For Alex

A hint for Dylan

It's 5 days until my due date. Five is my luck number. Fancy being five days early Dylan??? Oh go on... please....?

(lack of) progress report - 30th December (am) / day 3

As I seemed to be having a remarkably drawn out pre-labour, I thought I'd keep a 'progress' report. So where had we got to last time I posted? Oh yes, intermittent contractions from 3am and throughout Monday and a show just before midnight on Monday. Well yesterday, Tuesday, was fairly uneventful with contractions scattered across the day like the snow - the tiniest vague amount throughout the day, to the point that if you blink, you miss it! Had another trip to the Alex, this time planned to meet Mr Bosch the anaesthetist. My early epidural is all agreed and I was dispatched with a lovely information sheet... which I still haven't read, Doh!

Started with 'nice' regular contractions at 6am this morning, 45 seconds a pop every 15 minutes. 'Woo hoo, maybe this is it?' I thought. But no, by 9am they'd completely stopped again. Marvellous. So I'm back to random, intermittent and apparently pointless contractions. God knows how long this could go on for! The general consensus seems to be from a few days to over a week... aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

Will Dylan ever put in appearance? Currently he's far too bloody comfy sitting tight and causing trouble. Bodes well...

Alex's Tuppence Worth @ 30th December 2009

Another day, another load of twinges/contractions experienced by 'len (currently fast asleep on the sofa - various pains kept her up all night, bless her) and still no Dylan. This is without a doubt the weirdest waiting game I've ever been involved with, although obviously much less weird than what my darling fiancee is going through.

When we went into the hospital a couple of days ago I was completely expecting to be a father by the end of the day, which probably shows my naivety regarding just how rushed the delivery of a first child tends to be. And yet my nerves weren't half as on edge as I'd expected them to be - more than anything I was (and still am) more concerned about Helen's mental and physical state and whether Dylan was comfortable. A couple of days later and we're all feeling pretty calm, if not exactly relaxed. A sense of chilled inevitability. But what we are doing is attempting to grab as much sleep as possible, a luxury that we may well be denied for the next year or so.

Have been shaken out of my standard morning daze today by a combination of the charming sound of a vomiting cat in the next room and noticing the date in the corner of my computer screen. It honestly hadn't occurred to me that we're now so close to the end of the year- what with all the excitement of the past few days I'd kind of assumed that Dylan would turn out to be one of the last children of the noughties. He's now got just under 38 hours to manage that.

Just read through this post and trying to decide if it makes perfect sense and well-crafted reading, or merely resembles the musings of a thoroughly nervy imminent-father-to-be! Please feel free to post your opinions as comments!

Alex aka Babydaddy

One step closer...

...had my show last night and continuing this morning. I won;t go into the grim details, but Wikipedia has a very short article here.

It wasn't spontaneous, kind of encouraged... we decided to try one of the techniques for inducing labour... one that Alex was a big fan of! lol. However, I'm still pregnant, so he might be getting lucky again tonight... tee hee!

Not in labour, not not in labour...

Well the last 24 hours have been, er, interesting! 7pm last night I thought my waters had gone. Cue yet another bloody trip to the Alex, more time on the monitor and an internal exam (nice!). Waters hadn't gone, nor had I wee'd myself (hey, I'm naturally paranoid!) and they had no idea what i was, er leaking... helpful!

At three am I awoke with awful period type pains that built then decreased over a minute, every 20 odd minutes. Great, I thought, I'm in sodding labour! I was starving hungry so I made myself some toast and a hot water bottle. A few hours and several 'contractions' later, I fell asleep. I woke up this morning with terrible back pain and intermittent contractions, which have continued most of the day. I got to about 11am and succumbed and put the Tens machine on. Miraculously, it worked and has been a Godsend all day! However, after having mild contractions all day, this evening they seem to have stopped completely. Great. It feels like a lot of pain for nothing!

So I'm not in labour, but not really not in labour either. Apparently this could go on for several days without me properly going into labour, if I'm unlucky. I'd rather take the pain and go into labour now please! At least then they'll be an end in sight!

Happy 39 weeks to me! Apologies for the lack of bump watch pic, will sort tomorrow.

Back in the Alex

Well, I ended up back in the Alex again last night. Dylan is clearly not like his mum and responded to Christmas/Boxing Day by hibernating. After two days of significantly reduced movement, I thought I'd ring delivery for some reassurance, after all babies at this point move less don't they... apparently not! I got a thorough telling off from the midwife before I left for leaving it two days - oops!

