Reflections on 40 weeks.

So. I made no progress at Wednesday's OB appointment, and so I'm mere hours away from hitting my "Estimated Due Date" with no baby. I am uncomfortable, starting to be swollen most of the time, and ready to for baby to arrive.

That said, I am thinking about the adjustment of this, too. I generally enjoy pregnancy, and am a little sad that this is the last time I expect to experience this, and I feel like I haven't had a lot of time to really focus on the wonder of this pregnancy.

To paraphrase another expectant momma: Soon, my life changes all over again. We go from "child" to "children." It's been amazing to watch my body grow and change, and know that I am the unique home for this infant, and that I have been everything this infant needs for the last 40+ weeks. Soon this infant moves into a whole different world.

I wonder what this child will be like? Up until the last few weeks, I would have said this child was not nearly as busy in utero as Maia was, but that has been changing a bit lately. I think it will be bigger. I have a general guess on gender, weight and birth date. I'll have to put that in a separate post and see if I'm right on ANY of it. I never guessed birth date or weight with Maia, and even though we knew she was a girl, my gut told me girl early on with her.

Oh, and June Bug Gender Vote - pretty well split. 11 votes: 6 girl, 5 boy

That said... happy, healthy baby is good! Can't wait to meet June Bug. And while I do enjoy a lot of things about pregnancy, I am looking forward to the next part (and less back pain)!

Tick, tick, tick...

Things are about as ready as they can be (given my level of exhaustion: there's ALWAYS more cleaning, dusting, laundry and shopping to do), and I feel mentally ready to have this baby. I've gotten things resolved at work. I met with my CEO for a 90 minute meeting last Friday, and talked about my proposals... why I was proposing what I'd proposed, what his vision for the clinic was, what my vision for the clinic was. Lots of business. What his expectations for me were. Some information I wished I'd had MONTHS ago from him. I left the meeting feeling okay about most things, a little frustrated on some issues, and comforted on others still.

Ultimately, my "Go Big" proposal was turned down in favor of something more moderate... which is what I fully expected. I didn't get quite the raise I was hoping, but I think it will be adequate to allow us to keep both kids in daycare, provided we make smart financial decisions (i.e., if this kid is a boy, I think I will spend a lot more time shopping at garage sales and consignment shops for clothes. The timing for this is good, since it's garage sale season, anyway! And I'd like to find a new baby swing since the one we had for Maia has some issues with the seat, so I keep checking out Craig's list, rather than looking at buying a new one for $130+). Besides which, Maia had WAY too many clothes (mostly due to generous gifts, but partially because I couldn't help myself either!) and never got to wear many of them, or if she did, not more than once! So moderation is certainly in order for June Bug. For finances, for space, and perhaps even for the environment.

Lately, Maia has been spending a LOT of her play time at daycare and home with her dolls. Wrapping them up in blankets (and uncermoniously spinning them out again: "Wake up baby!"). She will stand with them, bounce and say "Shh Shh Shhhh!" I'm thinking she must be REALLY watching the teachers in the infant room take care of the two baby girls in there.

This morning after eating breakfast, Maia wanted to "See Juuu bug?" which consists of pulling up my shirt, and peering intently at my gigantic belly. Sometimes a poke in the belly button. "Hi Juu bug! Hi!" She will lay her head on my belly, put her arms around it. Today, however, she assured me that June Bug was a girl: "I go git a book? I read to her?" "Oh," I asked her, "Is June Bug a girl or a boy?" "Giirl! I git a book!" She ran to get a book and brought it back to where I was sitting in the kitchen, getting myself ready. I pulled my shirt back down (thereby covering up June Bug) "No! See Juuu bug! I read!" I was curious to see if she would "read" to the baby, but she mostly stood there with the book. She did NOT want me to help her, though. She's been very much entrenched in the "NOs" of the "terrible twos." The next few weeks are bound to be extremely interesting!

On a side note, one other thing Maia has been doing for the last month or so is singing... a LOT. And what I love is that she is starting to get the concept of the rise and fall of pitch. I don't imagine it will be much longer before we can start working on pitch matching with her. It's really fun to listen to her, and which songs she chooses to sing. This morning, it was a little of Bob Marley's "Three Little Birds (Don't Worry)" (which she knows from her That Baby cd) and some "Old McDonald Had a Farm." Her rendition of "Three Little Birds/Don't Worry" went something like this: ... don wowwwy.... bout thing..... thing.... be awiiiiht. If I start singing the song with her, she gets a HUGE grin on her face. Then I'll sing some of the words and stop, to let her sing the next ones.

In the home stretch...

This is day number 271 and you're 38 weeks pregnant!
You have 9 days or 1 weeks left, and are 96.8% of the way there.
Baby's age since conception is 257 days or 36 weeks.

Things start to settle in for me at work (finally managing to complete some big projects that have been weighing on me heavily) and while all has not yet been resolved, I'm beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

With this progress at work, I think I've been finally starting to relax my head and my body. This started to show at the OB's office yesterday, as I'm finally a fingertip dilated, starting to soften and efface (nothing major... 20-30%) and he was able to feel the baby's head. I've been feeling like the baby has been inching ever lower (although not nearly as low at this point as Maia was, but I understand that's to be expected... I may not fully drop until the day labor begins).

So for the most part, the office visit was good yesterday, although my BP was high, for me. So the nurse let me sit for a while to see if it would come down, which it did. I don't know if part of the issue was that I had just eaten lunch, or left work a little later than I'd hoped to get there on time. The second reading was still a little higher than I would have liked (130/80-something). My swelling is pretty minor, and fairly controllable (yay). I'm still totally able to wear my normal shoes, and my wedding ring still turns easily.

I have, unfortunately, gained MORE at this point than I did during the last pregnancy, which means way more than I would have hoped for either of them! However, nursing helped me shed quite a few pounds before, so I'm hopeful that process will go similiarly (or better) this time around.

Heartbeat sounded good, measuring appropriately (he didn't give us numbers for either again this time... nor did we ask, we were talking about other things).

SO. Uncomfortable? Yes. Impatient, not yet... but starting to get my head ready. It strikes me that when it's finally time to go, it'll all fly. I'm just trying to think of how and when labor will start, so I can figure out how to handle the care for Maia. It all depends!

Ray seems to think I'm bigger this time around... I feel very much like I'm carrying ALL out front. However, when I look at pics of the end of my pregnancy with Maia, she was pretty far out front, too. Guess I need another pic to really compare again.