Mar 26 2014

A Belated 36 Weeks Post & an X-Rated #GetBabyOut

Posted on March 26, 2014 by admin

I haven’t deliberately delayed writing this post, I was just pretty frustrated that my 36th week carrying this huge sack of baby and water was so painfully uneventful. This, despite me spending several hours embarrassing myself on a birthing ball, watching television with my hand down my bra, and conducting painful massages on bits of my body that I wouldn’t even expect Craig to touch. I even went against last week’s promise that I would never put myself through another bite of pineapple scoffing 3 LARGE fresh ones from Tesco in 2 days. Birthing Ball Labour A Belated 36 Weeks Post & an X Rated #GetBabyOut

Most of this week’s endeavours have been physical. I’m pretty sure my treatment of Craig could have earned me a segment on some crappy Channel 5 programme - maybe The Bad Wives Club, or Abused Husbands. When I’m not demanding he whip me up strange concoctions of food in the kitchen, I’m dragging him upstairs in the most unromantic way possible.

I’m not stupid. I realise that most of my experiments will come to nothing. I know full well that most of these tricks were either disproved some 100 years ago, or would need to be eaten / performed on a much grander scale than it would be possible (or even safe) for one person to achieve in one day. But still, I had hoped that Mini Madam would have at least given me a few little signs she was listening to her mummy.

The slightest change in her position or bit of pressure on my bladder and I’m ringing Craig and screaming that she’s gearing up and he had better come home from work (did I mention he’s often 100 miles away?). I seem to have reworked the morality tale The Boy that Cried Wolf for a modern day audience. When my water’s do finally break or I do get a contraction I can already see him rolling his eyes and deliberately taking the scenic route on the way home.

In truth, nothing has happened this week.

Nothing at all.

She’s still kicking away. I’m still producing pathetic amounts of wee every 10 minutes. I’m still crying at adverts with ‘sad’ music. I’m still exhausted after a single hour of parenting Dexter in the morning. None of this is new, and none of it is exciting.

I’m now thinking she’s planning on saying hello on April Fool’s Day as some form of punishment at having been evicted from the little den she’s made inside of me.

So keeping it brief - here’s the results of Operation #GetBabyOut this week. WARNING: This is not suitable reading for the faint-hearted… or for anyone really. GetBabyOut1 A Belated 36 Weeks Post & an X Rated #GetBabyOut

Sex

Don’t bother ladies. Seriously, you’re beyond the stage that you can derive any pleasure from a quick fumble now, and unfortunately the chances are this is also the case for your other half. 99.9% of Kama Sutra positions are now impossible or would have the unwanted side effect of turning off your partner for life. Spooning is your only safe option and you’ll probably find yourself inspecting the chaos on your bedside table rather than any meaningful attempt to participate in the activity at hand.

There is the merest smidgen of science that supports the fact that sex can help bring on labour. Semen may help to ripen, or soften, the neck of your uterus (cervix) ready for it to dilate when labour starts. Semen contains a high number of prostaglandins, which are chemicals that can help to relax tissues (high concentrates of this are used in induction pessaries given to overdue women in hospital - not sperm obviously, but prostaglandins).

Sounds good right? Well no. You’d need few pints of sperm to match the concentration found in just this one active ingredient in a pessary. Given the average man manages a tablespoon per session, even holing him up in a room with a naughty magazine wouldn’t be enough to get a sufficient quantity.

Tweaking your nipples

I can probably manage a quick 30 seconds before I begin to feel prudish / stupid / desperate. The sensation goes from ticklish to sore quickly, and I’d be lying if I said the thought of expelling a sudden burst of milk doesn’t put the fear of God in me. In truth, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to view my breasts as Objets de Désir ever again. They serve one basic function and that is is to feed my child. It has even got to the stage where I find myself physically cringing when I go for a night out and see women forcibly spilling out of their underwear.

