Due Fab Feb 2009: crossed fingers (and legs) we'll get through another thread without welcoming any early arrivals!

[MarkStretch]

Welcome.

Please feel free to add yourself to the list.

TinkerBellesMum - DC3 (girl), due: 01.02.09 (not expected to get far into December) (age 27, Birmingham)
Laidbackinengland - DC4, due: 23.01.09 (age 34, North Devon)
Nkweto - DC2, due: 30.01.09 (age 35, West London)
Mamagoose - DC3, due: 31.01.09 (age 32, Spain)
Questionkid - DC1, due: 03.02.09 (age 33, Wallington, Surrey)
PinkTulips - DC3, due; 04.02.09 (age 24, Roscommon, Ireland)
MsLucy - DC2 (a boy), due: 4/2/09 (CS a few days early)(age 38, North London)
Swampster - DC3, (a boy), due: 06.02.09 (age 40 , London)
Rosieposey - DC4, (a boy) due: 06.02.09 (age 36,Swindon,Wiltshire)
MarkStretch - DC2, (a boy) due: 07.02.09 (age 29, Norwich)
onwardandoutward - DC2, due: 07.02.09 (age 35 South West)
LittleMissNorty - DC2, due: 08.02.09 (age 40 in a couple of weeks, Kent).
KT1983 - DC1, due: 09.02.09 (age 25, London)
KazzaL - DC2 (suprise flavour), due 10.02.09 (age 35, Cirencester, Gloucs)
herbgarden - DC2, due: 11.02.09 (CS 02.02.09) (age 38, Berkshire)
TheHouseofMirth - DC2, (a boy) due: 12.02.09 (age 38, Wimbledon)
Littlesez ? DC1 (a girl) due: 15.02.09 (age 28, Manchester)
America - DC2, (a boy) due: 16.02.09 (age 32, London)
Rachrox - DC4, (a boy) due: 18.02.09 (age 28, Cheltenham)
Catstar - DC2, (a boy) due: 18.02.09 (age 36, Chessington)
Dinkystinky - DC2, (a boy) due: 19.02.09 (age 32, London)
Pluto DC2 (gender unknown), due 19.02.09 (Age 38, Kent)
DizzyBrummie - DC2, due: 20.02.09 (age 36, Berkshire)
Calico1 - DC2 due: 21.02.09 (age 40, West Herts)
mrsy - DC1, (a girl) due: 22.02.09 (age 24, Maidstone, Kent
Scubagroover - DC1 (a boy), due: 22.02.09 (age 31, London/ Kent)
Winemakesmummyclever - DC2 (a boy), due: 23.02.09. (age 35, Manchester) expecting cs @ 39 weeks.
Spottyshoes - DC2, due: 24.02.09 (age 28)
Lardybump - DC2, due: 24.02.09 (age 34)
Chilledmama - DC2 (a girl), due: 25.02.09 (age 32, Southsea)
Cocodrillo - DC3, due 26.02.09 (age 34 at the mo, London) expecting a CS at 38-39 weeks.
mumoverseas - DC4 (a boy), due: 28.02.09 (CS 2 to 3 weeks early) (age almost 41 Arabia/Crawley West Sussex)

I fell in love with DS the minute I saw him, despite a birth from hell - 2 days labour and emergency C-section.

I thought he was bloody amazing (and still do most of the time except when he screams "mum I hate you" at me!!!)

But not everyone is the same and if you don't feel like that from day one, it doesn't mean anything.

Just wanted to ask you ladies a dull medical question.

I'm having my platelets monitored as the levels are dropping - a side effect of pregnancy.

Apparently it's not life threatening, but if they drop really low, it can lead to haemmorage, which I guess would be an issue after a C-section.

They are lower than they should be, but not a disaster. Just made me feel a bit edgy.

Anyone else experienced this?

Gosh - if birth experience and bonding with the baby are connected then I'd have thrown DS out the window! I think everyone has very different experiences - there is no right or wrong.

