Still waiting...

We went to the doctor this morning. I am still dilated to one centimeter which is no progress from Sunday. I had another round of contractions through the night last night. I am pretty tired today, but the contractions have stopped again. Dr. Newman said that my guess is as good as his as to when she will decide to come. He didn't think it'd be today though. I am supposed to continue resting and doing kick counts to make sure Lainey is doing OK. We'll be going in tomorrow to the hospital for another round of monitoring. I will be 42 weeks on Tuesday and the doctor said that it is dangerous to continue waiting past that point. Lainey will be safer on the outside after that. His scheduler is going to call me today to set up a date for next week to induce when he will be available. It will probably be Sunday night for delivery on Monday. She still has a few days to decide to come on her own. I am hoping it won't be tomorrow, but it just might be! Apparently I am the most pregnant person my doctor has had since he opened his new practice more than a year ago. Glad I could be the one. :) In the meantime, I'm trying not to be discouraged and just rest. I suppose I have waited for three years to get pregnant and then nine months to get to this point, so what's a few more days?

We are moving in the right direction!

Last night after dinner my back started to hurt and I had really bad heartburn. We settled down at home and watched some reruns of The Office and I started to feel better. That was a little disappointing since I'd hoped the back pain was the start of something. Then at about 12:30 I started feeling really nauseous. That rolled into more back pain, and the start of contractions! They weren't terrible but they were enough to keep me awake and uncomfortable. So I thought we were really on our way, but Lainey decided she wasn't quite ready yet. I fell asleep at about 5 and woke up feeling better with no more contractions. But I think we are moving in the right direction. I lost the mucus plug last night, and that should mean that we are really close. I am just hoping and praying that she comes by tomorrow. I would really rather that she's not born on Halloween and I think if she doesn't make it by tomorrow then we'll be having a Trick or Treat baby.

I still feel kind of sick to my stomach. So I think I might take it light on the meals today. Nothing sounds good anyway and I really don't want to eat anything that is going to be terrible to have coming back out. We have a few errands to run that I could pass on, but I think I will go to keep moving and hopefully encourage Lainey to scoot! Please pray that we have real labor sometime today so that she can get here soon!!

This morning's tests

Everything looks good! My amniotic fluid level went up to 7.7 cm and Lainey scored another 8/8 on the biophysical profile. She's already a straight A student. :) We will go see the doctor on Thursday morning and then possibly go in to the hospital for another round of monitoring depending on what Dr. Newman says.

I have been having some contractions, but they are still nothing to get excited about. We are trying to determine when to induce if it should come to that. With Halloween on Friday, I am definitely not interested in inducing Thursday night. We may induce on Sunday night, but I will still be short of 42 weeks by then. And as long as Lainey continues to show good vital signs on her monitoring tests, I am hesitant to push her to come out earlier than she wants to.

Our plan is to take a little trip to Costco this afternoon and maybe grab dinner and a movie. We will just be waiting for the signs that she's ready to come out! It's getting harder and harder to be patient though!

No news...

Nothing exciting happened today. I wasn't going to post an update, but I was afraid some people would think I didn't update because I was having Lainey. :) Not today. We will be going tomorrow around 11 am to recheck my amniotic fluid and Lainey's status. John has been predicting she would come tomorrow, so we'll see if he's right. We are all getting pretty antsy waiting for her to decide to come. I will update tomorrow afternoon after our monitoring at the hospital. Hope you are all having a great week so far.

Another day gone by!

We went to church this morning and had some friends over for lunch today. I was a little bit worried that my water was leaking today, so we decided to go to the hospital to get checked out. I wanted to be safe even though I wasn't sure there was anything to be worried about.

They said that my amniotic sac appears to be intact. They also had me on the monitor again. Lainey's heartbeat was very steady and strong throughout the time we were on the monitor. I had a few contractions, but still nothing that is painful. They decided to do an ultrasound to check to make sure that I still have enough amniotic fluid. When you go past your due date, loss of amniotic fluid is possible and an indicator of placental function. My fluid levels were a little bit low. I was at 6 cm of fluid. Lower than 5 is dangerous, over 10 is normal. 6-8 cm is what they called a "gray area" in terms of how to proceed. Since we were in that gray area, they had the ultrasound tech come back to do a biophysical profile test on Lainey. They said that this test helps to prove that the placenta is functioning well enough to support the baby. To pass, you have to have a pocket of amniotic fluid that is at least 2 cm, the baby has to show practice breaths, flexion and extension of an arm or leg, and trying to roll over. They have 30 minutes to do all these things. Lainey did it all in about 5 minutes.

Since she is showing such healthy signs, the on-call doctor said we should come back for a repeat of the biophysical profile and heart monitor on Tuesday morning and Thursday morning, then see my regular doctor on Thursday. Of course, she could decide to come at any point. I am now dilated to one centimeter, so we are making progress!

Other than being overfull from eating Olive Garden tonight, I am still feeling pretty good. I think we will get a good night's sleep tonight and see what tomorrow brings.

A Haiku for Lainey

Not much news to report today, but I thought I'd share the haiku our friend Steven Payne wrote for Lainey:

A Haiku for Lainey....

This might persuade you
The world is bigger out here
Your Dad has a Wii

Thanks Steve-o!

If the haiku doesn't work, we are having pizza tonight... will it do the trick??

Apparently I am a little too comfortable

...for Lainey!

We went for the NST this morning and it showed a happy baby! Her heart rate responded perfectly to all her movements and I did have one small contraction during the test which she did fine with as well. We went to the doctor's after the NST and found out that I am 100% effaced, although still not dilated. This is good news since it means I've progressed some from Tuesday, so at least things are moving in the right direction... just slowly. Our plan from here is to continue waiting for her timing. Meanwhile we will be checking on her status with NST's twice a week. If she doesn't come this weekend, I am planning to go on Monday and Thursday of next week for NST's. We will have another doctor's appointment on Thursday to see how things are going and that will be my last OB appointment. If she hasn't come by then, we will decide on an induction date (probably Sunday night/Monday morning). The doctor doesn't think I'll last until then though. We'll see when she decides her birthday should be.

As for me, I am feeling fine. I have a little bit of anxiety about how she's doing, but the NST this morning did a lot to reassure me. Other than a sore back, I am doing great. We will probably try for another walk tonight when it cools off a bit. Maybe that will get things moving. I think I'll try almost anything (except Castor oil... blech). Thanks for all your sweet emails and comments. It's nice to know we have so many people praying for us!