The Last Days of Pregnancy

Well, these past months have been spent visiting with family and friends near and far, getting ready for baby, and working (with limited success) on staying out of the hospital. We're nearing the end of a 4-week stint of me being in or near the hospital- I haven't been home since we left in the middle of the night with some bleeding. It was terrifying, but not entirely unexpected, so we are more or less ready at home. We have (a few) little clothes, premie and newborn diapers, wipes, and a cradle ready for baby H. We even got the crib set up, and I bought a wrap to carry baby H around. This is so I can carry them around and pretend they are still inside, to ease my guilt for dragging baby H out before he or she decides they are ready (though, really, this is a life-saving necessity for both of us- so I don't feel too guilty!) While this isn't at all what we expected or hoped for, we are so looking forward to meeting little H and having everyone safely at home.

Some thoughts from the past few weeks.....

On surviving the hospital:

I wore my own clothes. I felt better, and the nurses treated me like I wasn't sick. Also, I was allowed to walk around the hospital, and I felt much more comfortable wearing clothes!

I didn't ask too many questions. If you ask if you can do something, they might say no. If you go ahead and do it, they are less likely to say you can't. (Of course, I used common sense here, and did ask about things I thought might not be a good idea.)

I ordered extra food! I had a small fridge in my room, and I would order cereal and milk for the next morning the day before. The food took 45 minutes to arrive, and my pregnant self and baby H couldn't always wait 45 minutes after waking up to eat. I also ordered extra butter, jelly, snacks, etc. And sometimes I'd order extra food just in case some of it was gross. Though by the end I had the menu pretty well figured out!

I didn't wake up when someone came in the room. Or at least, I pretended not to. Nurses frequently would leave and come back later, though I don't think this would have worked as well if I had been sicker. I also wouldn't wake all the way up for the residents' rounds- they typically asked the same questions and I gave the same answers every day. Rolling over was a definite no-no- there is a lot of me to roll over, and it would wake me up way too much. I did wake up, sit up, and put on my glasses when the whole group rounded.

I took walks and found every mildly interesting hospital destination. I'd try to get outside or at least walk through some well-lit skyways.

I was also blessed with many visitors, including my Dad's visit from back East, and E's frequent company.

On the last days of pregnancy:

With all the emphasis on getting baby H out safely, E and I have almost forgotten these are our last days as a two-person family! We are so, so excited to be entering a new season of life, but definitely mourn the passing of many good times "just the two of us," and are sad we didn't get to do a few things one more time before a small, needy person arrives.

I love feeling baby H squirming, and will be sad when I'm a single entity again. Especially in the last month of so, I feel them move much more regularly and I will miss having them so close and knowing they are safe. E can even hear the heartbeat now! Since we aren't actually in the hospital right now, we joke that he is the new fetal monitor.

I'm looking forward to rolling over and becoming a more familiar size, and I'm hopeful that my heartburn will disappear. I'm really, really looking forward to being able to move about the world on my own, without mentally keeping track of how far away the hospital is and how I would get there in an emergency. I'm also looking forward to being less physically careful as I recover- I'm pretty tired of "resting!" Perhaps most of all, I'm looking forward to meeting, holding, nursing, and getting to know our first child!

On parenting:

All of these experiences have brought home that parenting starts a little earlier than we had anticipated. One thing that has helped me keep a good perspective is reminding myself that baby H will have their own whole life- their own difficult circumstances, their own circumstances that work out unexpectedly well. And, many of those things are outside my control. My job is to parent them as well as I can, given the circumstances of their life. After all, I think of my life as my own, not something totally engineered by my parents (though they certainly contributed to it, in many great ways- thanks Mom and Dad!). And, knowing that baby H will (I imagine) think of his or her life in the same way helps relieve the guilt of having to make decisions that are between less-than-ideal and even worse.

On gender:

No, we still don't know if baby H is a boy or a girl! It is a big surprise to look forward to in the middle of the C-section (which I'm not particularly looking forward to), so I'm so glad we didn't find out. If anyone reads this in the next few days- it's your last chance to have your guess recorded for posterity before we know for sure! At different times I have hoped for either a boy or a girl, for various reasons, but I really can't decide which would be more exciting. It's fun to know I will be thrilled either way!