Oy vey!

Yesterday and last night was a little rough! Went to the doctor's appointment and had a tiny stroke when I didn't see our doctor's name on the window. I was so afraid she'd gone into labor before me, but turns out they had been too busy to switch out the signs for the day, phew! Well, we didn't make much progress last week, I'm *almost* 4 cm and still about 80% effaced. But Dr. Redden seems very happy with it all and says that we're just waiting to the contractions to get into a regular rhythm. She also said at next week's appointment (if I make it) we'll do an ultrasound and make sure everything's okay and we can talk about inducing if I want. I was hesitant at first, but I feel my spirit weakening with every passing day. I can handle a lot of things, but it's the days when I'm juggling 5 or 6 symptoms at once I feel defeated. Last night after the nausea, the back pain, the painful contractions, lack of sleep, allergies, swelling and now I'm seeing stretchmarks in unappealing places, once my foot arch started hurting I just hung my head and cried. At least Ben was there for the breakdown, he's been wonderful through the painful/uncomfortable times!

Okay, okay, enough of that! I need to stay positive and think good thoughts, right? I was ecstatic to get a call from my grandma yesterday out of the blue. She was just checking up on me and I was thrilled to hear she is doing well for the most part. She has restless leg issues and said her feet have been hurting lately as well, so I told her she really didn't need to have sympathy pains for me. I'm thrilled my sister just found out she's pregnant too! Which means four out of the five of us first cousins will have babies all within a year of each other, so hopefully they'll be great friends. I'm relieved Ben's work has worked out their issues so there will be no problems when I go into labor. (I may have threatened to waddle into his store and demand my husband loudly if they didn't let him leave when I need him and I might bring the 6:00 news with me.) And even better, Ben found out he's got 5 and a half WEEKS of paid time off left this year. So there will be plenty of paternity time plus a week here and there to visit our family members who can't make the drive to us.

Finally took pictures of the finished nursery, just need to dig through them and post them! Soon...

Still waiting...

Wednesday was our latest OB appointment and good news: I'm 3 cm and mostly effaced! Which means I'm close right? Welllll, I've heard of women walking around at 3 cm for weeks, so who knows? Friday night/Saturday morning I thought was going to be it. Woke up with some really painful contractions (painful enough that I cussed rather loudly without realizing how loud I was and scared Ben half to death), tried to time them, but of course they weren't regular. So I got up, drank a bunch of water, walked around and began to be bored. Thank goodness the Olympics are always on for those of us who can't sleep!

After talking with my mom and finding out all three of her children were late entering the world, I'm getting a little nervous. I had known I was two weeks late, but both of my sisters were also a week late, so I'm sure this is karma just getting me back for making her suffer in the summer too.

I found this article on the blog AND MARY I just read and makes me feel so much better about how I'm feeling right now: "The Last Days of Pregnancy: A Place of In-Between". How true it is! For the past couple of months I've felt ready to get this motherhood gig started, but in the last week or two I've begun getting nervous again. I try to think of the false labor pains as progression, but I either feel annoyed nothing is happening or nervous that I'm about to go into labor and I don't feel ready. I know I'm ready, so it must be these damn hormones again...grr!