40+ mums to be

[littleredmonkey]

Hi
I am 43 and expecting my first and these next several months are going to be a challenge so hoping to meet others in the same situation.
I can believe I have a baby growing in my dusty cobweb ridden womb. It has taken me 3 weeks to get my head around the whole thing and it is still worried about the future and being able to cope. My partner is fab and great helping me with the ups and downs of baby hormones. Nothing beats hot sweats, night panics and freeze in the middle of tescos wondering our we doing the right thing. I feel better this week and got my head around things .
Any ladies who also need support or just to have a good moan every now and again. xx
Ps thinking about having a toilet built next to my bed to save time going to the loo quite a bit in the evenings!!

I remember reading the Rough Guide to Pregnancy and the character having a panic and asking the dr something along the lines 'apart from a vaginal birth or c-section, is there any other way to get the baby out?'
I knew exactly how she felt

Oooh cross posts Bananna!!
Woohoo!! Huge congrats! Welcome to the worlb, Baby B!

Banana - Congratulations! :) :) Sounds like it went as well as it could! Do let us know when you decide on a name. Fabulous news! :)

Baby banana !!!!! Yeh congrats to you bananas - Welcome to the world. Huge congrats to you and your family . Look forward to hearing how the name game goes. xxxxxxx

Welcome babybananna and well done Mummy! 4hrs, wow!

Anyone worried about the birth... it will be so worth anything that happens when you hold YOUR baby in your arms, and it just gets better and better - smiles,hugs, kisses, being called mummy, "wuv oo" etc then of course they become shitty teenagers and it all goes wrong bla bla bla

Midgetm - I understand your worry - rats are horrid. But I'm quite sure you will be ok. I've recently had: undercooked beef, undercooked pork , runny egg yolks and I continue to drink one strong coffee every day. I'm not being cavalier - and I'm not advocating any of these practices but I think on balance risk is just that - risk - not certainty and it's quite hard to avoid some things without locking ourselves in a bubble! I think a little bit of something we're supposed to avoid is unlikely to be super-harmful (and I think with no direct rat contact and good hand hygiene, you'll be fine) in larger amounts more regularly though...was horrified a while back on the October 2012 thread when we were talking about good diets and one of the girls (this one's for you too exexe) was going on about how she was eating masses of liver 'cos it had all the good things in it for her and her baby . I did worry for her but she was so convinced it was the right thing to do I felt speaking up was futile.

Agree totally with bytheseaside - I think when you get to our age, especially if it's your first or if you were expecting fertility issues, or knew you had some kind of issues, it is very hard to believe that everything just might go smoothly. I'm still kind of disbelieving that everything is still ok at 17+4 despite having had no bleeding or anything. I think until my 20wk scan and daily internal karate chops I'll still find it hard to accept there's a healthy growing thing in there, despite my ever growing unnecessarily large for my stage bump .

LRM - I think it's super common to fear labour, especially when you've not done it before. I was terrified of the idea and trying not to think about it when I first got pregnant. Agree with exexe though - I do try and alleviate all my pregnancy neuroticisms by reminding myself that nearly all women in the world go through this. Oddly, I watched one episode of 'One born every minute' (haven't watched one since, don't want to jinx it) and felt better about it. There were women there coping. Doing ok - despite long labours. Even a young girl not being able to have an epidural and feeling sick on gas and air. For some reason, it made it seem more real and less scary for me. I'm sure that won't work for everyone - we're all different but there are a lot of women out there without 'scare' stories who had ok labours and perhaps it would help to try and speak to some of them? (we always seem to get told the 'horrific' ones and almost never the tales of the 'not as bad as I thought' ones :)).

Yay Bananna! Huge congratulations on the safe arrival of your baby boy, and a lovely sounding birth, you lucky thing!!

LRM it's natural to worry about the birth. I'm sure your MW will be sympathetic if you talk to her now and help you through it one way or another. You seem quite fit which I am sure will help. I've got a hypnobirthing CD which is incredibly calming. You might find it good to do something similar. I had a lovely deep sleep this avo brought on by it in minutes!!

Congrats banana! Perfect birth by sounds of it

Banana1, may I join all other ladies and congratulate on the arrival of your baby boy ? very happy for you and your family. Keep us posted on the name.

Birth... labour... I am still very fearful even if I have gone through it once. I guess my memory has just deleted the experience from my brain. :)
My Mum had 10 live and healthy children and in her time there was no gas nor epidural, and one of my brothers was 4.5kg while my Mum is a small person (1m50 and barely 40kg when he had him)... so it must be do-able, I keep telling myself. Of course there are always somewhere in the world ladies who have horrible birth stories, I try not to listen to them. I am sure we will all cope somehow when our turn comes :)

have a wonderful day everyone

Oh welcome baby banana and well done top banana for such a smooth delivery. This can be our benchmark.

