33 Weeks Pregnant

Only 4 weeks until I'm full term - dum dum dummmmmmmm.

I'm feeling quite excited really, but at the same time my mood has taken a shift. I feel a bit sad.

I feel like I have all of this major stuff going on and no one to share it with. Obviously there is James and I think (hope) he'll come good in the fatherhood department, but there isn't really anyone else.

I don't know if it's normal with your first baby on the way to evaluate the family that you are bringing your child into or if it's just christmas being around the corner making me yearn for those happy family occasions, but I've realised that my little girls family will probably be just the three of us.

My family lives a couple of hours away and I either don't see them until births/weddings/funerals, see them only if I'm paying and organising or don't want to see them anyway.

James family is also a couple of hours away and they are the same. The ones we do see, we only see if we make the arrangements and effort.

The obvious solution would be to pop out several kids and make my own large family unit but that's not very realistic unfortunately.

I'm thinking about moving, perhaps closer to James family, but I don't think that we'd be able to afford the countryside so close to Birmingham.

I dunno.

I think about friends to call "aunty/uncle" but I don't have many if those either. Who we'd have as godparents I have no idea! Can the priest be one? :-P

Then again, having a large extended family when I was a kid didn't do me much good did it. Put a bit of distance between you all and you might as well have been an orphan!

Still no stretchmarks which is nice. I saw a shocker of a photo today! Someone posting a pic of their kid kissing their bump and all I could see was this disgusting belly totally covered in stretchmarks. Blurgh!

What is it they say... earning their tiger stripes? Pfft. Talk about delusional. They're awful and ugly and you know if you can find the cash that you'd be getting them all cut off asap.

I was telling James about the photo and he almost earned himself a punch. "Oh well I don't think yours look that bad..." Those are VEINS! Que the lecture about my translucent skin being stretched to being practically transparent. Funnily enough he never notices the ones I have on my boobs - too busy finding an orifice I assume.

I've been keeping up my Epi-no once a week since I started. I had to get some KY Jelly to ease the process along. I managed 7.5cm last time which I was pleased with until I realised how much bigger 10cm is...

Weight-wise I'm a no gainer again! Still 25lbs. I don't know whether to be relieved or concerned but I'm trying to be happy about it.

I actually really like the shape of my bump at the moment. It's large and round and firm and is still ore-stretchmarks.

Oh, actually, people have actually started commenting on my pregnancy! Asking how far along I am and things like that which is nice. Just shop assistants and things, not any random people yet.

Babybond Ultrasound - 32+1

Ok, I caved. There was a bit of an incident yesterday and there simply was no way that we weren't having a scan asap.

Yesterday afternoon I was lying upside down which is a recommended way of turning a breech baby and because the concern is that baby might become engaged in a breech position I ran my fingers around the edge of my pelvis, expecting to dislodge feet if anything after all the kicks I've had in my vagina.

Well, I got a huge shock when I could suddenly feel an extremely hard mass.

I shouted up to James and he came running to see what was wrong and I told him to feel where my bladder is. He immediately had the same thought as me.

"Is that her head?!"

I felt at my ribs and could still feel her head there and, although I've always regarded it as feeling hard, it suddenly felt softer in comparison.

I felt confused and frustrated. Maybe her feet had got stuck and fused together? Maybe I was having twins? Maybe it's something else?

James wanted to know and asked again where her head was.

I couldn't answer. I didn't know anymore!

All I knew was that at her last scan she was breech, she has felt exactly the same since then and everyone else has called breech when they've felt her since.

But there was suddenly doubt. I couldn't carry on turning her if I didn't know she was still breech but I couldn't sit around doing nothing if she was breech.

James suggested we just got a scan done but it's £100!!! Oh fuck it. I didn't really have much choice, I had to know. I was super happy to be able to get one for today anyway.

Well, here she is! <3

She is the image of her daddy, which I guess is only right after all the hoops we jumped through to ensure he was actually her daddy! I am hoping that there is some resemblance to me but it's hard to get past the nose because it's his family trait. It also looks a bit disproportionately large but that seems to be normal on these late scans.

The image is only a narrow section because that seemed to be all that was in focus. The rest of the face was implied but it looked a bit distorted so I'd rather look at bits that are accurate.

At first it was a bit weird seeing her face and I have to admit I was a bit analytical and even critical like I am when I see any new face, but now i just keep going back to it and staring at her in awe. She's so beautiful.

Oh, yeah right, the breech thing.

So... Normally she felt like this.

When we arrived for the scan she felt like this, rotating to a 90 degree either side was common too.

Well... it turned out that she was like this:

So after all of that she's head down, bum up, legs moving freely and she was spine outwards - which is tick, tick, tick and tick for a vaginal delivery!

I don't know where things got muddled, I swear she feels exactly the same as she has for several weeks and in my defence I did call head when I actually finally felt it. I can only assume her head has been very low down for a very long time.

