Dec 08 - the one where we wonder what are our bodies going to do next?

[rosmerta]

Sorry for rubbish title, best I could do

OMG Turnip i'm doing that all the time, my neighbours are constantly knocking on the door to let me know they are there. They have our car keys on them and the car is right in front of our house. Not that that makes much difference as i am always leaving the car doors open too.

Hey all - not been on for a while, thought I'd better post before this thread runs out of space!

Turniphead - I have done many embarrasing things with keys this pg... you are not alone!

Am now 24 weeks and feeling not so comfy, pains in pelvic area - probably not helped by climbing into DS's cotbed last night to convince him to go to sleep. Must keep my knees together more... (thinks, if only I'd considered that 5 months ago ). Have sorted out our doula, but don't have a MW appt until end of Sept. Seems like aaaaages.

Take care fellow wombles

back from a week away - no time to read all posts so I'll just catch up on today's.

Turnip I read earlier that bad baby brain usually means a girl

Beans so glad all went well with your colleague and hope you get something for your smelly CM - am getting loads too and esp in the past few weeks, not smelly though.

abby hurray for section

Off to measure my bump now - have my 28 week appt on Fri (at 27 weeks as have to get blood taken then have anti-D at 28 weeks) so hopefully they will measure me properly. Bump feel enormous all of a sudden - had a bit of a wobbly moment last week as was shocked at huge bump and the thought of how big I'll be by dec . I weighed myself and seem to have gained a stone (somewhere between 13-16lbs), all of which must be on my HUGE bump !

i have 2 more donuts left should i eat them?

yep for sure - eat them

I just got DH to measure - seemed to know what he was doing and I'm right on 25 which is right on! Apparently you measure 3 times and take the average.

Hello Ladies

I love the Peak District too! Edale, Bakewell, Speedwell and Mam Tor. Went walking when i was quite early in pregnancy and nearly died walking up Snake Pass where before could walk it quite easily, my heartrate leveled out once got to top of Mam Tor.

I am also feeling the discharge bits- i've had it full on since the beginning (defo not thrush), practically have to put my knickers on a boil wash, too lazy to buy liners. I also get breathless at night time but only if I have stuffed my face that night.

I'm pretty set on getting a Maxicosi car seat soon but does anyone have any views on buying the fixi base too for the car?

I ate 3 yum yums on the way home from work today- oink oink.

Beans33 sounds difficult for you at work with the other lady, but i think your response showed lots of empathy.

hi ladythompson .. great barr very local to me as i live in birmingham .. in fact my dp comes from great barr went to school there and his parents still live there! When did you move away?

Hi mismama what part of birmingham are you from and which hospital are you under? Im with Good Hope in Sutton Coldfield.

Pixsix i shouldnt worry too much about your measurements as they can be quite unreliable .. plus as someone else mentioned GPs are not the best at that sort of thing, midwives do it everyday.

Re heartburn/molten lava in my chest my midwife ordered a prescription for me today although i cant remember the name of the stuff she said it was the same as liquid gaviscon but cheaper!

Breathlessness is def an issue for me too .. trying to read a chapter of the chronicals of naria everynight for my 8 year old dd is taking longer and longer as i keep on having to pause for breath

anyway im off to bed ladies goodnight xx

Thanks Turniphead1, defo helps

preggiejane we got the isofix base for DH - he had terrible trouble with DD's car seat and seatbelts until we got the clip-in base, which he loved. (He ain't very practical! )

Still lots of ctx here - am wondering when the culture will come back from the hosp as I hope it doesn't turn out to be something antibiotic-resistant! (hypochondriac here too!!! )

Had a bit of a to do with hospital today as I'd had a letter inserted in my notes demanding a glucose tolerance test and insisting I phone to make the appointment if it hadn't come through by 26 weeks. Turns out they couldn't refer me/book me in today because the relevant department has a stack of unfiled paperwork... . They are 'probably' going to phone back 'in the next few days' but were quite perturbed as to why I was phoning up in the first place .

This wouldn't bother me except the original referral was completely spurious IMO, and the notes say "if you fail to attend by 30 weeks you will have to measure your blood glucose 4x daily with a monitor" - even though it wasn't me that originally asked for the test!!!

I hope it will get sorted out tomorrow.

Turniphead I'm really not sure about Dermot... do you mean the newsreader bloke?!!>shakes head

verso will bear in mind too thanks.

oh Verso booking people can be so infuriating i wish they could just be civil sometimes and listen to the way they speak to people sometimes. Did they sort out an appointment for you. Seriously though get into some cranberry juice, it stops the bugs adhereing to your bladder so helps the antibiotics work. Don't worry if they aren't the right AB's the will have you one a broad spectrum one and the results will show if there is something that your wee bugs are more sensitive to so a bit more specific to your bug.

ladythompson DH was brought up in great barr and his mother has not long moved to Four Oaks now she is on her own.

Reban I live 10 min walk from Heartlands Hospital. I had my other two there, seems like a lifetime ago now. They are 8(in Dec) and 10. In fact I was walking to the hosp in labour with my first at about 10 oclock at night with DH carrying my bags, when he convinced me to stop off at my Mum and Dads for a cup of tea (we lived about a 20 min walk away then - I dont know what I was thinking ) Of course he knew Dad would jump in the car and refuse to let me walk any further .
I cant see me doing that this time around!

Hi everyone,

Oooh Christmas!
(sorry, I'm a bit behind with the thread - trying to catch up!)

