Wow... Who knew it could take that long? Part III

Monday, September 3, 2007 - Labour Day, 10:25pm

Pushing begins.

And somewhere before pushing began, I was catheterized to empty my bladder. That was a joyous process. Well really, the epidural hid most of the sensation - I felt it but not much.

For the uneducated - when pushing in a bed, someone holds your feet up and legs out for you.

I had two things wrong with my legs. My right leg had gone completely numb from the epidural and I had no control of it. Whoever was holding my right leg had to let it down gently or risk being kicked in the hip/thigh/stomach/lower nether regions.
Also I developed a massive nasty pain in my left hip at some point just before pushing started and it was only relieved when my left leg was held up. So, someone had to hold it up during rest periods when I was on my back - where I did my best pushing. During this time it occured to me that my mother-in-law had now seen parts of me that I had never seen... and that in an alternate reality that might bug me. Today however, she was responsible for keeping me supplied in cold cloths for my forehead and ice chips for my mouth and that was wonderful.

Somewhere between this time and what was deemed too long, the OB and the rest of the victory team were called in. They brought with them the vacuum. Not because they wanted to do some light housework while I was in labour. No, this little toy was to help extract the Jelly from its not quite so watery anymore world.

This would have been fine but I had informed the OB of what kind of patient I was earlier when I told her I didn't want to discuss the fetal electrode monitor thingy and she remembered that as the only information I got about the vacuum was that it could be scary if it popped off the head as it would be quite loud. I had to lie on my back while they prepared it and my left leg had to be left down which hurt like, hurt like... hurt a LOT. I was catheterized again during this period without being told and I felt it this time much more strongly than the last. So what I'm sayin' is, I was in some discomfort. I started flailing and crying and the victory team was firmly telling me I needed to stay still and cooperate (which I knew, but the bitch-slapping was appreciated) but I felt it necessary to tell them they were hurting me. My nurse told them that my left hip was causing me quite a bit of discomfort and that having my leg down wasn't helping matters and suddenly everyone was nice and calm again. We tried to increase the epidural but realized that really wasn't helping. Another bright person realized that there was no order for a top-up on it so we really should get moving. The vacuum now attached, we began pushing again and in just a few pushes from my end and pulls from the other end, the Jellyfish made its grand appearance at 1:42am Tuesday, September 4, 2007.

Probably one minute but what felt like more passed before someone told me the sex. All I got to see was the top of the baby's head where the vacuum had been. All I heard was "Oh, he's beautiful!" My brain would not register the sex until a nonchalant voice said in a nonchalant way, "Oh it's a boy by the way." That was when I looked down. The baby was already across the room being weighed and whatnot. No I looked more towards my knees (both down at this point - the pain went away with the Jellyfish) and saw a large green scrub towel soaked in what was presumably my blood. I knew what was coming next. I knew I needed to push the placenta out and I could see by the OB's face that we should do that now. I allowed myself a prolonged blink and when I looked back, she was looking at the baby across the room too. There was a ton of madness at this point while we discussed the baby's name. I asked Dad if the name we had picked looked like a good one. Then the OB said, "let's get the placenta out. You need to push again." So she coached me through pushing that out. Fun. I never got to see it. I had wanted to a little bit. Oh well, I know what they look like. Squishy and bloody and veiny. And gross. So you can see why I was interested in seeing it. Remember, I have a twisted sense of fun.

Then the OB and one of the victory nurses set about stitching me. It took them about an hour. So for this process you lie on your back with your feet in the stirrups and the crabby little victory nurse tells you to let your legs fall like jelly. I rolled my eyes behind closed lids (which conveniently had a cold facecloth over them) and held my legs apart for them with my hands. I still couldn't control the right leg and if I let it go on its own it would be out of the stirrup and on the floor - a position that wouldn't help anybody.

The nurse from the pushing helped me explain that the right leg needed to be supported because of the epidural. I said something like, "I need to hold on to this leg. You're not hurting me, but I will tense my leg muscles because that's what I do. If my right leg slides to close to you, smack my hand and I'll move it
again. Sorry." This worked well.

TMI ALERT

I found out later (discharge day) that the vacuum had required an episiotomy - no surprise and that baby boy had torn me internally. Rather than a tear along the vaginal wall, he had ripped me through the wall. So they had to find the end of the tear first and then do a nice happy stitch back out. So that's why it took so long

So, the details:

Baby Boy: Matthew William
Born: 1:42am, Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Weight: 8lb, 6.2oz
Length: 20 1/2"
Apgar scores: 9 and 9 (honestly, no one passes colour - I didn't).

