What Do You Think?

[trimestersdoula]

xposted from Aug DDC

Ok girls, here is what is going on.

Lately I have been feeling as though my body is getting ready for labor. Things seem really different. I have been having increasing BH ctx that are happening when I walk AND when I am just sitting around. They do quit if I change activities but some of them have been getting uncomfortable and some of them have been making me feel as though I have to poop (sorry TMI). Baby is still breech. I have also been having some lower back aches that come and go (been happening for a week or so now). The biggest thing is I am SOOOO anxious feeling but I have so much energy. I never went to bed until 1:30 AM last night. Normally I am in bed at 10 PM. I have been dead tired this whole pregnancy and now all of a sudden for the last two days I have had a TON of energy! I have also been sleeping like crap for the past week or so. I mean I haven't slept good at all this pregnancy but the last week I am up EVERY HOUR!!!! I have also had an increase in pelvic pain (possible early dilation, IDK).

So I have a dr.s appt. today and I'd like to tell her about all of this stuff but she has a major tendancy to freak out over stuff and she would most definitely want to do a cervical exam and I really don't want one at all right now.

So, what do you all think. Am I overreacting? I never had this stuff happen with DD and she was born at almost 40 weeks. Should I tell my CP what is going on or should I just leave it? I don't feel like I am going to go into labor anytime soon, I just feel different KWIM?

[Cory]

I have the same stuff going on with me-only no energy. I am 35.3 weeks and also lost a bit of mucus plug with a small streak of blood in it last week. Went to the midwife and from there to the hospital and my cervix is still long (like, really long) and dialated to 1cm, which is pretty much what I am all pregnancy anyway. I have another appointment with the midwife today and she wants to do an internal again just to make sure that nothing is happening still. I have to be 36.4 weeks along before I can birth at the birthing center.

I am going crazy-it is so hard to keep getting regular contractions or harder contractions (and they are contractions-not just BH) and think, "this is it!" only to have it fizzle out. Again. I have had two nights now that I seriously was thinking we were going to have a baby and woke up both mornings still pregnant. I guess that our bodies are just getting things ready a bit earlier this time. I am thinking that this baby will come before due date. I guess we'll see!

[nova22]

I would tell her. Honestly...I am very opposed to internal exams during pregnancy, I don't think they benefit as much as they endanger. I also don't know what she would hope to achieve by knowing whether you're dilated. If you are, that information could be helpful because it would show that your body might in fact be getting ready for labor. But if you're not, it's completely inconclusive. No dilation doesn't necessarily mean you're not about to have a baby; you can dilate all at once, right?

Anyway, having had a preemie completely out of the blue with no more than a few hours of warning, I would want to be prepared for it. If you are in labor you can get steroid shots that will help develop your baby's lungs. A friend of mine and I happened to be due within days of each other and we both happened to deliver about 7 weeks early. My baby stayed in the NICU for a month and her baby stayed for about a week. The difference could have been that she was at risk for premature labor and had gotten steroid shots before the baby was born; I was having a perfectly healthy, risk-free pregnancy (I thought) and didn't get the shot until a couple hours before my c-section, back when the doctors thought I might be able to stay in the hospital on bedrest for a few weeks before she was born.

Sorry to tell you something that I can see you don't really want to know, but if it were me, I would err on the side of caution for the baby's sake. I felt like that before she was born and chalked it up to paranoia because I thought there was no way I would possibly be in labor after having four full-term babies and my pregnancy being perfectly healthy. I had those weird, crampy, restless feelings for a couple days before I felt like I had a full-on contraction (I chalked it up to hunger pangs...I just was not seeing the signs here!) and my water broke an hour later when I thought I was having poop-cramps (sorry tmi).

[megviolet]

From my experience with this pregnancy compared to my first, and from what i've heard from... well... pretty much all my friends AND the 3 midwives, other birth community workers/doulas etc.... it sounds normal.
Whether you want to talk to your doc or not is up to you, i'd pray/meditate on it and know that you could discuss it without consenting to an internal (what good is the internal anyway? If anything, it could stimulate more productive contrax...no... i wouldn't get an exam)

Baby's position could be triggering it to some degree. Are you doing some poses to encourage better positioning?

Second babies have more room to move around, since the uterus is stretchier for them than for the first. Pelvic muscles are softer, so dilation pains happen earlier, your body has done it before so it practices more.
I've had painful BH since 20-something weeks. The worst was right around 32-33 weeks when i would regularly have painful contrax, in a pattern, that got worse if i sat down/layed down. They let up.. i still have them but not as bad. My baby was breech at that point too and i had tons and tons of pelvic pain (wearing a belt helped me a bit).


My midwife warned me that it's not unusal the second time to feel like labour is going to start all the time... BH can be painful, and the cervical/pelvic pain can begin in 2nd trimester. All that was true for me, so hoping you're body is just feeling like it... not actually doing it!

Best wishes

[HeatherB]

I would focus on hydration - drink LOTS of water, and make sure you're getting enough salt/electrolytes that the water is staying in your system. If you drink and it immediately comes out the other end (well, you know, quickly..), then you should probably have something salty and/or an electrolyte drink. Lots of BHs can definitely be caused by being even slightly dehydrated.

I totally agree that you can and should refuse an internal. If you want to, you can check yourself and see if you have changes over time, but, still, it doesn't mean much.

Hopefully the energy you're experiencing is that fabled "nesting instinct," and will give you plenty of energy to do what you need to before baby comes.