Anyone due May 2004 .. new thread

[twiglett]

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A Hairdressing Party!! that sounds like a hoot, presume this is your profession rather than a sort of anne summers experimental thing bozza? or do you mean party as in lots of 'em to do? I'm imagining squidgy pink and purple curlers and Girls Worlds at the moment.

Ante natal class was quite good but v. basic, good for dh to catch up on vast backlog of info a little bit ('what's an episiotomy' he hissed in my ear at one point, cue withering look from me). I weep soppily at all things relating to birthing babies at the moment so the birth video nearly finished me off. Luckily there was a knitted pink uterus on hand to perk me up. Mumsnet certainly doesn't offer THOSE...

Hospital looks v. promising tho' - midwife led unit, hope I can stay on their list.

Georgina, I was asked at my booking in Appointment if I wanted to go to the parentcraft classes but said no, seeing as I went to them before.

Phoned midwife team today to ask about going on a labour ward tour. She asked if I wanted to do the refresher course since this was my second but I said no just the labour ward tour and she told me just to phone the ward one day and if they're quiet I'll be able to go up and someone will show me round. Can't decide if that's a good idea or not. Would rather tag onto a proper evening class than go in specially, don't want to be taking the midwife away from her job on the ward if you see what I mean.
I'll have a think about it, I do want to go to it because they show you the post natal ward as well and I want to ask if they still supply the sleepsuits and towels etc. Don't think Dh really cares if we go or not.

Have read somewhere, and also my friend who is a physio advised that you should massage your perineum with wheatgerm oil to help it stretch more easily during birth. oooooouuuwwwch. am a first time mum, any advice? is it really that bad? dont want to tear and where do i get wheatgerm oil from?

sorry, just butted in there!

Gawd knows. My yoga teacher mentioned that from 34 weeks you should start perineum massage to help prevent tearing but haven't had any more details yet - I start the birth preparation class in two weeks time, so I'll let you know when I get there

I used Vitamin E oil whcih I got from the body shop

aha thanks girls. shall go find vit E oil. maybe a health food shop will have wheatgerm oil

Ouch ouch ouch.

Delicate topic I know, but my mini maternity briefs from mothercare are cutting in all the wrong places! Please tell me I haven't reached granny knicker time already

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Noooooooooooooooooooooo!

You mean you aren't in them already? I've been wearing granny pants for weeks - nay months. And now after my possible DVT scare on Friday (which turned out to be varicose veins) I now have support stockings as well!

Georgina - how did the appointment go?

Georgina if you massage your mini maternity briefs with sweet almond oil they might just stretch wide enough to let you in...NO SURRENDER to the granny pant!!

How was Hairdressing Party Bozza?

I succumbed to buying granny pants over the internet... hope they arrive soon because I think my legs will drop off from lack of circulation soon!!

The monitoring appointments are going okay. LFTs are normal. Had the ultrasound today and there's nothing obviously nasty with my liver - no gallstones - and blood flow to baby is looking good. Thoroughly pissed off with the antenatal clinic part of it though.

Got very upset today and stressed today. Was in the hospital for about 3.5 hours with dh and ds. As you can imagine, ds was playing up badly by the end of the three hours (he'd been an angel up to then) and then the carpark box swallowed all our money. So I'm probably blowing everything out of proportion.

Anyway, the ANC - I hung around for bloody ages to see three separate people. One to tell me I should have brought a urine sample (which no-one told me I needed to), two others to basically say okay you're fine we'll see you in two weeks. Not one of them did anything more than my own community midwife could do. So pissed off - one of the things I was really looking forward to this time around was seeing one midwife all the way through and building up a relationship, and now I'm just another blob of meat on the conveyorbelt again. Came home and sobbed for ages.

Really want to tell them to fuck off, I'm not ill just bloody pregnant. But then could I live with myself if anything then went wrong at the birth?

Bile acids slightly lower at 21 now - more blood tests on Wednesday, at least with the nice monitoring midwives and not the ANC lot. Think I'll either sink into depression or commit midwificide before this baby is out....

Sorry, stopped feeling self-absorbed and reread. Sorry to hear about your DVT scare, prufrock - that must have been terrifying. Glad it's "only" varicous veins (although they're pretty horrid too).

Spots - hmm.... massaging pants. I'm still only getting my head around massaging my perinieum let alone my underwear as well!!!

Hairdressing party went OK. It wasn't half as exciting as imagined - just a few of us get together complete with kids (currently 3 Mums and 5 kids ranging from 3.2 to 7 weeks) and we get our hair coloured and cut and all the kids (except the baby) get theirs cut by a home hairdresser who is a friend of ours. Take it in turns to host and provide lunch. Was exhausted afterwards and house looked like a bombshell had hit it. But DS had a nap and I had a lie-down and then was reasonably easy to tidy up.

