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2004-07-16 - 9.05pm��previous entry��next entry
24 weeks!!
Thanks for the supportive guestbook messages after my big upset ranty entry! :) I really appreciate such angry backing! ;) I am feeling soooo much better about the whole midwife/homebirth thing now because I posted at my homebirth forum about it, and got some really supportive and helpful replies from other mums/pregnant women. One of them gave me 3 websites to visit for back-up. Here they are incase anyone is interested (or needing this kind of info yourselves!):
The Association of Radical Midwives - yeah baby!!! :D Actually when I visited their site I remembered that I was a member of the ARM when I was a student midwife. I just thought their vision for childbirth was fab so I joined. I got my Pinard stethoscope through them too :) They have some great research and info, and links to other helpful sites, including the next place this nice lady suggested:
Homebirth.org.uk - this place ROCKS!!!! Seriously. I didn't even get to visit the third website (The Association of Independent Midwives (in the UK)) because I was reading this site alllll afternoon and making banners and burning my bras (hehe!). Okay not the last two, but yeah I just feel sooooo empowered about my birth choice after reading this site. I have started a Word document where I'm gonna paste a ton of their stats and research and FAQ answers to print out and take with me to my next midwife appointment!
The ladies at the homebirth forum also said I should write to the Supervisor of Midwives and request that this midwife be put off my case, but I think now that I'm armed with things that take all her arguments apart (literally ALL of them!), I will go in and give her what for, and then see if she'll support me. Sort of basically saying, "Well, I know *I* can do this, can you?!" And if she seems kind of negative then I will write to the Supervisor of Midwives and do my thang. This homebirth site also gives a sample letter for exactly this purpose so it's all made soooo much easier for me! Yay!! I feel loads better therefore.
And I'm gonna get a consultation with an independent midwife from the birth centre in London that has those FAB midwives (but costs waaaay too much money for me!). I went to their site and anyone can have a free consultation to discuss plans and options for pregnancy, labour and birth, whether or not you choose to go to their clinic. I would really appreciate some good back-up from an actual midwife over these homebirth issues - that would make me feel even more armed and dangerous (!) for my next midwife appointment. Plus they come to your home :) So I think I am going to book a consultation, I think I will really benefit from even just that.
Okay so that's the update on that! :)
New belly pic for 24 weeks is in the belly gallery! Neil just took it an hour ago. He was making me laugh again. I don't think there's loads of difference from the 22 week photo, but actually I AM bigger than then. Many of my maternity clothes are tight on my bump now across the jersey panel, not just the elasticated waist, whereas they weren't at 22 weeks. Also I just know I am feeling bigger in the bump since then. But the photo doesn't show it much. The angle's slightly different.
But YAAAAAAY I'm 24 weeks pregnant today!!!! Finally that wonderful milestone, as wonderful to me as when I hit the 2nd trimester at 12 weeks and finally got past the big miscarriage stat hurdle. Arthur is now officially "viable", and has a good chance of survival if he was born anytime from now. Of course we don't want that to happen, because he would still have a significant chance of NOT surviving, or of having long-term disabilities as a result of being so premature. So stay in there and grow healthy and strong Arthur! Only 16 more weeks to go.
Arthur now weighs 600g which is about 1lb 5oz, and he is 30cm (about 12 inches) long from head to heel. His feet are an inch and a half long from the tip of his toes to his heel. That would definitely account for some similar-sized shapes that have been trying to break through my abdominal wall lately! ;) His head should be about the size of a large lemon by now. I looked in my pregnancy notes and found my scan report from the 22 week scan. His gestational age was 21+6, and his measurements were all within normal, but his femur length was the littlest at 20+2. I have short legs (really short!) so it looks like Arthur has my legs. Neil's are long. Arthur's abdominal circumference measured at 21+3, so pretty much on target. He had 2 head measurements, his head circumference and his bi-parietal diameter (complicated to explain but basically it gives an idea of the length from the back of the head to the forehead, apart from other things). His head is the biggest part of him! The circumference measured at 22+0 and the BPD at 22+4! Neil's head is really little, except it's kind of odd shaped in that it's long from front to back, but thin from side to side. So maybe Arthur has Neil's head shape? Neil isn't too happy about this, because he's really self-conscious about his looks and doesn't like his head shape or face or profile. *sigh* So he doesn't want Arthur to inherit it. Poor love :( But also Arthur may be like my daddy, because I have Daddy's short legs, and Daddy has a big big head!! My mum has a little head (she even sometimes buys her sun hats from children's departments! So sweet!) and I think I inherited much more of my daddy's body shape. So yeah, maybe I passed that on to Arthur? Anyway we'll just have to wait and see!!
