What to do While You Wait for Labor to Begin
I am now one thousand weeks pregnant, otherwise known at 40 weeks, 3 days.
Since I found out about this blessed miracle and did the math, I've had one goal: get it out before December. Christmas is my happy time. It's a time for classy white string lights and old-school music and baking. I don't want to be eternally splitting my sacred December time between antique ornaments and Cars-themed birthday parties. I don't want my kid to feel like his or her birthday is getting overshadowed by Christmas time. Which is a very real possibility.
I hit 37 weeks, which is technically full term, in mid-November. I was determined to get labor started before Thanksgiving. The timing just made sense- my family was coming up anyway, my husband had the time off school. It was the perfect time to go into labor. So I walked, scrubbed floors, ate spicy food, bounced on my birthing ball, danced, visualized, prayed, cried, begged, and despaired. Labor did not want to be gone into. Baby did not budge.
3 weeks later, he/she is still hanging out, getting bigger and harder to push out, and I'm barely clinging to my sanity. It's partially the major, unrelenting discomfort of being this pregnant. I feel like an overinflated balloon. Except instead of air, I'm full of stomach acid and elbows. They said the baby would get less active towards the end of pregnancy. I wish someone would tell the baby that. I've tried, but all I got from that was a particularly spiteful bladder punch.
Logically, I know my baby doesn't have the mental capacity or inclination to hate or punish me, but emotionally, I'm pretty convinced that it's in there manically plotting how it's going to learn drums by practicing on my organs when I try to sleep tonight.
The other part of what makes the waiting so excruciating is just the expectation, the knowledge that things could start at any time. Every time I get up to pee, I fantasize about my water breaking. Every gas pain or other weird unexplained pregnancy twinge, I'm amping myself up for it to turn into a contraction. But so far, my water is unbroken, my twinges are just twinges, and my mind is slowly turning into a hamster on a wheel. I just want something to happen, dammit.
So I'm trying to distract myself. Here's what I've tried so far, to mixed success:
1. Sleep while you can.
This piece of advice is as universal as "get more exercise" and "look both ways before you cross the street." I don't know what happens in a woman's brain after she gives birth, but it clearly involves some fairly serious amnesia if you think I'm getting any sleep in my 10th month of pregnancy. Between the heartburn, constant bathroom trips, aching hips, congestion, sore back, and general anxious restlessness, sleep seems just about as elusive as a yeti.
I'm sure it will only get worse when the baby is born, but it is so far beyond "helpful" to point that out to me, or any pregnant woman. Who, in the history of bitching, has ever been complaining, been met with "Well haha, just you wait, it's about to get so much worse!" and then gone, "Oh, you're so right, and that knowledge has taken away all my discomfort with my current situation!" No. That's not how it works. That's just stupid. Knowing something is about to suck worse does not make the current situation better. It actually makes it worse.
And anyway, I'd much rather be kept awake by an actual flesh-and-blood baby with a face I can look at, than this writhing stomach bug inside me. When the baby is born, the discomfort will all be outside of me, and not punching me in the bladder, which is definitely my preference.
2. Enjoy time with your partner.
Ok, so this doesn't suck, as far as suggestions go. My husband and I are still newlyweds, and still very much enjoy each other's company. I'm all too aware that the blessed event fast approaching is going to disturb our cozy little slice of solitude. We both want this baby more than anything on earth, but as we get closer to the day, I'm thinking of things I had never considered, like how often he grabs my butt during the course of an average day. Once we have kids, that's going to seem less natural, I think. We're not going to have the luxury of spending days on the couch together, just talking and crafting and binge-watching House Hunters. Our time and energy will be divided like never before in our relationship, and I'm not looking forward to that.
So if you're waiting for labor to begin and you have a partner you enjoy being around, maybe focus on that. Go to a movie, or out to dinner, and appreciate the simplicity of life without babysitters. Of course, this advice only applies if you're in a relationship and this is your first kid. If you already have a kid, though, I'm not imagining that you have a lot of time to sit around googling how to pass the time.
On that note...
3. Enjoy time with yourself.
I haven't felt truly alone since I got pregnant- which, as an introvert, is a challenge. But if having another being growing inside me feels like an intrusion, I know it doesn't hold a candle to having a tiny person actually following you around for the next 5-6 years. So I'm taking advantage of this time to do all the things I like to do that I don't anticipate being super "possible" with a baby- long baths, show-bingeing, reading, playing The Sims (where, ironically, my sims have a LOT of babies). I've also been doing some baking and shopping for Christmas, since I know that's going to be harder after the baby is born.
4. Contemplate your mortality.
One great way to get the hours to fly by is to think about the circular nature of life, and your own impermanence. I've been thinking a lot about how I was born at one point, and had a childhood, and now it's over, and I'm about to give birth, and that kid will go through its own childhood, and eventually I will die and so will this kid and so will everyone. They say the time really flies by, and I bet it does! We'll all be dead in no time! I feel so much better.
5. Take advantage of the internet and your free time to be in a constant state of panic.
Hey, they didn't invent Google so you could not look up stories of stillbirths that happen with no warning signs!
6. Enjoy your last few days of eating whatever you want without guilt, even if you really should be feeling guilty.
Nutrition, shmutrition. Forget what the midwife said about maximizing your nutritional intake and minimizing weight gain. Haven't you suffered enough? You definitely deserve another piece of peppermint bark and unlimited cold cereal.
Seriously though, food is the only thing giving me the will to live right now. At least every sleepless night brings with it a midnight snack.
