Due August '07 - Part 4

[tokentotty]

Welcome all !!!!

Annie, we got a pool in a box from the NCT website. Works out at £100 including all the extras which I don't really think are optional like the hose and cover. Still a lot cheaper than the bigger hire pool we got last time, about £275 and you had to add chemicals which built up over time.

The pool in a box takes about 2 hours to fill depending on your boiler and it can stay warm because of the cover.

I've been having a look at some of the birth videos on google (dp actually asked if he could watch one I was watching...I think he's getting used to the idea now!)

If anyone is interested, here are a few links to some good youtube vids. Not for the fainthearted, so if you're easily offended don't click!:

There is a nice straightforward non-scary not too graphic birth video here

A rather more graphic educational one here but still straightforward. Shows delivery of placenta link

Squatting home birth, dutch lady but dubbed in english link

Hi everyone i'm due on aug 16th with my second and cant believe how quick its going esp with a 2 year old running around hope all of you are well i have really bad back ache at the mo but other than that its all going good

Muffin - Our cat has coped with 2 kids and 2 dogs over the last 4 years - have to admit she tends to live up stairs but everyone knows she's the boss! She has never been a very friendly cat and scratches every who strokes her but oddly she rarely goes for my children, even the over loving heavy handed 2 yr old DS!

I would tell you about my muddled brain but can't remember!

Evening All,
I wish this damn weather would make up it's mind - I've been adding/losing layers like a burlesque dancer today!
DH has been stuck in Hong Kong with work for the weekend so one of my friends came shopping with me today - and OMG we shopped ! I will have to dispose of some of these bags before DH gets home!! Still, I don't do it v often .
Had my eyebrows threaded as well (OMG that hurts) so was an all-round girly day. So much fun!
How are all the bumps today? My kicks have been getting seriously stronger recently - some really give me a shock.
So sorry so many are getting morning sickness still/again. I have had a few random incidents along the way - I find the Omega 3 that comes with Pregnacare is a garuantee of seeing my breakfast again, so have given them away!

Haven't posted for ages, but keep popping in to see whay everyone is up to. Bump is really active now, made dp jump the other day when he had his hand on it, so funny. Managed to go swimming yesterday which is lovely, felt great.
Off to France on hols on Friday. What do people think about travel insurance? Obviously we have some but I wondered whether any extra cover is needed.

Having my anti-d injection on Wednesday. Plus usual midwife appt. Amazing to think its less than 3 months now. Really need to finish the nursery.

Names choices change every week
Currently Edward (Woody), Sonny, Arthur (Art) for boys and Mathilda (Tillie), Agatha (Taggie), Missie and Harper for a girl. Harper is my fav but vetoed by DP so prob won't happen. Have a good week everyone

Gosh, looked at births linked on You tube, frightening stuff!

Hi all - haven't posted for ages either - tried to post last week from my parents place in France where DH, DS and I were holed up for our (very rainy) holiday, but it didn't work for some reason. Bablylovesmuffins our cat (well DH's cat to be more accurate) normally loathes me but gives me tons of affection when I'm pregnant - did it while ds breastfed too, maybe something to do with pheremones perhaps? Very strange - and she knew I was pregnant after just a couple of weeks too. Physically I have to report that the osteopath has worked wonders on my spd pain - apparantly mine was very mild, but it felt like agony - luckily they offer half price treatments to pregnant women and new mothers at our local practice. I've started being sick in the mornings again quite often - but luckily without the nausea - so it's not too bad. All the useful nappy links you've been posting are swaying me seriously towards reusables this time round - just need to persuade DH now... As to names .. well we seem almost settled now on Imogen or Mimi for short.

funbun meant to say - we didn't bother with extra travel insurance 'm fairly confident in the French medical service but I made sure I took all my medical notes with me of course and also an EHIC card - replaces the old e111 form.

Yep, we,ve got the EHIB card. Not worried about french medical care just worried in case owt goes wrong but I'm sure we'll be fine. I think I'll stick to the usual travel insurance. Can't wait for all the sunshine and relaxation and yummy food. Mind you it seems daft to go to france when I can't eat pate and runny cheese. Just have to eat more pastries and bread!

Feeling very sorry for myself today - look like I've got a black eye, dd passed on conjunctavitis (sp?!). Hopefully can get it sorted tomorrow more time off work (only been back a day after 2 week run of chicken pox)!! Also been getting lower back pains - think its the growing bump and lifting chunky squirming ds.

Was interested that the ostopath (sp again!) worked for spd as we've had a leaflet come through for a new local practice with special offer for pregnancy back pain - would like to get it sorted before it gets too bad. But find it hard enough going to the doctors let alone somewhere I don't know! Has anyone else got any good stories?

Funbun - love all your names - particularly like Agatha/Taggie - never come across one of those before!