I do remember wondering what I would do is I thought my baby was ugly and wondering if everyone would lie to me and tell me that he was gorgeous and then snigger behind my back! Happily I think there is a part of a new mums brain that makes you think your baby is the most lovely in the world (and everyone else has given birth to a Winston Churchill lookalike).

Sorry - no info on platelets....not heard about that but I guess if they are monitoring you they are all geared up for anything that might happen?

MsLucy- don't have any experience of that, is it something to do with your HB levels?

I have a question too- does anyone else have that horrible metallic taste again like the one you get at the beginning?

It's driving me mad. Not even eating 20 2 mince pies in one sitting is clearing it.

As for the falling in love thing, I have to say I did get it with dd, but I also got an overwhelming feeling of recognising her.

The best way I can describe it is seeing a very good friend you've not seen in ages.

I just remember looking at her tiny face when she was born and thinking 'I know you, and I love you already...'

ms - that is such a beautiful description it makes me want to cry (preg hormones) i so hope i feel like that. no metallic taste sorry but much sympathy as it was seriously grim

You lot are so chatty!!!!

Just beginning to get the baby l-o-w down in my pelvis occasionally - makes walking uncomfortable. Keep wanting to hoick him/her up off my bladder and into the middle of my abdomen. And so blardy emotional. It is like having no skin, being pregnant, I think - can't watch the news, can't cope with stressful situations. And having to get up in the night to pee is a bore. But there are other bits of pregnancy which really compensate for me. Feeling a person moving around inside me, and responding to music or familiar voices. I like that. The sense of really BEING in my body, which is so easy to forget when we are not pregnant - I have spent so much of my life treating my body as a vehicle which moves my mind, the true me, around. Pregnancy forces me to realise that that's a lie, and that my body is me too. And actually, I'm kind of excited about birthing another child.

I've had three curries in the last week But none of it gets rid of the metallic taste, no.

And bonding. I pretty much caught my first cihld myself, and we were skin to skin and breastfeeding within seconds. I don't think we actually did the newborn tummy crawl - I think I lifted them up to pretty much the right position. But I think doing that, if one is in a position to (depends on the type of caesarian birth if it's a caesarian of course; pain killers like pitocin or an epidural might also make it harder because at least some of the pain killers make the baby more dopey until it washes out of their system), gives one the best possible chance of the instant rush of love because that instant rush of love is mostly to do with oxytocin. I'm not knocking it at all for those of us lucky enough to have the instant rush of love with one or more children - it's a genuine emotion even if hormonally induced - but worth remembering that getting them by the breast skin to skin so they can find their way to the breast and get suckling is the likeliest way of getting that love hormone flowing.

MS - how lovely, That must have been an amazing feeling for you.

As for the exercise thing - not sure how I do it to be honest - Been doing the job for so long, im kinda just on auto pilot now.
Some classes are harder to get through - but the instructor is always allowed to stop & cheat correct people, so I can get away with some stuff

Not come across the platelets thing before MsLucy but if you post in the pregnancy thread one of the doulas on there may be able to help?

Markstretch, Onward - am glad that the rush of love thing happened for you guys
I get the metallic taste thing too - havent found anything to shift it (other than permanently eating of course )

So excited - we're off to Copenhagen for a long weekend on Friday with DS. Went there when I was pregnant with DS so is all v nostalgic. We're going to (weather permitting - looks v soggy according to the BBC when we're there) take him to Tivoli, a huge amusement park/christmas fair thing in the centre of Copenhagen - and spend our time there mooching around drinking hot chocolate or glogg and eating yummy danish rice pudding. Cant wait!

With Lily-Hope I had that big rush of hormonal love but with Tink it was completely different. Lily-Hope was a totally natural birth whereas Tink was a crash section. If the birth process is allowed to follow a natural path without too much interference the hormones will be built up at the end that cause that big rush, after a CS the hormones haven't built up in the same way and you don't get that release at the end.

