Pregnancy #2: 37 Weeks and Midwife/Specialist Appointment

I was 37 weeks pregnant on April 17th.

According to thebump.com the baby is the size of a winter melon.

The Baby
He is practicing some skills: inhaling, exhaling, sucking, gripping and blinking.

He is also getting ready for his first dirty diaper.

He measures around 19 inches and 6 to 7 lbs. I am sure he is over 7 lbs at this point if his growth scan last week was correct, but I have my doubts that it was.

He has started falling into a good routine of movement on most days.
The Mama
I have been having some contractions on and off for a few days, but nothing major. At my chiropractor appointment I jokingly told her to "adjust me into labor" I did have some more contractions after, but they went away once I went to bed. I wouldn't mind him coming sooner than the induction date as I just keep thinking about my 48 hour induction with Emma. All the midwives keep telling me it won't be that long, but technically 30 hours is shorter than 48.

I've been having some headaches this week, I tried upping my water intake but it doesn't seem to help. I'm also getting over a lot of sinus pressure/allergies so maybe that is part of the issue. It has been a pretty stressful week at work as well.

I'm pretty sure I lost my mucus plug on the 23rd, the last day of week 37, the pelvic pressure has increased a lot, however not really any contractions anymore. I woke up feeling really foggy on this day and it just progressively got worse. At noon I went to the school nurse and had her take my blood pressure. We took it four times over an hour period and it was high all four times, so the midwives had me go to maternal observation. We were there being monitored for about 2.5 hours, but my blood pressures were fine the whole time, my urine came back with no protein and the baby was doing well so they sent me home and told me to just watch it since I have two doctor appointments during week 38.

Midwife Appointment
We set an induction date of May 3rd, but going in at 8 pm on the 2nd for softening of the cervix if needed. We will find out for sure on April 30th. My blood pressure was high with the cuff, but fine when done manually. This happened when pregnant with Emma too. The information from our growth scan last week says he is in the 69th percentile. Three weeks ago he was in the 29th, so I'm not really believing these scans at all at this point. She said everything looks good. I found out I was GBS negative, so I am so excited not have to have any antibiotics during delivery.

Specialist Appointment
This appointment was at the office that I like the least amount, they always take forever because they don't buzz him soon enough to get what they need. For example, they had me on the monitor didn't check on me until 15 minutes in and instead of buzzing him then then, they let me go for another 5 minutes. Of course they didn't have what they needed, had to buzz him and then monitor for another 20. The other location checks on you every 5 minutes and if they don't have what they need in that first 5 minutes they buzz the baby to get them moving, so I have rarely gone over the 20 minutes there. It was really annoying and I'm sure they realized I was not a happy camper. Other than that everything looked good, the scan and meeting with the doctor only took about 20 minutes all together.

Compare to my pregnancy with Emma