38 + weeks

This has certainly been an eventful week! After doing my first NSTs (fetal monitoring) my baby was always the noisiest, the one moving around making the nurses sigh because they have to keep finding the heartbeat again when he flipped positions. It wasn't a surprise when they noticed he had an irregular heartbeat that went up and down. He constantly moves during the NST maybe he feels uncomfortable or gets stressed out because he doesn't know what's going on, those belts are always strapped on so tightly! Due to these irregular heartbeats I was told to retake the test many times only to be told that he was particularly active.
I even had a false alarm this week when A and I were returning from a meal with friends. I had pains at the top of my belly, it felt like the baby was winding me with his feet and the pain was making me cry out a little. I felt my belly getting hard and tensing up but this was way less uncomfortable than the winding feeling I got by those little active feet kicking around! So A decided to take me to the hospital.
They hooked me up to the NST machine again and to my surprise a few contractions were appearing. One contraction was actually quite strong as it measured 90 for a few seconds. The nurse told me 'it could be the start of labour, we'll have to see'.. this got me so excited, I wasn't at all anxious about labour I was just excited that it was finally happening. I told A, 'he's going to be born on the 5th!' and he got all excited too, he asked me if he should go and pick up my hospital bag.
They decided to give me an injection of Spasmex to stop contractions if it's false labour and indeed after waiting half an hour and taking the test again, my contractions had eased off. And back home we went. I was a little disappointed but I didn't mind, obviously Flavio needs a little more time in there.
My last NST was on Thursday and they had me coming back the next day due to this accelerated heartbeat again only to dismiss it as the baby moving a lot. The nurse noticed that my feet were swollen and decided to take my blood pressure. 140/100! She immediately told the doctor and he told her to take it again in ten minutes. She did so and confermed the result. She said it was particularly high and I had to take it again when I'd finished the test. The test was fine this time round,  he must've been sleeping for once. When she took my blood pressure it had gone down to 130/95 but said it was still high. The doctor sent me home with the prescription for some medicine. I decided to ring my gynecologist who immediately told me that the hospital should've admitted me straight away with blood pressure so high. She said that it was best for me to be induced as soon as possible.. This got me worried! She told me to go to another hospital where they were more likely to admit me and induce me. I hesitantly accepted and we headed to the other hospital. There they took my blood pressure which was still quite high but not worringly so and they hooked me up to yet another NST. I've had my fair share of fetal monitoring, that night I couldn't take it anymore, I just wanted to go home. There were a few contractions coming up on the result but the nurse said they were preparatory because they were irregular. After taking my blood pressure once again, it had gone down to 120/70 and so I was sent home. How stressful was that day! We decided to buy a blood pressure measuring home kit so I could monitor regularly but since then it has always been in the norm.
And we're back to playing the waiting game..!

37 weeks. FULL TERM!!!

I cannot believe I've got this far along! I've had contractions all the way through this pregnancy due to the detachment and this always made me think baby wants to leave me as early as possible! Well it's obviously not the case. I'm now 37 + 1 and Flavio seems like he doesn't want to budge, he seems to be comfortable in here! My gynecologist says he is bigger than average and if he doesn't make his appearance soon I'll risk having an emergency cesarean after hours of pushing with no luck. Unfortunately they don't induce here unless the baby is in distress so I'll have to get to at least 40 weeks before they take action. It was the last appointment we'll have with her, now I've just got fetal monitoring appointments and we're basically waiting for the contractions to come on.
My belly is enormous and heavy and I'm swelling up all over especially in my hands, my fingers are sore and I can't even move them in the morning! First I have to get the feeling back into them and then slowly move them softly until I can bend them and straighten them out.
What gets me is that I'm still hungry all the time which makes me wonder if this means he's still growing. He now weighs 3.6 kilos that's 8 lbs I think and that's probably all I could push out due to the size of me! I don't have childbearing hips, why is my baby so big?! I'm quite pleased in a way though, at least that means he's healthy!
Flavio, I've tried to get everything ready for you, Mummy's anxiously waiting to meet you and hold you in her arms.