Kat-out-of-the-bag

Last week was quite hectic. I subtly made my news public by sharing my blog. To be perfectly honest it was not until this morning though that any of it has felt real. I finally had my 12 week scan. Still convinced that I was further along or had multiple babies in my tummy I was mildly surprised to hear that I was in fact 12 weeks and 3 days pregnant and there is only one baby there. It all looks ok, they took blood tests for the downs tests which I will hear back in about 5 days. We took Summer (my 4 year old) along to the scan as I thought it would be good for her to be involved and see proof that there was a real baby in my tummy as I am not sure she fully believes me. She was mesmerised and more concerned that the scan itself was hurting me. Leading up to the scan has been somewhat hectic though. Had a variety of events to attend over the weekend, most of which involved people drinking. Friday's leaving drinks for a work colleague was really hard as people smoked all aroun...

Oh my god, its quite amazing how one little person can make you feel. It is nearing the end of two weeks with my lovely Summer and i already cannot imagine life without her. I find it hard to think what my life was like before her. We definately should have done this years ago. So after i had been stitched up they wheeled me back to the delivery room. Phil was leaving to get a couple of hours sleep and i suddenly felt extremely terrified as they laid this baby on my to feed and i realised i was completely responsible for her. My mum offered to stay with me until phil came back thankfully. As i had had a general anaesthetic i had no feeling from my chest down so she was a godsend and dressed summer for me. I realised i had no idea how to put on a nappy or anything. They then wheeled me to the ward to join the other new mums. Some family came to see us and my mother in law snuck in a mini bottle of vodka for me but as i was attempting to breast feed i didn't open it. Phil was kicke...

Summer is 6 days old. Sorry this is a bit late but it has been one hell of a week. Well i went into labour finally on Thursday morning at 6.30. I spent the whole day having contractions. They started to slow down early afternoon so me and my hubby went for a long walk to keep things going. By about 6-7pm the contractions were about 7 minutes apart so i decided to make my way to my mums house as she lives just down the road from the hospital. The contractions seemed to stay put at 7 minutes apart although the pain was increasing. It was all in my back which is a bit odd. It got so bad that i could barely stand it. They then got to about 5 minutes apart by midnight so we decided to call the hospital. They usually only admit you when they are 3 minutes apart so we had to make it clear that the pain was now unbearable. So my brother drove me, Phil and my mum to the hospital (my mum was my backup birthing partner). We were put in a room and about 6 hours later i realised i stil...

9 day overdue!!!! Well i am physically and emotionaly drained now. On Monday i had a membrane sweep which has a 70% chance of starting off the labour. While doing this the midwife discovered that i was in fact 1 - 2cm dilated (i was finally in labour)!!. She could feel the babies head and everything. So it seemed to be a matter of waiting for the contractions to kick in... but it never happened. So Wednesday the midwife came over again and did another sweep. She had to give me the bad news and explain that i was still only 1 - 2cm dilated, which basically meant my labour had stopped (or paused). So after the second sweep i waited for any sign of the labour progressing. I had severe backache for most of the day and then early afternoon i felt a contraction and 20 minutes later came another and yet another after about 20 minutes. Then just as i am getting my head around the idea of going into labour properly it stopped!!! The dissapointment was just so strong that i cried for most of t...

Well i am now 2 days overdue!! This part feels like it is passing by so slowly. I saw the midwife on Monday and she told me that they will only allow me to go 2 weeks over my due date. I have to go back and see her on monday (if i haven't had the baby yet) and they will do a membrane sweep if i want one. This is simply running a finger along the neck of the cervix to try and stimulate the cells into starting labour but its not garunteed to start things off although it has a good rate of success. So now i feel like a ticking timebomb. I am too scared to leave the house as i don't think i could face the humiliation of my waters breaking in public. I did not think it was possible to feel any more uncomfortable than i had been up till now but i was sooooo wrong. I keep having hot flushes and am generally sweating from my body overheating, with every move she makes it is actually bordering on painful and she is so far down. Also i am practically weeing every 20 minutes which isn...

