39 Week Practice Run

Well the past 36 hours have been a run for our money.

I had my second to last appointment yesterday. I started having a few contractions before my appointment started. I found out that I had dilated a little bit more. I was at 3.5 cm. It was a pretty good appointment. My doctor said that I probably would not make it to my next appointment but I am still scheduled anyways. We did not talk about any other alternative plans for inducing.

So after my appointment I went to work. It was hard to concentrate. The contractions were becoming more frequent. I stayed at work until about 3pm. I just couldn't handle it anymore and I was able to concentrate to get anything done at work.

I went to my parents house, because my mom had just gotten back from being in the hospital in Sacramento for the second time. I also wanted to pass the time.

I went home and watched TV for a little while. Then Phil and I went to dinner, and came home. I had started timing my contractions at 6pm. I had been having them all day but they became more frequent and consistent at 6pm and I decided it would be a good idea to start timing. I decided to lay down in our bed. The contractions were about 5 minutes apart. They were consistently 5 minutes apart until 2am. Around 10pm I started having back labor pain. It was so uncomfortable. There wasn't any comfortable position. I tried sitting, laying down, bending forward, squatting, sitting up, sitting back, laying on pillows. Nothing helped. There wasn't any comfortable position. It still was just uncomfortable and not excruciatingly painful. At 2am the contractions starting coming every 3 minutes. At 2:30am they were coming every 2 minutes. Phil helped me with some breathing techniques and around 4am I was able to sort of get the back pain under some sort of control. I was able to lay down (which I hadn't been able to do for about 4 hours). And I was able to get some sleep. I slept from 4am to 6:30am.

I woke up, and had a few contractions, nothing like I had during the night and early morning, and they were further apart. I still decided to call my doctor to see if it was time to go to the hospital. I got a call back about 20 minutes after I called. The nurse told me that I should go to the hospital since I was already dilated 3.5cm when I went in for my appointment and since I had 10 hours of contractions the nurse told me that I would be at least 4cm and I would be admitted. So around 10am we checked into the hospital. I was admitted to triage. They hooked me up to some monitors. I was checked and unfortunately I wasn't dilated anymore but I was thinned out at about 80 percent which is good. So after getting hooked up, and getting monitored the nurse sent me on my way to start walking. My contractions were there but they weren't consistent so she sent me walking (and drinking lots and lots of ice water) to get my contractions more regular and to hopefully do something to change my cervix. So after an hour of walking I got back in the bed and the nurse checked me again. No change!!! So she sent me home.

It was so disappointing....Phil and I went home and took a nap since we only got about 2 hours of sleep the night before. So we slept all after noon. I finally took a shower this evening. I felt much better. No contractions....so I was kind of sad because the nurse said that I'd probably go into real labor tonight or tomorrow. But so far...I don't have any consistent contractions so I'm guessing that it won't be tonight.