37w5d Appt

So we made it to full term this past Saturday! I came off bedrest last Friday and was in so much pain! By the end of the day, I thought there was no way I was going to last more than a couple of days…but here we are, a week later and Gavin is still cookin’. I am beyond thrilled to be where we are at now. Being off bedrest is AMAZING! Omg, I could go on and on. The boys are so happy to have me back, and I am even happier. They both had colds this past week, but are all healthy now. Being able to do simple tasks again like go to the grocery store and car wash make me so happy now, its really kinda pathetic, but having your freedom taken away from you for almost 10 weeks will do that to you!

I haven’t really felt many contractions…Tuesday night we took a drive down to San Juan to go to one of our favorite restaurants with the boys, and I began contracting every three minutes for about an hour or two, but then they just faded away. Other than that, things have been very quiet. Figures that for the past 10 weeks, I would contract from simply sitting up and now that I am moving around non-stop my uterus decides its time to relax. I had my weekly ob appt today, and everything is looking good, I go back next Wednesday for my final appt. My C-Section is scheduled for the 6th, and I am kinda thinking that I will make it till then. We’ll see!

36 Weeks

I am 36 weeks today! Yesterday afternoon around two, I began contracting, so I took a pill and decided to try to relax and take a nap. I woke up at 3:30 with some mildly painful contractions…I began timing them and they were about 3-4 mins apart. So I took another pill at 4pm (two hours early) and hoped it would calm things down. It only got worse. I began having some really intense contractions in my back. So after another two hours, I finally decided it was time to page the on call dr. He of course said, head into L&D to get checked out. At this point, I was really contracting but the intensity seemed to lessen a bit. So, I told Shawn lets wait another hour or so and then decide. The contractions didn’t stop, so I called L&D and told them I was coming in. They said that they were totally full but would monitor me in the recovery room. So around 8pm, off we went.

By the time we got there, filled out some paper work and got all hooked up, I was contracting every two minutes. They called my OB and she ordered a shot of the wonderfully magic drug terbutaline. It usually always works on my like a charm. Within two minutes of having the shot, my contractions had pretty much flat lined. They continued to monitor me until around 11pm just to make sure my uterus was calm. The nurse also checked me and I am still closed and soft, which was great to hear.

Hopefully I can make it at least 7 more days, then I will be full term and Gavin can come out whenever he see’s fit!

35/35!

Today I am 35 weeks pregnant and have 35 days till my due date! This is officially the longest I have ever been pregnant, so yay for that. In exactly two weeks I will be release from bedrest and I CAN NOT WAIT! I just hope we can make it there.

On a side note, I was talking to my bff Aimee today and she mentioned that bedrest is going “to make us broke.” She was kinda right, well, not literally, but is sure has been expensive. Shawn has stopped working overtime for the past two months, and that by far has been the biggest hit…not to mention the fact that I obviously have not been working. Instead what have I been doing? Online shopping. Yep, my name is Erin and I am addicted to etsy. If you haven’t been exposed to the wonderful world that is etsy, I suggest you go check it out…now. My main obsession has been finding stuff for Gavin’s newborn pics that I am going to take. Here is just some of the stuff that I’ve bought, excuse the crappy cell phone pic:

I can’t wait till he is here and can put some of this stuff to good use!

On another note, I am so excited to get my boys back in a couple weeks. I feel like I havent spent any real time with them in the past two months, because I haven’ really. All they can do is lay in bed with me, and that gets old for them after awhile. I miss them so much and can’t wait to be back to doing all my normal mom stuff. Here is a pic of them from the other night. We transitioned them to toddler beds about a month or so ago, and they have been falling asleep together a few nights a week. Its so super sweet, and just shows how much they love one another. (again, bad cell phone pic)

Love my boys so much!