5 days to go!!! Still no sign of the baby... I have tried everything to enduce the labour but they really are old wives tales and it will only happen when my daughter decides she wants to make an appearance. I heard walking is a good way to bring on labour and it also encourages the baby to move down into the perfect position. So we went to Gunwharf Quays over the weekend and did alot of walking. She definately moved down further and i spent the evening having stitch like feelings which i thought may develop into contractions but no such luck. I guess i just need to be patient and wait it out. It is quite scarey though to think every day "is this the day it happens". My biggest worry is that i won't realise that i am in labour. People laugh when i say this and just say "you will definately know about it" but after talking to my mum it seems that is not such a silly fear. She said that she didn't realise when she was in labour with my sister (first born) a...

Under 2 weeks to go. Well the braxton hicks have now completely stopped. So my previous thoughts of an early birth are now not as much of a reality. Had an appointment with the midwife on monday. She told me that the baby is 2/5ths engaged - in terms that most people (including myself) understand that means that the baby has made it down into the birth canal up to her eyebrows. Timing wise this means nothing as she will push herself further down as fast or as slow as she feels so this is no indication of her due date butat least i know she is in the right position and heading the right way. I also found out that i am anaemic which as i understand is very very common especially in the last few weeks. I simply have to take iron supplements and increase the amount of green veg & red meat in my diet. I have been taking the iron tablets for 3 days now and discovered a strange side effect today. They can make your stools turn black, quite shocking at first and then i realised why ...

Under 3 weeks to go. I will keep this one relatively short as it is a very trying day today. Its my last day at work and i am surprisingly sad about the whole thing. Work have given me a nice little monetry bonus and a mother & baby photo shoot voucher where i will get pampered and made over. We are going to the pub shortly for farewell drinks (well coke in my case!). I suspect there may be a few tears before i leave today. I am definately ready to go though as its quite hard to concentrate on work at the moment when my ankles hurt like hell and my back is also fairly painful oh and the fact that i have to rush to the loo every 5 minutes... Also the drive to and from work had started to worry me as i have to drive along a very busy dual carriageway and i got a bit worried about what i would do if i went into labour while driving. Oh well, feet up from tomorrow onwards. Phil has finally got into the spirit of things now and has bought the baby lots of clothes from the pumpkin p...

4 weeks to go. I took nest building to an even higher level last week. Something was really bothering me about the nursery - it just looked too crowded. So i decided to remove the wardrobe which led to other furniture needing to be moved around too. In the end i had re-arranged my bedroom, the nursery, the downstairs hallway and the kitchen. Needless to say i was knackered afterwards. Phil wasn't best pleased either when he came home to see what i had done. It does look nice though but perhaps i shouldn't have done it all on my own. Since then i have had a huge pain in my shoulder blade which i am sure is either a trapped nerve or a pulled muscle, it really hurts all the time but nothing i can do about it as i am not allowed to take any form of pain killers. My own fault i suppose. My aunty was visiting last week so i spent a couple of days with her shopping which was nice. She bought us a bouncer for the baby. Had another midwife appointment on monday (might be my last). E...

5 weeks to go!!!! This is a day early because i tend to write this at work and i am now working shorter weeks so am not at work tomorrow or friday. Wow - its been a tense week to say the least. Braxton Hicks have now officially started. For those of you that don't know these are simply fake/ practice contractions to get your body ready for the real thing. My sister had a party at her house on saturday night and that is typically where they really kicked in. My mum was there and everything so i tried very hard to play it down but they really can take you off guard and take your breath away. The next morning i popped into Guildford and they came back with avengance. I was with phil but tried my hardest not to let on what was happening as i didn't want him to panic. But i had such a pain in Next that i had to bend over and lean against the wall for support. Phil sussed something was going on. It was at that point that i suddenly realised what an idiot i was - i had been assumin...

Under 6 weeks to go!!! First off let me apologise for not posting last week. I had the week off work and my home computer decided to play up so i couldn't get online to do this. So i will try my best to combine the last 2 weeks. Last week (week 33) - Was hugely hectic! Myself and Phil had the week off and i was exhausted at the end of it but realised we hadn't acually acheived much. On the Tuesday we went to my sisters graduation and i had massive issues yet again trying to find an outfit that didn't make me look like moby dick. All my immediate family attended along with a few of my sisters friends. The first thing my mum said to me was "you have certainly got that pregnancy waddle" - Cheers mum. It was a really nice day and really nice to see my sister doing so well but making my way around london was very tiring and my feet had swollen up like balloons by the time i got home. So the next day we decided to take it easy and go to the cinema. We watched Harry ...

