Labor & Delivery

I had my first trip to labor and delivery today. I was a little apprehensive and may have even called my DR back to try and cancel going, but alas her and the doula thought it was best for me to get seen.


I've been having a multitude of contractions over the last 4days. They haven't been time worthy in my opinion and have really ranged from the top of my belly to the bottom and over to my lower back. I just figured my body is doing it's thang and getting ready for birth ( duh!)


Last night I realized I hadn't felt the baby much during the day and then decided to get a bit of exercise and try and get things moving. We went swimming for 40 minutes then sat in the hot tub for 10 minutes to help alleviate my back pain. Once we got out, I still craved a bit more, so we took Spencer on our once daily ( read: before I was a million months pregnant) 2 mile walk. I did well, enjoyed it even and when I got home I felt like a little old lady who couldn't stand up straight. I got right into bed, and thought I would have an excellent night of sleep. Psh, boy was I wrong.

I tossed and turned all night, lots of contractions, some strong, some just cramping, but one thing was apparent. My back hurt like hell and the baby wasn't budging.

Fast forward to morning, and I needed to be at work at 10:30am. I was up at 9:45 rushing to eat my breakfast and make us lunch when I got a very sharp pain ( which is now determined as a "real" contraction as opposed to those wimpy braxton hicks!) I had to breathe my way over to the couch, lay down and let it pass. It was then I mentioned to C what I had been going through all night and that the baby still! hadn't! moved!. We decided to call the DR and see if we could move up my Wednesday appointment to today and get checked out just in case. Of course she was fully booked and the nurse told me to head to L & D to be monitored.

I kind of freaked at the thought of going to the labor dept as I know I wanted to labor at home as long as possible and I wasn't entirely convinced this was the real deal. We texted our doula who is on vacation this week to ask her opinion. She said, she didn't think the contractions were close enough together for it to be active labor, but that we should go get the baby checked out, just to be on the sure side. She informed me that unless necessary, to decline any vaginal checks and once they could confirm baby was healthy and moving to ask to be discharged so we could continue laboring at home. She also mentioned that I could be dehydrated, and to start downing water as much as my body could handle.

I talked to C and mentioned I didnt have any caffeine the last few days so maybe I should try a coke before heading in. I laid down for 20 minutes, drank a coke and my contractions died down. I still had no baby movement but I figured the coke hadn't kicked in yet. I called back down to my DR and told them I'd like to wait a bit and see if I could get baby moving and told them my contraction died down and she said they still wanted me to go in.

Once we got into L & D we just figured it would be a good practice run for the real deal. We got hooked up, and were left to relax and let the monitors do their job. Baby started kicking ( of course!) and the heart rate was perfect at a 145 average. My contractions were not consistent as I thought, but we had a couple big ones in there that were kind of nice to see on the monitor instead of me just telling C " I think I'm having another contraction".


All in all, I probably had my first time mom worry, but I'm glad I went in for a peace of mind. We're home now and baby is moving away while mama is having more contractions and annoying lower back pain. Here's hoping we're making some progress and baby is on his/her way out!