Scary dream last night

I had a whopper of a dream last night...

I'd been feeling uncomfortable for days but because 'uncomfy' is pretty much a synonym with pregnancy - I didn't think much of it. I started to feel really 'off' though and wondered if something might be up. I felt a lot of pressure to go to the bathroom but no pain and from what I could tell - no contractions. I ask Tim to get me a mirror so I can check.

I'm CROWNING. I can see the babies head coming out. I reach down to catch him myself he's coming so fast! I catch him, just barely - he's so slippery! He's got hair and in the dream I can see his face (wow!) I"m frantically going through all the things I'll need to do, scared shitless of doing something wrong because we're not at the hospy. I calm myself down and tell myself that women have been birthing babies for centuries and that I can do this, just use common sense. I direct Tim to boil/disinfect something to cut the cord with. The baby is making noise but I wonder if I should check his airway and mouth, make sure it's clear, same with his cute little nose. When I look down to do this I see he's already latched on to my breast! I have to unlatch him to check and then try to get him latched again.... As I'm doing this it dawns on me that I still feel so full, like there is more baby in there. I look down and see ANOTHER HEAD. I'm yelling at Tim to come back and help catch the baby. He's just seconds too late, but it's okay because somehow I"ve gotten to a bed and the babie's head just lands on the bed. I do manage to grab a hold of the babies body and pull her up. (In the dream I know it's a baby girl). I'm still juggling Zach and now this new baby. (I think I even call him Zach in the dream?). I hand him to Tim and concentrate on this little girl. She's smaller than Zach, preemie sized. She was trying to latch on but then I see that her face is blue. I go from feeling confident that I can handle this to freaking out again that we're not at the hospital. I yell at Tim to call 911. Then I'm just screaming "Call 911".

I try to clear her airway. It's no use. I try massaging her little chest, frantically trying to remember my CPR classes. I realize at some point that I have not yet delivered the plancenta for either baby. They're still attached to me. I push/bear down to deliver the placentas - these too come easily with no pain. I turn back to the little girl. She's gone from looking like a normal baby (just small and blue) to her whole head being disformed. I realize she could never have survived there was something wrong from the get go. I wrap her in a blanket so I can't see her disformed face. I'm crying, weeping. Grieving for for this little girl child that I had so briefly and lost. Someone takes the bundle of her broken little body from me. My heart is still grieving and now I'm worried about something happening to Zach. I take him back from Tim. I can hear the ambulances arriving, but it's too late to save my little girl.

Then I get angry. How did this happen? I had so many ultrasounds - how could they have possibly missed this baby? If only I had known maybe I would have been able to save her? Then I start to wonder if I'd been hallucinating. Did I really have two babies? I look around. At some point the cords were cut. I see two placentas sitting on the floor side by side. They were the same in size, both were healthy looking (or what my mind has determined is healthy looking). I know then that I did have 2 babies, it wasn't a dream or a hallucination. I also see the bundle of her body too and remember that I couldn't possibly have saved her. The paramedics arrive, and I know somehow that Zach is okay. I feel some peace about the situation... I wake up.


*****
My own interpretation....

Obviously some subconsious fear on my end going on that I won't know when I'm going into labor... some reassurance as well though that I'll be okay, when the time comes I'll just know what to do and my instincts will carry me through.

I'm not sure how to view the 'twin'. Early on in this pregnancy I could have SWORN that I ovulated twice and had two implantations. I also had a scare of bleeding and had my first ultrasound shortly after that. Only one heartbeat and one 'Bean' was found at that point.

Whether I actually did have 'twins' or not, I think this dream is just my subconsious sorting out any unresolved feelings.

It's a bit freaky for me because I've had a few prophetic dreams in my past, but I didn't wake up from this one thinking "Whoa... this is going to happen". I"ve always woken up from my 'prophetic' dreams with the feeling or just KNOWING that it wasn't JUST a dream. I didn't have that overwhelming feeling with this dream so I think this was just my brain doing the normal dream 'sort out stuff' kind of thing.

33 week appointment - meh *shrug*

So I had my first NST. Nothing too awful there, I brought a book with me to read so I wouldn't be bored. Funny but the baby kicked and punched at the monitors, and moved away from the u/s probe measuring his heart beat almost immediately. Makes me wonder how loud it is when they strap those monitors on and do ultrasounds.... Anyhow Doc kept me waiting a bit - but again I had my book so no biggie.

I'm not in a 'rush around' mood today anyhow so I was content to sit in peace and quiet and read my book.

My blood pressure was back down a bit 120/80. No weight gain, lost a lb even but I personally think it was just lighter clothing today. (I go more by my scale anyhow since I can weigh nekkid and there isn't the variability of clothes weight etc).