Anyway, I was popped on a monitor and I jokingly said "you watch, he'll wake up and now and start performing!" Lo and behold the minute he knew he was being observed he started jiggling so much they couldn't get a resting heart rate. My belly looked like lava and I could hardly keep the monitor on! I think he moved more in half a hour than he had the previous two days! What a little show off - he's so going to be a performer of some kind!

Funnily enough we got the all clear, and the afore mentioned bollocking and headed home. He's been a bit more lively today, so all is well and we're trudging along in our usual hugely fat and sluggish fashion. Hurrah!

There's something about Mary

..however, I'm desperately trying not to emulate the famous Christmassy one that everyone likes to portray dressed in a blue tea towel. So far, so good and we're past the Quenn's speech and Dylan's still safely tucked away.

Fingers crossed he stays there for the rest of the day. There may be something about Mary, but the whole giving birth at Christmas thing she can keep to herself!

Merry Christmas from 'len and Al

Early Christmas present

Woke up this morning and Santa's brought me an early Christmas prezzie - a massive bloody bruise on my chin! I have NO IDEA where it's come from, I've not had a trip or fall, nor has Alex taken up fiancé beating! It's just appeared overnight! The only thing I can think of is that I coulod have twatted myself in the face with my Carpal Tunnel brace in my sleep, as it's got a big metal strip down it. If not, no idea! Let's hope I don't go into labour or they'll be calling Social Services!

Merry Christmas!

Bump Watch @ BBC 23 December 09

"Movements from your baby tend to slow down around this time – there's simply too little space to move around." Really?!?! Not that I've bloody noticed -he's still a jiggly little monkey! He's punching me as we speak and pushing his legs out to the left hand side of my bump!

Clothing crisis

OK, things are officially getting desperate on the clothing front!

First it was growing out of my normal clothes, but I'm now so big, I don't actually fit into any of my maternity clothes any more! Seriously, all but one of my maternity tops are too short and bearing bump in sub-zero temperatures is not fun! I have a few long tops and a few long jumpers and that's it! All the short stuff I have to wear with my bump band, just to cover my belly.

However, now my maternity jeans are broken! First the gusset split and I had to stitch it back together. Then Mum had to restitch my shoddy needle work. Then the fly broke a couple of weeks ago. However, I've been struggling along with a mixture of accidentally flashing people and hiding it with my bump band. However, with only a few weeks to go, the fabric on the gusset has now disintegrated, so I can't even stitch it! If I pull my bump band down low enough to cover my holey crotch, I expose the bottom of my bump; if I cover my bump, I flash my crotch to half of Warwickshire.

This Christmas I will be mostly holy, I mean holey!

Merry Christmas!

Bump Watch - Week 38

38 midwife appointment

Well, the next time I see Ros, I'll either have Dylan or it'll be my due date - eeeeek! All's well, BP and wee fine and my little man's dropped down considerably (I could have told her that by the fact my bump is round me knees, I can breathe once more and my bladder can hold a teaspoon's worth of wee!) and is now 4/5ths engaged, which is -1 on this pic:



Crazy!

'len is going to murder Alex!

Aaaaaargh just seen the picture below - noooooooooooooooooooo!!!

Will post a proper bump watch pic tomorrow to celebrate 38 weeks... after I've killed Alex for posting that pic!

Helen looking very 'Elfy...

Yes, I'm probably going to get a telling-off for posting this pic, but it IS Monday (traditionally the day of bump pics, despite this image being taken Friday afternoon).

Enjoy!

Bump Watch @ BBC 19-20 December 09

19 Dec 2009
"Your weight normally remains stable in the last two to three weeks of pregnancy – and your bump is now as big as it's going to get." THANK GOD! It just seems to be descending to my knees now! Though the upside to that is that I can breathe now!

22 Dec 2009
"Your baby is looking chubbier each day – much of the extra weight he's putting on is fat." Chubby monkey! Excellent!

When babies arrive

Found this rather interesting graph of when babies arrive. As Christmas day falls on 38 1/2 weeks for me, looks like I stand a 50/50 chance of doing or not doing 'a Mary' i.e, giving birth on Christmas day! I hit 38 weeks tomorrow, so 20% of women due when I am would have had their babies by then - scary!

Remember it's not too late to have a guess when Dylan will arrive! You can access the spreadsheet here or check out the post with instructions here

Random musings

Feeling a bit musing-y today... maybe it's a hormonal thing? Or maybe it's because Alex is going to be away tonight? He's off to the annual 'festive poker' session with boys, which is being held just down the road in Solihull this year. The premise of the event is the boys get together and go out on a pub crawl dressed as Santa and/or other season characters, get drunk then go home and play poker. Here's what Al looked like last year:

Note dad-to-be Martin in the background. It's good to see such sensible daddies to be!!! tee hee! He's only going to be down the road, but it's going to be very weird being this heavily pregnant with him not here - especially as with him working from home, I'm very used to having him around!

