How far along? Thirty-six weeks and 4 days
Vital stats? +27 lbs, +3 lbs from last week, which was a plateau from the week before. I’m very unsteady in my week-to-week gains, but on target when I take it on average over a month. I didn’t really change my eating this week, and I think a fair amount of that gain is new water retention (see below for more on that fun). From my OB appointment today, blood pressure at 112/60, a bit of a bump up but certainly nothing to worry about. No protein or glucose in my urine, so despite water retention ramping up, no sign of pre-eclampsia. Had my GBS swab done, so might find out the results next week (Tuesday appointment, which is kinda quick turn-around for a culture-based test) or the next week*. Spud is head down, heart rate at 130.
Sleep: Still strong, still comfortable when my ribs or heartburn are under control. I woke up this morning at 4:45 and didn’t get back to sleep until 6:30 or so, without needing to pee or anything specific. I’m hopeful this is not the beginning of late-third-tri insomnia, which many of the women in my facebook birth club have been dealing with. We shall see! I had installed the Imgur app on my phone earlier this semester, and deleted it last week after realizing I was scrolling random internet memes until falling asleep instead of reading or just trying to sleep – it was definitely delaying my bedtime for no reason.
How am I feeling physically? Swelling has taken on new dimensions. My generally loose engagement ring got put in my bedside table drawer this morning, as it’s getting harder and harder to remove, even in the mornings. I did some lab work for the first time in ages, and had to bump up my glove size, from a previously-comfortable-now-very-snug M to a usually-way-too-loose-now-reasonable L. I am still comfortable walking as long as I can walk (waddle) slowly. I’m still ok for energy during the day, and getting tired earlier in the evenings, but still able to run an errand or two after a full day of work, and help Pea with dinner, cleaning, and (online) Christmas shopping. I almost think this week was stronger than last for energy, though I am feeling heavier and slower in general. I still LOOK small, and so there is still a disconnect between how pregnant I feel and how pregnant I look.
How am I feeling emotionally? I am ok this week, largely because I am deeply fatalistic about getting anything done before going on leave. I had a conversation with a colleague today about how present Labmonkey is well aware she is screwing future Labmonkey over, but is having a hard time doing anything about it. My colleague laughed and said he’s gotten more and more comfortable taking his google calendar “to dos” and just dragging them a day, week, or entire month over. I’m still stressed about the fact that I’m mismanaging my fourth-year students, but I have a plan in place to try to rectify that even from afar/distracted next semester.
Pea and I decided to be pretty minimal this Christmas. Usually we just do Christmas Eve PJs and then fill each other’s stockings. This year we’ve agreed to instead get one or two smallish things, because we both already had those in the works, and, as Pea said, if we did stockings “we’d have to go to a mall!” (accompanied by Pea’s distraught face) I’m ok with this plan – we are both pretty baby-focused right now, and generally non-materialistic in our expressions of love** – and next Christmas will be the start of heaps of new traditions. Plus the very last place I want to be right now is in a pre-holiday mall.
Best moment? I had a really nice weekend in Capital city, a bit unexpectedly. I’d gone into it believing my father and step-mother were in substantially worse shape relationship- and emotional fortitude-wise, but they’d sorted a lot of their crap out before I got there. It was a nice trip, if tiring. I got back to New City in a snowstorm, to a gourmet dinner of garlic tart with home-made pastry a la Pea, which was a lovely homecoming.
Medications: Lovenox, 40 mg sub-cutaneous injection nightly. Prenatal vitamin in the am, iron supplement at lunch, vitamin D and calcium in the evening. Zantac 150 mg at night about 2-3 times a week.
What I miss? People talking to me about anything except the pregnancy. I get that I am very visibly pregnant and that this is a big thing and that I generally only talk to people for about ten minutes per week so to them this seems sporadic. But I’m a bit tired of it. I then also come home and talk to Pea about the pregnancy and all the stuff we still need to do, so it’s not like I am any better. Perhaps this is practice for having a kid.
What I’m looking forward to? Convincing Pea to order in burritos tonight instead of the boring pasta I’d bought yesterday. Convincing Pea to drive around a parking lot this weekend. One of these will be a harder thing to do than the other. 🙂 Coming up with a final short list of names for Spud because we really do need to do
What have I done this week for the pregnancy? We ordered a change table pad and a carrier, which were outstanding items. I bought a bunch of items we need for the hospital bag, and some nursing bras. I registered for the Nestle give-away and got their welcome package in the mail two days later (free diaper bag, free formula samples of early-days liquid formula, free bottle, free can of powdered formula). If we don’t need the formula, I’ll donate it, but I like that we have some on-hand in an emergency now and that I didn’t have to buy it. Plus with the give-away from Toys R Us, now we have two different bottle types to trial when we try to introduce a bottle.
Milestones? Technically I am now in month nine of this pregnancy. I am also three days to full term, which is fun. I do feel like I hit a new level of pregnant this week – leakier boobs, super swollen, all that fun late-pregnancy stuff.
* I am very torn about GBS results and preventative antibiotics. If I test positive, it is about a 5% incidence rate of Strep infection in the baby, and it is nasty. Some hospitals will monitor before a preventative course of antibiotics – if the baby tests positive within the first 12, 24, 48 hours, then they treat, otherwise not. I’m hopeful my hospital would be open to this, as having me on antibiotics during labour and Spud on a preventative course in the first days of life are absolutely opposite to my antibiotic philosophy (which is based on scientific facts). Strep B is just bad enough for Spud that I’ll go with the antibiotics if my hospital enforces them strictly, but otherwise would prefer to wait. Hopefully I’m GBS negative, and it’s all a moot point.
** There is that “Five Love Languages” book, where your preferred methods for expressing or understanding love are categorized as Words of Affirmation, Quality Time, Receiving Gifts, Acts of Service, and Physical Touch – while I think this may be artificial categorization, Pea and I would likely each end up with “Receiving Gifts” as our fifth most-important expression of love. It isn’t how we connect, or show love.***
*** If I were guessing, I’d guess my top three were Physical Touch, Acts of Service, and Quality Time, while Pea’s are Physical Touch, Words of Affirmation, and Quality Time.
labmonkey2 
Good practice? Maybe. My experience has been that the problem with only talking about kids once you have them is more that they take over your life, so you actually don’t have much else to talk about (they’re also fascinating, and they make conversations with awkward people way easier). But shouldn’t you be enjoying the last few weeks of having conversations about other things?
Here’s one: I had a dream last night that you and Steffen and I murdered my grandmother. Or we tried to, but she shocked us by not dying. My grandmother died while I was writing my thesis, and I wasn’t even in town. Things are going pretty well at work, so maybe I associate my grandmother’s death with success?
I really feel, and don’t take this the wrong way, that if Steffen and you and I wanted to kill someone, we’d be able to. That said, you are scrappy and I imagine your grandmother was too, so maybe she’d have posed a challenge.
Also, congrats – strangest comment on this blog to date. 🙂
Pea and I are going to take the week of the holidays to watch movies in theatres and have adult conversations and sleep in a lot, as a last hurrah to our existence as DINKs.