I'm too huge and cranky to figure out a good way to wrap this post up, so in lieu of a conclusion, please enjoy this selection of humorous pregnancy memes.
Since I found out about this blessed miracle and did the math, I've had one goal: get it out before December. Christmas is my happy time. It's a time for classy white string lights and old-school music and baking. I don't want to be eternally splitting my sacred December time between antique ornaments and Cars-themed birthday parties. I don't want my kid to feel like his or her birthday is getting overshadowed by Christmas time. Which is a very real possibility.
I hit 37 weeks, which is technically full term, in mid-November. I was determined to get labor started before Thanksgiving. The timing just made sense- my family was coming up anyway, my husband had the time off school. It was the perfect time to go into labor. So I walked, scrubbed floors, ate spicy food, bounced on my birthing ball, danced, visualized, prayed, cried, begged, and despaired. Labor did not want to be gone into. Baby did not budge.
3 weeks later, he/she is still hanging out, getting bigger and harder to push out, and I'm barely clinging to my sanity. It's partially the major, unrelenting discomfort of being this pregnant. I feel like an overinflated balloon. Except instead of air, I'm full of stomach acid and elbows. They said the baby would get less active towards the end of pregnancy. I wish someone would tell the baby that. I've tried, but all I got from that was a particularly spiteful bladder punch.
Logically, I know my baby doesn't have the mental capacity or inclination to hate or punish me, but emotionally, I'm pretty convinced that it's in there manically plotting how it's going to learn drums by practicing on my organs when I try to sleep tonight.
The other part of what makes the waiting so excruciating is just the expectation, the knowledge that things could start at any time. Every time I get up to pee, I fantasize about my water breaking. Every gas pain or other weird unexplained pregnancy twinge, I'm amping myself up for it to turn into a contraction. But so far, my water is unbroken, my twinges are just twinges, and my mind is slowly turning into a hamster on a wheel. I just want something to happen, dammit.
1. Sleep while you can.
This piece of advice is as universal as "get more exercise" and "look both ways before you cross the street." I don't know what happens in a woman's brain after she gives birth, but it clearly involves some fairly serious amnesia if you think I'm getting any sleep in my 10th month of pregnancy. Between the heartburn, constant bathroom trips, aching hips, congestion, sore back, and general anxious restlessness, sleep seems just about as elusive as a yeti.
I'm sure it will only get worse when the baby is born, but it is so far beyond "helpful" to point that out to me, or any pregnant woman. Who, in the history of bitching, has ever been complaining, been met with "Well haha, just you wait, it's about to get so much worse!" and then gone, "Oh, you're so right, and that knowledge has taken away all my discomfort with my current situation!" No. That's not how it works. That's just stupid. Knowing something is about to suck worse does not make the current situation better. It actually makes it worse.
And anyway, I'd much rather be kept awake by an actual flesh-and-blood baby with a face I can look at, than this writhing stomach bug inside me. When the baby is born, the discomfort will all be outside of me, and not punching me in the bladder, which is definitely my preference.
2. Enjoy time with your partner.
Ok, so this doesn't suck, as far as suggestions go. My husband and I are still newlyweds, and still very much enjoy each other's company. I'm all too aware that the blessed event fast approaching is going to disturb our cozy little slice of solitude. We both want this baby more than anything on earth, but as we get closer to the day, I'm thinking of things I had never considered, like how often he grabs my butt during the course of an average day. Once we have kids, that's going to seem less natural, I think. We're not going to have the luxury of spending days on the couch together, just talking and crafting and binge-watching House Hunters. Our time and energy will be divided like never before in our relationship, and I'm not looking forward to that.
So if you're waiting for labor to begin and you have a partner you enjoy being around, maybe focus on that. Go to a movie, or out to dinner, and appreciate the simplicity of life without babysitters. Of course, this advice only applies if you're in a relationship and this is your first kid. If you already have a kid, though, I'm not imagining that you have a lot of time to sit around googling how to pass the time.
On that note...
3. Enjoy time with yourself.
I haven't felt truly alone since I got pregnant- which, as an introvert, is a challenge. But if having another being growing inside me feels like an intrusion, I know it doesn't hold a candle to having a tiny person actually following you around for the next 5-6 years. So I'm taking advantage of this time to do all the things I like to do that I don't anticipate being super "possible" with a baby- long baths, show-bingeing, reading, playing The Sims (where, ironically, my sims have a LOT of babies). I've also been doing some baking and shopping for Christmas, since I know that's going to be harder after the baby is born.
4. Contemplate your mortality.
One great way to get the hours to fly by is to think about the circular nature of life, and your own impermanence. I've been thinking a lot about how I was born at one point, and had a childhood, and now it's over, and I'm about to give birth, and that kid will go through its own childhood, and eventually I will die and so will this kid and so will everyone. They say the time really flies by, and I bet it does! We'll all be dead in no time! I feel so much better.
5. Take advantage of the internet and your free time to be in a constant state of panic.
Hey, they didn't invent Google so you could not look up stories of stillbirths that happen with no warning signs!
6. Enjoy your last few days of eating whatever you want without guilt, even if you really should be feeling guilty.
Nutrition, shmutrition. Forget what the midwife said about maximizing your nutritional intake and minimizing weight gain. Haven't you suffered enough? You definitely deserve another piece of peppermint bark and unlimited cold cereal.
Seriously though, food is the only thing giving me the will to live right now. At least every sleepless night brings with it a midnight snack.
I'm too huge and cranky to figure out a good way to wrap this post up, so in lieu of a conclusion, please enjoy this selection of humorous pregnancy memes.
It's just poop. It's always just poop.
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