Even the midwife and chiropractor called breech!

Anyway. SOOOOOOOOOOOOO RELIEEEEEEEEEEEEVED.

32 Weeks Pregnant

Oooooooooooooh it's getting close now, not far off at all!

I've been cool as a cumcumber about labour and although I'm still maintaining my composure it's starting to feel like a bit of a facade.

Baby is now apparently 42cm from head to toe. I was wondering what to use to illustrate what 42cm looks like and thought maybe the length of my arm but that's way too long... Wrong!

42cm is exactly the length from my wrist to my armpit shockingly, and that fact doesn't help my facade much either.

I know this is probably tmi, I don't particularly enjoy toilet talk either, but I try to think of the worst experience I've had on the toilet ever. Really hard and painful stools that literally made me fear permanent blockage until I eventually managed to shift them. How big were they? Not very when compared to a baby.

Thinking about the physical dimensions of something the length of my entire arm but twice as wide is starting to play on my mind, just a little bit.

Then there is the baby brain and the frequent liquid diahorhea that's worth a mention.

Oh and my back is killing me and I'm spending most of the night tossing and turning to try and decide which side is marginally the most comfortable but luckily I seem to be managing to return to a deep sleep quickly.

I can confirm that my little girl has definitely been getting the hiccups this week, once or even twice a day. No doubt. 

Omg they're annoying!

I am a hiccup'er. I haaaaaaaate getting them. They are involuntary, painful, occur when most inappropriate and last for ages. Luckily I have only had them once during pregnancy.

No surprise then that other people having hiccups really pisses me off too, never more so than when they are happening in my tummy for over 10 minutes at 3am. And yes I've tried a well timed "BOO!" without effect.

The good news is that I gained 0lbs this week :) Still on a 25lb gain.

Baby Brain

Baby brain is one of those things that I see people constantly using as another excuse to draw attention to their pregnancy while also getting out of looking like a right prat for saying or doing something thoroughly stupid.

In fact I've seen women using it as a very early pregnancy symptom during their 2ww.

We all have those moments though (I hope) where we are distracted and get a bit confused momentary and perhaps speak before we have sorted it out in our head, even when we aren't pregnant.

I often do anyway. I'm always thinking about ten things at a time and therefore the probability of me getting muddled, particularly when my train of thought is interrupted, is quite high.

It's been really nice falling back on the old "baby brain" excuse, although I've come to realise only recently how prematurely I was using the phrase.

Only since about 30 weeks pregnant have I discovered what baby brain really is and it is not a simple case of a bit of a public blonde moment. It's more like the onset of Alzheimer's and it's actually quite scary.

I get confused just like usual, but I no longer have the ability to correct myself. If other people don't point out the error and explain why it's wrong, I don't understand and get all frustrated and even a bit panicked like I'm losing my mind.

They think it's funny like it would be, except for the fact that I no longer get the joke. So they tease and mock because my goof up is sooooooo obvious and stand there feeling like I've just lost someone dear to me, and that is myself.

Luckily I don't feel that way all day long or even every day, but when baby brain strikes it's not a cute and amusing way to highlight my pregnancy to me. It's a sign that pregnancy really does shrink your brain and I'm just praying desparately that once the baby arrives, it grows back again.

Treating Breech with Moxibustion - 31+4

Another £40 spent on trying to get this bloody baby of mine turned.

This one was like torture!

I turned up at the alternative therapy clinic where I'd previously had acupuncture for IVF, it didn't help at all.

I waited in the reception room and a door opened and two women stepped out, the therapist and the client, closely followed by the pungent stench of moxa which resembles something like cigars and cannabis. I'd actually forgotten how overwhelming the smell was!

The therapist was the one who I was seeing so she called me into the room.

She acknowledged my bump, instructed me to sit at the desk and asked me how she could help me. I paused, assuming that she'd already know and of course she did but I answered anyway.

As I explained about my breech little madam, she made some notes but seemed a bit doubtful about what I hoped to achieve. She pointed out that her main concern that there was a reason for the baby to be breech but I explained there was no known reason so far. It only worked to fuel my expectation though.

I lay on the couch and she told me that she'd be be lighting two moxa sticks, which look a bit like fireworks to me but she described them as being like cigars, and then holding them against my little toes to stimulate energy points which should make baby more active and encourage her to turn.

This is where I became a bit scepical. She's already very active already and she was already kicking off at my being laid on my back like she always does.

What followed was basically a torturous cycle where she'd hold the sticks close to my toes and I'd have to tolerate them getting hotter and hotter until I'd yelp "hot!" and then she'd pause to flick off any ash and blow on the ends to reignite them before placing them at my toes once more.

I think the idea is that the heat increases with duration but I'm pretty sure that most of the time her hands were just moving too close and literally burning me.