On the pants front I am just wearing ordinary multi-pack cotton briefs. Not maternity at all. Have had to buy large maternity tights though. Couldn't keep small/medium up and they were digging into my thighs. I am 5'4 and a size 8/10 pre-pregnancy.

Georgina does that mean they reckon you do not have a liver problem?

I just don't know. Wish I did.

poor you that must be demoralising in itself... How shitty that you were after a less hospital - based experience this time around. But maybe, maybe , maybe their brush-off attitude is a signal that things are from their point of view going not too badly? No consolation, I know... it's horrible to be on a conveyor belt. And horrible not to know about your own state of health.

I've certainly got the impression that they're "happy" with me so far. They've very much got a "wait and see" approach which is good in some ways, but frustrating in others as it would be nice to know where I stand so I can get used to the idea/make plans.

After talking it through on the other thread and this one I think a big improvement would be to switch back from the hospital antenatal clinic to my local community midwife and I think I'm going to make that my priority over the next few days and see if I get anywhere. At least then the stress levels will become a little more bearable.

Hello, Hello, how is everyone doing?

Well, 31 weeks today, got my check up with my GP. She said bp fine still nice and low, bump is fine measuring 29cms/inches whatever it is they measure it in, so I'm behind on measurements like I was last time. Platelets are still low although higher than last lot of results, if that makes any sense whatsoever Up to 109 this week. Oh and GP said baby was head down, well it certainly wasn't last night with all the kicking it was doing in my side but must have moved before I went to the dr's today.
Other than that not a lot to report. I'm seeing the midwife at 34 weeks for a check up and have to go back to GP for check up at 38 weeks. If it's your second baby do you still get the check ups every two weeks then every week or do they not do that? And does anyone know when you can start taking the Rsapberry tea leaf tea or tablets? Is it 32 weeks?

Oh and we went away for the day last Friday to a pram centre near us and ordered the travel system. Still have a huge list of things that I need to buy though.

Yesterday and today I am enjoying a whole new spectrum of baby movements like SURFING INSIDE. Really makes me laugh because it makes such a character of whoever's in there, after a long time of quite delicate/insubstantial movement. I had that Thing that everyone tells me about when in the shower: a very pointy knee suddenly made my belly into a cone shape! I prodded it with a cry of 'What's That??' and the knee was snatched away back into the depths. I decked myself laughing. So much more aware of his/her little body that I went out and bought baby clothes by the dozen.
I DO like the sound of the hairdressing party Bozza. Saving it up on my file of nice things to do in the future, esp. when me and group of mates all have our babies out in the world.

Hairdressing just sort of evolved spots because my friend had a baby in Jan, I had a baby in Feb, the place we got our hair done closed down in March and the best stylist went mobile. So logically we said we'd get her to do it and look after each other's babies. Then another friend with toddler joined us. Then they've both had babies and now its my turn.

Sounds like you're really excited about everything. I have this need to get things down out of the loft but need to tidy out the babies (DS's old) room first. Will try and get onto this tonight because there's a charity bag to go out tomorrow.

Linnet are you on shared care? Only seen my GP once to register pregnancy. But have seen midwife at 12 weeks (booking-in), 21 weeks, 25 weeks and 28 weeks with next appt at 32 weeks. She did say at booking-in that if you had no complications they tend not to see you as frequently.

It is share care that I have same as last time. I went to see the midwife at 24 weeks but since I had also been to see my Gp that week the midwife said I was to choose one of them to see since there was no point seeing both of them. So I chose my GP as I know her and she's really nice, midwife is grumpy.
Midwife did say to go back to her at 34 weeks for a check up and blood tests and to go over the birth plan, which I must type up so it doesn't sound so rude and instructing, been jotting things down as I think of them need to make them sound more normal and polite. so I'm doing that and going back to see the Gp at 38 weeks.
Just wondered if I should be seeing someone at 36 weeks and then every week for the last 4 weeks, or maybe they don't do that with second babies. I'll ask the midwife when I see her.
I don't mind going to my Gp, last time I saw my Gp all the say through except for clinic appointments, and I don't have a clinic appointment this time until I'm 41 weeks, hopefully won't get to 41 weeks this time though . And Last time the community midwife didn't cover my labour or delivery at all so I'm expecting that this time will be the same and I'll be cared for by total strangers.

Hello, how are you all? is the gappy messaging because everyone has other children to look after? How are they all adjusting to the idea of siblings? hope they are being nice and making you excited about having TWICE AS MANY CHILDREN.
I am doing well but noticing that I need to stop work... current job will take me to end of March then i can sit down and make babe nice and HUGE for arrival. Can't wait for opportunity to sit down more. will relish it, I promise.
Got an enormous cramp in calf the other night that made sweat stand out on my brow. And thought, 'i wonder how that compares to labour pain?' Not sure if I want to know the answer to that one. xxx

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