LRM you would be insane if you didn't worry a bit about birth, it is an unknown. You will find your way through it. In the end I realised how DD came out didn't matter, as long as she came out ok. I have low standards and expectations!

Well I am feeling awful. Hurled up by breakfast before I had even finished it and can hardly move. Anyone else had sickness strike 2nd trimester? Not thrown up at all till now. Feels wrong and I feel awful. God knows how people cope who are sick all the way through. My first day off work sine finding out I was pregnant, hope this picks up soon.

Crazy voice in head of course says its weils disease but I least I know I'm crazy now!

Hope you are all doing much better x

Wonderful news about babyboybanana!!! Congratulations and warm wishes.

woo for BabyBanana! that's just lovely news! awwww. Hope he gets a name soon!

welcome to the world, baby banana! and congratulations to banana! xx

Midgetm - how are you feeling this evening ? hope you have managed to have something to eat and a peaceful sleep this evening and wake up feeling better.

Evenings eating biscuits in bed watching tv - 4
Times at the gym -0
Priceless xxx

Thanks LRM. I have stopped vomiting but may go to EPU tomorrow as had a bit of spotting. Hope it's all just a UTI but don't want to leave this over the bank holiday and worry myself silly. I've managed to keep down fluids and also just risked a packet of hula hoops - hope they stay in! Enjoy bed and biscuits x

Hope you are ok midget?

Mmmmm. Massive acid reflux attack just woke me. Ugh. Where's the Gaviscon?

Morning FF looks like vomiting was a bug as DD hurled her poor little guts up at 2am. This reassured me that pitting was maybe the strain if puking. However, ita more like bleeding now and I am totally freaking out. Can't decide if I should go a&e or EPU. Feeling very demented and lost my positivity. Anyone experienced 2nd trimester bleeding and it been on?

So many typos a sign of my state of mind.

Pitting = spotting
On = ok

Too many typos to mention

Midget, don't stress too much, if you can leave DD go to A&E to see if they can check you before your EPU appointment ? otherwise you will be thinking and stressing on your own. Let us know how things go. Lots of positiveness towards you now from me.
FF, woke up at the same time as you, DS had wet his bed, first time for the past 3 weeks...
LRM it seems that you are having a good time with TV and biscuits... :)
My tummy is already as hard as a concrete ball, seeing MW later today, hopefully she will not tell me off, my sister who is a nurse told me to stop rushing around as she fears that the cervix could go slimmer to early.

What a wet day in London already !

midget don't panic. Many reasons for spotting and baby more resilient now. do phone MW or go to EPU/A&E though ASAP. Vomming while preggers horrible whatever cause. Keep us posted. Positive vibes.

Oh, hpbp do take your sisters advice and slow down. Not worth it. Lucky you having a wet bed to deal with.

I fell back into deep sleep. Just awake now. Find need to sleep so much frustrating, but don't seem able to fight it. Have scan this avo. Is 'just' standard oldie scan, but still a bit apprehensive.

Midget get yourself seen to. For what its worth my sil had heavy, heavy bleeding throughout her whole pregnancy. We always feared the worst. My nephew is now a gorgeous 5 yr old!

Its so easy to worry. I've been convinced a number of times that something is going wrong.

Midget - hope you've managed to be seen by now and have had some reassurance - If not, you probably know this, but just in case: I think epus are usually 9-5 mon-fri and not bank holidays, sometimes you need a gp or a&e to do an epu referral - mw can't do it in my area, or some areas I think you can just self refer. Fingers crossed for you - bleeding is just so common, usually harmless, but horribly scary.

Banana - hurray!

hpbp - put those feet up asap - no more dashing about

fireflies i've just started to be able to sleep for England now i'm in 2nd tri - first time I've had proper deep sleep for months I think - rather than all the naps (although I'm still up several times a night for a wee) Good luck with scan

Thinking of you Midget x

Thanks for your messages and support old ladies - it is much appreciated.

Well eventually I was seen by a marvelous specialist. She has no idea why the sudden bleeding but thinks it was an old bleed. Maybe dislodged by the vomiting but not sure about that bit. My cervix is still long and closed (phew - I was dreading her saying it wasn't). She scanned me HB 160 BPM, very leggy little alien bean kicking away. She found it amusing as mainly used to early scans and said - blimey it looks like an actual child in there. Placenta is looking fine (I was worried about that). So happy that all looks good but always distrustful of the 'we just don't know' line in view of my history but relief is what I am feeling for now. I was convinced it was all tits up last night but the hope came back in again The Midgets midget lives to see another day. Still can't eat much but at least keeping fluid down and should get results from urine test back from GP early next week if I have a UTI. So tired and hungry I could weep but back in my own bed again and resting. May have to cancel my trip to the cup final and just take it easy this weekend instead. I think I need a big nap and a hug so off to get both. x

midgetm that's great news! Hope you manage to take it properly easy and have help with your poorly dd