3 and a bit hours pushing.
Baby boy had low blood sugars - not a full crash, but low. I had high sugars for the first half day, but then both of us stabalized. Woo-hoo!

No count on stitches, but one tear and a standard episiotomy.

A few more details, including the most entertaining which occured Tuesday night/Wednesday morning:

Company came on Tuesday evening and there were so many of us we took over the whole waiting room. Grandpa and Nanny were able to see the kid and Dad's Mommy and Dad and Dad's brother and sister-in-law and their kid (Jelly's cousin) were able to see the baby.

Baby boy's blood sugars were checked a lot during the day on Tuesday - always from the foot. Poor thing.

All day Tuesday we struggled with breastfeeding. I have some physical barriers that are complicating things, and baby boy had low blood sugars making him tired. We were able to pump enough to get him fed using a cup during the day - the nurses were very helpful with that. At night we fed him again and the evening nurse was good enough to come back at midnight to feed him again. Then she left us and told us to make sure he ate again within 4 hours.

It started with the poo. at 2:00. We both changed the pooey, end of meconium diaper and wrapped him back up to put him to bed. At 2:15 he cried. I offered him a boob but no. We gave him some formula while I pumped. By the time we got the colostrum out, he wasn't interested in it anymore. Somewhere between 2:20 and 3:00, during which time Dad told me to sleep, he was still fussy. I woke up and said, "have you slept?" Dad said, "No." I said, "give him to me. Sleep." So we changed another diaper and gave him the colostrum he hadn't been interested in before and I wandered around with him for a bit.

I pumped again during this period - 15 minutes on each side and lost it all down my side - didn't get any of it into the cup. I cursed and cried and did my best not to break into all out sobs.

It took us until 6:15 to realize just how sleep-deprived we were. This was when we looked at the table and realized we had three sealed bottles of formula in the room.

4 hours struggling to feed our infant son and not knowing how to do it before we realized there were THREE bottles of READY TO EAT formula AND three nipples in the room with us. So we topped up his usual 5 mL feeding with the formula and went to bed. I fell asleep with the bairn on my chest and woke up around 7:00.

I looked at the clock and figured I should stay awake because any moment someone would come through the door wanting to look at my bum. The staff really is fascinated by your bum after you give birth. As it was the first person to poke their head in the door was someone from housing services. She just wanted to empty the garbage and announced that breakfast would be showing up soon. It did. I figured it had been 24 hours, I didn't need to have my sugars checked. I was about to eat when one of the lab rats came and smiled. I asked her which one of us she wanted. She said she wanted me. The two of us reasoned together that I probably didn't need my sugars checked so I could go ahead and eat. She left. I started eating. The daytime nurse showed up to check my sugars. Dangit. They were good. Baby boy had his done too and they were low. So the lab was called to check them in their fancy whirly machines. Where they were deemed okay - for the second time -woo-hoo!

I ate. The OB came and told us if we wanted to leave that day we could. Again, we expressed our love for her. Discharge was all organized through the nurse. Baby Boy fell asleep during his PKU (nasty blood test done with the heel). He screamed for a bit, but eventually fell asleep. I told the nurse that I would continue to try breastfeeding and that I had every intention of pumping it for him until we figured something out and that we had formula at home for him to supplement. She was happy with that. So we were allowed to go home when my Mommy showed up to help us pack.

And home we went.

That's it for now.

More details will follow at semi-IRregular intervals.


Ciao!
-HLC

Wow... Who knew it could take that long? Part II

Monday, September 3, 2007 - Labour Day. No really, Labour Day.

So, at 8:45 we were transferred to the Birthing Unit. I was hooked up to a fetal monitor.

Again.

But it wasn't a non-stress test this time. No clicker. I presume you're not given a clicker to minimize clicker damage when the contractions come.
(please note the joke here)

At 9:00am the attending OB came in and removed the Cervidil. We love Dr. W.

Next, she broke my waters, leaving us unsure about our feelings for Dr. W. This was a more horrible experience than the cervidil. I suddenly realized if I couldn't handle this, I REALLY needed the epidural for later. There was headboard punching involved. In a nutshell, water breaking was a "Bad Touch".

At 9:30 the Saline IV was started. Dad called his parents to update them and came back around 9:50

At 10:15, the pitocin drip was begun - 2mL/hour not a ton. I said, "okay, let's talk epidural." The OB said, "no you're not dilated enough. We need you to be at 3cm before we even think about it. You can manage the pain by walking around." I said, "okay" meaning "so you're gonna' check me regularly right?"

