McKamey Clan: Oh Baby!

When you go into the doctors office with each subsequent pregnancy, they tell you that pregnancy is going to get harder and harder each time. They tell you that you will be more uncomfortable, feel more symptoms, have a harder time carrying the baby, etc. I never really found that with my first 3 pregnancies. They all seemed to feel the same more or less. Well, I guess #4 is when it hits ya!

This pregnancy with our sweet baby girl was by far the most draining. This could very likely be due to the fact that I was also busy changing around 3 older McKamey kids. But I certainly felt it a lot more this time. Just more sore, tired, achy. More symptoms than I have previously experienced.

And then we got the 3rd trimester. I knew that starting around 34 weeks I would begin going in for non-stress tests (nst) to monitor the babies fluid levels since I was induced for low fluid with Conner. Well, the first couple of them went good. Fluid was in the lower part of the normal range, but still normal so not a concern. Then after a week or two of nst's I was sent up to triage because the baby was having some heart decelerations that looked concerning. It was just days before Kellen's birthday and I was not quite 37 weeks. I didn't want to have the baby before Kellen's party and ruin his special day (we all know how Kellen feels about celebrations). Plus, I knew that having the baby this early would most likely mean a short stay in the NICU...not something we were wanting. After hours of monitoring and a pitocin induced stress test, Baby was given a passing score and we were sent home. Though happy to be home there lingered a feeling of worry and concern as to what it was that had caused these decelerations in the first place.

Sure enough, a week or so later we earned another trip up to triage for monitoring, once again due to concerns with her heart rate. This time the monitoring didn't last quite as long. And we were allowed to go home but were told to come back the next day for another NST, just to keep a Really close eye on baby.

At this point I had had it. I was stressing constantly about whether or not she was okay. Why was she having these decelerations? What happens if she is having them when I am not on the monitor? She was also measuring small according to measurements done during ultrasounds...right around the 30%. I am usually known for having big babies, so to be having a baby measure small to me seemed to be alarming and a cause for concern. I felt like every second of the day all I was doing was waiting for the next moment I felt the baby kick so I knew she was still okay. I love pregnancy, but this time around it was just plain stressful in the end. So I decided that it was time to take matters into my own hands. The doc said that they would not be able to induce before 39 weeks unless there was a serious medical reason to do so earlier. I was just about at 38 weeks, but didn't know if I could take a whole other week of stress and worry. So I decided that I was going to do my best to Make my fluid go down some so that they would take things seriously and get this baby out. I spent the whole weekend on my feet as much as I could! (They tell you to rest to make more fluid, so I did just the opposite). And we made sure to have maternity pics taken, just in case this actually worked and we had a baby.

So here we are, 37 1/2 weeks. Looking at this belly you certainly wouldn't guess it was a "little" baby in there :)