How long now?
How long now?
- about 5 weeks 4 days
How long 'til you finish work?
- about 4 days (and I can't wait)
How is the PET?
- BP fine; proteinuria, gone; oedema, shocking (painful tenosynovitis the worst)
Are you excited?
- well, actually, a combination of terrified, anxious, apprehensive, sad and excited. And bloody nervous, too.
I'm terrified that something will still go wrong, or the baby will have some sort of funny syndrome, or have cerebral palsy or some other thing we can't screen for antenatally.
I'm anxious that mum is coming to help out, but she occasionally drives me crazy, and that this may be a really bad idea. Also my dad and sister are coming to visit the week after the due date, and will want entertainment. I'll be too shickered and may tell them to go f*&k themselves.
I'm apprehensive about all that labour entails. You have to remember that my experience of labour for the last three years has all been of women who are requesting epidurals because of the unbearable pain, or because they are exhausted. I'm worried that I will not cope.
I'm sad because my llife will change forever, and, quite honestly, I quite like my life. I especially like being able to pick up and go somewhere at a moment's notice. I like being able to travel with only what I can carry. I like not having responsibilities other than to myself(including professionally) and my husband. I like being able to get up early and go for a swim when I want.
I'm also sad because I have spent so long worrying about and denying this pregnancy that I haven't let myself enjoy the pregnancy. When I first fell pregnant, I was so overjoyed with the idea of being a vessel to creation, so alive to the new life within me; I felt so blessed and ripe. That lasted a whole week and a half until I miscarried. I have spent at least 30 weeks of this pregnancy deliberately concentrating on other things (the exam, selling the house, moving house, the holiday) so if this one didn't go as planned, again, I would protect myself from the hurt of loss. Now that I want to enjoy the pregnancy, I'm not sure how that is done- where do I have to go mentally to allow myself to do it? The closest I get is when I am swimming in the mornings, possibly because this is also the time I feel the most well physically (no tenosynovitis, sciatica, respiratory embarrassment or heartburn), and my belly swells out in front. I imagine I am a great sleek seal, a great sleek pregnant seal. It's lovely. But the minute I am on dry land again, I feel lethargic and enormous and sore.
I am excited about meeting the baby, but I would be lying if I didn't say that because of all that shit I don't really feel bonded to it at all.
I think this is what worries me the most- before we started trying to get pregnant, I imagined pregnancy would be a wonderful, intimate time of bonding with the new life that is so very much a part of you. It hasn't been, because of my major denial. I want very badly to start feeling this bonding, but I only have 5 weeks and 4 days left. I am sincerely worried that I won't be able to love this child as much as it surely deserves, simply because of my own selfish denial in order to protect myself from the potential of loss.
So despite having now been blessed with actually being pregnant, and making it to a major milestone (34 weeks), I am so scared that I will not be the mother thst this child deserves. Does that make sense? I had a dream last night that I had had the baby (I had a GA LSCS in the dream) and then when they brought around the baby (which was already smiling and walking) that I didn't feel like it was mine at all; the baby seemed like a present someone gives you that obviously was very expensive and difficult to source, but completely not your taste, but you still feel obligated to put it on the mantelpiece and ooh and aah at it all the time. It was disturbing.
What a mess I am.
- about 5 weeks 4 days
How long 'til you finish work?
- about 4 days (and I can't wait)
How is the PET?
- BP fine; proteinuria, gone; oedema, shocking (painful tenosynovitis the worst)
Are you excited?
- well, actually, a combination of terrified, anxious, apprehensive, sad and excited. And bloody nervous, too.
I'm terrified that something will still go wrong, or the baby will have some sort of funny syndrome, or have cerebral palsy or some other thing we can't screen for antenatally.
I'm anxious that mum is coming to help out, but she occasionally drives me crazy, and that this may be a really bad idea. Also my dad and sister are coming to visit the week after the due date, and will want entertainment. I'll be too shickered and may tell them to go f*&k themselves.
I'm apprehensive about all that labour entails. You have to remember that my experience of labour for the last three years has all been of women who are requesting epidurals because of the unbearable pain, or because they are exhausted. I'm worried that I will not cope.
I'm sad because my llife will change forever, and, quite honestly, I quite like my life. I especially like being able to pick up and go somewhere at a moment's notice. I like being able to travel with only what I can carry. I like not having responsibilities other than to myself(including professionally) and my husband. I like being able to get up early and go for a swim when I want.
I'm also sad because I have spent so long worrying about and denying this pregnancy that I haven't let myself enjoy the pregnancy. When I first fell pregnant, I was so overjoyed with the idea of being a vessel to creation, so alive to the new life within me; I felt so blessed and ripe. That lasted a whole week and a half until I miscarried. I have spent at least 30 weeks of this pregnancy deliberately concentrating on other things (the exam, selling the house, moving house, the holiday) so if this one didn't go as planned, again, I would protect myself from the hurt of loss. Now that I want to enjoy the pregnancy, I'm not sure how that is done- where do I have to go mentally to allow myself to do it? The closest I get is when I am swimming in the mornings, possibly because this is also the time I feel the most well physically (no tenosynovitis, sciatica, respiratory embarrassment or heartburn), and my belly swells out in front. I imagine I am a great sleek seal, a great sleek pregnant seal. It's lovely. But the minute I am on dry land again, I feel lethargic and enormous and sore.
I am excited about meeting the baby, but I would be lying if I didn't say that because of all that shit I don't really feel bonded to it at all.
I think this is what worries me the most- before we started trying to get pregnant, I imagined pregnancy would be a wonderful, intimate time of bonding with the new life that is so very much a part of you. It hasn't been, because of my major denial. I want very badly to start feeling this bonding, but I only have 5 weeks and 4 days left. I am sincerely worried that I won't be able to love this child as much as it surely deserves, simply because of my own selfish denial in order to protect myself from the potential of loss.
So despite having now been blessed with actually being pregnant, and making it to a major milestone (34 weeks), I am so scared that I will not be the mother thst this child deserves. Does that make sense? I had a dream last night that I had had the baby (I had a GA LSCS in the dream) and then when they brought around the baby (which was already smiling and walking) that I didn't feel like it was mine at all; the baby seemed like a present someone gives you that obviously was very expensive and difficult to source, but completely not your taste, but you still feel obligated to put it on the mantelpiece and ooh and aah at it all the time. It was disturbing.
What a mess I am.
posted by jen at 6:48 PM
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