10:45 - the pitocin was increased.

At 11:00 my learning curve steepened as I said, "Oh no nurse, I can't talk through my contractions." But even the student nurse saw through that. Darn. Foiled again.

At 11:15 when the pitocin was increased to 6mL/hour we began to refer to it as a frenemy. It was a self-induced pain but it would lead to something wonderful.

At 11:30 we all remembered the 2 hour PC sugar test had not been done. Oh well. Not that big a deal today right? I mean, the kid can't possibly grow too much larger today right? It was somewhere around here that the student nurse took pity on me and asked if I was hungry. I said I could eat if she'd let me. I was under the assumption that I was allowed no food by mouth all day and I was willing to follow those instructions but if anyone else wanted to eat they would have to leave the room to do it. She told me she would track down some cheese and crackers. She came back at 11:55 with a full lunch tray! With restrictions. I wasn't allowed to eat the main entree - they called it Shepherd's Pie, I called it "Hamburger with mashed potatoes on top and a side order of green beans." Dad was allowed to eat the entree. I was allowed to eat the cheese and crackers, drink the milk... the small stuff. I was allowed to eat the small stuff. Not for carb restriction but for food intake restriction. Again, I'm perfectly fine with the whole "you're not allowed to have food" thing. I don't want to aspirate during surgery anymore than they want me to.

At around 12:15 the pitocin was increased again. Now we're in the double digits. 10 mL/hour. I was rewarded with an after lunch nap. Actually it was more of an after lunch veg-out.

At 12:45 my Mommy arrived with a laptop and music. The Jelly always liked Little Feat before, we thought it would be good to play it during labour.

The next pitocin increase came at 1:20 and with it another examination of the cervix. This was done by the student nurse who was very talented at hitting all of the nerves and making them hurt. I grabbed a hold of the rails on the bed for that one. She apologized profusely and I assured her it was okay - she had to learn how to do it. Of course, her exam was then checked by the nurse that was working with her. So I got two of those little gems back to back.

It was decided at this point that my waters were still in tact and needed to be broken again. Sometimes when breaking waters they only get an outer membrane, not the full bag. It didn't hurt as much this time and it worked MUCH better for them. We're talkin' Niagara Falls here.

This time we remembered to to do a glucose test at the 2 hour mark. And they were good thank you.

At 2:20 my Mommy helped me inform them that I REALLY wanted something for the pain. We also learned that I was not allowed to walk around because I needed to remain attached to the fetal monitors (that weren't doing anything anyway because the squirt was moving too much). After ascertaining that I would be allowed to get the epidural later and that I understood it wouldn't make the pain go away altogether, I was given an injection of morphine and gravol. I didn't even get drowsy from it.

A few minutes later we talked to the sister in law and let her know what was happening. Not much.

At 2:30 I got my next bag of salt.

Dad's Mommy came around 3:00 to take part in the festivities. It took us a minute to explain to the the Gestapo guards in the birthing unit that she belonged there - she was one of my support people and we wanted her in the room with us but they eventually got the hint.

At 4:00pm after fighting the good fight and with the pitocin at 14mL/hour and having endured double and triple contractions at 2:00 minute intervals (which seems to mean two minutes from the start of the first group to the start of the second group, NOT two minute rests between them) I asked, no BEGGED for the epidural.

At 4:20 someone had the brilliant idea to let me out of bed (I'm allowed out of bed? You said I wasn't!) to go sit on the birthing ball - most people call these "exercise balls." It's true. They're wonderful. They open EVERYTHING. The whole pelvis opens up and all the pressure you've been feeling goes away.

