You can call me doctor!

But you really shouldn't.

I turned in all my paperwork and paid all my fees yesterday. It is done! And the bindery is printing it for me right now. It suddenly felt like it was Friday, which is a feeling I haven't had in a very long time.

I have officially won the race with baby, who is still doing his gestation thing. It is crazy to think that They were warning he could have shown up 6 weeks ago and he is now post-dates. Baby knows best and I'm sure we'll meet face-to-face fairly soon. Perhaps on Labor Day. Ha, ha.

It has gotten to the fun part of pregnancy where everything is a potential labor sign. Or not. Pre-labor or tummy bug? Burst of energy related to labor or excited about depositing the dissertation? Nesting instinct or standard cleaning de-stressing response? Back pain from baby shifting or sleeping in a bad position? I'll be right sooner or later.

I am ready, but I don't seem to be too anxious, yet. All the medical staff I interact with seem to assume that I'm Extra Ready and seem to spend a lot of time talking me down instead of figuring out that I'm not anxious. I figure baby knows best (or the placenta, or my uterus, or whatever it actually is that makes the decision) and I'd rather let it decide than have me decide.

The last person I was in to see was very strange (If you count nurses and ultrasound technicians, I have now seen at least 19 different health care people about baby in the last 3 months)(Geez, how did I get that dissertation done? I'm amazing). She was covering for another doctor who was on vacation, so I was literally going to see her once. She totally sat down and chatted to me for 5 minutes about Stuff (PhD, etc). And she tried to talk me out of feeling like I should induce even though I made no mention of it. I guess I expect the chat from someone I'm going to see a lot, but just for one visit? Don't we all have better things to do?

A memorable week?

This week is shaping up to be pretty exciting. As of this morning, I printed out my dissertation document on fancy paper, got my advisor to sign all the paperwork, and put everything in a box on my desk. Woo! Now I just need to have the graduate school accept it all and I will be done. That is scheduled for Thursday morning. Less than 48 hours!

Thursday is also my due date. Turing was a week late, so I'm not holding my breath about necessarily having #2 this week, but I'm kinda feeling the vibe like it might happen. I either feel like I'm gearing up for labor or ate something bad . . .

I am officially ready to have the baby as of yesterday. Previously at my non-stress tests, I was very good about knowing that he wasn't quite passing the test (too sleepy/lazy to get his heart rate up often enough or moving around so much that it was hard to track his heart rate) and I put a ton of effort into making it all work - holding the heart monitor the entire time or asking for juice (with ice) early. For Monday's test, baby wasn't very awake - he kept just missing the change in heart rate that he is supposed to get. And I really didn't care. I drank the juice and he perked right up and passed, but my attitude was "well, if they induce me, that's OK too."

Nothing like a huge drop in cortisol to get a baby, right? I'm trying to be good about just sitting still and relaxing a bit. Like blogging. Reading the biography of the name we're probably using for baby. Knitting. I have some work to do, but it is all icing at this point. Go me!

Moving

After three days of not wanting to move (ah, the joys of pregnancy, a thrombosed hemmorhoid!), I am finally capable of doing things like walking or changing positions without wincing in pain. It has been really nice to actually walk to the coffee shop or hang out outside with Turing. My body feels better for moving. Now, if I could just sleep for more than 2 hours at a time . . .

In other exciting news, I have one more little thing to get past my advisor and I will officially be done with my dissertation document. I have to do some final figure clean-ups (Word has started freaking out and messing some things up) and table of contents business, but it should be printable by Sunday. Rock! My official plan is to print it out on Tuesday and drop it off on Thursday.

Then have a baby on Friday. Ha.

Then maybe I'll start writing about things that aren't pregnancy or dissertation related. Maybe.

Progress on all fronts

We did our trial run to the hospital on Wednesday. I wasn't sure if I was in labor or not, but I had reached the magic "60 second contractions every 5 minutes" point for over an hour, and I figured better to error on the side of caution. And get my brother-in-law over to watch Turing before it becomes morning. So, we went and sat in triage until 3 in the morning. It turned out to be not labor, but I have dilated and effaced a bit, which is way more advanced than the last time around. Even if the rest of it goes at the same rate, I will have shaved 24 hours off the entire labor and delivery experience. Awesome!