I asked why moxa sticks were required and why I couldn't just put my little toes against a hot radiator and she was sensible enough to acknowledge it was a good question but didn't actually admit that she didn't know and instead chose to vaguely inform me that moxa nourishes the blood.

I also enquired if acupuncture would be better and she told me that there was an acupuncture point involved in the moxibustion but a needle would have too much of a severe response for it to be safe. You know I'm buying my own acupuncture needles when I get home!

Even though she had said that the treatment should last about 15-20mins, she was at it for 35mins to fill the 45min appointment. It wasn't relaxing at all and in fact by the end my toes actually felt a little burned.

Also, the room was thick with the smoke and I even started to wonder if it was any less harmful than cigarette smoke.

She gave me some moxa sticks to take home and told me it would be much cheaper to perform the therapy upon myself which I should do 4 times per day for 20 mins. This had already occurred to me so I purchased some sticks off Ebay for 75p each but still wanted to see the actual treatment performed before doing a DIY effort.

I stood up and left, baby fell back to sleep before I'd even gotten back into the car with her head in her very favourite place right between my ribs and I drove home smelling like a serious pot head and worrying about lung cancer.

The appointment was actually yesterday so today I attempted to recreate moxibustion with the help of James to hold the sticks in place and it was rubbish. Baby didn't give a crap, the smoke and smell was horrendous and me and James both felt a little bit sick afterwards as if we'd just sucked down a whole 20 pack between us.

I'm not going to do it again. The radiator seems like a good alternative and if that fails I can always stick myself with some needles, I'm a pro at that.

Treating Breech with Chiropracting - 31+2

Oh, I'm going to regret this - two activities in one day, again! I guess I'll have to recover for the rest of the week...

I was quite looking forward to my chiropractor appointment. I'm partial to a good bone cracking to relief any stiffness or aches and I figured if there was a physical reason for baby being breech and it could be fixed that it would be something spine or pelvis related.

I turned up at the highstreet clinic, and not someone's house, and was handed a form to fill out. Just basic stuff really, address details and general medical history questions and then some diagrams of bodies that I had to shade the areas requiring attention. 

The receptionist was really friendly and got me a drink and before long a women appeared to lead me into a treatment room.

Initially she seemed to be about 30 because she sounded young and spoke quickly but I think she's more like 35-40. She looked a bit mediterranean and was almost painfully thin but was really nice and bubbly.

We worked our way through the form and I had to mention the IVF because of the Clexane and she asked how many cycles. I told her six and she looked shocked and said I'm a new record - yay me. She attempted empathy by acknowledging how hard it must have been... zzzzzzz. Get to the back cracking already!

She asked me about how active I am, how much time I sit for, how much pelvic floor exercises I do. I made the mistake to admitting to not doing my pelvic floor exercises which turned into a lecture with her telling me how important they are and me telling her how tedious they are.

She did however mention they should be stopped at 38 weeks to allow for proper stretching during labour. We don't want our muscles too toned. I had heard of this previously but not heard it acknowledged by someone who seemed to be knowledgable about it and still an active advocate for the exercises.

She asked me if I'd had any Braxton Hicks to which I told her that I hadn't but she said it was pretty early for them anyway.

Then I explained to her about baby being breech and about not being sure if she was frank breech or not.

She asked me to lie on the couch on my back and then had a good old feel at my bump. She was a lot more thorough than the midwife was as she felt the baby at every inch and followed her body to see where it lead whereas the midwife kind of just dug her hands in and wiggled them around.

I was told that her head was up as suspected and flexed which means the chin is tucked under like it should be and that her bum was nice and loose. She umm'd and ahh'd as she seemed to be following the shape of the limbs and she decided that her legs were not by her head but were kind of frog legged downwards as she could feel the knees. That was a relief anyway and I assume that it means baby is a complete breech which is pretty much exactly the right position but pointing the wrong way. I don't know if that makes her more likely to turn or not.

Just then she declared I was having a Braxton Hicks. I couldn't feel anything, but then she explained that my bump had gone really hard. That is a Braxton Hicks?! My belly has been doing that at random intervals for weeks already, but I thought Braxton Hicks involved cramping sensations. I thought it was just baby putting up a little force field when she didn't want me poking her...

While I was lying down she also pulled my arms up above my head and asked me to straighten my fingers and showed me how one of my arms was reaching about an inch further than the other one and then I got up and say back at the desk.

At this point she pulled out a plastic spine and pelvis and proceeded to explain to me what happens to the pelvis and spine and what is happening with me. It dragged on for quite a while but I think the gist of it was that the ligaments on the left side of my pelvis were restricting its movement.

She explained that I might suffer some discomfort and I had to sign another form to consent to what was to follow.