Around 5:45 or so I was told the anesthesiologist was on his way and I needed to walk back over to the bed so I would be in the right position for him when he got there. This took all of about 5 seconds to achieve so I went to the bathroom for a bit. Then I came back to the bed and waited for what seemed like HOURS as the contractions got stronger and stronger. At 6:15 the new nurse in charge decided it might be a good idea to turn the pitocin down. We dropped to 8 mL/hour and 5 minutes later the Epidural Man arrived. We're going to call him that because it's easier to spell. During this period only Dad was allowed to stay in the room. So his Mommy and his Dad went out to get some dinner. My Mommy went somewhere to get food and sretch her legs. Dad was allowed to stay but was pushed aside. I was sitting on the edge of the bed with the useless nurse in front of me and the Epidural Man behind me. I was told to tell them if I was having a contraction and I was told to stay still. I figured I was meant to inform them of contractions so I could flail like crazy while they waited to stick a needle in my spine. Instead I got "you have to stay still." Finally useless nurse grabbed my shoulders and held me still, scolding me most of the time. Epidural Man took three tries to get the line in and apologized continually. It was a good cop/bad cop scenario. I briefly entertained the idea that the epidural may not work and then pushed that thought out of my head. When the line was in and taped securely to my lower back, middle back, and shoulders (that puppy wasn't going anywhere) the Epidural Man sat at a desk and filled out his charts and stuff and we chatted for a bit, "do you know what sex the baby is? This is your first, are you excited?" stuff like that. Somewhere in there I said "I love you" and he said, "well let's see if it works first" and I said, "I love you for trying!" Seemingly seconds later someone asked me if my legs felt any different. I said, "yeah, they're a little - no a LOT warm." Everyone said in unison, "oh good, it's working." I said, "you rock!" as the Epidural Man left the room. I must remember to send him flowers.

We had a slight problem with the bolus cable for the epidural. It seems the cable was a bit wonky so every time they hooked it up to the pump, an alarm would go off. We went through three pumps before we figured out what the problem was. Oh well, learning curves and all. At some point in here my cervix was checked again and I was at 6cm. Wow... 6. How did that happen? When did that happen? And oh dear, the epidural could slow this down. Well maybe it won't.

The next hour and a half was a fun time for all as we steadily re-increased the pitocin drip - which finished at 16mL/hour at 10:25pm. The OB also came in to attach a fetal heart monitor to the Jelly's head - which was apparently visible to those who were looking at the right angle. These are lovely things that attach to the baby's head via a small corkscrew like thingy. I told the OB that I knew what it was and what it was for and that it kind of creeped me out and I didn't want to talk about it so she said, "okay" and attached the device.

At 8:00ish, the evening staff nurse came in and checked my cervix again. 9cm. I said, "excuse me? 9? When did that happen?" She laughed. Good sense of humour that one. From this time 'til about 9:00 we got to rest. I honestly can't remember what everyone else was doing but I had a lovely nap which was interrupted only a little bit by vitals checks.

At 9:00pm my cervix was checked one more time.

The nurse said, "so, you're 10cm. Can you feel contractions still?"

I said something along the lines of, "Huh?! Yes. I can feel a bit of pressure." She said, "okay, well when you can feel the next one, let's do a push to see how you do.

I said, "okay."

The practice pushes went really well.

I was thrilled - the epidural was not turned down. I was to have full epidural for the whole delivery!

See Part III for delivery and postpartum

Wow... who knew it could take that long? Part I

(this one's gonna' be long. sorry.)

Nine months officially came to an end last Monday.

We went to the hospital Sunday, September 2 at 5:30pm. We went to the birthing unit as directed by the OB, confused the people at the desk and were sent over to Postpartum where they apparently do inductions. Oh well, I did manage to make people laugh by saying, "I'm not in labout but my doctor would like me to be."

I was admitted and subjected to and yet another non-stress test. I comforted myself by remembering that there wouldn't be many more of them left. The Jelly wasn't moving so we decided to go the popsicle route to see if the cold and sweet combo would get it moving. About three minutes after I finished the popsicle (grape - double) dinner showed up.

We tried not to lose faith in the hospital's general intelligence.

I mean, if you're going to serve carbs, maybe we don't need the popsicle to get squirt moving.

Anyhoo, at 7:00pm that night I became a patient and my modesty was tossed neatly out the window with the first in a series of internal exams. The exam showed the cervix was still firmly planted somewhere around my tonsils and wasn't showing any signs of coming down any time soon on its own. So in went the cervidil.
(for the uneducated, cervidil is a gel that aids in softening the cervix)
This was an altogether horrible experience.

TMI ALERT!

Cervidil comes in a very small suppository format. It looks like a teeny tiny tampon attached to a REALLY LONG ribbon where the string would ordinarily be. This makes sense. The suppository needs to be taken out (like a tampon) and since it's WAY higher up than the usual temporary stuff you put in that particular location, the pull-string needs to be longer.

WAY LONGER.

And it's not a thin string like one would hope. It's actually quite a wide net-like ribbon. The end of which needs to be tucked in to avoid being accidentally pulled out. Unfortunately the end often gets "stuck" on the glove of whoever is placing it - so it takes a few tries.