Under 8 weeks to go... Lets start off with something that is fresh in my mind - last nights ante-natal class! The strange couple didn't turn up this week much to the midwifes relief. Me and phil were the first to arrive (again) and had a giggle with Tanya (the midwife) about the previouse week. She promised that we would be finished much quicker this time. We went over assisted labour - what happens when things go wrong! The look on my face must have been quite something as she kept apologising to me specifically everytime she said something gory. Funnily enough i can handle most things but when it comes to having the drip tube in your wrist or the epidural cord in your spine i get incredibly squeemish. She ran through the realities of a C section and its much more scarier than i had first thought. I always thought you couldn't feel anything but she said it actually feels like someone is doing the washing up in your tummy. Also that you are only anethasised from a certain pa...

Ooooh i am now in the single figures for the count down - 9 weeks to go!!! Its been fairly uneventful this week again. Although on Sunday i took nest building to a new extreme. I decided to get a new computer desk and bring it into the living room and out of the conservatory, i also decided the conservatory needed a new floor laying down and to be completely re-arranged to make it a nice dining room / chill out room. So we did it all in one day as i simply couldn't wait once i got the idea in my head and Phil wasn't going to argue with a hormonal pregnant woman. It looks great though and i am really pleased. We have been in that house for a year now and for the first time it is set out the way i want it. Oh i won that dress from ebay (the one i plan to wear to this wedding on saturday). It arrived yesterday and i tried it on. It looks fab. I am out to prove that you can look great when you are the size of a house! The only thing that lets the outfit down is my flat shoes. Fl...

Hello, This week i have mostly been e-baying. God i forgot how addictive it is. I now contantly have my ebay summary up on screen in the background to keep an eye on items i am bidding on - its so sad! Anyway down to business. I had the all clear from the diabetes tests so thats a definate plus point. I have my next appointment with the midwife on Monday, i think i have to see her every 2 weeks now until the baby arrives. I have booked up the other anti-natal classes (the ones where you practice breathing and discuss the drug options etc). The first one is on the 4th July and i am really looking forward to that, so is Phil strangely. Phil went away last weekend fishing so i thought i would take the opportunity to get a few things done around the house and pack my hospital bag (the one you keep by the door ready to grab when you go into labour) but to my annoyance i got very little done. Phil had left my dad with strict instructions to not let me overdo it (he knows me so well!). My...

God week 29 already... First things first - the diabetes tests. Midwife came on Tuesday morning to do the tests and hinted that she now thought i did NOT have diabetes but to wait until the results come back as i could be borderline. I have spent most of this morning trying to get my results but my doctors are being a nightmare and won't tell me anything. They basically said "there are no notes attached to your results so assume they are clear". When i pushed them on this and asked if that really meant i had the all clear they panicked and said they couldn't really tell me anything which is awfully unhelpful. I have had to call the midwife to get her to sort it out for me - just waiting for her to call me back! The hernia has been ok but mainly because i have been under the strict eye of my husband who won't let me do anything (or at least he wouldn't last week - this week both my husband and dad have quickly forgotten and i am the scivvy again!). But as lon...

Hi again, You may be confused as to why i didn't write a blog last week and why i am doing this weeks early. Well lets just say its been a very eventful few weeks. I have been somewhat poorly and now know why. Last week i was severely hit with nausea, dizziness and a number of other ailments that i probably shouldn't have kept to myself. I have also been getting a strange pain in my tummy next to my belly button. This pain has gotten gradually worse over the course of about 3 weeks and secretly i was really starting to worry about it. I found myself on the internet looking up my symptoms and coming up with all sorts of silly things. Anyway yesterday i had a routine midwife appointment and told her all my symptoms. Funnily enough after having an excellent bill of health up until this point everything started to fall apart and they have discovered two things wrong with me and both sound far worse than they actually are (honestly). The first is that my urine sample has shown ...

Hi all, Its been another slow, uneventful week.. I have stupidly worn my heals again today for the first time in weeks and realised that it wasn't such a bright idea as my feet and back are now killing me. It has also highlighted how much my ankles have swollen as i can't even do my knee length boots up! Funnily enough one ankle/ foot is much more swollen than the other which does look really funny. The only way to ease this i have found is just soaking my feet when i get home from work in a bowl of warm water with bubbles. While on the subject of feet i am on the brink of giving up wearing socks as i am now really struggling to bend that far to put them on. At the weekend i had to get phil to tie my shoe laces as i just couldn't stretch over the bump. I have figured out a way of doing it although it is very awkward, i simply put my foot on the third step (on my staircase) and push my knee out to the side this way i can lean forward quite far. As you have grasped by now ...