I posted this a few weeks ago Christmas baby - any tips? and got some useful replies.

thats so funny you walked to the hospital, i remember being in the minicab on the way to the birth center with DS and just pushing on the tens machine button and losing all concept of time. I don't think i could possibly have walked any distance.

I settle for one donut in the end so still one for tomorrow.

have just spoken to DH who is in swindon at the mo for work, his dad is unwell so he is going to go home to Australia for a couple of weeks in October, so this baby had better not do any premature birthing. Poor thing i wish i could go with him but it's a bit expensive for us all to go and getting a bit late for long haul flights.

Hi reban. I've been getting heartburn on and off too. The chemist said no rennies - the packet says not in pregnancy.

They gave me Gaviscon (eurgh!) which I'm not keen on but seems to do the trick.

I guess you might know the old wives tale about heartburn? That you get heartburn from babies with lots of hair?

Hi Natalie!
Sorry to hear things haven't been great - are they better now?

morning all - working from home today, so no chance of me counting prams and massive chance of me posting like there's no tomorrow...

couple of questions for non first-timers:

• tens machines - do they work, are they worth hiring?
• if you want to be pretty active in your birth, does that rule out using a birth pool?
• does using a birth pool rule out using a tens machine? don't want to electrocute myself, obviously.
• birthing balls - should i get my own, or ask for one at hospital in labour?
• labour room floors - are they clean? should we bring something to put on the floor?

sorry - couldn't sleep last night so spent an hour reading about birth, hence the questions

verso - how frustrating! i got a letter from the hospital the other day, telling me i had missed my last appointment wtih the mw and they had to make me a new one. actually i had been there, waited ages, was seen unexpectedly by doctor, not mw, and the doctor said "why am i seeing you, you should be seen by a mw". doctor then advised me to book in for all the following mw appointments up until birth, which i did, and then when i called the hospital back for something else, they denied all knowledge of those appointments. hmmm...

hi waitinggirl, thought I'd answer some of your questions!

I didn't have a tens but know people who did and they said they were more of a distraction than relief

Wanting to be active doesn't rule out a birth pool, you can still move around in the pool and change positions etc. But if you want to birth in the pool then you shouldn't get in until about 5-7cm dilated otherwise your labour can slow down. If you get in 1-4cm then its good as pain relief.

And nope, you can't use a tens in a birth pool! But you can have G&A

I would say get your own ball, not all hospitals have them available and they're good to have at home as well. I'm already using mine!

Labour rooms should be thoroughly cleaned and they should have mats available for you, might be worth checking with the hospital.

Hope that helps

rosmerta - thank you!

Morning all!

preggiejane - we hadn't intended to get the isofix base for the Maxicosi, but it turned out our seatbelt was too short to fit the car seat without one - so try it out in your car first! How long you use it really depends on your DC - can be much longer than 9 months. DD is 16 months and we've only just moved her into the bigger car seat as it seems pretty dull for her to be facing backwards all the time...

waitinggirl - I had a tens last time. Not convinced it did much for me, but it seems to go differently for different people. You're at the Whittington aren't you? I'm pretty sure they have birth balls there, but you might want your own one at home anyway - they're really handy to sit on before the end and I found that once DD was born, bouncing with her on the ball was a sure fire way to calm her down! Labour rooms are normally spotless - not always true for the ward itself though. If you get a chance, its worth doing the tour of your hospital maternity wards - so much easier when you can visualise everything and you do get the chance to ask lots of questions.

verso sorry to hear you're still not feeling great and about the nightmare booking appointments. My hospital has just introduced a new computerised booking system, which no one knows how to use. I'm never quite sure whether I actually have an appointment when I show up, and last time I went, they had to get out the tea and biscuits to placate a massive roomful of pregnant women waiting to be seen...

turnip - meant to say, sorry about the stress re your DH's work. Not the easiest time to be in the banking industry. Glad there are highlights to your day though!

I am on Rennies for heartburn and it says on the packet that they are fine for pregnancy and breasfeeding - I prefer the chewy ones as I hate the chalky taste of the original ones.

wg what is it with MW appts ?! Last time I went the GP surgery had double booked all MW appts so there were loads of pee'd off pregnant ladies sitting around !

rosmerta appreciate the birth advice you gave to wg, very useful for is first timers ! What are you using the birthing ball for at this stage, are you doing exercises or something ? I've got a gym ball somwehere, maybe time to dig it out !

We have ordered the isofix base for the maxicosi car seat as have a 3 door car so want the convenience of being able to clip it in as clambering into the back to attach the seatbelt to the carseat after possibly having a section sounds like a nightmare!

After last night's measuring chat I went
off and measured my bump and it seems to be over 32 cm !!! Where do you count as the 'top' of the bump ? just under b00bs ?... am terrified I am having a monster baby now !

PreggieJane - we have ordered the MaxiCosi but the car is too old for Isofix Seemed ok with out when we tried it in the car before buying.

So MissMama's DH and Reban's DP were both brought up in Great Barr! Small world. As I said, my Mum and sister still live there and I often go shopping in Sutton when I'm up from London. I was there on Sunday seeing my Mum and going to see my nephew's riding lesson in Alridge. I left when I was 18, to answer Reban's question. And actually Reban, my sister is a Nursing Consultant at Good Hope, she has worked there for yonks so I know the hospital well. If you get into any strife when you're in there (and I sincerely hope you don't) let me know and I can despatch her to sort it out, she's good at that sort of thing!

I'm envious of the people who have their dates for their cs - I am still waiting for mine and I really want to know now!