My Due Date Came...

October 28th finally arrived. My due date! And baby boy was still in my belly. I had my doctor’s appointment and I was still at a one. I was quite disappointed. So I made a game plan with my doctor. He allows women to go two weeks over their due date. Jason and I had a hard decision to make. On the one hand, I wanted to give myself as much time as possible to go into labor naturally so I wouldn’t have to have a repeat C-Section (since they can’t induce you on a VBAC). At the same time, how awful it would be to go two weeks over and still not go into labor and still have to have a C-Section. Luckily, I had been feeling pretty great considering I was 40 weeks pregnant. On the other hand, if we waited too long Nancy might be gone in Colorado, since Amy was due with her fourth baby any day. Her due date was November 11th, but it was very possible she could come early. I wanted baby boy to come before Nancy left...so do I wait two weeks with the possibility of her being gone, or do we schedule a C-Section for before she leaves. After discussing it with Jason, we decided we would meet in the middle. We would allow for a week overdue before having a C-Section. Jason said Wednesday the 5th would probably be best for work. When I discussed this with the doctor he said that sounded good. The hospital was already booked for the 5th, however, so we scheduled it for Thursday the 6th (with the possibility of bumping it up to the 5th if something opened up). So I continued my curb-walking (an exercise that one of my new neighbors swore by to help induce labor), and any other thing I could think of to help kick-start this baby.

40 weeks

As is procedural for an overdue baby for that office, they had another nonstress test ordered for that day. I had to return two days later (Halloween) because I had only marginaly passed. I passed well the second time. These times I was smart and enlisted Nancy to take care of Charlie while I did them. One day she took him to the park and he shockingly did a great job going down the slides! For some reason, Charlie has been afraid of slides and swings. During the second appointment, she took him to the Museum of Natural Curiosity. Such a cool place! We met up for lunch afterwards at Carl’s Jr.

That night, it was Halloween. Luckily, I had found a costume for Charlie earlier that week. It was hard to find one in his size that wasn’t a super hero costume. He sure made the cutest Mickey Mouse! George and Nancy came by to see Charlie so we fed them dinner and then went trick-or-treating in our cul de sac. They left, and we stuck around for a little bit to answer for trick-or-treaters (we didn’t get nearly as many as we had anticipated, so we had tons of left over candy) before heading to Draper to visit my parents. We enjoyed some goodies and then our parents had a surprise visit from Paul, Mandy, and Lily. It was fun to visit with them for a bit. All in all, it was a fun and busy Halloween. Even though I was sad that baby boy was not here yet, I was glad to spend that Halloween with Charlie and to be able to go trick-or-treating with him. It sure was cute.

Halloween pajamas from Grandma Arbon

On Sunday, the fetal movement seemed low. It was really concerning me. I know that babies generally move less the further along you get, but his movements seemed very few and quite weak. Even when I would poke and encourage him to move, he would barely respond. I knew it would cost us, but I had to make the wise parenting decision, and so I went to the hospital to have another non-stress test done. Luckily, I passed. Baby boy was pretty sleeply and unresponsive at first, but after using the baby buzzer, he moved really well for us. It was nice to have that reassurance that everything was okay.  

On Tuesday (November 4th), I had my 41 week appointment. I was measuring at a two, but my belly measurement was still pretty small so they had me do an ultrasound. After measuring the baby, they found that he was measuring in  the 10th percentile. Because he was so small, they wouldn’t allow me to go passed Thursday. (While talking with my doctor before the ultrasound, we were debating again whether or not to let me go two weeks over, rather than keep the scheduled C-Section for Thursday. He was going to be out of town for the weekend so if we didn’t do it Thursday, he could do it Monday. However, after seeing how small the baby was, the doctor said it wouldn’t be safe to wait that long. I didn’t feel too alarmed about the baby’s size, but the nurse giving me the ultrasound results acted as if she was giving me really bad news. So, perhaps it was a bigger deal than I thought it was. I guess you never know, though. Better to be safe than sorry.)

That night I met up with Bryton and Jaleah to celebrate Bryton’s 28th birthday. We met at JCW’s for milkshakes and fries. My perfect kind of dessert! So tasty! I did have a couple of hard contractions on the way there and on the way back. But with just two days to go, and feeling pretty good, I didn’t have much hope of going into labor.

Wednesday morning (November 5th), I was back at the doctor’s office for another non-stress test. The results were typical….baby boy was sleepy and needed some buzzer encouragement, but his movement and heart rate looked good after that. I felt slightly encouraged that the day before I lost some of my plug and that night I had some strong contractions...but the nurse and I concluded that it was just too little too late. All that was left now was to hear from the hospital with my scheduled time for my C-Section.