So fun was had by all. I was also informed that the primary negative side effect (that doesn't usually happen) that my medical team was worried about is that cervidil can cause extreme uterine contractions which in my case meant that the baby would be unable to handle it and I'd be having a C-Section. I said, "okay." Which meant, "well, I'm at the hospital, I can't think of a better place to have that happen."

Anyhoo, after that greatly enjoyable experience I was hooked back up to the monitors for a 2 hour non-stress test.

At 9:00ish a lovely woman came in and took all the monitors off. We love her.

20 minutes later Dad went home to sleep in a real bed (grr) and I had a snack, took some inuslin (under a nurse's written guidance, not visual - I love her.) tried to prepare for sleep in an actually very comfy bed. But I woke up every hour to go to the bathroom because I was still pregnant.

Dad was back by the next morning at 7:30.

Before that I was up at 6:00 to growl about the turkey tv dinner I'd been given the night before (Jelly still wouldn't let me properly digest things).

At 6:30 my vitals were checked. Temperature normal, BP elevated - oh really? I can't imagine why my blood pressure might be elevated... Certainly nothing to be excited about.

I was able to squeeze in a shower before breakfast and a glucose test (their machine) were ordered. I also took some insulin before breakfast - the last injection I would take in the hospital. I explained to the new nurse that I was on a slide scale and would need to decide how much of breakfast I would be able to eat before I knew how much insulin to take. So while I was trying very hard to count carbs on this VERY exciting morning I had to contend with an impatient nurse (who was probably very overworked, I don't blame her) saying, "how much are you going to take? How much are you going to take?" I finally said, "I have to count the carbs first. I don't know how much I'm going to use until I know how much I'm going to eat. Give me just a second." And she promptly shut up and let me do some basic addition. I went with the usual 18 units knowing that this wouldn't be a problem later in the day. I figured I might go a little low but not terribly and later in the day my sugars would only rise so it wasn't a huge issue. Besides, if all else failed, someone would be able to get me some dextrose - provided they all remembered I was diabetic. Yes, once again I had to explain to EVERY new face that I was gestational diabetic and that my Endocrinologist had said I would have my sugars checked every two hours during labour but if they had new instructions then I wasn't worried.

At 8:45 we were transferred to the birthing unit.

See Part II for the labour section.

Baby's home! Baby's home!

It's Dad again.

OK, so he's been home since Wednesday evening.

We managed to update Facebook, but we haven't gotten around to this yet. We named our son Matthew William Cameron. He was born at 1:42AM on Tuesday September 4th 2007. He weighed 3800 grams, or 8 lbs. 6.2 oz. in real numbers. :) Wednesday morning he weighed 8 lbs. 2 Oz. Friday morning was his first outing - to Alliston! Poor guy. He was very easy to deal with the whole time. We went to Alliston to see Mommy's family doctor, which incidentally is now his doctor too. He weighed 8 lbs. 12 oz. there, apparently we are doing something right. He has oral thrush - not really a shock since most newborns get that. We have some drugs to give him, we're pretty sure he doesn't like it much but he doesn't fight about it either.

Well thats about as much as I can think to write at the moment. We'll be back to add to this later.

almost-Dad.... first post in a LONG time

Hey all, it's Mike. Mom is in the hospital she has been given cervadil (sp). They are keeping her overnight in case labour starts on it's own.

Things started with getting her admitted, and they started a non-stress test. Mommy got her dinner served in bed, on a tray. Turkey, mashed potato, and carrots or squash or something for veggie. Cream of Asparagus soup - which was salty like the Dead Sea. She drank the milk, and the Grape Juice. I ate her date square - she wasn't sure how to count the carbs, and shoot the insulin for that.

When the cervadil was inserted, they hooked Mom up to the no-stress test system again. For 2 hrs. the straps were itchy, and she needy to use the potty... Well after that was done, she got up, and went to the washroom, and walked around enjoying the freedom of not needing to lie in bed.

I'm sleeping at home to get a good nights sleep. I worked Saturday night, but that's another story. I'll be heading back to the hospital bright and early - around 7:30AM

Well I hope my grammer, and sentence structure weren't too awful... I'd hate to permanently ruin her blog. :)

Okay, one more post

Oooh.

Big day. We go to the hospital at 5:30 today and let the doctor on duty do her thing (yes it is a woman, I've been told) which I am sooooo looking forward to, let me tell you. No sarcasm.

really.

I've also apparently lost the ability to type accurately so if there are any glaring typos... deal with it.