Nipple Stimulation A Belated 36 Weeks Post & an X Rated #GetBabyOut

Unfortunately for me, there is some scientific justification for using nipple stimulation to evoke labour. The act of tweaking releases the hormone oxytocin which can help your labour progress. This hormone controls the contractions of your uterus (womb) during labour and can be administered by midwives (in synthetic form) to induce you. According to an uncited source BabyCentre claim (and I’m not suggesting this should become any sane woman’s pregnancy reference) in a study, 37% of women who had tried nipple stimulation went into labour within 72 hours.

This is certainly appealing but you’d need to stimulate your breasts for an hour, three times a day which is easier said than done when you have a curious two-year-old hanging off your arm from 8am - 8pm. Will it scar him? I’m saying yes, even if I’m just making excuses so as not to try it.

So that’s it from me. I’m now well into my 37th week so will report back soon.

Mar 21 2014

Day 1: Operation #GetBabyOut

Posted on March 21, 2014 by admin

As I’ve now reached the dizzying heights of week 37 (well I’m 2 days early but who’s counting? Well actually I am, every minute of every hour but let’s brush that to one side) I’ve gone on strike. I’m now mounting Operation #GetBabyOut which is similar in scale to the military’s quest a few years ago to flush out Bin Laden. I’ve decided I will not be leaving the house until I’m en route to the hospital to deliver Mini Madam.

And this Mama is serious. Look, I’m in full camouflage and everything! (I’m not good at looking mean - I look constipated).

For the next few days (not weeks, as it won’t take that long) I’ll be trying out various techniques to tempt her out.

First up… Pineapple

Yep, despite hating the stuff, I force fed myself two Del Monte tins of yellow goodness this morning, Proud of myself and waiting for one almighty contraction I took to Facebook and Twitter to share my achievement. Within seconds I was delicately informed that the pineapple needs to be fresh (tinned pineapple doesn’t have the correct enzymes) = #Fail1.

What’s more, according to Tina from The Trials and Tribulations of a Brummie Mummy apparently you’d have to eat at least 8 of these bad boys to even stand a chance of ousting baby. The idea is to bring on a bout of diarrhoea that will kick start the process. Tina also helpfully informed me that her midwife once quipped she’s seen some disastrous births with mums disgracing themselves via both ends as a result of scoffing pineapples and curries.

Result: I can’t manage another bitter mouthful. I seriously don’t fancy pooping my way through labour anyway. Those tins were eaten in good faith and it seems I’ve already buggered up the operation. For an hour after this torment Mini Madam went to sleep anyway so I can report I’m aborting this stage and moving onto plan B.

Plan B - Raspberry Tea

I don’t drink tea. In fact, I don’t drink any hot drinks at all. If I were thinking in any way rationally I’d have waddled my way to Holland & Barrett and bought capsules, but no. I sent out the bloke to ASDA and got him to buy tea. To his eternal credit, he did ring me from the tea aisle and tell me that they didn’t stock it. Raspberry did feature in various fruity concoctions, but not on it’s own. Having insisted he read each one out to me (rather, he shouted them as the signal was pants) I finally opted for Twinnings Pomegranate and Raspberry.

Having had three of these of these today I’m now frequently stopping typing for a wee. It’s fairly sickly, and not sitting all that well with the pineapple so it’s a only slight improvement on plan A, and it seems it’s just as flipping fruitless too. Literally.

Yep my Twinning tea is extract only. It’s probably made by scientists in a warehouse somewhere filling up conical flasks with flavourings out of tiny bottles marked with E123s, not lovingly prepared in Japan by tiny women picking and drying out leaves as I’d (somewhat ignorantly) envisaged #Fail2.

Result: All I’ve achieved by drinking this garbage is turning my wee red and bringing about a case of the number 2′s. Baby is probably laughing at me in there.