Arthur has been very kicky today. He was quiet all morning and didn't wake with me, so after a while I ate some chocolate and lay down, and within 10 minutes he was walloping the skin off my abdomen! :) He walked and pedalled around my womb, it was really sweet! I could see (and obviously feel!) his little feet making little measured bulges as they walked across to the right, several inches, and then up about 5 inches, and then back across a couple more inches, and then they stayed where they were and had a go at jumping instead! :) I love my little boy. I could feel and watch him moving and kicking me all day long if he was only active without stopping for a rest! My 24 week pregnancy update at Babycentre says that babies at this stage are practising walking and pedalling in the womb now, so I guess Arthur's right on schedule for that.
It's so humid today. I am just sweating so much, it's annoying! It's not even that hot, just really humid and muggy. My clothes are on, off, on, off, on, off all day long. If I put clothes on and walk downstairs I am sweaty and hot and knackered, so they need to come off to give me some air and let me cool down and feel comfy again. Then eventually I get cool or else figure that I ought to be wearing something more than underwear around the house (good thing we have net curtains!), so I put them on again, but right away the same thing happens. I think I would be really happy just wearing underwear until the frosts start! But oh well.
Today I went out and walked to the postbox and back. I really need to start exercising more than this! But wouldn't you know, the schools all broke up for summer today/yesterday so the pool will be chock full of kids and so on. But I still should exercise more all the same. Even just more walking. My lower back really aches when I walk, it feels so pulled-on by the weight of my bump, but I was quite surprised to notice that it sort of starts to feel looser and less stiff and sore by the time I'm getting back home again. So maybe it NEEDS the exercise, to loosen up and stuff? Maybe I should try walking for longer, and more regularly? Well, obviously I know I SHOULD do that, but yeah. It's too humid for long walks at the moment. Bleurgh.
I have eaten really badly today. I felt weird and depressed earlier, and soooo bored and restless. I ate chocolate, and no small amount of it either :S And doughnuts again. Tsk. But they are all finished now, so that's them out of the way! And then I wasn't hungry at lunchtime so I just had a plain ham sandwich. And when I got peckish I ate chocolate tiffin cakes. I just seem to have a sweet tooth today, but I guess I shouldn't indulge it so much! I did fancy a peach earlier and I bought some nice ones at the supermarket yesterday so I ate one :)
Hmmm, what else? Still leaking colostrum, but not large amounts or anything.
Can babies smell a fart? Or feel one? Crazy questions I know, but I just wondered!! It's just that I passed wind in the most awful way this evening - I mean I never smelled anything LIKE it in my life, it was so awful (!!), and the moment I smelled it, Arthur woke up and started kicking me like he was agitated! He only quieted down when the smell dissipated!!! How weird is that?! Hehe! I guess maybe he was reacting to me being so appauled at such an odour, or else my writhing around trying to get away from the smell!! Hehehe! Ohhh I really don't need to tell you stuff like this, do I!!! I lose any dignity I was hanging onto previously! ;)
I am sleeping really deeply at the moment, infact since Tuesday night when I cancelled going to housegroup because I was sleeping badly and feeling knackered. I spoke to Dave on the phone and asked them to pray for my sleep and the midwife appointment, and from that night on I have slept like a LOG, I mean seriously, I never sleep this deeply. It's so nice :) Thank you God. The midwife appt obviously didn't go so well, but what I wanted them to pray for was that everything would be okay physically for me and the baby, and it is. So God answered our prayers, and I'm grateful! :)
Hmmny, I can't think of anything else.... nope. I'm sure I had more to say but it's gone out of my head - ooh wait, I forgot to say that in yesterday's entry I was being all annoyed at Word for correcting my spelling to US and saying it was spelt differently in the UK. Well I just want to point out that um, I'm stoopid, because in a moment of boredom today I looked up those words and uh, they are spelt the same way here as in the States, so I've been spelling them wrong for EVER!!! D'oh. Oh well. You live and learn! ;)
Okay I need a drink of water so that is all for now. If I remember what else I was going to say I will do another update. We are going to France to see my parents a week from tomorrow - I can't believe how fast that has come up! I'm excited so see my parents, but dreading the journey. Oh well, I won't dwell on it now :) Anyway I will update again soon!
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