36 weeks – A week of celebrations

Hi Everyone!

What a lovely week it’s been. I turned the grand old age of 32 this week so there was a lot of lovely celebrations, which you’ll read all about in this weeks update below. It has been lovely to be a bit spoilt and indulge in lots of yummy treats!

But the most important bit of this week to me has been my 36 week scan. For any of you who follow my blog (and a huge thank you if you do) you’ll know I’ve been counting down to this scan to finally find out if I need to have a caesarean section due to a low-lying placenta. We were told about this at the 20 week scan and had another scan at 32 weeks, when they informed us it hadn’t moved enough still. So today was the big “final decision” scan! And we were lucky. It has indeed moved enough for the consultant to say I can go ahead with a normal delivery and there will be no need for an elective caesarean section! I am so pleased. I did get told that I’ll need an IV and a cannula during labour to keep my fluids up, but I would have needed this anyway as I want an epidural. I have to admit the idea of the cannula scares me more than the epidural itself; it’s pathetic but the thought makes me feel really squeamish. However, I can imagine by the time I am in labour and in a fair amount of pain I won’t care!

Seeing baby again was as amazing as ever. It may have been our fifth scan, but I don’t tire of it at all! To begin with it was a standard external scan and baby was wriggling about and we could even see it clenching and unclenching its fist. But for the sonographer to get a more accurate measurement of the placenta placement I was again subjected to the rather more intrusive internal scan. I’ve quickly come to realise that with pregnancy and labour, it’s best to just leave your dignity at the door and pick it back up on the way out!  Although one bonus of such a scan is that the sonographer could see hair on the babies head with the camera and showed it to us on the screen. It was amazing to see so much detail!

So I am really happy to at least now know and I can prepare for labour a bit more!  And with only 4 weeks until my due date I feel like I could explode with excitement. Everyone keeps saying this part will drag but, despite the tiredness and sickness, I am really enjoying it.  So here is this weeks update:

How Far Along: 36 weeks! Meaning that by the end of this week, my baby will be full term and if it wants, it can show up at any time!! Wowzers! I am so ready to meet this little one now. I feel so bonded to him/her already; I chat away to it all the time and give my bump a nice massage every night. I am hoping that the next few weeks continue as nicely, and as speedily as they have so far.

Weight Gain: I haven’t actually weighed myself this week!  I don’t think I need to; given the vast amount of cake I’ve eaten I’ll definitely have put on a bit more. I do feel like now I need to be a bit more careful with how much I gain, but I do make a lot of effort with my main meals, making sure they are healthy and balanced, so I don’t feel too bad for the occasional sweet treat! And with a birthday cake like this can you blame me (the hippo on top is supposedly a “cute little pygmy hippo” which is an affectionate nickname my husband keeps referring to me as. He is only messing though so please don’t think bad of him. I was impressed he could bake such a yummy cake):

Stretch Marks: I am praying that as I’ve been so lucky I won’t get these now. I’ve now taken to having two baths a day cause it soothes my back and helps me get to sleep at night so bump is getting slathered in oils and lovely body lotions after each of these which helps!

Sleep: Up and down! I seem to have two terrible nights, then one good night. I had awful nights over the weekend, and was back to the frustration of just crying cause all you want to do is go to sleep but I couldn’t cause of my stupid restless legs. But then the night before my birthday I slept really well; I don’t know if it’s just cause we had such a busy weekend it all caught up with me, but I was so grateful to have slept well. I am surprised that I’ve not started having any crazy dreams yet as I’ve heard this is very common towards the end of pregnancy; I do wonder if it’s because I haven’t known till now how I will deliver so perhaps now they’ll kick in.

Best Moment This Week: This will be a long section!! Cause it’s been birthday week there’s been so many lovely moments.  But I have to start by saying the best moment has been the results of todays scan and getting to see the baby again. Sorry to keep repeating myself; I’m just so super happy 🙂

The weekend was absolutely lovely! We had our friends come to visit and they are also expecting a baby and are 10 weeks behind of us. They absolutely spoilt me rotten with flowers, fake fizz and cake:

As if that wasn’t enough, we spent our Sunday going for the most lovely afternoon tea at a quirky little tea shop. The food was amazing; I thought my husband wouldn’t enjoy it at all because he is not a fan of hot drinks and therefore doesn’t like coffee shops (if he had his way he’d put them in Room 101) but even he enjoyed it!  The food was absolutely delicious and a spot of shopping afterwards was an added bonus

One of the most lovely things about having our friends come to visit was spending time with one of my lovely bump buddies! It’s always nice to be able to ask each other questions, share our fears or embarrassing experiences (we won’t divulge on those though) and help each other out. I felt really privileged that our friends asked for our advice on things; as I said in my blog last week, there is such a difference between people’s opinions and their advice, so if a friend comes to me for advice I take it as such a compliment and am always happy to help as much as I can.