Last Resort: Jogging and Mum-Twerking

This was never supposed to be dangerous. I’m not opposed to looking like a prat, but I didn’t ever imagine giving myself an injury. Yet, in the five minutes I jogged around the sofa in my lounge this is exactly what I’ve done. I only actually managed 5 laps of the sofa before I realised it was pointless. My boobs had flown out of my bra and Dexter was regarding me curiously and pulling at his tee shirt in a bid to expose himself in sympathy.

It seems this plan requires a gym kit. I’d need a sports bra and something with a higher neckline than my maternity vest top . Taking a few slaps on the chin by my own breasts seemed to jolt me back to reality with a bump #Fail3.

Despite the jogging not working, I did succeed in waking up my daughter. Deciding I could simulate the jogging movement by simply bouncing on the spot, or some gentle upright twerking, I’ve since managed at least ten minutes of this every hour for the last three.

Result: In my head, I’m gently coaxing her further down my belly and low into my uterus. In reality, I’m probably either amusing her or getting on her wick. With each bounce I’m probably doing irreparable damage to my bladder too. I’m fairly optimistic something is going on though. Another week of this and she’ll be hammering down below in a bid for freedom. Surely? And all I’ll have lost is every scrap of my dignity! A small price to pay?

So that’s Day 1. A complete waste of time? I’ll let you all know tomorrow.

Mar 19 2014

35 Weeks Pregnant

Posted on March 19, 2014 by admin

So I’ve kissed goodbye to 35 weeks and now the countdown can really begin. Just one more week and I’ll be officially considered ‘full term’. I’ve done all my homework and collated a bunch of natural labour inducers (from the whacky to the scientific) and plan to pack them all in over the next few weeks. My diet will consist of raspberry tea, curry and pineapple (I expect I’ll get some strange looks in Tesco when stocking my trolley with this lot) and my evenings will spent frantically trying to fit in hour slots of Wii, bouncing on gym balls, breast pumping, and sex.

Too much information? Trust me they’ll be nothing glamorous about it! week 35 35 Weeks Pregnant

In other news, I had my final midwife appointment last week. I had been really looking forward to sharing the news that Mini Madam had nosedived but unfortunately my midwife was at a conference. To my frustration, the stand-in was the very midwife we moved GP surgeries to avoid with this baby. Luckily, I didn’t have any real concerns to raise so could just about tolerate her lack of English, half-arsed conversation, and generally scattiness. We just have one more consultant appointment and scan left to go then we’re home free. No more weeing in pots or being poked and prodded until D Day.

Unfortunately, most of the exciting symptoms I’ve experienced over the last few weeks have dried up now. I’m still getting random tightenings and I can feel her exerting pressure on my pelvic bone whenever I’m upright, but the actual contractions have stopped. All this downward momentum has led to even more frequent trips to the loo which is beginning to get on my wick. I seem to be up every single night at 2.29am for a quick pit-stop so the Mystic Meg in me is wagging her finger furiously.

In truth, I’d be hugely relieved if this turns out to be middle of the night dash to the hospital as the drama will give me less time to tot up all my little niggles with the NHS. If I’m stuck on a hospital bed all day you can bet both Craig and I will be swapping complaints under our breaths and generally making a nuisance of ourselves. I’m actually a fairly placid person but I tend to lose all power of diplomacy when I’m feeling nervous or frustrated.

The biggest concern right now is that I’ve become a real basket case. I spend most of day crying, slamming doors and generally ranting. I’d make a great a candidate for Gogglebox but I won’t be winning any Parent of the Year awards anytime soon. I think these last few weeks are definitely going to test my metal as I’m now really frustrated, tired, and fed up. I struggle to pick up Dexter so he’s bored to death and acting up as much as I am. I tried to do some pregnancy yoga yesterday, but let’s just say it doesn’t have the desired effect when you’re being pelted with wooden puzzle pieces when your eyes are closed.

Right that’s it. Let’s get week 36 out of the way and I’ll start blogging about my ‘experiments’ to try to tempt her out. Over and out.