You take it on faith, you take it to the heart
The waiting is the hardest part.
-Tom Petty
Today's theme is: "Oh my God. Still?"
Yes. STILL. I am at the point where every pregnant woman who ever lived gets shifty-eyed and starts making furtive glances at tilt-a-whirls and giant bouncy houses and thinks to themselves you know, it could work...
I felt this way when I was pregnant with Chris. The days tick down, and I do my best to keep my mind off the fact that OH MY GOD THIS KID IS STILL INSIDE ME HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE? At this point, all she's doing is eating for free. I feel like shining a flashlight up my crotch and tell her goooo towarrrd the liiiight. We went to the Greek festival this weekend, the first year since my engagement that I wasn't volunteering to feed people who couldn't pronounce what I was feeding them if they tried. Dim got permission to park on the church grounds, an honor reserved for, I don't know, the pope? We had better-than-handicapped parking. The policemen working the traffic and crowd had to be radioed as to our arrival so as to be waved through the police line. I felt ridiculous. I'm not made of nitro-glycerin, for Pete's sake. But Dim was insistent. If I go into labor at the festival, he didn't want to wait half an hour for a shuttle bus to pick us up and take us two blocks to the hospital.
Once I got there, the women staffing the booths (who all know me) were pretty much of the same mind when they told me: SERIOUSLY? IS YOUR UTERUS MADE OF ADAMANTIUM OR SOMETHING? HOW HAVE YOU NOT GIVEN BIRTH YET? Okay, the Greek ladies didn't say Adamantium, but still. One of them led me over to a local politician who is running for Governor, a man who was wearing glasses too stylish to be a heterosexual Republican, but who also happens to be a talented ER doctor and a military surgeon, made awkward introductions, and instructed him to keep an eye on my midsection for the remainder of the evening in case I broke my water all over the stuffed grape leaves. (Secret ingredient, by the way.) The poor man was there to shake hands and kiss babies, and yet still managed to be graciously polite about his new assignment: Cervix watch.
So of course, after all the attention showered on me, which I find completely embarrassing, I don't go into labor. I get Pope parking, and a medical escort on standby, so OF COURSE nothing happens. Dim and the kids went with (big) Sophie again to the festival last night, but I stayed home. Dim parked in Pope Benedict's spot again, just in case he needed to make a speedy getaway, so OF COURSE nothing happens again. There was nothing on TV for me to watch, and nothing but unfolded laundry for me upstairs, so I took myself out to a movie. It had all kinds of nice explode-y noises and big booms to scare a kid out of hibernation, but no.
The induction is scheduled for Thursday at ungodly o'clock in the morning. I'm trying to keep my chin up and stay distracted. It's really hard.
But soon this will all be over, and I will have a new little baby in my arms to cuddle and stroke and try to fit her entire head in my mouth. And you? You can come over and have amniotic grape leaves.
I am 2-3 centimeters dilated, which essentially means that I could go into labor in the next hour or two weeks from now. It's so maddening how any sign of labor has no timeline attached to it. Women have been having babies forever, yet we can't seem to find any consistent indicator of when we will actually go into labor. It could be now, it could be next week. There isn't a shred of punctuality or predictability about any of this.
Perhaps our bodies are Greek by design.
Sophie is terribly excited to meet her new sister. She tells me every day (several times a day) that Mama's going to the hospital and the doctor's going to help get Zoe out. Then Zoe is going to come home and Sophie can play dollies with Zoe. But first the doctor has to get the baby out of Sophie's tummy, too. Chris has no idea what is going on. He kisses my belly, but I think that's only because it's so massive that it's the only thing his lips can reach without mountain climbing and rappelling equipment.
I spend my days tired and cranky, and do my best not to bite anyone's head off, especially Dimitri's. Every time I stand up, I feel the kathunk of the baby's head settling a little bit lower in my stomach. And then I want to pee. Some days, it's not even worth it to get out of the bathroom. My weight gain this pregnancy has been slight, I think about six or seven pounds, but the rearrangement of what's left has been so dramatic that I feel as if I've gained fifty. My lungs are in my cheeks, my intestines are in my throat, and my poor bladder is squinched down somewhere around my knees. I feel like a Mrs. Potato Head with all the parts in the wrong holes.
Mrs. Potato Head, though, had a convenient removable panel around the back, as I recall. That, given my situation, would be really handy in the next hour or the next two weeks.
I'm anxious. I'm not scared, exactly. Scared isn't the right word. I'm not scared of things I can't avoid. I am scared of avoidable things, like bear attacks or not studying for math finals, but this train has only one destination and my being scared ain't-a-gonna change the conductor's mind. I'm worried that if I go into labor on my own, that I will have a repeat of the horror of Chris' birth. The rapidity, the screaming, (oh, the screaming. Did I ever tell you that I actually scared the OB with all my screaming?) and the LACK OF DRUGS AT THE END WHEN THE WORLD WAS CRASHING DOWN AROUND ME. Let's be clear: I am amazed at how excellent the outcome of a drug-free birth was; Chris was alert and responsive, I felt like a million dollars, I was up and walking soon after birth, and my recovery was nothing short of miraculous. HOWEVER, and this is a however big enough to print on a Jumbotron, all blinky and set to Queen's "We Will Rock You," it was so shocking how jaw-droppingly, jaggedly, obscenely painful it was. The outcome was wonderful, but the process was something that I wouldn't inflict on anyone.
Except for maybe Hitler. Hitler could have done with a little natural childbirth. But that's it.
Some women have a deep well inside them. It's a well of strength and self-determination from which they draw the bravery, serenity, and courage to go through childbirth without opiates. They can put their mind in a place of peace and repose long enough to pop out a baby with nary a grunt. These women deserve our respect and admiration. Their partners, husbands, and families should stand in perpetual awe of these incredible paragons of power and selflessness.
But my OB and I agree: I am definitely not one of those women.
I have a high tolerance for pain, I do. I'm not a wimp. But there's a line drawn in the sand of my brain, a line past which I think that if there's relief, and my insurance is willing to cover the expense of it: BRING IT ON. GIVE ME TWO. If my husband is being helpful, give him one, too.
Given the speed at which my second labor progressed, and knowing that labors tend to get faster the more that you have them, I'm seriously worried that this little girl is going to be born in the car. My doctor wants to induce at 39 weeks if I haven't delivered by then, but I don't really want that either.
See what I did just there? Allow me to introduce myself: my name is Jen McHypocrite. I don't want the drug intervention of an induction, but y'all can hook me up to an epidural pump right now if you like. If I go into labor before 39 weeks (please oh please oh please oh please) the decision is made for me: all I can do then is hope like hell that Dim's car can drive faster than my uterus can work its magic. But if this kid hangs on until 39 weeks, then an induction is on the menu.
I know that I'm overthinking things, and this will all seem so silly once the baby's here (soon, please oh please oh please) but I don't have much else to do these days. All I can hope for is that well that I mentioned earlier taps into a larger underground aquifer that I can dig into, too.