Birth announcement, aka WE DID IT!

We had a beautiful baby girl last night! Lainey Marie was born at 9:18pm in a beautiful, intense homebirth - didn't quite make it to the waterbirth tub because she wanted out! 8lb 1 oz, 21 inches long & absolutely delicious! We are so blessed and thankful to our awesome midwives - what a seriously amazing experience! Birth story to follow!

Meeting term means lots of emotions!

37w3d with baby #3

When I hit 37 weeks last week, it was a BIG deal. I definitely did a little dance and high-fived and hugged my husband lots - we did it! TERM! To us, term means no preemie, and the "okay" to give birth at home with our homebirth midwives. When we hit 29, 30 weeks it was a weight off our shoulders. We had made it at least as far as with Kieran. Each appointment, each week I still felt wonderfully healthy, a little bit more anxiety was shed. For the longest time I kept wondering how I'd feel when I got to term. I wondered if I'd just be waiting for the other shoe to drop - for pre-eclampsia to rear its ugly head at me at 38 weeks or something. So when I got to term, and then to the day I had Maia...I just felt fantastic! 37 weeks was a very important goal, but the ultimate goal is a pre-eclampsia free pregnancy. And at 38w2d, I can say that it's still pre-e free, and now I am truly  believing that it's 100% possible I will not have a single pre-e symptom this time. What an AWESOME feeling that is! Things could always change, but at this point, I highly doubt it.

Hitting term and still being so healthy brings up other emotions, too. Like pure excitement about going into labor! I am so ecstatic that I will go into spontaneous labor this time! I had two medically-necessary inductions, and while I don't judge the women who choose them, because everyone has their own varied reasons, I do have to wonder...WHY!? The joy and excitement and anticipation! It's all a surprise and it's exciting to me! I cannot understand choosing to induce for most reasons, I just can't. This time, my baby gets to choose its own birthday, whenever it feels ready!

So, being term, being so close to my homebirth...it all pretty much rocks. I feel way too amazing to be 38 weeks right now. I feel lucky and blessed. I am just weeks (or less!) away from meeting my third baby  now!

Appointment updates!

Well, I am pretty behind on appointment updates....but honestly, I wouldn't have much to say! They've been BORING! And that's what you want when you've had the pregnancies I've had :)

It goes sort of like this:
34 week appointment - perfect blood pressure of about 120/60, no protein in the urine
36 week appointment - our HOME visit! The midwives came to our house, checked out our birth kit and the house layout, and I had another perfect BP reading.
37 week appointment - BP 118/62, slight protein in urine, but cause is most likely from recovering from the 24 hour stomach bug so we're not worried...also - I AM TERM!!!!!!!! Also, my big belly measures 39+ weeks!
38 week appointment - again with the perfect BP (118/62) and not even a slight trace of protein in the urine! Measuring a normal 38 weeks now, and we estimate baby is about 7lbs :)

38 weeks...can you even believe it. I have never been so pregnant! Maia was induced at 37w3d so I'm in uncharted territory now!