Maybe I'm feeling so philospohical because I'm so symptomatic these days? The past week I've been having so many Braxton Hicks, I feel like my body's practised for ten births rather than one! Combined with the period-type pain, I feel constantly like I'm on the verge of something. It's a very odd feeling, plus I could do without being so uncomfortable and twingy! I feel like my bump is round my knees it's so low these days.

Maybe it's the threat of snow? The North and the East maybe basted with the stuff, but we've had a grand total of 8 minutes worth here. Even so, it sets off something in my head. Paranoia's yes, what if it snows so much that I can't get to the hospital? Or Al can;t get to me? Plus there's something about snow... maybe I'm developing a Mary complex and imagine I'll end up delivering in a stable of Christmas day!!!

OK, now I'm getting weird, I think i need a nap - though I'm horribly twingy so I doubt I'll be able to. Might have some cuddles with the cat instead - she's become very affectionate and content since the move, chatty too!

Briiiiiiiink! Meaow!

Bump Watch @ BBC 17-18 December 09

17 Dec 2009
"Average age of women having their first baby in the UK is 29 - and that's three years older than the average age in 1972." God, that's probably the first and last time I'll be average!

18 Dec 2009
"By now you should have packed your labour and birth bag." Er, it's been packed for a couple of months and living in the car for the past fortnight!!!

Back from delivery suite!

Seriously...and no, I'm not in labour! It all started with a swollen foot. My right foot suddenly swelled up quite dramatically at about 3pm. By 4pm I was seeing flashing lights, so I thought I should ring labour ward and ask if that was normal. They said it wasn't and called me in.

To cut a long story short, after some foetal monitoring, blood and urine tests and blood pressure checks, it turns out that I don't have the pre-eclampsia they first thought. I have all the symptoms bar high blood pressure - so a brief moment or normality (in my B.P.) saved me from a whole world of stress! Me? Normal!? lol It was crazy seeing the foetal monitoring - it showed all my Braxton Hicks - no wonder I'm so tired, my uterus is going crazy all the time!

Am home now and have had lots of cake, so I'm happy. Plus I've seen delivery suite and it's quite nice - phew!

Just have a consultant's appointment tomorrow to sort out my early epidural.

Bump Watch @ BBC 15 December 09

"Your baby's fingernails will be fully formed by now." Good job I've bought some scratch mitts then!

Bump Casting

Last Friday, Al and I took a cast of my bump (I'll update this post with a pic in a bit when Alex isn't under deadline and I can get him to bluetooth it)

Anyway, we photographically documented the hilarious, messy, stressful and uncomfortable process. However, due to the nature of the exercise, there's quite a lot of gratuitous nudity (sadly just Alex topless and a heavily pregnant woman getting her big fat bump out) and obviously my baps and bump cast in plaster, so rather than put the pics in the post, you can view them in a step-by-step guide to bump casting here ... if you dare! Click on pictures to enlarge and read captions.

Crawling round on all fours

Yes, I've got to start crawling round on all fours. Went to see Ros the midwife and everything is fine except that Dyl's turned slightly back to back, so I have to start crawling round on all fours to try and encourage him back into the right position... fun with my knee, but hey, needs must!

Dylan had a good go at entertaining the midwife. She had a little feel then got out the doppler. As she put it on my belly, we thought he'd kicked it straight off. Then she tried again, and the same thing happened. By the fourth or fifth time we twigged he actually had the hiccups and his hiccupy spasms were throwing the doppler off my belly! He's not even born and he's trouble!!!

Dylan is full term!

Well, we've made it! My little boy is full term today!!! I'm 37 weeks pregnant today, which means if I go into labour now, they'll happily deliver him and he should be absolutely fine. Full term of pregnancy is usually defined as 37-42 weeks, so maximum 5 weeks to go! To celebrate, a spot of bump pic:

I've had a strange old weekend. The 13 hours of intensive NCT antenatal was exhausting but brilliant (I will post a review soon, I'm so knackered today, I'm struggling to get this post top make sense, let alone something more complex!) It didn't help that I'd had very little sleep thanks to some crazy period type pain and loads of Braxton Hicks most of the days and nights, to the point I've made an additional appointment to see Ros the midwife today.

Anyway, I'm too sleepy for this. I'm off for a snooooooooze................