Hello again, I saw the midwife on monday and it turns out i am suffering from this doming thing i mentioned last week. Its nothing too serious but i have to be extra careful and try to not make it worse. The only way i can do this is by not lifting much and making sure i get out of bed the way i was shown. It is just about not putting too much pressure on my tummy muscles. It seems the morning sickness is back... Only in the evenings though thankfully. I am constantly tired again and no amount of sleep makes me feel any better. I also feel quite sick in the evenings (possibly worse than in the first 3 months). I have also started to lose my appetite again - although i am forcing myself to eat as it is crucial at this stage that i get all the goodness i can to pass onto the baby. I can only pray that this is not going to be the way i feel until the end. It will hopefully just pass!??! We went to Phils parents 20th wedding anniversary party at the weekend which i found so tiring. ...

Hi all, Sorry this is a day late but i had warned you it probably would be. So yesterday we went to the first antenatal class. I was by far the most pregnant woman there. As i have explained previously there was a mix up and i should have been to the first class ages ago so i was not too surprised by this. The other women were between 14 - 18 weeks and most of them were not even showing. The midwife holding the session was great - very funny but obviously loved her job. We discussed various things like posture, how to sit at work and how you should lay in bed to how your internal muscles are changing and why. We also practiced our pelvic floor excercises which was hilarious as she made Phil join in (men have a pelvic floor too you know). I should also point out at this stage that there were only two guys there, phil and another lad the same age named freddy. I didn't really learn anything i didn't already know or hadn't already experienced but i think phil found it all q...

GGGRRRRRR. How annoying, i typed up my blog yesterday and went to post it and i got a message to say that blogs were down and when i tried to get back  to what i had written it had been wiped!!!!!! so i have to type this up again which is very uninspiring. Another busy week for me which included a weekend of shopping. I popped into Aldershot on saturday morning to get some flat shoes to help with my afternoon shopping with my mum. Thank god i got them, what a godsend. I think the heals are out for the next 4 months now. I got some lovely black sequinned ballet pumps. Anyway popped out shopping with my mum in the afternoon and got loads of baby stuff. I was mainly looking to start my stockpile of nappies, wipes etc and although i did get alot of that stuff i also got a bit sidetracked and got some really cute girly things. I always said that if i had a girl i would not dress her in pink and be really girly as i was always and still am a bit of a tom boy. But i got a bit carri...

What a week its been. Last saturday i managed to throw my back out cutting my hedges back. This was probably not the most intelligent thing i have ever done and probably not the kind of job a pregnant lady should be doing but it seemed like a good idea at the time. So for the last week i have been hobbling around like a 90 year old and it takes me a got 5 minutes to stand up from a seated position. The good thing that came out of this is that i now admit defeat and may start to take it easy like i have been told. I can't bear another week of pain like this. The worst part is that i cannot even take anything for the pain - not even deep heat. Had my nephew stay over on saturday night. He is only 5 but is one of the most enchanting kids i have ever met. So i got in some practice. Think Phil has some things to learn about patience but apart from that he is great with him too. Back to my baby and the news that everyone was waiting to hear (i suspect not). I had the scan yesterday an...

Hi all, Sorry about the short blog last week but it was manic at work and i had to work through my lunch hour (which is when i usually write these things). Had to prepare a presentation for my company away day which went very well in case you were wondering. Finally the nursery is complete (feels like we have been doing it forever!) and as soon as i figure out how to get the pictures of it off my dads digital camera i will post them on my page. It is so awesome and i am so happy with how it has turned out. I have never seen a nursery quite like it which is cool as i like things that are unique. So now we are fitting it out with furniture. I went to the car boot sale on the A3 last sunday with my mum and Phil which was very productive. Mum bought us a beautiful moses basket on a stand which is ideal for the baby when he/she is first born and also handy when you need to be mobile. It only cost her £8 and is in mint condition. I also bought a rocker/ bouncer for £1 which again...