I've moved

You can catch up with the continuing adventures of Spidermoney, M2T and Trogdor himself at Mum To Trogdor blog. Just click on 'view my complete profile' and then click on the link to the new blog.

What to expect when you're 41 weeks pregnant

A growing sense of desperation.

The books give out after week 40. You've moved off the pregnancy map. You're now even further than the never mentioned 10th month. Here be baby eating monsters.

Even though every damn book you're ever going to read on the subject says that a baby is considered to be 'term' at any time from 38 - 42 weeks, as soon as you hit 40 weeks people will start asking you when you're going to be induced. (Answer: If and when it's medically indicated)
Most people, including a lot of medical professionals, would describe me as being post dates by 7 days even though, by their own definition of a full term baby, I should still have a week before I'm considered remotely over due. Not to mention that the average length of gestation for a first time mum is something like 41+3.

And it's frustrating and a bit depressing and you begin to feel that you're letting every-one down. Which is odd because surely this is something that really only concerns mother and baby?

This week has really not been the best for me actually (which I'm sure has been obvious to my nearest and dearest). It culminated in a full on wobbly/melt down on Tuesday which saw Spidermonkey staying home with me on Wednesday to make sure I a) was ok and b) didn't eat 14kgs of chocolate (isn't he lovely?) and my parents offering to fly 2000km to keep me company (aren't they lovely too?). I told them it wasn't necessary. By this stage I was beginning to feel like something of a tool. (What? I haven't had PMS for the better part of a year. I can have one outburst.)

So, I decided to try some acupuncture to see if it would get things moving. It hasn't but it was an interesting experience none-the-less.

A few notes -

I've heard it doesn't hurt. It does. It's not excruciating but it's quite unpleasant. He put a needle in my hand which paralyzed it for a while until I complained and he pulled the needle out a bit.

It's very weird to have some one push pins into you, attach a battery to some of them and give you mild electrical shocks while Chinese meditation music is playing. Any imaginings I had previously about pins and electricity featured either a prison torture scene or a lot more leather.

He gave me some sort of DIY acupuncture band-aids. They're little sticky squares with pins in them which I'm wearing on my hands and legs. I can push them and cause myself pain! Ahh, the fun never starts.

What to expect when you're 40 weeks pregnant

I'm pregnant bro. Pregnant as.

(This is pretty much what I feel like)

I wish she hadn't said that...

I went to see my midwife on Monday. She's been great through the whole process and I do really like her BUT as she made me an appointment for next Tuesday she said 'but I don't think you'll make it'. Which is awesome, right? The Trog is ready and raring to go and Spidermonkey and I are looking forward to meeting our little burninator.
Well, initially I was very excited. Monday I called my parents to let them know they might be booking flights to Sydney soon. Tuesday I spent cooking so we would have at least a few meals for after the birth. Wednesday I spent running around sorting out last minute things for the classes I teach. And now it's Thursday... Thursday... (tick tock tick tock tick tock).
Up until then I was quite content to think to myself - could be now, could be 2 or 3 weeks from now (I was just on 39 weeks at that stage). Suddenly there is an expectation. It's ridiculous - she was just trying to be encouraging. There is no way she can tell when this baby will be ready to be born. But now I have performance pressure.
I'm the type of person who has trouble using public bathrooms if I know there is some-one in the stall next to mine who might be able to hear me. You want to add an extra 15 minutes on to my average 'toilet time'? - bang on the door and ask me if I'm going to be much longer. (Not that I'm suggesting any-one would want that - I'm just making a point) Now I feel like I'm on a four day limit to get the baby out. My cervix is welding shut as I type this, I just know it.
This may be a world first 11 1/2 month human gestation.

No, that's not too weird.

I wonder what Troggers will have for his sweet 16th?

I'm having a moment

Yes, I know I haven't posted in aaages! And I will catch up on all the baby stuff - of course there is every chance that Troggers will be with us by the time I get around to it but I needed to rant and I thought here was as good a venue as any-where else.

Background: There is a new national poetry prize called The Blake Poetry Prize. It used to be exclusively an art prize but this year they expanded to literature. Or 'literature'. First place is $5000. Count it people - that's more than some NIDA graduates make in a year. I did not enter this competition. I jotted down some notes here and there before I realized that I really don't know enough about what constitutes a poem these days to make a serious attempt*. The theme is 'Bliss, Blasphemy and Belief'.

This is the winner.

WTF?

