Practice

You know what they say - "practice makes perfect"!  Last night we took a practice run to the hospital!  Yesterday evening around 7:30, I was having a sharp pain in my upper right side.  It seemed too high to be my appendix, and it wasn't super painful - just uncomfortable and consistently coming every few seconds.  It continued as I went to bed.  I was a little worried and tried my friend Dr. Google to see what it could be. 

I fell right to sleep, but when I awoke at 1, it was still there and my stomach seemed really tight.  So I woke up Uncas and we called the midwife on-call.  After asking me some questions, she said that I could come in to be monitored and to check things out.  Of course I felt really stupid and said as much, but she explained that if something serious happened and I didn't come in, I would feel terrible and she would feel terrible too!

So - off we went getting ready to leave at 1:30 in the morning.  I do have a bag packed and we added a few things.  I had to get Sammy's bag ready in case we ended up staying there and of course he was just plain confused!  I knew that I wasn't having any contractions, but I was just worried that the sharp pain might mean something else was wrong.

In a way it was nice to make this little trip because neither Uncas or I are very familiar with hospitals (I went once when I was 5 for a couple of stitches in my chin).  The nurses and midwife were super nice.  They hooked me up to the monitors and baby was doing just fine (Thank Goodness!) and I wasn't having any contractions.  The midwife thinks I have a bruised rib from the baby kicking me.  It wouldn't surprise me as my child is quite active.  But last night everyone kept commenting on how active the baby was, so I think it might be more active than normal.  We are definitely convinced that we have a budding soccer player inside of me!

All told we were probably there for about an hour.  I am glad it was nothing more serious and still feel a little silly for going in.  But ultimately, I would have just been up all night worrying about nothing, so it's probably not such a bad thing.  The midwife even said that it was good to come in to be sure because nothing is more important than the health of the baby. 

And now we know where to go and what we have to do when the baby really does come.  Instinctively I knew that this really wasn't it - we didn't even bring our bag into the hospital, but it makes me less intimidated when the time actually comes.

I think that we still have at least a week if not longer before the baby makes his/her appearance.  I hope that more snow melts here before the baby comes.  I don't know why, but I have always pictured bringing the baby home with little to no snow on the ground!  But much like not being able to control when a baby decides to come, I can't control the weather either!