Week 37: Crampy

Hi, we are still here. I had my last gynecolgist visit on Friday. She said there's nothing more to be checked out so all we do now is sit pretty and wait. If I'm still here in this condition on January 7, daily fetal monitoring begins. And then induction follows soon after that. I hope it doesn't come to that. I would welcome the early arrival of the baby. I'm not good at sitting around and waiting. There's been too much sitting in this pregnancy. I feel like a human incubator/human Baby Bjorn. I need my body back and the baby needs to get here so he can try out his super cool top-of-the-line swing thing that I'm going to buy him for Christmas. It's time for he and I to be two separate entities, much as we love each other.

Not sure if this is TMI, but we are all friends here, so I think I can tell you that I've been feeling really crampy since Saturday. Crampy and with a backache. Something is happening "down there," and the one thing I'm sure of is that it's not my period that is coming! Even though that's how it feels. What does this mean?

Since I am going to have three weeks with no doctor's visit, I've opted to have a midwife come to the house next week for a pre-labor pep talk with Cristiano and I. She's Italian but worked in England for several years, and a friend recommended her as someone who is full of tips and useful information. She said that in England she went around doing house calls like this as there it is common practice for a woman to be treated by a midwife throughout pregnancy as opposed to a doctor. In any case, she will also check the baby's heartbeat, measure him and let me know what position he's in, etc. If the baby is still stubbornly hanging around in there next week, I'm going to go into full-on natural labor inducement mode. Raspberry tea, long walks, hot chili pepper on all my food. Whatever it takes. Well, I'll keep you updated. Keep checking your email...