Off the top of my head - is poetry anything that is too fucktarded to be considered prose? How can he be driving and be like the 'only still thing left on earth'? Is it possible that referencing Dante to lend gravitas to a poem is clichéd to the point that it actually achieves the opposite effect? What is happening in the tree world that they are both fraternal and avuncular? What the hell does this have to do with the theme? And, once more for emphasis, - WTF?

It's not a poem just cos the person who wrote it says it is.

BTW - this whole rant is a poem. Suck it.

* In retrospect, this may have been an advantage.

Out of the mouths etc 3

My midwife called during a class with the kids. The kids then wanted to know what a midwife was.
Girl: So you go to a hospital and the midwife helps you?
Me: Babies don't have to be born in hospitals of course.
Boy: Of course not. Babies can be born any-where. Babies can be born in caves. (Thinks about it) But then he'd have people pointing at him saying 'haha, you were born in a cave".

I don't know. I think it would be kind of cool to be born in a cave...

32 weeks

Only 8 weeks to go, assuming I have a 40 week pregnancy.
Apparently little Trogdor experiences REM sleep which means he might be dreaming. What does an unborn baby dream about? Fluid and distant sounds? Slight changes in the light? Does my heartbeat feature in his dreams? How could he even know the difference between awake and asleep?

How it's going...

Dates and numbers:
There are 59 days until your guess date.
You are 221 days pregnant.
You are 7.2 months pregnant.
You are in your 8th month of pregnancy.
Your 1st trimester: December 15, 2007 to March 14, 2008. (0 - 12 weeks)
Your 2nd trimester: March 15, 2008 to June 27, 2008. (13 - 27 weeks)
Your 3rd trimester: June 28, 2008 to some time in September. (28 - 40 weeks)

I have fiddled with some of the dates of course. I do have a slightly more 'accurate' EDD but apparently only 5% of babies turn up on the 'right' day so how accurate is that really?

I just want a happy, healthy plumber.

Since I last posted we have finally moved! I write this from our new living room surrounded by all the detritus we thought it was a good idea to pack. (Why, why do I need a purple bag full of tennis balls that don't bounce? Obviously at some stage I thought I needed them so I can't possibly throw them out...)
We are coming to terms with all the hidden responsibilities (and costs) of home ownership. I'm so used to ringing the agent to tell them what's broken, faulty or defective and then waiting months for something (or nothing) to be done. Now we can get whatever we want done very quickly but wow... it's not cheap.
Forget being a doctor or a lawyer I'm hoping Trogdor will feel drawn to plumbing. Possibly a locksmith...

Long post.

So, it's been quite a while since I last posted. I can't believe I have been pregnant for half a year already. The first 8 weeks seemed to take so long. I didn't blog in those first months because I couldn't bring myself to believe I was going to have a baby and it seemed like such a sad thing to have to stop blogging if the pregnancy ended unexpectedly. I thought I would remember what it was like but in the past two days I've been flashing back to that time and I'm surprised by how many sensations and feelings I had forgotten.

This is what I remember - Every thing was new and even though Trogdor was planned, and I was extremely chuffed he turned up so quickly, I felt completely bewildered and over whelmed. For a good six months prior to trying to fall I had voraciously read every book and website I could find on the subject of pregnancy and birth (so I can tell you how relaxin works on the pelvic ligaments but don't ask me how to change a nappy) but for those first weeks I felt as though I had been given a 1970s Lonely Planet guide to some exotic location in which I had just woken up. I knew it should be familiar but nothing was quite what I had imagined it to be.

Each morning I would wake and wonder if this was the last morning I would feel well for the next nine months. Then I'd eat a mint slice from the pack I kept by the side of my bed. I remember feeling that it was such a dangerous time. Every little twinge seemed to herald doom. Going to the bathroom was fraught - each time I expected the dreaded spotting (that's blood for people who aren't familiar with menstrual euphemisms). I would wonder if I had given up alcohol soon enough. If my bag was too heavy. If the pre-natal vitamins were 'good' enough. If I could be sure the cheese on the pizza I was eating had been heated to the right temperature for the right amount of time to kill all the listeria that was no doubt festering inside it. If I would ever enjoy fish again.

Each 'main stream' book I read told me to go and get tests done to find out 'how things were going', to find out if 'something was 'wrong'' regardless of the fact that no-one could do any thing at that stage even if there were something 'wrong'.

I wanted there to be something I could 'do' to make sure the baby would be well. Of course, there are many things a woman can do to help protect her baby from harm but there's nothing any one can do to guarantee a happy or healthy child.