Unexpectedly she then asked me remove my clothes except for my underwear and to put a hospital gown on. She gave me a moment and then returned and she asked me to perform several movements while standing up like touching my toes, sliding my arms down each side of my legs, standing on one leg, etc.

I hopped back onto the couch that had a special lowering section to accommodate a bump and a special pillow and asked to lie on my belly.

What followed REALLY hurt. She was pressing various parts of my arse and legs but it felt like she was using her knuckles or something. In some places it felt like she was boreing a hole into my flesh with her fingers and when I confirmed it was very tender where it was pressing, she'd just press it even harder. It typically hurt more on the left side.

She didn't touch my back but she eventually asked me to roll back onto my back and then she attacked my neck muscles instead.

Afterwards she did my arms again to discover that now the other arm was longer which meant she had over corrected so she had to make another slight adjustment and they like magic they both finger tips met. I couldn't help but think that it'd be fairly easy to manipulate the outcome by simply pulling my arms to where she wanted them.

Then she was finished and I am devasted to report that there wasn't a single crack during the whole thing :(

She told me the baby might be more active and that lying down on my left is better than sitting down which suits me!

She recommended switching between lying on my left and bouncing/leaning on my ball.

The cost came to £55 but the next appointment will be in a week and will only be £35, although it's also half the duration.

I got home and followed orders and my little lady has actually been very active. She normally is anyway but it's mostly been down below which has been unusual.

I'm lying in bed and having a feel and yes, she still in her usual comfy breech position *sigh*.

Midwife Appointment - 31+2

I had another midwife appointment today and it was alright. I've decided that I like her anyway, it's just a shame she doesn't do many deliveries anymore because she's the kind of straight talking but sympathetic midwife I'd be hoping to have. That said, she did tell me a whopping porkie but I can understand why but I'll get to that.

Pee sample was normal and so were the bloods I had taken at the last appointment, even though I did have to ask about them.

I mentioned that I had my jabs done and that I got shouted at for not having my notes, seeing if she acknowledged if she never told me about needing them. "Pfft I never tell anyone to take their notes, carrying a big folder around everywhere!".

We were asked if everything was alright and we told her that it is, but we still had concerns about her position. We told her about trying alternative therapies and she was really interested and enthusiastic without at all being kooky and alternative herself.

Then I jumped on the bed and she did my blood pressure which was fine, baby's heartbeat which was 148, fundal height which was 31cm (and actually comes up above average for 31 weeks on the chart)  and then had a good feel at my bump.

She said it was a difficult one to gauge and she wouldn't bet her life on it but she was fairly sure she was still head up. By the end of the grope though, she seemed more confident. I think her head is fairly obvious but the rest is all lumpy and it could be anything.

As I jumped up off the bed I mentioned I still hadn't felt her head down at all and she replied that she probably wouldn't go head down now because it's just going to get tighter and tighter as she gets bigger and with her legs being extended and by her head she just couldn't kick off to move.

I asked if her legs being stuck by her head could damage her legs and without flinching she immediately replied no and I believed her... Well, as much as I believe anyone ever.

It did seem a bit weird to me though that baby has her head up and legs supposedly by her head and yet she's always poking me in the vagina. In theory her bum should be by my cervix and she can't thump me with her arse cheeks... I'm starting to wonder if some miscommunication has occurred with the sonographer having said that her legs were extended to mean they were extended downwards but since it's been interpreted as "breech legs extended" = "frank breech".

I did ask about how things would progress from here and she pretty much said it'd depend on my 34 week scan. She asked which consultant I had and she figured it out from his scrawl of a signature that looked nothing like a name! She laughed and said we must be in on Tuesday and that we were stuck with the druggies because those are the kind of patients he deals with, but they all seemed pregnant to me... Pregnant and druggies?! She described him as an odd guy but nice. We think he seemed nice anyway and he must be compassionate to work with addicts without judging them.

She did say that if they try to turn her manually that they'll see me at 36 weeks to book us in for 37 onwards so an emergency csec because of related distress wouldn't result in a premature baby but they would not intentionally wait until I naturally went into labour because then my stomach is too tight to manipulate without a muscle relaxant.

Bugger. I don't really want a late December birth.

I'm thinking I'd rather opt for going into labour and just seeing how she's lying when my waters go and if she's still breech then having the emergency csec then. I'm not sure the manual turning is worth the risk when she's been so insistent on being head up. Maybe she's wrapped up in cord or something.

Then after the usual pleasantries, we left.

I did google as soon as I got home about leg deformities and for the first time ever, genuinely wish that I hadn't. Yes, their legs are deformed. Not permanently apparently, but basically their poor little legs are stuck up by their heads even after they are born and it results in hip dysplasia and a harness has to be worn for several weeks to get their legs back into a functioning position. I shouldn't have waited until my scan had revealed if her legs were like that or not, but now I've got 3 weeks of worrying.

Next midwife appointment at 35 weeks.