34w5d Appt

I feel like 34w5d will be forever engraved in my mind…its the gestation that I had the boys at. I was no where ready or prepared for the moment when they said, “we are prepping you for a c-section.” I was scheduled for my normal weekly appt and everything seemed fine. Dr.Moore went over when to stop taking my meds later the coming week, and advised not to go into labor within the next couple days since it was a holiday (NYE) and she wasn’t on call. The she noted that my blood pressure was a tad high and wanted me to run over to L&D just for them to run some lab work and make sure I wasn’t showing any signs of pre-eclampsia. Luckily, Shawn was with me, so off we went. Once in L&D, they ran my labs, and hooked me up to the monitors while they waited for the bloodwork to come back. Then I began contracting…like every two minutes…and they were painful. My labs came back fine, but the nurse called Dr. Moore to tell her about the contractions, and Dr. Moore said, ok its baby time. I was scared, I knew it was too soon and that  nicu stay was in our future.

So, as it turns out, today I am 34w5d and had an appt with Dr.Moore. I was nervous just because this entire pregnancy has been the mirror image of my first with the boys…and how ironic that I would have an appt on the same gestational age.  In the back of my head, I have been scared to death that I wouldn’t make it to today this time around….but here we are. I made it, and hopefully will keep Gavin cooking for at least another two weeks.

My appt today was pretty uneventful. I am measuring right on track at 35 weeks. My total weight gain is so far 25lbs, which is pretty good. With the boys, I gained a total of 55lbs, so thats about right on track. Hopefully the weight gain will slow at this point, my goal with this pregnancy was to keep it under 30lbs total, so we should be on track with that.

I am staying on full bed rest until 37w, which is two weeks from this coming Saturday. Dr.Moore said she wants me to stop taking the procardia round the clock at 36w and just on an as needed basis from 36-37 and then stop completely. I think I am going to stick with it until 37w, I am so tight and crampy on it, I can’t imagine how bad its going to be without it. I will have my last p17 injection at 36 weeks, so it will last until 37w.

That was about it. I will see her again in two weeks, which will put me at 36w5d, and then begin my weekly visits. At this point, I will be thrilled to make it to 37w, but am secretly hoping I can at least make it to 38. It would be nice to get a little time to run some errands, and spend some real time with Shawn and the boys before this little guy makes his grand entrance.

If anyone knows how to make the next two weeks fly by, please fill me in. After being in this bed for the last 8 weeks, I hope these last two will go in the blink of an eye.

34 Weeks!

Today I am 34 weeks! Most doc’s consider this a gestational milestone, so I feel good to have made it. I had the boys at 34w5d, which would be this coming Thursday. I know I am going to make it a few more weeks, I have to! I have my next appt with Dr.Moore on Thursday. I am sure she will do an internal, I am interested to see if I have started to dilate or efface at all. With the boys, I was 2cm and 80% effaced from about 33 weeks until the day I delivered. The thing that gives me hope is the fact that I never progressed past that point with the boys. So maybe with this little guy, I can make it a couple weeks off bedrest to my scheduled c-section date. It would be nice to kinda get back to normal for a couple of weeks before having everything change again for the boys. We’ll see. Three more weeks, three more weeks, I can do this. (I hope)

32w5d Appt

So yesterday I had my weekly visit to Dr.Moore. She explained that she was stopping the weekly ffn’s sicne I am past the time that they recommend them. (I think we should have done it one more week, but whatever) She also told me that she will take me off bedrest around 36/37 weeks, and off procardia at 37 weeks. Shawn and I have talked and we are going to keep me on bedrest until about 37 weeks, and then just have me take it easy from there. Hopefully I can make it at least a week after coming off bedrest, but I kinda doubt it. I am so tight and crampy all the time I think that once I get up and stop the meds, its going to happen pretty quickly. So now we just keep doing what we are doing and hope to make it another month. I think I can…I think I can…

Bedrest with two little guys…

Bedrest is hard, really hard in fact. You feel super helpless, and have to give over control since clearly you are no longer in control from your bed. The hardest part for me has been the time away from Brandon and Brody. They hate it and cry and whine for me. Not fun, in fact I feel like the world’s worst mom no matter what I do. I feel like I am letting down on of my kids no matter what, I need to stay in bed to protect Gavin, yet I need to be out of bed to take care of my kids. The choice is hard, but not really a choice when you have previously had preemies. I will do anything to give Gavin the best start at life that he can have, even if that means me going insane for weeks and weeks.

