Bump-date: Week 37 [Full Term]

Can you believe it? We’ve made it to full term which is so totally awesome. Now I feel completely relieved that he should be okay to come whenever he wants from this point on.

These last few days have been pretty busy – so excuse the extra long post. Lots to update on I guess! 🙂

Exercise this week:

As you have probably noticed my only form of exercise these days is yoga. It’s so relaxing, seems to be helping with my ligament pain, and they say it may help when laboring –- I’m gonna stick with it until I physically can’t do it anymore.

1. 1 hour prenatal yoga
2. 1 hour regular yoga
3. 1 hour prenatal yoga

Baby/Mommy Updates:

Baby: It’s definitely been funny to watch my Dr. measure my belly each week. Baby boy started out measuring two full weeks ahead of normal several weeks ago, then slowly started to catch back up to measuring the same as me (so if I was 35 weeks he was measuring 35 weeks). But it seems that since last week he’s had another growth spurt and is now freaking me out by measuring in at 39 weeks! And by guestimation is weighing in at 6.5 pounds as of last thursday.

Mommy: As for me, I have started to recognize what a braxton hicks contraction is. Though I only seem to have them at night, they haven’t been too bad (just feels like someone is flicking my belly in my sleep).

Also the Doctor checked my cervix last thursday to get an idea of where I was at, and was surprised to see that I was already 60% effaced. She said she would be surprised if this baby came after his due date of April 30th..meaning he will be here sooner as opposed to later.

Weight gain:

Since I just told you how huge my baby is, I feel okay with letting you all know that I’m sitting at a 39 lb weight gain. It’s obviously more than I was striving for, but I’m not worrying about it at this point.

Best moment of last week:

My mother put together a special ceremony to honor my transition into motherhood. It was really awesome to be a part of (I promise to share more about it as well as my baby shower in a future post).

Part of the event involved doing henna on my belly. It’s one of those things I’ve been wanting to do since I found I was pregnant. I just love how it came out.

Baby’s Car seat:

I’m still just finishing up all those last minute to-do’s, with the big one being getting the car seat installed and checked by the hospital. I can’t even begin to tell you all how emotional that was for me. I thought it would be a two minute snap the car seat in and go. Boy was I wrong!

I learned so much from the car seat installation technician. She said that in her 12 years of installing car seats she has never seen one that was actually installed correctly. Eek!

I highly recommend getting yours checked before baby comes as I hadn’t realized how technical it was, and how having the seat installed could really make a difference in the life & death of the baby in the case of an accident.

You can use the website www.seatcheck.org to find a certified car seat check location near you or find out more information.

How I’m feeling:

I still can’t get over how itchy my belly has been. It’s been bothering me so bad that I can’t sleep at night because of the itching/burning. Though I am happy to report that by mixing baking soda and water (making a paste) and applying that on the itchy area the symptoms are relieved. This is the only thing that has worked so far.

Besides that, I’ve been feeling pretty good. I still get pretty tired by the end of the day and can’t move around very fast but overall I feel pretty good for how huge I am these days.

Overall:

Whew! I applaud you if you read this entire post –I didn’t realize I had so much to say.

I’m feeling a little emotional over the idea that I’m going to be in charge of a little person soon, but after last week I’m feeling confident in my abilities of being a mother.

So now we are seriously playing the waiting game. I told the little guy in my belly he is allowed to come whenever he wants now because I have all the major stuff taken care of!