Twin Pregnancy: 36 Weeks!

I said I'd try to do better with blogging about things other than pregnancy, but it didn't happen last week. However, I don't want to miss out on these weekly posts as I know someday I'll be glad I wrote them, so here is my 36 week post. 36 weeks! I'm so happy to have made it here!

The belly is huge and heavy and cumbersome. Check it out (I truly think it looks smaller in pictures!):

This is another big milestone week as the babies could come at any time now and most likely be take home babies as opposed to NICU babies. That is so exciting and relieving to me! I really can't believe that we have yet to have one hospital visit or complication, but we are SO thankful for that! While in my head I have set my sights on making it to 38 weeks (just two weeks away . . . eeeeep!), we would be thrilled to meet our babies at any time now. 

I have finally started to retain water this week. Yesterday - for the first time - I couldn't get my rings on when I was getting ready for church. It makes me sad, but I decided to just leave them off from now until the swelling goes down after delivery. I think it's wonderful that I've made it this far with no swelling carrying twins, so I'm certainly not complaining! I have also noticed that my ankles have been pretty swollen by the end of day for the past 4 or 5 days. I'm still drinking tons of water, so I think I'm just at that stage in pregnancy that this is going to happen. I also gained 4 pounds this week according to my scale. And yes, I know how crazy that sounds! I really think that most of that is due to retaining water (how could it not be?!?) as I haven't started eating like a crazy woman or anything. That puts my total weight gain at 27 pounds now, but I'm taking comfort in the fact that the water weight will go away quickly once I give birth. 

Before I start this next section, I want to say that carrying twins has been an amazing experience. It's so different from carrying one baby, and I am thrilled to have been able to do this. I have tried really hard to not complain and to truly enjoy each moment for the blessing it is. After going through infertility and baby loss, I know what an incredible blessing this is. However, with that said, I am going to be real for a minute. This is not all sunshine and roses. I am at a place in this pregnancy where I am miserable pretty much all of the time. Thankful, yes, but miserable. My muscles and bones ache. I am sore everywhere. It's almost impossible to roll over in bed or go from sitting to standing. It hurts to do just about everything. I am nauseous and fatigued and huge and not sleeping due to discomfort. There is constant pain in my ribs, and just breathing is a difficult task at times. I have started to have sciatic nerve pain on my left side, and there is so much pressure down low sometimes that I feel like I'm on fire down there. However, I can do this! It may be two more weeks or just a few days, but I can do it!

For weeks now (maybe even months), people have asked me, "Are you ready?" to which I'd reply, "Oh, not yet." But yesterday at church, my answer was "Yes!" I've definitely turned a corner! 

We saw Dr. N this past Tuesday at 35 weeks and 1 day along. My blood pressure was 122 over 80 at this appointment. Chris and I left our kiddos with a friend and went to the appointment by ourselves. I'm glad we did because we ended up waiting in the waiting room for about an hour, then in the exam room for another 20 minutes. While we were in the waiting room, the babies were both being super active and my belly was bumping and thumping all around. Another patient even noticed and said something to me about it! So, she and I started talking, and she is just one week behind me with her first baby. Of course, her belly looked tiny compared to mine, and she even said, "The next time I feel like complaining about being uncomfortable, I'm going to think of you!" Ha!

As always, Dr. N did an ultrasound first and both babies looked great. Baby B is still breech, so I asked him how that might work if I was to deliver vaginally (which is what I want). He said that hospital policy is to try and turn the baby after Baby A is delivered, but he may just pull Baby B out by its feet. Ummmm, yikes?!? I would love for Baby B to turn, but either way I want to try for a vaginal delivery if Baby A stays head down. I also found out that I'll have to deliver in the OR in case we have to do an emergency c-section (also hospital policy), so that will be different. I need to ask if I will still be able to have two support people in there with me or if it will be just Chris. I would really love to have my mom in there as well (she's been with me during both previous deliveries). 

After the ultrasound, Dr. N swabbed me for the Group B test, and I'll find out the results of that tomorrow. Then, since I was already bottoms off, he checked my cervix. No surprise, he found that I have nothing going on toward labor yet. Which was fine with me, but hopefully we can get something going in the next week or so. 

Right before he walked out, I asked again about switching from my Lovenox injections to Heparin injections. He had said at 32 weeks that we'd switch at 34 weeks since going into labor on Lovenox is not ideal. Then, at 34 weeks, he said that we'd wait until 35 weeks since things were going so well. Well, guess what? At this appointment (35 weeks), he said that he wanted to wait another week to switch! I told him he was making me nervous (mostly because I can't have an epidural if I'm on Lovenox when I go into labor), but he was very confidant that I wasn't going to be going into labor on my own this week. And, so far, it looks like he was right! I see him again tomorrow.

The babies are active every day (praise God for that!), and I'm almost constantly feeling knees, elbows, bottoms, and heads roll across my belly and kick and punch and distort my belly in all sorts of weird ways. I'm also having about 10 Braxton Hicks contractions each day. They do take my breath away sometimes, but they aren't what I'd call painful. This day, my belly was as square as could be!

And I'm not sure what was going on this day? Baby A tends to be more active and loves to push that bottom out!

This past weekend, we put our carseats in our van to see how everything was going to fit. It's a bit tight with four carseats, but it's going to work! Then, we got out the double stroller frame my friend gave us and practiced putting the carseats in that (we hadn't done it before). I even strapped a couple of Brianna's Cabbage Patch Kids in the carseats which the kids thought was hilarious. Brianna wanted to push the stroller so badly, and pushed and pushed it until we made her stop. As it turns out, she not a great driver (and yes, I'm a horrible driver too so she comes by it honest) and won't be pushing the babies! But, it sure was cute to watch her push that beast of a stroller and pretend her new siblings were in it!

I'm anxious to see what Dr. N has to say at tomorrow's appointment!