KT, Day Three is great! I had it on day five (premature baby and a CS, took my hormones awhile to catch up) I was pumping at my bed sobbing my heart out and A MW assistant came in to see what was wrong. I looked up at her with a big grin and said "I've got milk" it was the first time I'd got anything out on the pump! Just think about the most hormonal you've ever been, crying over anything whether you're happy or sad and it's just a bit stronger than that! Of course, not everyone gets it and it doesn't last long when you do, it's usually just a really hormonal day.

nadssss, it might not happen before the baby is born, but it's not a sign that you will have problems when the baby is here.

We've just got back from the dentist. After spending a week showing everyone what she will do for him she clamped her mouth and shock her head with a cheeky grin to go with it! She did show him her rice pudding though so he got to see her lower teeth. I've not got off so well though. I have one wisdom tooth remaining, it's a lower one and very impacted which is why it's never been removed. Lately I can feel it trying to erupt and when I eat I'm putting pressure on it. He said it's infected so he's put me on antibiotics and is going to give it a clean next week. He can't do anything because it's all stuff that's not appropriate in pregnancy (X-ray and sedation). He said there's bone over the tooth so it's not going to be easy to remove I'm a little worried about losing the number 7 but I think if they have to get to the 8th they will have to

Oh god in a weird way I too loved day 3.

I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed and let all of those pent up frustrations out which I had kept inside for the last 9 months. All the worry, stress, nerves, terror, everything.

I wailed for England.

But in between wails I managed to mutter 'It's ok, I'm ok, I'll be ok tomorrow'. Even the midwives on the ward were looking sideways at me and tip toeing past my bed.

I say don't fight it, have a crying fest.

It's so nice to be able to be on somewhere like here and be completely honest about it and not be judged!
i remember a few weeks after ds was born a friend came to see us, she was holding him and said "Do you just love him so much?" And I replied "Oh, I hadn't really thought about it, I suppose" (sounded very convincing by the look on her face). I know she was judging me for being selfish and a bad mother, but she didn't have dc's so I didn't really care.

The other thing I'm worried about is that now I obviously love ds to the point where I look at him and feel like I could explode, and I know this is stupid, but I'm still thinking (sometimes) will I resent ds2 for taking me away slightly from ds1? Will I resent that I can't have the same time with this one as I've had with ds1? Do I have enough love in me for however many children we have? It's really quite frightening. My mum says your heart just gets a bit bigger, which I'm sure it does, but doesn't take away the fear iykwim.

There are two excuses you will have to get away with doing or saying anything you want, labour and Day Three Blues!

Got the metallic taste thing going on too. No idea what it is all about. I am treating the symptom with choc chip cookies .

Didn't have a mad rush of love with ds, just a kind of "oh yes, that's right, it's you" feeling. A bit like what MS said, but I just felt as though he had always been there from day 1. Hard to explain without appearing a bit of a fruitcake really .

Didn't get any of the baby blues symptoms you guys have mentioned. Kind of hoping I do get the chance to bawl my eyes out at some point this time round as it has been a thoroughly miserable pg experience so far. It sounds like a it must be a great stress reliever.

dinky - Copenhagen sounds wonderful. Hope you all enjoy every minute.

TBM - that's just typical of kids isn't it? Very sweet though. Hope the wisdom teeth aren't too painful.

Mslucy - I don't know much about it tbh, but at least it has been picked up on and is being monitored now. There are a couple of pg related conditions that can cause this. My best advice is to ask as many questions as you can until you get answers about what is the cause, any interventions or problems that may arise & possible avenues of treatment that may be required (e.g. immunoglobulin or platelets IV). Make a list of questions (it doesn't matter how daft or insignificant you feel the point may be) and take it with you to your next consultation, so you don't forget anything.

Oh onward - I want yet another curry now . Dh is on call, so no idea what time he'll be home and he is the curry king in our house....bah!

God I love MN. You're all describing so many of the physical feelings I'm having, which makes me feel so normal. But also all the emotional stuff too, so despite being a little bit of a wreck, again, you've all made me feel so normal. Thanks ladies!! In short, my hips ache, I also feel like this baby is wedged right onto my cervix and want to hoik him up all the time, my bum cheeks hurt, I've been feeling a bit lightheaded, etc etc. I'm also emotionally unstable, crying at the most ridiculous things (the celebrities getting their letters from home on I'm a Celebrity the other night? That programme is complete car crash tv, I don't care at all about any of the people on it, some of them are pure horribleness but me? Addicted. And crying when they all got their letters. Idiot.) I'm also going through a bit of a period of realisation - um, I'm having a baby. Yes, I'm really having a baby. I'm totally terrified, and yet so excited. No wonder I keep randomly crying, there's a lot going on in this body at the moment.

