What's Up, Doc?

Another week, another doctor's appointment. The latter weeks of pregnancy seem to be filled with them. And now that I'm full term, the hope is that she'll say something like, "Great, you're 80% effaced and 3 cm dilated!"

I had never heard of 'effaced' or 'dilated' prior to being pregnant. But somehow now it's all I think about...

Of course I didn't get to hear that great news from doc today. In fact, it was the same as last week (1 cm, slightly effaced), which I really shouldn't be surprised about because it's pretty much the same story from just about everyone who's around my stage of pregnancy. Of course there are the lucky few who give hope to us all by going into healthy labor 3 weeks early, but for the majority of us 1st time moms, that's simply not the case. In fact, many 1st timers often go late, and end up being induced a week after their due date.

I'm still hoping that at some point soon all the contractions I'm having (and have had for months) will actually start proving themselves useful. Doc told me to do whatever I want and not worry about them coming, so you better bet that's what I've been doing. Not that it appears to be making a difference. I've been swimming 3000m 3-4x/week, water running 30-40 min 3-4x/week, walking Hoku 45 minutes just about every day, and hitting the elliptical at the gym at least once/week. Clearly, exercise has no bearing on effacement and dilation for me.

I do see a light at the end of the tunnel though. Doc said today that baby weighs just over 7 lbs! That means he/she has gained about 1.5 lbs since last week! (That made me feel better about being 2 lbs up myself.) Rachel also reminded me that I will not be pregnant forever, so I'm now chanting that as my mantra.