Harder This Time Around

I was just thinking last week how easy I've had it so far with this pregnancy.  No morning sickness, except for the occasional passing bout of nausea.  No fatigue once I got past the first trimester.  No huge weight gain.  No ridiculous cravings that no man could possibly appease.  And my back (herniated disc and all) has never felt better.  I was loving my cute little belly, and enjoying feeling those little baby flutters.  Basically, living it up.  On Saturday, I hit the 23 week mark.

And all hell broke loose. 

Scott and I ended up at ER around midnight on Sunday.  A few hours earlier, I had started feeling crampy but chalked it up to doing too much (Bailey was staying the night at her grandparents' house and I had  REALLY scrubbed things around the house).  I took a nap for about an hour, and was still feeling blah when I woke up.  Took it easy the rest of the night, and Scott and I went to bed around 10:15ish.  I couldn't get comfortable and the cramping was getting worse.  It was like this rubber band of pain that kept squeezing around my stomach and back, and nothing I did got rid of it.  I drank a ton of water, took a warm shower, walked around a bit, tried laying down...nothing.  The cramping wouldn't go away and kept getting worse.  I called the after-hours line at my OB's office and they sent us over to L&D.

They hook me up to the monitor and we can immediately hear the baby moving around and kicking like crazy.  His heartbeat was great and he didn't seem in any sort of distress, but the pain just would not go away.  We spent about 4 hours on the monitor before they sent us home with a diagnosis of round ligament pain.  I don't agree with this, but I'm no doctor.  I had round ligament pain with Bailey and I had it early on in this pregnancy, and the pain I had been feeling for the last 10 hours was NOT the same.  Not necessarily contractions, but definitely more pronounced than round ligament pain.  My discharge orders were to follow up with my OB this week, drink lots of water, and rest woth my feet up as often as possible.

Rest...with my feet up...as often as possible.

I run a home daycare, and work 55 hours a week.  Not to mention the hours I put in with Bailey after daycare has closed.  There is no such thing as resting with my feet up often.  Or at all.  There's always a diaper to change, always someone to feed, always someone who needs to be picked up or otherwise lifted for some reason, always something to be done.  Needless to say, I haven't been resting so much.  I can catch a 15 minute break here and there while the kids are napping, but that's about it. 

I hurt.

My back has been killing me since Saturday.  My pelvic bones feel like if they stretch any further I'll rip in half.  I can never find a comfortable position, whether it's standing up, sitting or laying down. I've had heartburn so bad that I've come close to vomiting more times than I can count.  Sometimes, when I switch positions or move a certain way, I feel a painful popping in my belly (the doc says this is all the ligaments and joints stretching).  A lot of the time when the baby kicks it's hard and it hurts.  Every time I stand up, I feel like my inside are about to fall right out.  I don't remember it being this bad when I was pregnant with Bailey.  Some days, it's almost unbearable.

And I still have 16 weeks to go.

There's no such thing as rest and relaxation when chasing around a toddler all day.  And I've got 5 of them in daycare right now...more to come next week.  And then when they all go home,I have my own toddler to contend with.  Bailey doesn't understand when I tell her that Mommy has to sit down and rest for a few minutes, and the disappointment I see on her face sometimes breaks my heart.   I love her to pieces but, my God, it's hard sometimes!

This afternoon, I logged on to my birth board on Babycenter and read 4 different stories from women who are just about as far along as I am and who have gone into early labor.  Only one of those babies survived, and it's not looking good for him.  When I read these women's stories, and thought about how heartwrenching it must have been to go through 24 and 25 weeks of pregnancy only to deliver a stillborn baby, I feel both relieved that my baby is doing alright and ridiculous that I'm complaining about being in pain when other women would give anything to be in my shoes.  When push comes to shove, I'd take any amount of pain as long as my baby is doing okay.  At the end of the day, how can I be anything but grateful that he's healthy and "going strong"?   I complain to Scott about it often, but the truth is that I'll gladly take the pain for the next 16weeks in exchange for a healthy baby in December.

Is it exhausting and close to excrutiating most days?  You bet.  Have I come close to tears more often that I'd care to admit in the last week?  Yes.  But, in spite of it all, if you asked me if I'd do it all over again my answer would be an immediate and resounding:

HELL YES.