Baby Blogging - Weeks 34 - 38!

The last Baby Blog I did was just over a month ago (see here), we had 7 weeks left to go and we had excitingly had a scan to see our little girl in 4D.

That time seems like a while ago now. Time is flying.

These last 4 week have been a whirlwind. You may have seen this post: Pregnancy in funny pics where I found a number of pics and memes that I felt really summed up getting to the end of pregnancy.

Or maybe you saw our Instagram getting filled with pictures of our maternity photo shoot?! If you didn't you can check out the highlights here.

And there was the week that contained two Baby Showers - one organised for our family and friends and the other by my colleagues. Full details are here.

What none of those posts talk about are the rest of the baby drama that has been going on. It didn't really 'fit' into any of the posts and to be honest it has been something we have been exclusively talking to our family and close friends about.

The headline is 'Baby girl is breech and we are booked in for a C-Section on the 5th of July 2018.'

To get to that headline has been a journey though.

After our weekend away in Norwich and the maternity photo shoot I had a midwife appointment. Just a routine check up, blood pressure, pee test and then a quick measurement of baby. It was here that things took a slight twist though. (If you read the previous post you will know baby girl had turned breech but as we were only at 32 weeks they said she had plenty of time to turn.) We were know at 34 weeks and the 'time for her to turn' was now. When the midwife couldn't decide if she was still breech I was booked in for another hospital check up. (Turns out heads and bums can easily be confused in the womb).

Between the midwife appointment and check up we Googled ways to 'spin' baby girl and while there was no definitive answer we tried a few resting positions to see if we could encourage her. No luck. The hospital appointment confirmed she was still breech.

The other twist was that there was now a pocket of growing water around baby girl that they wanted to monitor. They think the volume of water could be the reason she has stayed breech and  in weeks 34-38 I have had 3 separate scans to measure the water and baby girls growth. Both are tracking fine. Thankfully.

Add into the regular hospital visits a crazy time at work and you have my last month. My maternity cover started, my new starter started and I needed to make a final trip to our head office in Bournemouth as well as numerous trips to London to do training and handovers.

The biggest day we had was on the 13th of June, at the hospital appointment we had our consultation about our 'new birth plan'. We had discussed it privately and agreed that if baby girl was staying breech then we would go for a C-Section.We were completely aligned on it until we were face to face with the consultant and running through our options.

• Option 1: breech vaginal birth - as baby girl is head and feet up she could be born bum first
• Option 2: ECV - where the doctors try to turn baby girl by giving me drugs to loosen the area and then physically push her around
• Option 3: C-Section

When the consultant was running through the options she very clearly wanted us to try option 2 and it threw us. We asked for some time and ran through the pro's and con's (which they helpfully lay out in a document). Option 1 sounded too painful and if there were complications it would end in a C-Section anyway. Option 2 just sounded painful and in the 'cons' it lists 'baby distress' and only 40% success rate. We decided if we weren't going to have the birth we planned (calm, water birth in the birthing suite) then C-Section it was. We accept the recovery time, the fact that it is an operation and the medication but ultimately we want baby girl born in the least traumatic way for her and I have the best support network around that means I can focus on recovery. If a C-Section gets her out in less than 8 mins and takes away the complication of the excess fluid, my two placenta's and her potentially getting stuck then it's the right decision.

That said it took us almost an hour sat in the consultant room and once the decision had been made she went to check availability. She said due to the fact that we were only 3 weeks away from official due date it may be that we have to join a waiting list and we'd get called in if there was a cancellation. Thankfully there was one free spot.....on the 5th. We turn up at 7.30am and wait for our turn. That's the new birth plan.

We can't thank the consultant/doctor for taking the time with us, while she clearly had a preference, once we had made a decision she was 100% with us. She was calm, reassuring and didn't rush us even though it was 7pm. We left reassured that we had made the right decision for us.

Now the decision is made it has also meant Laura can swing into planning action, having an exact date to work to has focused us on our last to-do bits. Including finishing the nursery, which we can now say is done :) We have made plans with my parents and sister around visiting times. I have booked annual leave Monday - Wednesday so I can officially start maternity leave on the 5th and maximise the paid leave with baby girl. In some ways we have taken a sigh of relief - neither of us are great with the 'unknown'.

We have also been speaking to other couples who are in our situation and those who had the ECV failed to get the baby to turn, in one case the baby was clearly in distress and the Mum almost passed out. I know everyone's experience will be different but for us it was confirmation we made the right decision.

We also managed to fit in an evening class that covered baby first aid and bottle feeding. We felt that the NHS class had taken a focus that 'breast is best' and while we really hope we can breast feed we felt unprepared if that wasn't the case. I mean how you sterilise a bottle, measure out formula and make sure baby is getting fed enough were all things we were clueless about. The class was brilliant though. While the first aid bit terrified us we left with far more knowledge about what to do in an emergency and it covered points we would never had considered.

I am also relieved to be on my final countdown at work and so glad that my last few days are working from home as the UK experiences the current heatwave. With temperatures around the high 20's the thought of commuting is enough to make me hot. The radio is talking about the train tracks buckling and the tubes being a nightmare, my team are telling me that even with air con the office is still too warm and there is no air outside. I am so glad I am not in as part of it. It's also giving me the opportunity to clear through my inbox so I really ready to close my laptop knowing nothing is outstanding.

Having ventured out to my last Birthfit class last night at 7.30pm and seeing 29 degrees Celsius on the car thermometer also confirmed just how hot it was. I only went as the discussion was on C-Section recovery but after an hours work out sitting down to 'discuss' was in reality me concerned about how big the sweat circle was going to be around me after sitting down for 20 minutes. (I am mainly kidding - it was a very useful discussion and I'll be sure to post the advice shortly.)

I have had my last lunches with my favourite clients, had my last meetings with my team and set up my last handover calls, it feels strange. When I wrote my first 'Baby Blogging' post it was December, I was 13 weeks pregnant and today has seemed a million miles away. I feel kinda sad at just how quick the time has gone (I mean remember this video of the first 3 months?!). It is balanced by excitement to finally meet our family's newest addition but I know it will be the end of life as we know it. The comfort through pregnancy has always been collapsing on our couch at the end of a busy day and being able to just talk. To reassure each other and just relax. In 10 days our focus will forever shift from just being us and that is scary. We want the change but it's hard knowing there is no going back. Our nights away from baby girl will no doubt end up with us forever talking about her, worrying about her. I'm not sure where 'we' will fit in with all the chaos but we'll be sure to keep you updated.

Whatever happens we have our 4 year wedding anniversary on the 28th of June and a last chance to celebrate just us. I can't believe it's been 4 years! If you weren't following us back then here are the wedding highlights: Blog Post and Highlight Video.

So this post could be it....we will share pics of the nursery at some point soon and keep you updated when we get the chance.

Also *side note* the end of my pregnancy has come with A LOT of tears - I mean in the last 2 days alone I have cried no less than 10 times. At the generosity of my parents, at the hard time our friends have just gone through with their dog, at Laura leaving to go out, at Bisbee for being so cute and hoping that she knows even with the changes we will love her completely, at paying £4.50 to park at the hospital, at the fact that I wasted 20 minutes in the wrong waiting room at the hospital, writing this blog. Here's hoping it stops soon!