Teeming with #2: Week 37 update!

Full term. (How the heck did that happen?!)

Well, full term according to my midwives, anyway. Using their "wheely thing", they determined that my due date is Dec 2nd. By my own "first day of my last period" calcs, it's Dec 7th. So I'm either a couple days past 37 weeks or a couple days shy of it. I'm going with the former because I have the suspicion I'm going to pop pretty soon. Little Man has definitely dropped, and I've been experiencing some interesting "Braxton Hicks but Different" sensations. All in all, I feel like I'm "ripening" if you know whadda mean.

In any case, I'm officially huge now. :)

Current weight: 145 lbs so still on a 1 lb/week gaining schedule. I was measuring a bit small at my 35th week appointment so my midwife ordered me a biophysical profile / growth ultrasound which turned up "mostly normal" results - baby scored 8/8 with lots of fluid and measured at about 40th percentile in weight (estimate was 2.5 kg or 5.5 lbs). However the more in-depth report (which takes longer to come in) cited there is "notching" on my uterine artery.  My midwife said this is almost certainly nothing to be concerned about in my situation (full term, low blood pressure), but to play it safe and ensure baby continues to grow well, she's booking me for another ultrasound at 38 weeks. If I make it that long, of course! :)

Other health-related stuff - hemoglobin's up a bit more to 107 (good) and Group B Strep swab's been sent in but no results yet. Bathroom trips are now required once or twice / hour (yay) though thankfully the bleedy nose problem has taken a hike. I do have minor heartburn from time to time but nothing like my last pregnancy, and I've also managed to remain totally unbloated which has enabled me to keep my wedding ring on! (Had to remove it at 32 weeks last time around.)

I'm definitely feeling increasingly tired as these late-preggo weeks pass, and the last few days have brought on some emotional spells as well. Crying for no reason, snappishness, that sort of thing. Pregnancy, as a whole, keeps me quite level so these spells are unusual and add to my inkling that Babe #2 will be coming early. Of course, there are also 2348203432 things going on in our lives right now - finishing up work (3 more days!), numerous home renos, loose planning around S' 2nd birthday (keeping things simple this year), regular activities (swimming, kinder music, curling, yoga), early Christmas planning/shopping, attempting to keep things somewhat manageable around the home front and, of course, blogging when I can grab a spare moment or two. Juggling it all has become fairly overwhelming, not to mention that we remain totally unprepared for our little guy's  arrival. We're almost certainly not going to have S' "big girl room" ready in time (it's still a semi-hoarded office, where I sit typing now) which means she'll need to remain in the nursery for awhile. Not a huge deal since the little man will hang out in our room for a couple months anyway, but it would be nice to have all our ducks in a row here. Following my first bout of BHbD sensations the other night, hubs DID get the car seat ready so we can check that one off at the very least. :) (Now, someone kick me into gear to get that hospital bag together!)

As per my recent FB post/question, I'm still not doing a heck of a lot to prepare (physically, mentally, emotionally) for labour and birth. :-/ Still doing a weekly yoga class which is SUPER awesome, and I bounce around on my exercise ball when I think about it, but that's about it. I do have a little evening ritual of slathering Belly Jelly all over my bump, which is somewhat meditative in of itself and hey - if it manages to reduce the severity of impending stretch marks, even better. (Yup the little rascals are beginning to make an appearance, but they're not terrible just yet.)

As for S, she TOTALLY appears to "get it", giving my belly lots of kisses and telling people that her little brother's coming soon. She loves reading It's Quacking Time and on the last page points out the members of the duck family as Mommy, Daddy, S and [insert brother's name here]. (Nope, still not telling! :)

So let's play a guessing game - when (date/time) is our Little Man going to arrive? Is there gonna be another T w/ #2 update?