30 Weeks...

It's Friday, which means that we are another week closer to Nublette's arrival. Wow! It's kind of funny, actually, because I remember visiting our friends that had a baby a month ago when SHE was 30 weeks pregnant. At the time, that seemed so far off, and I wasn't even showing yet!

The big baby stuff from this week was our natural childbirth class, which we went to on Tuesday night - ended up postponing the regular class until September, and had a perfectly lovely, rainy Saturday with friends instead :) The class actually made me feel a LOT better about a LOT of things - mostly the sorts of options you have during labor, like being able to eat (lightly), not have an IV, only 15 minutes of fetal monitoring every hour, etc. Those are all things that help labor along, while the opposite - ice chips only, IVs, constant monitoring, etc (all required if you have an epidural) - can really make it tougher, since IVs and monitoring generally mean you're confined to the bed (which can slow labor and make it more painful), and it just seems like a full-body physical activity like labor could use a little more caloric fuel than ice chips provide :) Brookwood also just got birthing balls and squat bars a few months ago (also great if you're wanting a natural birth), so that was great to know that they are available.

Brent and I actually had a lot of fun with the relaxation and breathing exercises, even though they felt kind of corny to be doing them when i wasn't in labor. The nurse who was teaching it would probably say we had a little too much fun, lol :) She gave us clothespins to put on our earlobes (which really didn't hurt) to give us some sort of painful distraction to use during the exercises, and mentioned that you could also use ice cubes to practice at home. Now, this was something I could get my mind around. When I was little, I lived in deadly fear of my yearly checkup and finger pricking (yes, I recognize the irony of a person who used to be afraid of getting her finger pricked opting for natural childbirth, but that's a whole other discussion), so sometimes I would "practice" by biting my finger periodically for weeks beforehand (which surely hurt more than the finger stick!) So practicing relaxed breathing while holding an ice cube is actually right up my alley. And while surely it is nothing like labor, I do think that the practice of staying calm when you're uncomfortable is probably very helpful.

I think the best part of the class was just knowing that Brent and I are in this together. Labor and delivery will be the same as anything else tough we've been through - as long as we don't quit and stay relaxed and let God handle it, I know everything will turn out fine, though I'm learning not to have an expectation for what "fine" means. I am also grateful that I am married to a man who is so funny and relaxed and knows how to make me laugh, as I'm confident that that will be a GREAT help when things get hard.

Guess that's it for the week!