I'm really quite scattered today. I hope the day will go by relatively quickly and not like Christmas Eve generally does. You know the feeling. The way time seems to truly sloooooowwww dooowwwwwnnn when you're really excited about something. Kind of like when you're sitting in class - elementary, high school, college, university, detention, drivers' ed... whatever - and you swear the hands on the clock are actually moving backwards... That's what today is going to be like. We live about 20 minutes from the hospital so we'll be leaving around 5:00. Really it's just the time of one regular work day - shorter for most people. But time is already crawling. It's 9:30 right now. Only 7 1/2 hours left.

SEVEN AND A HALF HOURS?!

WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO FOR SEVEN AND A HALF HOURS?

The day's fairly anxiety-ridden. I'm still not worried or nervous about the birth itself. I'm not thinking that far ahead. I'm more worried about the results of the initial check at the hospital. Will we be allowed to stay or will we be sent home? The doctor didn't tell me to call first which I find interesting. Generally when you're going for an induction you're supposed to call ahead to make sure they've got room for you. If they're really busy with walk-ins they send you home. Will I have started to dilate on my own and be sent home for that reason? I don't feel any different. No increase in the braxton hicks contractions. Jelly on the other hand is frog-kicking me to death. Seriously... anyone familiar with the breast stroke's leg movements will get a good idea of this. Imagine it happening in your rib cage. This is what Jelly is doing right now. Like while I'm typing. It's worse when I try to do something so innocent as go to sleep.

well that went a little off topic eh?

Right... will I be kept there? Will I get the gel? Will it work? Will I need to have my waters broken? Will I be on pitocin - dear God not pitocin. Don't get me wrong, I want this baby out as badly as my OB does (not that she'll be there, she's on vacation) and I'm not going to argue with them if they want to use pitocin but if they do I want the epidural IMMEDIATELY.

Will labour start tonight when I'm trying to get in the ever important sleep or will I be delivering sometime on Tuesday or - yipe - Wednesday? How long will we let this go?

If they do keep me will Dad be allowed to stay or will he be sent home? We'd prefer he stayed but can live with it if they want him to leave. I'll be asleep anyway. Will the idiot nurses let me take my insulin the way I say I'm supposed to take it?

But enough about me, specifically.

We have plans to chunk up the day a bit. For example, I'm not even ready for my day yet. I'm still in pyjamas and in need of a shower - gotta' be beautiful before the big event.

We're only mostly packed. I plan on re-packing once or twice and Dad still needs a change of clothes in the bag. Bag. Heh. Suitcase. We have no less than three bags packed and no pillows currently ready to go. So, re-packing sounds like a good way to kill 20 or 30 seconds.

The house is clean. There is nothing I could do to make it better except maybe reaarange the basement and I get the feeling the more rest I have now, the better.

I just want to make sure the kitchen is clean and the garbages are emptied before we leave.

Everything is taken care of.

So we're going out to brunch. Well the restaurant calls it brunch. The Gestational Diabetic Diet does not allow me to have "brunch." So what I'm really having is breakfast food for lunch. And they've got a really good looking menu too. I plan on taking an extra cartridge of insulin with me.

So that should get us through to about 1:30. Then we can come back here and ... rest? What are we supposed to do for three and half hours? Watch a Lord of the Rings movie? We don't have the first one and I don't think my attention span would last that long anyway. It's Sunday. There's nothing on television today. I could try a foot spa. And we could read I guess. Maybe a few last trial runs so we don't look like complete idiots with the car seat? I wonder if the cat would like to help...

Doubt it.

So anyway, that's the plan for today. Hurry up and wait. Patience is a virtue I possess only when teaching. I do not possess it for big events like this.

Of course, it's almost 10:00 now and I still haven't felt the munchies come on yet. Maybe this afternoon.

Maybe it's time to sign off and try that reading thing. Maybe I could clean the kitchen again. It's easy to clean when it's already clean. Maybe I could start the packing again.

Maybe I could write a book all about fretting. The nervous type - not the kind you do when playing a stringed instrument. That's different.

Maybe if I sign off now I'll stop babbling.

Oh... for those who are interested... here's how labour works with Gestational Diabetes. Labour is spent with the usual infusion fluids (nothing by mouth except clear fluids at my hospital) and no insulin. Labour sucks enough energy - 700 calories per hour. Afterwards I get to eat normal food for 24 hours an monitor my sugars. Presuming they look okay, I get to to another glucose tolerance test in 6 weeks. Yippee. Lookin' forward to that. So here's hopin' that the diabetes goes away with the placenta. Keep your fingers crossed!

Ciao!


-HLC