41+3

Soooo... still pregnant! Ok then!

A few days ago, I had several hours of light but regular contractions, once every 7 minutes. I am supposed to call the midwives when I have painful contractions once every 5-10 minutes, so that was sort of a confusing state to be in. I decided to send Mateo to my parents', just in case, and then wait the night out. I was in for a long evening, as the contractions made sleeping difficult and the possible excitement made it even more so. However, I eventually fell asleep and woke up at 5 am, experiencing the same contractions once every 10 minutes. Eventually, they spaced back out to their once every 20-60 minute holding pattern I have been in for about a week.

The physical side effects of that were less bothersome than the emotional ones, because I was super excited that maybe it was going to be the big day. Turns out that was wrong (all wrong!) and so now, here we are again, back in the waiting game.

Yesterday was my 41+ week appointment, and I learned a few things.
1) Everything looks great, except that I am supposed to have a baby outside of my body instead of inside of it. Small detail. Otherwise, baby and mama are doing fine
2) I have not gained a pound since 36 or 37 weeks, which means that this baby has had somewhere between 4 to 5 weeks' worth of packing on the pounds to indulge in. I figured my caloric intake has just gone straight to him, and now I am worried we have a big fella on our hands.
3) I am still no further progressed than I was at my previous appointment, which sort of makes me want to gauge my eyes out.

But the key piece of information that I learned is that the midwives won't let me go past 42 weeks, so that means there will be an induction if my body doesn't get its act together shortly. So... there is an end in sight. I have really, really, really wanted to avoid an induction with this baby, mainly because I don't know if it will be my last or not and I would like to have the experience of going into labor on my own. I also would like to attempt a waterbirth, and I know from experience that the pitocin is so brutal that I may not be able to make that happen if I get induced. So. Blargh. I have a few more days to go and I hope he decides to come out and say hi.

In an attempt to get things moving, the midwife stripped my membranes yesterday. I had never had that done before, and was told it was pretty excruciating, but it honestly didn't hurt me. However, I went home and immediately started experiencing really horrible, awful, bad, terrible cramping in my abdomen and lower back. I also started having real, genuine contractions that I was having a hard time talking/moving through. The frightening thing about yesterday was that the cramping was so severe that I had a hard time recognizing what was a contraction until it was really at its peak, because I was in so much pain at baseline already. Jeff was asking if I thought this could be the beginning of labor, and maybe we should start timing the contractions, and I honestly freaked out and had a little panic attack. It occurred to me that I was going to have to be the one to make the call as to whether or not my parents should come get Mateo and/or we should head to the hospital. I honestly had no idea, because the pain was unrelenting and I didn't know what to make of it. I ended up just crying for a short spell while Jeff put Mateo to bed, and then I pacedthe house for a bit.

After about an hour of horrible, awful pain, it finally subsided. I am back to the more comfortable cramping and lower back pain that I experienced just after the sweep. Apparently, sweeping the membranes doesn't always work, and we should know if it did within 24-48 hours. It has now been 24 hours...

I'm hoping the universe works in my favor and gets this baby in my arms soon. This has been a long wait, and the last few days have been sort of tortuous with all these fake-outs and what not. The good news is that I woke up feeling energized this morning, and I am just so grateful to have gotten a good night's sleep after spending the entire day in some form of pain yesterday.

Next appointment is on Friday, if we make it that far, at which point we will schedule an induction. Fingers crossed, fingers crossed...