Glad to hear the osteopath did good work on your SPD, Treacle - I hope the rest of you with back pain manage to get it sorted.

Some corking names here - Agatha / Taggie is brilliant.
DH is violently averse to 'soft' or 'pretty' names for girls, so our shortlist is running along Rachel / Laura / Zoë lines.
Long list of good boys' names which is hard to whittle down - hopefully when he's born he'll look like a James / Edward / Adam etc and there won't be a problem...

Hope you're all better soon, loler.

I had a bit of a scare last night, silly really. I was taking my brother a cup of tea and suddenly had a huge spasming pain in my belly to one side which doubled me over. Dp and bro were a bit scared especially as the pains kept coming and everytime I couldn't carry on talking!

(I knew it wasn't labour, the pains were coming every few seconds and it was more in reaction to moving about, not coming in a rhythm or anything) anyway they made me call NHS direct, and they told me what I suspected- I'd probably pulled a muscle in/around the bump.

On speaking to them I remembered that earlier I'd lifted a load of carbooting stuff off the kitchen table, didn't realise how heavy it was but felt fine at the time! Cue a big telling off from the boys and being made to sit down while they did everything. Shame, that.

Got my 30 wk scan this morning anyway so I'll mention it when I go. Hope everyone else is doing ok and not lifting stupidly heavy weights like me!

Hi ladies!
How are we all?
Any body getting "Braxton Hicks contractions"? I had loads at weekend!
Babymadxx

Morning all - I cannot believe bananabump you are already going for a thirty week scan. Thirty seems so close to forty...
It is really easy to pull a muscle isn't it? It must have been frightening for you to be in all that pain near the baby.

I find I am getting a stitch if I walk a little too long in heels. I am going to have to give up heels entirely soon.
I am waking up in the night with hip pain as well after lying on my left side to sleep. It is really annoying but not like SPD.

Sorry to hear of the conjunctivitis loler. Hope it clears up soon for you. You will finally be well just in time for the baby at this rate!

Treacletart glad you had a lovely holiday - even with rain France must have been a good break. I entirely forgot to book travel insurance or pick up the E11 replacement card before we went to Italy, and having never seen a midwife (first appointment tonight!) had no notes to take. I realised my error on the plane out. Lucky for us, baby thrived on Italian food. Hope you do better at organising yourself before you leave though funbun (great names!)

Sweetydarling what a fun shopping day it sounds. It must be hard having your DH so far away. Did you shop for baby or yourself? We spent a happy half hour or so buying some bibs and bobs for baby at H&M yesterday. Originally it was just because I realised I had not bought any socks or caps, but then there was a sleepsuit with Pooh and Tigger, and a little summer outfit with surfer shorts (my LO is destined to follow his/her dad into this sport I think) and it was hard to put things back in the end. So, so broody now that my sensible ebaying instincts are failing me.

Welcome to angie!

That's all really. Hope everyone has a happy and healthy week.

Hi All
another one who hasn't posted for a bit

Kiteflying- Congrat's on keeping in the heels, can't quite imagine wearing them at all right now, but i live in the country so not very practical here either, i think i've almost forgotten what they are LOL

Babymad- hi not seen you for a while, though your scaring me with the mention of braxton hicks!!! are you still in the dark about the gender of LO?

Banana bump- i've never heard of pulling muscles like that, but I'll remember not to make any tea for anyone just in case

Mrs badger, It's nice to hear all the names, some really great ones.

Treacletart- i like imogen too, always have although just to warn you it is very popular here in Oz now.

Name Tip- Have a look on the birth register and find the most popular names for last year. i thought i was choosing a slightly unusual name for my ds and it ended up being number 13 for the year, I was not too happy about that. Wanting a name not on the list for this one.

Angie -welcome i'm due the 15th but hoping for either 16th (mine and dh's date) or 14th (ds's date) different months though, but does help everyone remember of birthdays

Hi to everyone else, i've run out of steam for the moment.

Afternoon all

3 friends in 3 weeks have all had first babies early- one 2 weeeks, one 10 days and one a week. Starting to rethink maternity leave plans.....(and panic slightly due to my complete lack of preparation).

Re names- everyone seems to be calling their little girls Isabelle and Isabella at the moment- know of at leat 5 in last 2 month!

Hi everyone, managed to catch up without having to read hundreds of posts this time! Hope you all had a good weekend. Sorry to hear about the pulled muscle/conjunctivitis, hope you both get sorted soon.

funbun - which insurer are you going with? I'm off to Spain in a few weeks and I want to pick one who covers pregnancy, just in case. Got the E111 card though, so should be fine. I went to France at easter and it was hard to avoid the cheese but all the bread and croissants more than made up for it! Brie and the like are ok if they're cooked too, so you don't have to avoid it completely.