Those first 12 weeks became a time of letting go and acceptance. I couldn't control what was happening to my body. I couldn't make sure everything was going to be fine. There was no expert, no doctor, no piece of advise that was going to 'save' us. The best I could hope for was that I wouldn't get in the way of what was happening within me. And then a very simple thought occurred to me. It wasn't particularly deep. In some ways it wasn't even particularly helpful. It's also not something that every-one is going to accept, agree with or like. But, for what it's worth this is it - Babies are born because God wants them to be. And sometimes babies aren't born and that also fits in with His plan. We don't know why and it's possible that we'll never know. Yet every woman who accepts her pregnancy has to make peace with that knowledge and then move forward trusting that every thing will work out for the best and that, in those cases where the best still seems pretty awful, they will have the personal strength to keep going. At that point I relaxed.

Pregnancy is a strange waiting time – the 'now/not yet' period. People congratulate me but I don't feel I've done anything yet. I am becoming more assertive in my day to day life but I don't have anything to protect. My milk (well, colostrum) is starting to come in but I don't have anything to feed – unless I tried the cat but that would just be wrong and icky. It's such a short time but at the end of it an entirely new human being will arrive. A new person who is already with me but who I haven't met.

40 years in the desert. 40 days in the wilderness. 40 weeks of pregnancy. Coincidence? At least at this rate they'll be a land with milk if not honey. I can buy honey.

Keep on training Sydney

I was traveling on the train to work this morning when, a few stops after mine, a pregnant woman got on. My guess was that she was a couple of months further along than me (but she was also thinner so we might have been at the same stage). Any-way, it was a crowed train on a Monday morning and no-one got up to let her sit down.
I and all my fellow commuters hunkered down in our seats and refused to raise our heads in case we caught her eye and were forced to notice she was standing there. Finally, thinking 'this is ridiculous', I got up to offer her my seat on the basis that she looked more pregnant than I did. She refused my seat - I didn't exactly press the point either - and then finally some older man who had, up until that point, been reading the Bible stood up for her. NB - If you're going to advertise your faith like that you'd better be prepared to give up a seat.
I don't know - I can't drink, I've got backache and now no-one will stand for me on public transport. Is there any point?

More LOLs

Bits and bobs

First of all a huge congratulations to SleepyT (thanks for the name Phoenyx) on the birth of her daughter! Great news and I can't wait to meet her in June.

Secondly... I'm not too sure. I haven't blogged in awhile mainly because there hasn't been much to blog about. I'll try to collect all the little things that make up my day at the moment.

• Trogdor grows and kicks and goes back to sleep and grows some more. Last night the cat, who is still around, fell asleep on my lap. I think the cat's purring disturbed Trogdor's sleep because suddenly I felt one of his limbs swipe very quickly from right to left across my abdomen. It was the weirdest feeling! I squealed and jumped a foot into the air - disturbing both Spidermonkey who was watching the Sopranoes, and the cat.
• A special thanks to the genius minds behind Hot Milk. Who wants to be hanging out their underwear and have neighbours enquire if Gran's paying a visit?
• I've noticed people who know I'm pregnant - especially men - eyeing my stomach warily as though it's going to explode and cover them in a sudden shower of baby. Baby shower. Heh. It's ironic - I've finally got a truly great set of breasts which, for the first time are encased in silk and lace (not that they know this) and what are they checking out? My stomach.
• I've started rehearsals for my next show and I am enjoying it tremendously. In between shows I forget how much I enjoy the rehearsal process.
• Oh yes, the most exciting piece of news! The tenants at our unit might be moving into a new unit because that tenant might be moving out and we might be in our own unit sometime soon. (You see why this piece of news slipped my mind?)

I think I'm pregnant!

I was sitting at the computer with my hand lightly resting on my stomach when... I felt a kick. Right through my stomach! (Not right through my stomach, obviously. I mean, my hand felt the kick.) I think I might be pregnant.

And yesterday Tyd gave us some little socks with football boots printed on to them. Very cute.

Weirdness and random thoughts

Conversation today with a MOCIT (Mother Of Child I Teach). I've taught her daughter for a term and all our previous conversations have taken about 30 seconds prior to class.

MOCIT: So, congratulations on your news.

Me: Thank-you.

MOCIT: Was it planned?

Me: (pause) Yes.

MOCIT: Have you thought about what you're going to do?