So, we're back to "anytime in the next 3.5 weeks."

That's fine, as I still have plenty to work on for my dissertation document. I finally sat down and made a list of the things I've accomplished, so I'm feeling like I have done a ton of work. There are basically 8 real chapter and 3 sets of revisions. Round 1 was my macro level revisions to committee concerns in which I did some serious refocusing, cutting, pasting . . . that revision is entirely done. Round 2 is my advisor's comments on round 1, which are sometimes substantial, but mostly involve clarification. I do a close read after round 2. I've completed 3.5 chapter of this, and I'll probably have another chapter done tomorrow. Round 3 is any tweaks my advisor finds left over from round 3. 3 chapters have made it through that far and are finished. So, there is still work to do, but I'm feeling like it is possible to be done by the 30th. Barring terrible things happening or my advisor totally slacking on me.

And I'm feeling Really Pregnant. It is either that I am actually 38 weeks pregnant or that the constant contractions are just wearing me out - I don't want to stand very long or walk very long or carry anything for very long . . . and I want to sleep a lot. And I'm just tired. Fortunately, the weather got cooler, so I'm not super swollen. For that matter, I'm not nearly as swollen as I was last time around, which is nice. I still know where the tendons are in my feet and my shoes don't leave visible impressions when I take them off.

I would like to go swimming to take the pressure off my back for a little while, but I just feel weird about swimming knowing that I am dilated a bit. I know it is fine, but it feels weird. So, maybe some yoga tonight. Maybe.

All about my bladder

Baby has been all about punching my bladder today. Jerk. It is really hard to focus on my final grammarical read-through of chapters 1-3 while getting my bladder punched. Let's not think that I'm near finished, though, since I have substantial revisions for chapter 8 and tons of advisor comments for chapters 4+ . . . here's to hoping it gets done by the 30th.

In other exciting bladder news, my lower abdominal muscles are no longer cramping in pain whenever I get more than about 2 ounces of urine in my bladder. It seemed that last little bit of stretch was just a bit too much. My theory is that baby has engaged, but since I've been swimming throughout the pregnancy, I haven't really been short of breath very much, so I don't have that clearer indicator to actually know if he's engaged. [Shrug]. He will do what he will. At least we didn't make a tradition of going into labor on the last day of my mother's visit.

I have been fairly focused on actually getting my document done. I feel like, presuming no complications like c-section or a sick baby, I will actually meet my deadline. Of course, I would much prefer to be done before the deadline. But I am getting so tired of coffee shops. But I get annoyed driving into my office because driving feels like a waste. Life is hard.

The good news is that baby appears to have outgrown his heart arrhythmia problems - for the last three non-stress tests, I haven't heard any dropped beats. I'm going to wait until delivery, but it appears I will get to eat chocolate and have decaf coffee again very soon. Maybe I'll like the coffee shops better when I can actually have coffee.

Super progress

My mom was here for a week and did Everything. Seriously. It should be no surprise where I got my work ethic from. While she was here, she did most of the childcare hours, cooked a bunch of meals, filled half my freezer with food to eat once the new baby arrives, cleaned, and painted my living room. And some other stuff, probably.

This means I was very focused on my revisions. Not only did I have a lot of time to be working, I had guilt for any moment wasted (my mom is painting my living room, I cannot justify surfing the internet). I did manage to sleep a lot and put some mulch in my yard and go to a million doctor appointments, as well. And write. I am nearly done with my Big Revisions (cut, paste, refocus), so I am starting back through on my polishing revision. And then I should pretty much be done. Exciting!

My mom also did an excellent job of hunting down the damn meal moths that have invaded the house. They appeared at the end of June, so I had to go through and throw out a lot of random things - half-bags of specialty flour that had been sitting in my cabinets, dried beans, nuts . . . basically, all the grains, nuts, fruits, herbal tea, opened pasta, and unsealed chocolate. It was a lot of stuff. But I have a ton of room in my cabinets, now.

I was worried that I was breeding moths to land on the ceiling, as I couldn't reach to kill those. Mom got them. Since she left, I've only seen 2 more moths and I could reach one of them.

Waxing??

The week before my defense, I did spend some money at the salon. I got my hair cut for the first time in a year and half (the ends are much less angry at me) and I treated myself to a pedicure, which has made me very happy. Talking to the same person for two hours was a bit of a challenge, but I powered through it.

