Two Week Countdown to D-Day

Okay, it has been a while since I last talked about pretty much anything on my blog, so it is time for an update while I am still able to. I am now 38 weeks pregnant, which for those of you who are unaware of pregnancy timelines in weeks, it means I’m about ready to pop and my due date is in two weeks (but to be technical, from 37 to 42 weeks is considered “full term” and after 42 the baby would be considered “post term” or LATE).

I’m sure I’m not the first woman in the world to be absolutely terrified by the prospect of labor, but given that I probably have not much more than 2 full weeks left being blissfully “childless”, I cannot stop thinking about it. It isn’t like people saying “You must be so ready to have her out already!” or “You look so huge! You poor thing! I bet you can’t wait to have it be over!” is helping. No, actually I like her where she is, I don’t have to take time out of my day to feed her, change her or bathe her yet. She can just stay in forever. Plus when else am I ever going to get to experience her moving inside me again? I won’t, that is when. I like her where she is for several reasons, but by the same token I do want to meet her. She can just take her time is all.

I realize that once she is out I get to walk again and my waddle will fade into memory, and that I’ll be able to get out of bed, or a car or a chair without the need of someone to counterbalance me. I know that once she is born I’ll stop having so much heartburn, be able to sleep on my stomach fully again and not have to rush to the bathroom quite so often. And lastly, I’ll finally be able to move again because my feet won’t swell so much that they literally feel as if they will burst if I walk on them and my hips won’t feel like they need to be bound together in order to keep me from splitting apart.

Other than those things, I really love being pregnant though honestly, and people go through much, much worse in life than swollen ankles and waddling when they have some chronic diseases. Really, I am thankful it isn’t much worse and that it has a time limit and I think that considering that it didn’t get to this nearly unbearable stage until right now, about a month from my due date, that pregnancy is great. I don’t really want it to end at all.

Everything will change when my daughter arrives. I’ll be a slave to her every need 24 hours a day every day of the week for years. That is a little daunting, I mush admit. I’m not so sad to have to be needed that much, because I love to be needed and wanted and loved, the part I am afraid of is the stress (I get stressed over dumb things as it is, and far too often already) and the lack of sleep. I keep having to remind myself that that too, is a finite amount of time. She will eventually sleep through the night (even though I bet I’ll never be so lucky as to get 9.5 hours a night like I’m used to having until she hits her teenage years) and I’ll someday get sleep, yet the stress part of the equation will be ever present.

At least I’m lucky and have Mike. He has been the best dad-to-be ever. He is the most supportive, wonderful individual. I couldn’t have invented someone more loving, caring and sympathetic than Mike. I am so glad he is helping me and that he wants to be a dad. He’ll be the best father I could imagine for our little girl. I can’t get over how lucky I am to have him and for us to be having our little girl soon. He cannot wait to meet her and hold her, he tells me that all of the time. I adore our little family already. I love that Mike brags to total strangers that he is having a baby soon. I really can’t possibly imagine how I could have found a more perfect man to be with. God definitely made us for each other. (On that note, Mike is 9 months younger than me as if God made me and then decided I needed a mate and then made Mike! Plus we were born on the opposite sides of the US, me on the West Coast and Mike on the East Coast and yet we ended up somewhere in the middle and found one another. It is too perfect to be an accident, it was divine intervention for certain.)

Anyway, I’m looking forward to meeting the little “lump” (as we sometimes affectionately call her) soon, but I’m more than terrified by the idea of going through the pain to get there. I wish I could just skip the hard part and have her here with us minus hours of intense pain, suffering, heat and emotions. I feel that it is like being baptized by fire to become a mother, you have to go through the worst imaginable pain (so I’ve heard) and you come out on the other side with a darling little present who tortures you for several months while you recover from delivering them. How unfair!

Anyway, thank you for reading this and hopefully all goes well.