36 Weeks

Until the baby gets here, I really have nothing to talk about besides my pregnancy. So I will warn you now, if you don't like to hear things like uterus and other pregnancy words, you might want to stop reading! I promise I won't get graphic. But I live with words like this everyday, so it's nothing to me anymore. Yesterday I reached Week 36 of my pregnancy. I went to the doctor Wednesday, and everything was fine, except that I wasn't "measuring correctly." I'm not going to get into all that but basically my uterus was much lower than it was supposed be. We think the baby (who does not have a name yet) has "dropped" (when the baby descends lower into the mother's pelvis; this does not mean I will go into labor any sooner or later), which is totally normal. However, I am going back on Tuesday for a checkup, and I will also have an ultrasound done to take measurements of the baby and to check for fluid to make sure that nothing is wrong. I guess I should've listened to the girl at Arby's who took my order on Sunday and who took one look at me and said, "Oooohhh girl, you look like you 'bout to drop!" Maybe I should've mentioned this to my doctor. It probably would've cleared up any of her concerns! :)

The baby is moving around a lot! I hope that she waits until her due date (December 13) or later to make her debut because I have to finish finals! I have spoken with all my professors and they are all letting me take them a couple of days early, but that won't matter if she comes really early! Technically, 37 weeks is full term. This means that on Thanksgiving day, this baby is ready to live in the outside world! But she could also go until 42 weeks, which is the end of December, which I do not want to even think about. The doctor told me if she hasn't come by week 41, she will make her come out!

Because she could come at any time, Ben and I have been instructed to take it easy and hang around Birmingham until her birthday! If I travel somewhere this far along into the pregnancy and go into labor, my insurance won't pay the hospital fees. It's really good insurance, but it's UAB insurance, and they want you to have your baby at UAB! And who wants to go into labor out of town? It's not safe at this point to be driving all over the place anyway. This weekend we are going to buy all the extra supplies we will need to take care of a new baby. Ben is a nervous wreck already, and I will be packing my hospital bag this weekend as well, or so I have been told!

I will try to think of some more funny things people have said to me about being pregnant. I don't really get out much. Actually I go to school and come home and study and that's about it. Ben does all of the grocery shopping and errand running for us now since my back starting hurting. But on a hunch, I started sleeping with a pillow between my legs 3 nights ago, and the back pain has pretty much vanished. I wish I had thought of that mid-October when it started! I lived in agony for 4 weeks for nothing! It was actually my pelvis and hip joints that were hurting. Anyway, now that I've recovered, I'll get out and about and maybe people will give me more ridiculous advice!