there. at the time, my best friend, who had relocated to our childhood home with her husband a few years before, was just about nine months pregnant. her due date was about a week after we had to leave to return to work and school, and we didn’t have any other trips planned for that year (it turned out we took Carter there in late May, but we couldn’t have predicted that then). I so wanted to meet her little baby before we left. I remember touching her belly and asking him to come out. the night before she went into labor we took her out for dinner at a Thai restaurant (yay spicy food!), and the next day while we were scuba diving we got the call. and so it was that before we left the islands we got to see the new addition to our extended family in his little hospital crib.
this Friday, Gavin’s parents are leaving for a few weeks overseas. they are excited to meet their latest granddaughter. I have been talking to her over the past few days, asking her to come a few days early: “come out, little girl, and meet your grandparents!” at this point, unless we go into labor today, it’s unlikely that they’ll get to see her before their return. so please send positive thoughts—it can’t hurt.
yesterday was a tough day. we hadn’t slept very much the night before, and we’d had a very busy (probably too busy) weekend, and so I spent much of the day yesterday taking a few steps and then stopping to rest or retreating back to bed. later in the afternoon I went to yoga and actually felt a lot better—I think the amount of time in vinyasa class spent with one’s head facing the floor really helps.
I saw my acupuncturist informally this morning (her son is in Carter’s class at school) and she reminded me that I should really take it easy. the baby’s birth could come at any time and if it’s right after a sleepless night it will no doubt be all the harder. this is good and sensible advice.
it is weird waiting for something you have no control over. I would love to use this time to get more done, but I’m having trouble doing much. I’m not really impatient or frustrated, just curious about how it will all go down. if I could wish for anything, it would be a good night’s sleep—I seem to only be able to get two hours at a time. so those of you who are sleeping normally, please have a good night’s sleep for me!
after last week’s email and post, a number of you wrote back and said things like this:
”i just hope the url is indicative of the final naming choice!”
an equal number countered with comments like this:
”A big sigh of relief when I read the last line of your blog.”
and one of you, whom I still haven’t forgiven, said this:
”you are totally caving on the name.”
the weekend went fine. I had a bad episode in a Target store (short errands with minimal standing are fine; longer errands that require walking through large stores seem not to be) and another in an art studio (possibly a combination of the chemicals and lower levels of oxygen), but other than that things seem fairly stable, health wise. I don’t feel like I’m progressing toward labor any time soon, but I’ll keep you posted. the worst thing is having feelings of faintness while I’m by myself—it’s scary not to have anyone around to help. but when Gavin’s there he literally pushes and pulls my whale weight up and down the street and up the stairs so I don’t have to carry so much—awesome!
lately I’ve been a bit in shock that there will very soon be a baby in our lives. I mean, you try to get pregnant, and then you wait a really long time for the baby to gestate, and then all of a sudden the baby could arrive at any moment! and that’s just nuts—you have no idea how to take care of a baby! it’s just totally surreal. but of course, exciting too.
hey all! I’m going to try to use this website over the next couple of weeks to post updates on my overall health, our imminent labor, and hopefully the baby’s arrival. I will even try to update the site when we eventually go into labor!
I’m trying this out because between sleeping so many hours of the day and being busy with various aspects of prenatal care, acupuncture, and baby preparation (not to mention everyday life!), it’s been hard to keep everyone individually posted about what’s going on. so if you’re interested, check back at your leisure—I’ll try to post a little bit every weekday. you’re also welcome to share this site with others who care—it’s going to be a bit too tedious for anyone who doesn’t know us personally, though.
here is the update/backstory: we became 37 weeks pregnant this past Tuesday, May 8th, which theoretically means the baby could come at any time between now and four and a half weeks from now (damn those first babies!). a few months ago, I started having health issues that made it more and more difficult to do physical things; eventually I stopped working and began resting more. today, my care team believes that the baby is just fine—she’s about 7 pounds and ready for birth at any time. however, I’ve been told to slow down a lot, avoid exerting myself, and try not to get into the situations that make me dizzy/faint/pass out. on Wednesday of this week I went in for acupuncture and felt a lot better afterward—in fact, two people told me that I looked better (unprovoked!). also, after a variety of in-hospital and out-patient testing and monitoring (blood work, ear-nose-throat, fetal monitoring, an echocardiogram, oxygen, testing for pre-eclampsia, etc.), the senior midwife in my practice basically agreed that it’s probably a mechanical problem (the uterus pressing more and more on the vena cava, thereby restricting blood and oxygen flow more and more as the baby gets heavier), which is nice because we’re finally all in agreement and can act accordingly.
so that’s the latest! sorry for the dry and technical post—I’ll try to liven things up a bit when I post on Monday.
p.s. we still don’t have a name for the baby—“Thistle” is just how we refer to her in utero.
