I had to go and see a new midwife at a different clinic because mine is on holiday so that was a bit of a faff not knowing her name or where to go but I soon figured it out.
She was much older than I expected, I'd guess late 50's, and her blonde/white short hair didn't do her any favours as even though it looked nice it's practically the modern blue rinse perm. She was quite plump too like many grannies are.
She was quite brisk and efficient too, unlike my usual chatterbox midwife. She had a nurse with her who did all the pee dipping, observations and note taking.
My pee was fine and my BP was fine.
The midwife was reading my notes and questioning my dates and my requirement for a sweep so early. I could feel my blood boiling slightly as she started splitting hairs about the consultant putting "term" in my notes when I was only 39+5 at most. I had to explain that I was supposed to have an induction at term and therefore my sweeps were booked for the week before and the consultant assured me that I'd be able to have one at today's appointment.
Eventually the midwife conceded but expressed her frustration by exclaiming that it's not going to work this early on because I won't be favourable, just to make me feel crap.
Why the fuck to they do that? Suddenly get all psychic just to foretell doom. They go on about how individual and different each and every pregnancy experience is whenever you want to know something specific, but you try to take control and obviously you're just wasting everyone's fucking time because of course they already know exactly how little you've progressed without even looking.
Before the sweep she measured my fundal height which was 38cm, the same as last time. She suggested she measured it differently to my usual midwife but my usual midwife had done them all and not just the last one. The last one saw me above the 90th percentile but this one (and all the previous ones) had me at 75th percentile so I reckon the last one was a blip.
She asked if baby was still moving and I told her that she was moving fine. She's still very active, the only difference being that it's more sliding movements and cervix stabs than tummy poking.
Then she felt for the baby's engagement (3/5) and position (cephalic L.O.L.) and seemed a bit confused. She took it for granted that the baby was head down but couldn't place the rest of her. She asked me and I told her what I thought, that her bum was high in the middle with her being frog legged either side and her spine going down the left/middle. She wasn't convinced though, I could tell, and she even asked if anyone had mentioned her being back to back which they haven't.
I have wondered if she is back to back sometimes, just because her legs protrude forward so much, but they felt the same during my last scan and she wasn't back to back. It does seem physically possible to me that she just has her legs spread to the extreme.
Anyway she checked the heartbeat down my left side (146 bpm) and then asked me to remove my lower garments for the sweep.
She asked me if I'd had an internal before which I said that I had but not during late pregnancy. There wasn't much point it elaborating that I've probably had more internal examinations than she has delivered babies.
I lay on the bed with a piece of tissue covering my muff and spread my legs while the midwife put some gloves on and maybe some gel but I didn't see.
Then she inserted her fingers and I braced myself for what I expected to be a rather uncomfortable experience. She very briefly felt around before spending literally 2 seconds... erm... fingering me and then withdrew her hand looking very pleased with herself.
She told me that she had been able to give me a very good sweep but I honestly didn't feel a thing.
Furthermore, my cervix was in the ideal position (anterior) and was fully effaced (thin) and she could easily get her finger in so I was 1cm+ dilated. I was much more favourable than she'd expected.
MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAA!
Not that I'm one to gloat or anything...
I got dressed and left soon afterwards and hurried to the loo expecting to see a big lump of snot or some bloody discharge but not a hint of either.
Walking back to the car I felt that perhaps I had some low cramping but it was very light, certainly nowhere near as bad as period cramps. It was more like a heaviness.
I grabbed some food, bought some pure clary sage and raced home, commanding James to have a wash while I bounced on my ball and then to meet me in the bedroom. He huffed and sighed as if I'd just asked him to spring clean or something but he was a trooper and managed to complete his chore for the day.
Men. They want it until you tell them to help themselves and then they'd rather watch TV, or in James case sleep.
Now I'm lying in bed, yes at 3pm, already starting to lose faith that I'm going to go into labour anytime soon.
I tried to book in for another sweep for next Monday with my usual midwife who should be off holiday by then but she's fully booked. The receptionist told me that it'd have to be the week after but I told her that I'll unlikely still be pregnant by then so now I need to phone them tomorrow morning *sigh*.
I'm just going to let the semen do it's thing for a little longer and then it's a pure clary sage bath followed by bouncing on my ball followed by food followed by bouncing and maybe I could get James to perform again today but I doubt it so it'll just be EPO pessaries for me.
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