My thoughts: Do? With my classes? With the labor? When the weight on my side of the bed starts to leave a permanent dent in the mattress? (I thought I'd line it with heavy plastic sheets and turn it into a fish pond)

Me: I haven't decided yet. I'm still considering my options.

Nicely vague. Smile and nod.

In other news I am finally starting to show. At least, I think I'm starting to show. I haven't had any comments yet but I've been staring at my abdomen intently over the last few days (weeks) and I'm sure there is a more protrudey bit (yes, I like my new word too).
Not so much a bear getting ready for hibernation as a bear in there.
And now I've weirded myself out a bit.
My concern is that none of the weight I have put on so far is actually 'baby weight' and is rather 'me using pregnancy as an excuse to eat like a pig weight'. Which means that by the end my 'after baby body' is going to be very similar to my baby's body - soft, squishy and unable to ambulate under its own steam.

I went looking for maternity bras today. Ye gods there are some horrendously ugly undergarments for the maternal frame out there. For the next 5-ish months I'm going to have a huge stomach hanging off me proudly proclaiming that yes, I got laid at least once - and never again if these brassieres have anything to do with it.

One of the girls in the teenage group asked me what the most annoying thing about being pregnant was. I didn't have to think about it - people telling me what I'm 'allowed' to do. (On the other hand when I do do these things other people's disapproval makes it that little bit more fun*.) (Adolescent behaviour? Me?) The class looked a bit relieved. I think they were expecting some pregnancy horror story. You won't be hearing them from me girls - but from dozens of women in your future. Just fall pregnant and wait.

*Just to clarify - I'm not going to inject heroin no matter how many people advise me against it. However, recently I was told that eating prawns would give Trogdor a birthmark in the shape of a prawn! How cool is that? I'm not even sure I can stomach prawns but I'm sure as hell giving it a go now.

Vale Brian Donovan

God made the angels to show Him splendor, as He made animals for innocence and plants for their simplicity. But Man He made to serve Him wittily, in the tangle of his mind.
A Man for All Seasons.

Brian was a man of tremendous intelligence, generosity and faith. Remembered and missed by every-one who knew him.

AYB!!

What to expect when you're 20 weeks pregnant

• Your belly should now protrude quite nicely, as the uterus rises to the level of your belly button. Actually, my uterus rises beyond the level of my belly button according to the mid-wife I saw yesterday. Apparently I have a low belly button. I knew I was special.
• From about this point on you have only 20 more weeks or so until delivery! Yes genius, I know. That's why they call it 'half way'.
• As your abdomen grows each week, you will find you become stiffer, larger and frequently shift your posture and balance to remain comfortable. To be honest I've been experiencing this since puberty.
• You have entered one of the best periods as you do not face the difficulties of either stages of the pregnancy and are quite comfortable with your pregnancy status by now. 'Either stages of the pregnancy'? There's only two stages now? When did that happen? Surely they mean something like 'either of the other stages'? And 'Comfortable with your pregnancy status'? Right. On one hand I would like to think I've always been comfortable with my 'pregnancy status'. It's not like I was an hysterical mess for the first 13 weeks. On the other hand, in 20 weeks I will be given total responsibility for a baby boy. I don't know anything about boys. Or babies. This kid is screwed. So no, I wouldn't say I was completely comfortable.
• You can start creating a birth plan giving details about your preferences for the birth of the baby. I want a Star Trek transporter so they can beam the baby out. Can we do that?
• The baby is big enough for you to feel the fluttering or quickening movements on a regular basis by now. Yup. And I love that it's called the 'quickening'. There can be only one! People told me that the baby's first movement would feel like bubbles, or like a butterfly fluttering against my abdomen. It actually felt more like a tiny foot in the guts.
• The normal changes which occur during this period are:
• frequent urination - no
• constipation - no
• indigestion - no
• heartburn - oh yes

• However these symptoms are pretty mild now and become more profound later as the pregnancy advances. Cheery little bastard aren't you?
• You are in a better frame of mind by this stage and feeling fit physically as well as mentally. Bite me.

Half way today!

Trogdor at the 18 week scan

Here he is looking like... well, every other ultra sound you've ever seen.
Having the photo is lovely but it doesn't give you a sense of the little personality we saw bouncing around inside me.
I wish I had a little video to show you just how busy he is in there. He played peekaboo with the scanner, tried to grab at his feet when ever the sonographer attempted to scan them and waved his arms up and down while she was trying to get a picture of his heart. Playing up for the cameras already - heh.