TBM - I sympathise, I also think I've got wisdom tooth trouble. I've had some awful toothache in the past couple of days in that area, but have been hoping it'll go away. Maybe I better get myself to the dentist. I hate the dentist, with a passion. I'm actually, and this is no joke, looking forward to childbirth more than the thought of going to the dentist.

With DS1 I had the absolute immediate love thing - he couldn't have been anything other than what he was and he was THE single most A-mazing thing. Ever.

With DS2 it took a while. I think I had been so worried about him disrupting my relationship with DS1 - I just kept looking at him wondering: "Who on earth is this chubby little stranger who has come to live in my house?"

Now they are both incredible and overwhelmingly lovable and loved. The past couple of weeks have really driven home just how precious they are. As if I needed a reminder!

Oh, and I love the thread title Dinky, gets my vote.

Oi you lot, Vertbaudet have got a sale on

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

oh my god, you lot can talk. Not been on here for a few days as DD has been very unwell, she just can't shift this awful cough and cold and we are up most of the night every night when it is worse!
just had to try to catch up on about 5 pages and can't possibly remember everything I wanted to say. I hope that everyone who was feeling ill feels better soon and TBM, so pleased to read the growth scan went well.
Ref names, there are some lovely ones. I really wanted Isobelle when I had my DD but my DH put his foot down as it would be shortened to Izzy and the compound he lived on in Saudi for 7 years was called the Izzies! I also liked Abigail but he said it would be shorted to Abby. I had no problem with this but he comes from a part of London called Abbey Wood and our surname is Woods! that would sound a bit daft, Abby Woods from Abbey Wood!
Dinky, had to chuckle at Daniel and Jack. I love both names in fact DD was going to be Jack but she turned out to be the wrong flavour. We joked about having twin boys called Jack and Danny, as where DH comes from in sarf London that is cockney slang for something! Needless to say, he put his foot down! I still think they are lovely names but maybe not for twins from sarf London!
Annoyingly, we had a girls name all ready this time, Kalila, which in arabic means 'darling, beloved'. We were so disappointed when we realised we coudln't use it! Still in negotiations ref our boys name although there is one favourite which I'm not allowed to say!
Hope everyone is ok and not too cold! (I miss Saudi!)

MOS: can't believe you're missing Saudi after all you had to say about it !

swampy, its not so much saudi, its the 20 - 25 degrees in the winter I'm missing. I don't think I've ever been so cold!

thanks for the advice wmmc.

will do exactly as you suggest.

As they say, if they were really worried about me, they'd drag me in there asap, rather than suggesting I see the doctor in a week's time.

will keep you all posted.

Evening everyone. I sorted through ds's old baby clothes earlier, can't believe he was ever that small!
Got everything in a big bin bag ready to wash after xmas, and some stuff in the machine to get started on hospital bag.

Hope it's all ok mslucy, they would have you in if they were very concerned. Try not to worry until you have too, know it's easier said than done

Hello everyone

Its so nice reading about all your experiences. I also worry I am going to love number 2 as much as I do DD (especially as I'm not enjoying my pg) or that he/she may disrupt my relationahip with DD.....but I've also been told that your love expands.

A friend from work bought in her 4 month old son today and I had a cuddle, and for a little moment, I did think, oh fuck, I'm going to have one of these soon .....can't wait though.

7 days left at work then I can wash all those little clothes and get the moses basket out etc

MSLucy...platelets help your blood clot, so a lack will affect clotting times. If it goes too low, they'll be able to give you a platelet transfusion though, so its good you're being monitored. Important though if you cut yourself / bleed for any reason. Make sure you carry your mat notes everywhere with you.