FH measurement was 39 Weeks. Doc is of course still concerned about the babies size. I see this as no biggie as when I saw him last week it was 38 weeks and now a week later I'm measuring 39 weeks, 1 week's growth for 1 week's time period. Now last week at 32 weeks measuring 38 weeks - yah that was a bit of a jump. I went from measuring 2-3 weeks ahead (fundal height) to measuring 6 weeks ahead. Big jump there. But now I think the baby has slowed down some - and is gaining appropriately.

To be honest I can't help but wonder how much my lower belly 'fluff' adds to the measurement as well, and whether or not the doc is subconsiously measuring me larger just because I have the label 'diabetic'. I mean - my blood sugars went up into the 130's & a few 140's for about 2.5 weeks there, but now this past week they've been back down under target (for 2 post prandial). I'm pretty much (on average) keeping my sugars at or below what a person WITHOUT insulin issues would be at. Seriously though - I'm curious... if I walked into a different docs office, who had no idea of my past history and they just took a fundal height measurement - what would it be? It seems it's such a subjective measurment.

Anyhow - the end result is another ultrasound early in December, and continued weekly NST's.

p.s.
This chart shows the levels that the American Diabetes Association considers abnormal at each interval of the test:

Interval	Abnormal reading
Fasting	95 mg/dl or higher
One-hour	180 mg/dl or higher
Two-hour	155 mg/dl or higher
Three-hour	140 mg/dl or higher

So according to that my 'bad' readings wouldn't even fail me for the 3 hour GTT.

Count down is on

Hard to believe that in a few short weeks I should be holding my little baby boy in my arms.

I love him so much already!

Lots of emotions going through me in the last few days. Last week on the 10th I had another ultrasound to check the size and weight of the baby. He is growing fast. Measuring 2 weeks ahead and weighing 5 lbs 11 oz - in the 83rd percentile for weight.

But because my eating hasn't been absolutely 100% perfect (especially the week my parents were here for a visit - I blame myself. Logically I KNOW that my blood sugars have been great. they've been deteriorating in the last 3 weeks, but nothing atrocious. I know that what I term a 'bad' blood sugar measurement wouldn't even fail someone on the glucose tolerance test that they do to check for gestational diabetes. I keep TIGHT control. Yet - I can't help but question, and blame myself. I've always had a tendancy to do this. Logically I know that it's more likely that the baby is just naturally growing big, that he would even if I didn't have PCOS and insulin issues.... but emotionally it's not that straight forward. Emotions take over and I start doubting myself. Doubting what I believe to be true, going over every little thing that I've eaten and given myself the inquisition. I've raked myself over the coals. Hubby has sensed it. There was an inconsolable sadness in me and he could feel it. In a way I think every mother is like this. Intelligent, logical people, blaming themself for something going wrong with their child, despite the evidence that suggests that it just was, that it wasn't their fault.

I think too that once you get the label gestational diabetes you're an automatic 'suspect' to have a big baby. There's a bias there, an automatic assumption. I wonder sometimes if the doc doesn't subconsciously measure my belly bigger than it really is - because of a subconsious preconceived idea. According to him I'm measuring at 38 weeks, and yet strangers who don't know that I have GD - are surprised to find out that I'm as far along as I am.

I've gained a total of 10 lbs this pregnancy so far. I have about 6-8 weeks to go. This is far less than I expected to gain for sure. It was definitely not a planned thing. I thought keeping the gain to 20 lbs would be a rough goal to attain... yet here I am barely gaining any weight (despite eating copious amounts of healthy food).
I've just followed my body's cues. Eating when I'm hungry (and when my blood sugar was low enough - below 100 mg/dl) and not eating when I wasn't. I've still had the occasional indulgement, and the almost daily indulgement while my parents were here... but 95% of the time I'm on plan with my eating. Consiously trying to pick good carb choices, eat enough protein and veggies, and when on the road and only having the choice of fast food - limiting my portions of 'bad' carbs.

I've majorly cut back on my caffiene intake. Having *maybe* one cup of coffee a week now - and it's been that way for months. I've avoided aspartame almost completely. I've even limited splenda on the off chance that it too isn't healthy. Since so many things that we thought were healthy are now labeled 'bad'items.

I haven't been as active as I thought I would be... but lack of energy has played a big part of that.

Still - I was doubting myself. I went to the diabetes education nurse to get some advice and talk about adding in the short acting insulin. Something I'd been hoping to avoid. My average 2 hour post prandial #'s were creeping into the 140's ... higher than my goal of < 120 mg/dl and I wanted to deal with it (rather than stick my head in the sand and have my baby grow even larger than he needed to be).

I'm glad I went. She made me feel so much better about myself, about how I was doing with my #'s. I expressed my concern about the babies weight. She poured over my log book again, reviewing my blood sugars. Bless her soul - she tells me: "Well I can't see how it's your blood sugars causing the baby to grow big, maybe he's just meant to grow this big. Looking at your numbers I would never guess that your baby would grow too big, you're one of my model patients. I wish you could come in and talk to some of my other patients - you're doing so well!!"

