Never ever did I think I would be blogging on a Sunday night one week after this baby was due to arrive.  Yet, here I am. 

Ever see the movie Groundhog Day?  This last couple of weeks has been the pregnancy version of that movie.  Every night I have some mild contractions that may or may not follow some sort of pattern.  Each night I go to bed thinking that maybe... just maybe I will wake up to a real contraction and we will get to play out the scene from every movie or TV show where the wife says, "It's time!"  I drift off to sleepyland and then I wake up to pee.  No sign of labor.  I wake up to pee again.  Still nothing.  I wake up in the morning and think to myself, "Well, maybe later today." 

After a couple weeks worth of disappointments I have resigned myself to the simple fact that this baby is never coming out.  My mother shared with me that an elephant's pregnancy is 2 years long!  How is this relevant you might wonder?  Well, I am starting to suspect that the boy parts that the sonographer saw on the ultrasound must have been a trunk instead.  Looking forward to welcoming this sweet elephant baby in December 2014!!

It has been a wild couple of weeks!!  I had a couple of weekly appointments where my OB would check baby's position by palpating my uterus, and verified that baby was head down.  I got the results of my GBS swab and they were negative.  All was lining up for the dream natural childbirth.  Then at 38 weeks and a few days my OB again felt my uterus and this time he sighed.  After a ultrasound to confirm, he informed me that baby was breech. 

I cried. I was seeing all of my dreams for a natural birth fly out the window.  I knew breech babies mean c sections and while I clearly recognize that there is a time and place for them, I am completely freaked out by the idea.  I cried some more.  Then, my doctor began talking about doing a version.  I had seen one done on one of those baby shows years ago but hadn't heard anyone speak of them first hand.  Despite knowing very little, I was scheduled to give it a try the next morning. 

I showed up and making what could be a very long story very short, I was given an IV with some meds to relax my uterus.  The doctor came in and with the nurse holding the ultrasound machine he grabbed the baby through my belly and started moving him.  It hurt.  I won't lie.  It hurt a lot.  But, thankfully after only a few minutes, the doctor let go and said, "Okay."  It was over and baby was head down!!

Then, as I laid in bed for monitoring, I was uneasy about the amount of movement I was feeling from baby.  They had strapped a elastic brace around my belly to help keep him put but it clearly wasn't preventing him from squirming like crazy. 

A few days later, I was SURE that he was head up again.  I could feel his head in my right rib cage.  I was crushed.  I just had to make it until me next appointment so that he could flip him again and possibly induce labor so that he wouldn't have time to flip back again.  Thankfully a couple of days before that appointment, I felt him flip again.  Then, I was pretty sure that this baby was back to head down.  It was a crazy couple of weeks for sure!  At my appointment, the doctor did verify that he was, in fact, head down! 

So then we wait...

I thought for sure labor would have started early but today makes me exactly 40 weeks.  I am not feeling anything significant in the way of labor but I know that that doesn't really mean anything.  I am still in a bit of denial that this baby will arrive here any day.  Any hour.  Maybe even tonight!  I don't think it will hit me until I am in labor.  Probably more like transition.  Or maybe not until I hear a first cry.  Until then... we wait.