After I had Bran and Brody I had a really hard time dealing with the fact that they were preemies and all that comes along with that. Unfortunately you can’t really understand unless you have been there, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Recovering in a hospital room without your babies is no fun, especially when you hear the baby next door crying. Having visitors come to see you and ask why the babies aren’t with you sucks. Seeing your babies for the first time 12 hours after giving birth to them is hard. Seeing them hooked up to machines to help them breathe is even harder. I could go on and on…having preemies was without a doubt the most difficult thing that I have ever endured. Its a roller coaster that I never want to go on again, so I will do all in my power to keep Gavin cooking.

Overachiever

So thats what the L&D nurses told me, that my uterus is an overachiever when it comes to contracting! Wonderful. Over the next two weeks, I made two more trips to L&D. It all kinda went the same as last time, contracting every 3 mins, 2 rounds of terb, negative ffn’s, and discharged after 5 hours or so. Hopefully my “weekly” trips to L&D will stop soon and I won’t have to go back till late August! Lets hope and pray.

June 17th, trip to L&D take 2

So on June 17th, I began contracting again, and this time they were super painful, I could barley walk. I finally decided to go in and Shawn waited here for his mom to get here and would then follow me. Once in L&D they gave me a shot of terb, gave me an ffn (a test that tells you if you will deliver in the next two weeks), and then ordered an ultrasound. The ultrasound showed that Gavin was doing great, and measuring in around 3.5lbs. My cervix was long and closed, with no funneling…so all of that was great news. The contractions still were coming on strong, so we got another shot of terb and waited for the results of the ffn. After another hour or so, the ffn results came back negative. I was still contracting but hey had become irregular, so they finally sent me home around midnight with a prescription for procardia, a drug that us used to help relax the uterus.

June 15th…

On June 15th, I got some sad news, I don’t want to share it here, but a dear friend of mine was going through some pretty scary stuff. I instantly began contracting and later that day was checked in L&D for monitoring. I was contracting every 5 mins. This was all too familiar for me. I went through this with the boys time and time again. Interestingly enough, my pre-term labor started with the boys at 27 weeks, and thats exactly what I was this time…27 weeks. Its like my body only wants to bake babies for 27 weeks. So I got one shot of terbutaline to try to stop the contractions. Terb is a nasty little shot that burns going in and then makes you feel like you are on speed. At least what I gather it would feel like, since I have never actually done speed. lol. Your heart races, you become flush, and I get the worst migraines from it. No fun. The first shot didn’t work, so they administered another. Five hours later things had calmed down and I was discharged. I had an ob appt the next day, and she laid down the law…strict bedrest from this point on.

Its a boy and here we go again…

The beginning of this pregnancy wasn’t as bad as the 1st tri with the boys. I wasn’t as sick, which was great. We had our 12 week NT scan and the tech gave us a guess on the sex, she said she was about 90% sure that it was a boy! We were thrilled, the idea of having three boys was overwhelming, ie: eating us out of house and home, but super exciting at the same time.

Fast forward to 20 weeks, we had another u/s and it was confirmed that it was indeed a boy! So we decided on Gavin Shawn for the name. We always use family names for middle names, so it was an easy choice for us. Around 21 weeks, I began having some tightening and cramping. I told my ob about it and she advised me that I needed to be resting as much as possible. Ha! Try that what two 2 year olds, not so easy. The next week I began having multiple braxton hicks combined with the tightness, so I made an appt to see Dr.Moore the next day.

We decided that I needed to be on modified bedrest and that we should start 17P shots. The progesterone shots are recommended by the March of Dimes for women that have already experienced pre-term labor as well as the birth of a premature baby. I had pre-term labor with the boys from week 27 on and had them early at 34 weeks. So this sounded like a great option for us. I began the shots that week, and hoped and prayed that we wouldn’t have to endure all the difficulties we had while I was pregnant with the boys.

Modified bedrest was pretty impossible. I have two toddlers, and a husband who works 24 hour shifts. So I tried to rest as much as possible, but that usually only meant during nap time. I cut down on my work load, and just tried to take it as easy as possible, with hopes of avoiding full bed rest this time around.