Mamas, I'm not sure if any of you will have any suggestions to help me but I'm kind of losing it and need some support.
First, I'm 40+2 today (with baby #1) and honestly, feeling OK. There are no indications that labor is on its way - very few contrax, no mucus, no backache, no "intestinal clearing", only intermittent and light cramping, babe is still relatively high. My midwife doesn't do cervical checks as part of the routine visit, so I don't know where I'm at in that regard. I had acupuncture on the EDD but even my acupuncturist said that it might not help much since I didn't seem close to labor.
I'd be OK with going to 42 weeks since I'm feeling relatively well *except* my mom is arriving from across the country next Wed; she has already been telling me that she isn't flying in to spend a week staring at me, which isn't helping. We get along fine, but I'm the kind of person that goes inward in times of stress and though I'm planning a hospital birth, I cannot imagine going through early labor at home with her around... and I really wanted to wait as long as possible before going in.
I was coping with all this until yesterday: I woke up and my shoulder was achy. I can only sleep on my side, so I figured I tweaked it sleeping - but ladies, for an injury I can only imagine I did to myself while sleeping this is ridiculously painful. I really can't use my right arm at all, very limited motion; it's so sore that I can't sleep, and the only position where it doesn't hurt is when it's propped up to the side at about shoulder level (I'm typing right now on the laptop with my arm on top of a stack of pillows on the arm of the sofa), and it can't support any weight at all which makes lying down / getting up / getting in and out of chairs really difficult. Last night I totally lost it sobbing a few times for fear that I *would* go into labor soon and I wouldn't be able to use my arm through labor, and that I wouldn't be able to hold the baby once it got here. I'm stressed that I'm losing what little sleep I had and I'm going to *start* labor exhausted and in pain.
Thanks for listening mamas.
First, I'm 40+2 today (with baby #1) and honestly, feeling OK. There are no indications that labor is on its way - very few contrax, no mucus, no backache, no "intestinal clearing", only intermittent and light cramping, babe is still relatively high. My midwife doesn't do cervical checks as part of the routine visit, so I don't know where I'm at in that regard. I had acupuncture on the EDD but even my acupuncturist said that it might not help much since I didn't seem close to labor.
I'd be OK with going to 42 weeks since I'm feeling relatively well *except* my mom is arriving from across the country next Wed; she has already been telling me that she isn't flying in to spend a week staring at me, which isn't helping. We get along fine, but I'm the kind of person that goes inward in times of stress and though I'm planning a hospital birth, I cannot imagine going through early labor at home with her around... and I really wanted to wait as long as possible before going in.
I was coping with all this until yesterday: I woke up and my shoulder was achy. I can only sleep on my side, so I figured I tweaked it sleeping - but ladies, for an injury I can only imagine I did to myself while sleeping this is ridiculously painful. I really can't use my right arm at all, very limited motion; it's so sore that I can't sleep, and the only position where it doesn't hurt is when it's propped up to the side at about shoulder level (I'm typing right now on the laptop with my arm on top of a stack of pillows on the arm of the sofa), and it can't support any weight at all which makes lying down / getting up / getting in and out of chairs really difficult. Last night I totally lost it sobbing a few times for fear that I *would* go into labor soon and I wouldn't be able to use my arm through labor, and that I wouldn't be able to hold the baby once it got here. I'm stressed that I'm losing what little sleep I had and I'm going to *start* labor exhausted and in pain.
Thanks for listening mamas.
With dd #2, I had a broken rib and I was terrified of how bad it would hurt in labor. But really, compared to the intensity of labor, the rib was no biggie. Some positions hurt it and some hard pressure from dh or my doula was unbearable, but all in all, the rib was not a big deal. And the pain from it radiated into my arm/shoulder, so I'm feelin' ya again on the pain of that. Chances are, the endorphins that allow you to manage labor pain will let you manage the shoulder pain as well. Don't discount your body's ability to birth through pain, regardless of where the pain is coming from, i.e. contrx or shoulder.