My actual birthday was a very relaxed day. I was woken up with tea and toast in bed and a lovely pile of gifts from my husband and friends. He spoilt me rotten with the highlight being a booking for a full body pregnancy massage. I am so excited; I’ve got it booked for next week so I will write about it in next weeks blog and, more than likely, recommend all pregnant women everywhere get one done!!! Amongst many other lovely presents, a couple of the highlights were these gorgeous mummy/baby gifts which are so cute, along with the best smelling candle in the world. And I even got a present from my precious bump!

So a huge thank you to my gorgeous husband and friends for such thoughtful gifts:

I had an amazing facial and Indian head massage at my friends salon which my family treated me to. It was so relaxing at one point I was falling asleep on the beauticians arm!  Then in the evening the hubby and I went out for dinner which we hadn’t initially planned, but as time is getting on now with the baby’s appearance getting ever nearer, we thought what better excuse to go on a date night. We went to one of Jamie Olivers Italian restaurants and it was amazing; such good value and delicious food. As it was my birthday and I am a gold card member, I was given a bottle of prosecco which we took home to save for our New Years Eve celebrations

Miss Anything: Not missing anything in particular. I am noticing I am struggling with really basic things though; trying to put on a pair of boots is probably one of the funniest sights my husband has to endure. And driving is becoming a real struggle; even on a short journey my back is in agony so I am going to try putting a cushion in the car to see if that helps me through the last few weeks.

Movements: Still feeling lots of movements. Yesterday little one had its back along my right hand side but overnight it has totally flipped over and now it’s back is on my left hand side. Head is down and is becoming engaged which is encouraging. I am still getting a lot of feet and fists poking out which is a funny sight and very reassuring for me. When I couldn’t sleep the other night and baby started kicking it made me smile so much because even though I was fed up and shattered, it was like baby was saying “don’t be upset Mummy, it’s all worth it”. And it is.

Food Cravings: My friend told me this week she was making a shepherds pie for dinner one night. As soon as she said it, that was all I could think about. I’d never cooked it before but I gave it a go and I must say it was really nice! Then my husband mentioned he had a fry up whilst he’d been away for a night on a business trip; since then all I’ve wanted is a fry up!! So we are going to treat ourselves to another date at the weekend and go out for breakfast. Any excuse to go out on a date 🙂

Sickness: And so it continues. Still being sick every few days. I’ve not been too bad this week although I did feel quite ill on my birthday and also at the hospital today. Eating little and often definitely helps. I am looking forward to baby dropping because I am hoping I will be able to eat a bit more then without being so full up so quickly!

Mood: It’s been a funny old week. Although it’s been a lovely week full of celebrations, I have had some emotional moments. I won’t go into it, but sometimes things do get to you a bit more than they normally would and you feel more sensitive. I’m sure the lack of sleep hasn’t helped much. But as of right now my mood is of great relief and happiness, knowing I can now prepare for my babies birth a bit more and just the sheer high of getting to see him/her today. I also felt really loved getting lots of lovely birthday messages and messages of luck today before my scan. I truly have some amazing friends and family.

Looking Forward To: The weekend!  My lovely girlfriends are taking me out for afternoon tea (my new favourite thing) as a belated birthday treat. I am so looking forward to just catching up and putting the world to rights over vast amounts of cake! I can’t wait to see them all.  I’m also ridiculously excited about my pregnancy massage on Monday – it will be absolute bliss. I am seeing a friend afterwards for lunch and I can imagine I will be in a super relaxed daze when I see her.

I’m also looking forward to a catch up with my friends from my NCT class next week. It will be the first time all of us have got together away from the meetings so it’ll be lovely to hear how everyone is doing. I should imagine we can all sympathise with each others impatience as the weeks go by.

There is so much to look forward to with this little baby coming!  I am getting so excited, and I love this time of year it makes everything even more magical. I also have some very exciting plans in the pipeline.  It’s something I’ve always wanted to do and after much discussion with my husband and friends I feel even more enthusiastic about the prospect. I am going to leave it as a surprise for now as it isn’t something that will happen overnight but it’s very exciting and positive and I am looking forward to setting the wheels in motion.

I hope you all have a good week. Keep your eyes open for more posts; I haven’t forgotten my “Daddy to Be” interview, it’s just been a hectic week this week.  All that cake eating takes up so much time!

Thanks for reading – I love to read your comments on my blogs.

Xxx