Alex's Tuppence Worth @ 13th December 2009

You know you use the internet WAY too much when you receive a text message saying,

Is Helen in labour? Neither of you seem to have been on Facebook today!?

Many thanks to Martin for this long-overdue wake-up-call regarding our excessive cyberspace habits!

Alex, aka Babydaddy

Tweet birth

I've added a feed to my Twitter page in the right hand column -> Why? Well, I figure if all goes to plan and I have a straight forward labour (touch wood), I can tweet the progress of labour and the birth from hospital! Until then, it'll be mainly full of links to this blog, but I thought it would be wise to add the feed now ready.

Hopefully whilst in the early stages of labour I'll be at home and maybe able to blog... who knows. Either way, the Twitter feed is there if I can send updates, so I don't have to send out lots of text updates when I'm going to be, er busy! Tee hee

Antenatal... finally

Finally made it to NCT antenatal classes! Whoop! One down, one and a breastfeeding session to go and they can't come too soon. Back pain is getting worse and my Braxton Hicks have been non-stop today - am worried that labour is imminent - not good as I'm due in Wolverhampton tonight! I'm hoping I'm just having a painful time of it, rather than being in early labour. I suppose only time can tell... at least I can go into it with a little more knowledge if i have to!

Will post a review of the NCT classes tomorrow, after the second session - if I make it! lol

Bump Watch @ BBC 12 December 09

"Oops – left it a bit late for antenatal classes. NCT do 'labour weekends' in some areas to cram it all in – check your local phone book for contacts or call their information line on 0870 444 8709." Well, we start this morning and will be at antenatal 10-4.30 for the next few days - will post a report when I get a chance!

You can now post comments on this blog!

After 8 months I've finally worked out how to enable comments to anyone - whoop! So feel free to add comments! There's instructions in the right hand column.

Hurrah!

My baby boy...

In lieu of a scanner, I've photographed the scan pic. So, meet Dylan!

He's looking slightly to the left and is pouting! The wishbone shape is his nasal cavity. I have no idea what's going on bottom right, he looks like he's wearing a toga!

Carpal tunnel misery

OK, I'm officially sick of the Carpal Tunnel in my right wrist. It's bad enough that the numbness and finger pain wakes me up in the night, but now I'm getting numbness in the day too. Meh. I hope this goes after delivery, as this article seems to suggest

Wah!

Hopefully the culinary delight Alex is whipping up in the kitchen should cheer me up - roast veg and purple sprouting broccoli gratin!!!

How is that possible!!!???

Bump Watch @ BBC December 09

Time for some more catch up...

7 Dec 2009
"Research shows your baby can be affected by stress hormones. Make time to relax and rest." Poor Dylan's doomed then!

8 Dec 2009
Your baby's head may engage in the pelvis any time now – especially if it's your first baby (second and subsequent babies engage later as the pelvic bones are slightly different)." He's 3/5ths engaged i.e. 3/5th of his head is in my pelvis

10 Dec 2009
"Your baby's growing fast! These last four weeks could mean an extra two pounds in weight (one kilo)" Bang on - he's 6lbs 10 with three and a half weeks to go!

11 Dec 2009
"Your baby's lungs are almost fully mature now, and breathing difficulties at birth would be most unlikely." Hurrah

When will Dylan arrive?

OK, I thought I'd get people to guess when our boy's going to put in an appearance!

I've set up an online spreadsheet which hopefully anyone can access and add their name to... hopefully!

You can access the spreadsheet here

You just need to add your name next to you guessed date, check the spreadsheet says autosaved in the top right-hand corner, then quit. You don't need to sign in, or do File > Save. To check your entry has been saved, just close then reopen the spreadsheet. Any problems, just email me at helen.crook@gmail.com and I'll add you if you let me know what date.

Fingers crossed it works!!!

A morning at the Alex with Alex

Spend a very interesting morning at the Alex (aka the Alexandra Hospital, Redditch) seeing the consultant about our Dyl. It didn't start well. The midwife was flabbergasted that no-one at Lewisham had been bothering to track my size, and plotted me a nice graph... which was bloody scary as I was WELL above the top line for size. She immediately decided that I needed to be tested for gestational diabetes tomorrow...and I nearly sh@t myself!

Fortunately, the consultant decided to try and do a growth scan first, as the glucose test would involve a 12 hour fast, then a blood test and sugary drink, then a two hour wait in the hospital, then another blood test - starving a pregnant woman? Surely that's torture? Call Amnesty immediately!

