Well Friday marked 39 weeks and started what I fear may be the first of many false alarms!! I have been back at work now for a week and it has been going really well. Besides having some hip and back pain, (probably due to me not being used to my new body weight after so many weeks of bed rest) I have felt really good! I love my job and love doing anesthesia, so being back at work has been a wonderful distraction from wondering when our little lady will make her debut.
On friday my shift started off normally - I was feeling more contractions in the morning than I had been feeling earlier in the week, but with my history of contracting all the time, I really didn't think much of it! I had a busy day and by lunch time I was starving and so happy to eat. I probably scarfed my food a little too fast, but while I was eating lunch I started having some really strong pains in my lower abdomen, and noticed that I was having pretty firm contractions as well. The pains and uterine tightening didn't seem to be happening at the same time, but I couldn't really figure out what was going on. All I knew is that I was really really uncomfortable and it was not fun!! I continued to do my work (which was challenging to say the least) and even though I was in a lot of pain, I wasn't convinced that I was in labor, so I just tried to tough it out! I really didn't want to cry wolf and ask to leave work, only to return on monday still pregnant!!
So...things continued, and to make a long story short....the pains I was having continued throughout the afternoon and into the evening. I drove to my Mom and Dad's house after work in serious pain and called the nurse at my doctor's office, who didn't seem to think the pains I was having were labor pains. I relaxed with my parents for a while and Tom came over to help out as well. Things calmed down a little but I was really uncomfortable throughout the evening and continued to wake up in the middle of the night with awful pains about every 10-30 minutes. By saturday morning, I was feeling much more comfortable, but was contracting every 3 to 5 minutes all morning. The contractions were enough to get my attention and make me catch my breath, but I was not in serious pain. We decided after an hour or so to call the doctor. The on-call doctor who I spoke with basically said that I was not "in labor" until I was having contractions that were so painful that I wasn't able to talk or walk through them, and they had to be 5 minutes apart. Well....this was quite frustrating for us considering that the pains I was having on friday were terribly painful but weren't considered labor, and now I was having contractions every 3 minutes, but they weren't labor either!!! Talk about FRUSTRATION!!!! Both Tom and I had gotten excited that morning with the frequent contractions, and made sure all of our bags were in the car adn ready to go! Unfortunately...it looked like there was no need for excitement ;-)
After a while I just decided to stop timing everything because it was just making me more disappointed and upset than anything to see that I was probably not in labor and that everything on friday was just a big false alarm! So, as you can probably gather from my tone...I was not in the best mood yesterday after so much pain on friday, and a terrible nights sleep....and then more frustration when I realized that it was not really a sign of anything...big bummer. But I guess that's how it is with labor....lots of people probably go through this so I shouldn't complain! I guess I just figured that after 16 weeks on bed rest, that I would just go into labor pretty quickly after I was allowed to be up - guess this baby has other ideas!!
Thankfully, I am feeling much better today! I have still been contracting quite a lot, but like I said - I'm not timing anything until I can barely stand how much it hurts....then maybe I will finally believe that what I'm feeling is labor! Until then - I will not be convinced ;-) Haha....my stubborn attitude is coming out now. I am happy to be healthy and able to be up and living life - so I just need to continue enjoying myself and accomplishing things that will be much more complicated once we have our little lady with us and outside of the womb ;-)
I will have my 39 week doctors appointment tomorrow with my regular doctor who I haven't been able to see for the last two weeks, so I am really looking forward to talking to her about what our plan will be if we get to 40 weeks or beyond! ;-) I will let you all know how that goes and if anything changes at all. For now....all is well, and we are continuing to wait....but not so patiently! ;-)
Lots of love,
Katie, Tom and The Little Lady
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