Monday, February 2, 2015

Twin Pregnancy: 38 Weeks!

We made it, we made it! Yay!!!!!!! Not only did we make it to our goal of 38 weeks, but we also made it to February (a far less important goal, but it still makes me happy). I am truly surprised to still be pregnant, although I'm not sure why? I have had to be induced with each of my pregnancies, and you may remember that with Brenson I was almost a week "overdue". Still, I personally know about a dozen people with young twins (all under the age of 6), and every one of them without exception delivered at or before 37 weeks (most of them in the 35 to 36 week range). Yet here I am - at 38 weeks - waiting to be induced. I'm certainly not complaining about this as I know it's a HUGE blessing that we haven't had any issues with pre-term labor! 

Here is the twinbies baby belly at 38 weeks: 

And here is a front shot:

You can see above how the belly has started to grow wide instead of out. We're just out of room! I also think that the babies have dropped some. What do you think? 

I did not gain any weight this week . . . dropped about a half of a pound actually. This puts my weight gain total at 28 pounds for this pregnancy. This is so funny to me, as it's the least I've gained in any of my full-term pregnancies! That's certainly not what I expected since I'm carrying twins. With Brianna, I gained 42 pounds (but weighed 4 pounds less to begin with), and with Brenson I gained 30 pounds (but weighed 10 pounds more to begin with). So, I currently weigh about 10 pounds less than when I delivered Brianna and 12 pounds less than when I delivered Brenson. 

The swelling in my fingers and feet has not really been an issue this week. I could probably put my rings back on if I wanted to, but I'm just going to leave them off. I've really been careful to drink, drink, drink water so I think that has helped. 

My appetite is good right now, but until the last few days I haven't been able to eat much at a time. That's another reason I think the babies have dropped . . . I can actually eat a normal portion of food without being miserable! I will say though, I haven't been able to make it all night without getting a snack for about two weeks. Last week, I would wake up at about 5:00am (because my hips hurt so bad . . . there is a ton of pressure on my hips and it makes sleeping difficult), and my stomach would be growling so bad that I would be a bit nauseous. I would get up and eat some cheese and crackers or nuts or something to settle my stomach so I could go back to sleep. I wasn't always able to go back to sleep though, because sometimes the food would wake the babies and they would bump and thump for close to an hour. This past week, I would wake up even earlier - like between 3:30 and 4:00am - and have to get a snack. The nice thing about this was that if I ended up being awake for an hour or so, I could still squeeze in a little rest before the kids got up for the day. 

The babies have continued to be very active. As you can imagine, my stomach is incredibly tight these days, so sometimes when they stick out a foot or an elbow I feel like my skin may split right open! They both like to stick their little bottoms up and totally distort my belly!

Example A:

Example B (ha!):

I decided to wanted to see a progression of how my belly has grown over the last 6ish months, so I put together this collage of my belly pics. It's kind of amazing how sometimes you can see growth from week to week!

As you know from my 37 week doctor's appointment update, I'm scheduled to be induced on Tuesday, February 3rd. People keep asking me if I'm ready and the answer is YES! Physically, I'm spent and need some relief from the aches and pains of pregnancy. We are also just SO ready to meet our babies! My Mom came on Saturday to stay a few weeks with us, and the kiddos are excited to have her here. I am, too! The plan all along has been to call my sister (who lives about 20 minutes from us) to keep the older Bs if I go into labor on my own. Well, she and her daughter are both sick - and have been for a few days - so I was relieved when my Mom got here and I didn't have to worry about childcare anymore. Several of my besties are also sick right now, so we may not have too many hospital visitors. I'm okay with this, but it does make me super sad that my sister and several of my friends won't be able to share in such a special experience with us :-(. Such is life sometimes, I know, but I just hate it. 

This past week, I battled a cold and some severe congestion for several days. I also had an ear infection in my left ear. The head congestion made it almost impossible to sleep because it was so much worse when I was laying down, so I did take benedryl for several nights in a row. I seriously never take that type of medication (Chris had to go buy some because we didn't even have any in the house), so I hated to take it now. However, I needed sleep, so I did it. It certainly helped, and I'm feeling much, much better now. My worst day was probably this past Thursday, mainly because I would get mucus in my throat which would cause me to gag and gag and gag until I threw up. I was pretty miserable! I asked Chris to take Friday off work and watch the kiddos so I could rest. He ended up taking them to a local Children's Discovery Zone, and they had a blast! I think it was just what the kids needed. Unfortunately, on Saturday, Brenson started coughing and feeling really bad. His cough was much worse on Sunday morning (and he had a slight fever), so Chris took him to our Pediatric Urgent Care. We are not normally ones to take our kids in for just a cough and slight fever, but we really needed to know what we were up against and rule out things like RSV and the flu. 

Our poor boy waiting on the doctor: 
He doesn't have the flu or RSV, but the Urgent Care doctor recommended that he not go to the hospital to see the babies when they are born :-(. This makes me extremely sad, but I also don't want to risk the health of our newborn babies. However, since I'm planning to deliver on Tuesday, I'll still be in the hospital on Wednesday so maybe he'll be well enough to come by then. We'll just have to see. I'm glad it's nothing serious, but the timing is awfully bad. 

I'm am just so excited to meet our babies and introduce them to everyone! I'll try to update fairly quickly on here or on Instagram after they are born. I can't believe that this part of our journey is coming to an end, but I am overjoyed for our new journey to begin!!!


4 comments:

Charlotte said...

Praying for a swift and safe delivery of your twinbies : ) I can't wait to hear their birth story and see their sweet little faces!

Carey said...

You are seriously SO CUTE. Cannot wait to hear the story! Praying for you girl.

Cheryl said...

I'm so excited for you! I pray everything goes well tomorrow for you and the babies. It's going to such an exciting day for your family! I can't wait to see the babies here on the blog!

Cassidy Adams said...

What a blessing! You look great! I remember that pressure and hardly being able to walk with ONE. I can't imagine TWO! #respect :) Prayers for a safe delivery