Doing a growth scan at 36 1/2 weeks is pretty tricky, as the baby is too big to scan properly. However, they managed to get a look and he's big, but not too big! He's currently 3/5ths engaged (3/5ths of his head is in my pelvis), 6lbs 10oz and has a big belly (like Daddy lol). I don't have abnormally large waters either, so why I'm big, I'm not sure! Maybe I just have a stretchy uterus or something!? Got to see his lovely face, even though the picture wasn't great. Also got another eyeful of his huge todger! We got a very blurry pic of his face (thanks lovely sonographer), so I'll try and get it scanned in somewhere.

Thankfully the scan has ruled out gestational diabetes, so no starvation for me! They're also not concerned about my heartbeat as, like I said to Lewisham, it's always been there, it's just hormonal and asymptomatic. The consultant's only concern was the LLETZ I had done in January and whether my cervix will be compromised due to scarring, as I dilate in labour. I won't go into details as to what that is, as it's a bit grim and 'female' - it's a treatment to prevent cervical cancer and involves removing precancerous cells... anyway, the curious can just hit Wikipedia and it's delightful Americanised entry here

Other than that, they are expecting me to deliver a healthy, 8 1/2lbs baby boy in the next month or so. Let's just hope they are right!

Bump Watch - week 36 (and a half...oops!)

Finally found a moment to do this week's pic... only 3 days late!

Yes I'm big but there's already a 6lb 10oz baby in there! How do I know that, we'll I'll post a seperate entry in a moment....

36 weeks and all that...

Well, it's been a hectic week. We're pretty much moved now and just have a small mountain of boxes to unpack and sort - though God knows when as today I've had the physio and the midwife and antenatal tonight; then I'm off at the crack of dawn to London tomorrow for fracture clinic and hopefully the decision as to whether they are going to start cutting into my leg again in the new year. Sadly, I think they will... boo!

The move's gone well, but I've done far too much as I've been getting a bucket load of twinges and backpain as a reward. So I'm under orders from the midwife to do less... ha ha haaa haaaa haaaaa! Tell that to box mountain! Other than that, everything went fine with the midwife. She seems to think I have nothing to worry about baby size wise, but I remain unconvinced. I'm still 3.5cm over my number of weeks, 1.5cm more that recommended. I think I'm going to ask the consultant at the hospital on Thursday, as I'm sick of everyone saying "not long now, when are you due?", then when I tell them, they always disbelievingly say "really? Christmas day then".
Aaaaargh! SOD OFF!

Sorry...

Right, better get myself fed as I have a breastfeeding session at the Alcester Children's Centre tonight - busy, busy! Bump watch pic to follow on Weds when Al's back btw.

One month to go...

Well, officially at least, I have one month to go now! One month until parenthood!

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek!

Oh my God, where has the last 8 months (and my waist) gone?! Dylan's due date - January 4th seemed so far away, and now, it's almost here - just one calender month! Ok, I'll lay off the exclamation marks now...

It's not even ten days now until I'm full term (37 weeks), so basically any time in the next six weeks he should be here. I'll be a mum. God, that felt weird to type. People call me mum and I assume they are talking about someone else! (Sorry, back to soem gratuitous over use of the exclaimation mark again it seems.)

Anyway, it's also Granny Davis' birthday today, so happy birthday Corrine! xxx

Bump Watch @ BBC - 3rd December 09

With the move I've got a bit behind again, but it's all interesting, so I thought I'd get caught up!

30 Nov 2009
'It's worth reading up about caesareans, so you're prepared should one be necessary.' Not trying to worry me then there Mr BBC! What is there to read up on? It's major surgery that could save my life in event of an emergency... been there, done that this year!

1 Dec 2009
'Babies born at this stage are small, but generally healthy, though they may need some special care at first. Most will be able to co-ordinate sucking and swallowing directly at the breast.' There is NO WAY this one'll ever be small!!

2 Dec 2009
'You may have noticed Braxton-Hicks contractions by now – 'practice' contractions that differ from labour because they are not usually painful and don't get longer and more intense over time.' Oh yes, but oddly, I'm getting less of them. Maybe my body has had enough practice? lol

3 Dec 2009
'It's not just your baby who's grown these past eight months – your uterus has, too. Before pregnancy it weighed 40 grams, (about one and a quarter ounces) and now it's a whopping 800 grams or about two pounds.' Er, intereseting but TMI - too much information!

We have moved!

Whoooooooooooop!

We are official residents of Alcester, Warwickshire! We've still got some stuff to move and a lot of sorting, but tonight we'll sleep in our own house The Shires.... hobbit-tastic!