Love all the name choices, especially Imogen and Harper. Maybe DP would go for it as a middle name funbun?

loler - some of the women at my yoga class have back pain and they've had great success with osteopathy. I'm going to see a chiropractor about mine this week, but might try an osteopath too.

kiteflying - Edgware Birth Centre are on 0208 732 6777.

Just got back from the hospital after my scan (Kiteflying: it's sposed to be a 30 week growth one but I'm 29+2) having had a bit of a shit time really. Firstly the sonographer took one look at me and demanded to know how much I weighed "in case they needed to use a stronger table" wtf? Yes, because I'm THAT big I can buckle metal tables with the power of my lard.

Anyway I informed her that the same table had "held up" in my past three scans in the same room, and promptly lay down. She then told me that because I was overweight she wouldn't be able to see anything, and then poked around for all of three minutes with the screen turned away, didn't explain anything to me, then cursorily flipped the screen around and said "there's his head, there's his heart. Can't get a better image because of your weight" (The last sonographer managed to, but it's easy to blame other factors for when you aren't that good at your job, isn't it?)

Anyway she said his growth has tailed off, and she was just closing the door on me when I asked some more questions, so she told me go to antenatal for the results to be deciphered. When I got there they hooked me up to a monitor for 30 mins, everything was fine, heartbeat normal, plenty of kicks etc.

I'm just feeling a bit confused now because though they keep explaining tiny bits of what they're doing, I don't really know what they're expecting to find. Why did I need a growth scan in the first place? Because they expect him to be huge because of all the pies I eat? Bah, I'm fed up.

And the sonographer left my bellybutton full of KY jelly. Cow.

Anyway, consultants appointment tomorrow so he can inform me that I'm fat too. Wahey.

Uki yep but that's men for you, a "surprise baby" which I feel great about now. My friend who is 33 weeks said this afternoon that she started getting BH around 30 week, so I feel assured by her now!

Bananabump-just wanted to say sorry for horrible morning, that was a very rude sonographer, in more ways than one.
You have a right to be angry and i'd complain,if it's not her responsibility to comment on growth she shouldn't have.

I hope you get some better treatment tomorrow.

Bananabump, what an awful woman! You should definitely complain. There's no way you should have to put up with treatment like that, even if you were horribly obese and had a history of breaking tables that's still no excuse for rudeness. Hope the consultant's a bit nicer.

hi everyone - back from fantastic holiday - dont have time to read all posts just now (if ever - two weeks worth would probably take another two weeks to read) but hope you are all doing well.

read the last few posts - sorry to hear about the rude sonographer bananbump - not what you need at any time let alone when you have questions about why they are doing tests etc.

hope to catch up with everyone soon, but if there has been anything major in the last two weeks, i'd appreciate a very quick update.

have any of the low lying placenta women had their next scan yet? i have mine on friday.

oh for all those having their second babies - our friend had her baby girl last friday on the hard shoulder of the M90. time from waters breaking to giving birth was 2 hours (her first labour was about 36 hours so this was rather unexpected) so her dh delivered his baby girl at 3am (with a little help from the nhs on the end of the phone).

Hi conkertree, glad you had a fab holiday, what did you get up to? Bit of a boring question but did you get travel insurance? I'm going away in a few weeks and I want to make sure they cover me for pregnancy-related stuff, just in case.

OMG, well done to your friend and her partner for delivering on the motorway! Hope they're all doing well.

Not much has happened with me, we toured the local birth centre last week and it was lovely, so we'll be booking in there.

Hello all !! Back from Las Vegas yesterday and taken today and tomorrow off to rest up and sort out my bodyclock. Midwife coming over any minute though for a check up and to take blood (boo !). Think she's doing the Glucose test as well as she told me to have lunch at midday and nothing sweet until she'd been.
How are we all ??? I'm massive, getting kicked/punched, you name it, all the time now and have spent this morning sorting through baby clothes that I bought from others on MN and what I brought back from the States with me. Even bought Peanut's first teddies and felt rather emotional as I sat on the bed with everything all round me .
Banana - am absolutely horrified to read about your sonographer experience and would definitely, definitely complain and take it further. No-one should ever be treated like that and I really think you're absolutely right that it's due to her incompetence and lack of ability that she's had to behave that way in a vain attempt to hide it.
Katybird - get the E111 equivalent for your travel to Spain, I never take out insurance in Europe as this guarantees you'll receive care for every eventuality in the same way as you'd receive care wherever you were in England. If you do feel that you want that bit of extra security then I can dig out the people I insured myself through to go the US last week as I was given their name/number here on MN as one others had used. Will dig it out for you to call them if you like.

Might start another new thread as this one's getting so large, what do you think ?

conkertree I have my "placenta scan" at 35 weeks so in about 5/6 weeks (OMG just round the corner now) time and my DS's are coming to, MW said that if I tell the lady/scanner that the children have come to see the baby for the first time she'll do a longer (with it being a late PG scan and just to see if placenta has moved) scan just for them, bless!