I just about hugged her right there in the office. It was the affirmation that I needed. Just that little push to help me to see the logical side of things and not let my emotions derail me.

I'm still worried that the baby will be too big. If he gains 1/2 a lb from here until 38 weeks - I'm looking at a 8.5 to 9.5 lb baby. A little on the large side, but manageable for sure. My doctor is talking induction at week 38. I'm hoping to convince him to wait until the later part of week 38.

I'm torn between wanting this little guy to have as much time in there as he needs, and avoiding a c-section.

I want to avoid a c-section for a lot of reasons

1) The separation between mother and child at birth - those first few moments of bonding time are so important to me.
2) Anesthesia does get into the babies blood stream. Most people say it's 'minimal' but studies show that these babies have a harder time breastfeeding, are lazy latchers etc.

Breastfeeding is extremely important to me. I make no judgements on what other people choose for themself and their child, but for me I feel I need to do everything that I can to ensure that breastfeeding happens. This means no bottles in the nursery, no binkies or pacifiers until I get breastfeeding established. I don't want any chance of nipple confusion happening.

3) c-sec is a major surgery. Even though my blood sugars are under control - having gestational diabetes and pre-existing blood sugar issues makes even more nervous.


On the other hand - if we try to induce labor before my body is ready - it's likely to end in a c-sec anyhow. If the baby grows too big - automatic c-sec.

So it's a bit of a quandry - the answer to which may become clearer as the pregnancy progresses. And who knows - maybe my body will be ready by 38 weeks anyhow and I'll go into labor on my own??

I'm trying not to stress out about it. I'm just going to focus on each day, eat well, get as much movement in as I can, and enjoy every moment I have!

Here are some pics of the little man from his 4-d ultrasound session:




And here's me at 30 weeks:

Quick update

Well I've severely neglected this blog!

Things are going well for me. My blood sugars continue to do well, although I think in the next few weeks we'll be adding in a fast acting insulin injection to my regimen.

I've had 2 HbA1c's (to measure average blood sugar) during this pregnancy, they were both 5.1 - VERY good.

I almost feel bad ... I hear so many women complain about pregnancy, and to be honest? I think I've had it pretty easy. The nausea in the first trimester wasn't fun at all and I struggled a lot with that (since throwing up severely mucks up my blood sugars and it would have been so nice to give in and throw up and feel better!). But even that wasn't that bad. Either that or everyone else is a wimp! ;)

Second trimester was great, I felt frustrated that my belly wasn't popping. I wanted so DESPARATELY to look pregnant. After trying for a year, not knowing if we could get pregnant or not... I'd finally achieved my goal... and here I was not looking pregnant!

Somewhere around 27-28 weeks I started actually looking pregnant. Of course I wore maternity tops that emphasized this. *chuckle*
Now at 30 weeks, there really is no hiding it. I suppose some folks might still glance at me and wonder if I was just fat or if I was pregnant, but MOST people will clue in to it.

So far baby isn't measuring too big, but I have another ultrasound next week to check to make sure. M belly on the other hand IS measuring big from time to time. I don't think I'll ever put much stock into fundal height measurements after this pregnancy. With the last ultrasound baby was measuring only a week ahead but that particular week my belly was measuring FIVE weeks ahead. Big discrepancy there. Even the ultrasound estimates can be off.

I also scheduled a 4-D ultrasound on Monday :) It's a lot of $$ but I really WANT to do it. The pictures are so neat! PLUS my parents should still be here then so they can come along and be a part of it! Yay! :)

My parents arrive tonight - ACK! - so much to clean! BUT I know if I don't get it done they won't mind. They're here to see me, my expanding belly, and hubby and not to check up on my housekeeping skills (which these days are severely remiss).

Energywise - I'm getting more and more tired. Mostly because I'm not sleeping well. It's getting harder to get comfy and STAY asleep. Either my bladder or the babies kicks are keeping me awake.

My latest fascination involves staring at my belly and watching the baby roll, move, kick, wiggle... it's amazing to watch. My own little alien movie theatre ;) I think the best thing about it is that now everyone else can SEE the baby move. Tim has been able to feel the baby move for many weeks now, but now you can SEE it. It's visible proof that I'm pregnant and not just fat. Sounds silly to say that, but it's important to me. I should probably spend some time exploring why I'm so focused on making sure people know I'm PREGNANT and not fat.... but I'm sure it's tied up in body image and the 3 years I spent trying to lose the fat so I could get pregnant. ;) See I guess I HAVE thought about it! *laugh*

Anyhow - I have to get back to work, and then frantically clean up the house a bit!

p.s. I had to limit comments to registered users only because I was getting spam comments on older entries :/ Hopefully I can open it back up again in a bit.