One of the things we talked about, over the two hours, was waxing. I have never been much of a Girl, so I don't know stuff about Stuff.

I haven't shaved since sometime in high school - probably about 14 years ago. Mostly because I've never been very good at it (missed spots, cuts), I hate spending so much time doing it so I never did it very often, and I don't really see the point. It isn't so much a statement about me sticking it to The Man as it is a statement about me not caring what The Man thinks. And since I'm so blond, I doubt most people notice unless I'm wearing a tank top or a shirt with very short sleeves. But I know some people notice the leg hair and very quickly. I would actually even shave for the random special occation except that having to grow it back out again, through all the pokey, itchy phases is far too high a price for the occational event.

While I am not motivated to hide my hair for The Man, I will hide it for Professionalism. Much like I will keep my hair brushed and neatly contained and hide my tattoo. I wear pants or pantyhose at conferences and I presumed I would do so when I start interacting with patients. The problem is that I generally dislike the way dress pants fit me and I can't wear pantyhose for more than a day without getting a yeast infection. It isn't a problem that keeps me up nights or anything, but as I think about pulling together a professional wardrobe for teaching next spring, I've been wondering what my solution will be. Running around the hospital in long skirts doesn't quite seem appropriate, either.

I am actually considering half-leg waxing as a solution. I knew that waxing only had to be done every 6 or 8 weeks which is about as often as I could convince myself to do something like that, but I didn't realize that the hairs that grow back are soft instead of pokey-blunt from the razor. I could actually wear the cloths I want (flat shoes, knee-length skirts, button down shirts) without the pantyhose or the razor. So, I consider it. We'll see.

How strange, this cost-benefit analysis.

Spending

Trouble and I don't spend very much money on stuff - we both tend to be anti-stuff, though our house is overflowing with baby related items. I am very excited that I will get to start purging baby items as baby finishes using them. Woo!

We do spend a lot of money on food. Between my hippie organic ways, eating out, and just eating more because I need to eat five meals a day, food is our primary expense every month. While I know we could do a lot better with meal planning and saving money on food, I don't mind too much - of all the things to spend money on, food seems fairly reasonable to me - though it would be nice to be saving more. Our other big expenses over the past few months have all been "random" - travel, insurance, new vehicle. In the past two months, the only stuff I can remember buying is a pair of happy-pregnancy-feet sandals, some mulch, and some fancy yarn for knitting in doctors' waiting rooms.

As I finish up my PhD, I am trying to spend down my grant money. I have been far too frugal, so I have book/software/supply budgets that need to be spent now. I'm getting books for medical school and a bunch of classic statistics books that I will use for the rest of my career. In some ways, it is kind of fun to build my professional bookshelf. In other ways, I feel a bit gross for getting so much more stuff into my life. At least I can store all of the books at my office for another year . . . after that, I may need some sort of rolling, under the bed bookcase. Yuck.

Bounce

Here's how big I was last week. Today, I found out I'm even bigger - when the receptionists at the OB/Gyn assume that you're near term, well, you're big.

I'm actually feeling OK and like the delivery is not eminent - now that I've passed the absolutely worst days for going into labor (pre-dissertation defense), I feel like it is going to be another couple of weeks. As if feelings mean anything. The non-stress tests have been good, the ultrasounds are reasuring, and no doctor has said "induction" to me in weeks. My guess is that it will come up again in two weeks if someone else hasn't decided to do something on their own.

The dropped heartbeats were far fewer during the last non-stress test, and while I hate to get too excited, I'm feeling like that might actually get resolved instead of going on forever. During the test, I get to sit there and record when baby moves and chase baby's heartbeat with a monitor. You're supposed to record a movement and then the heart rate is supposed to increase. Since there is so much fluid and so much room, baby doesn't just stretch and get held in the same place, he stretches and then drifts. This means my tests take forever to administer because I lose the heart beat every time he moves. As if I didn't have anything else to do besides sit at the doctor's office.

I have gotten to the point where people will comment on the street about how I must be delivering any day now. I vaguely say something about "that's what they say" instead of "oh, I'm due in another month." I think the constant comments are making me feel even bigger. Not much I can do about it, though.