I ordered my girdles with side zippers and they arrived just a few days before my scheduled induction.

Bellefit suggests that you first start wearing the postpartum girdle the day you get home from the hospital and that you wear it 24 hours a day for the first week.  (Except when showering or when washing the product, of course.)  I’m not quite to the end of my first week of wearing it, but I had to share how pleased I am with this product so far.  This is the sort of product that I wish that I had had after all of my pregnancies.  Not only does it make me feel more confidant in my postpartum body, but it also helps the body recover from pregnancy more quickly.  It gives firm yet comfortable support to the entire torso.  It does not pinch or feel binding.  The fabric is soft and breaths so no worries about getting over heated.   I love, love, love it!  When I look at myself in the mirror, it’s hard to believe that I gave birth to a 10 pound 9 oz baby just 6 days ago.  I can’t recommend the Bellefit postpartum girdle enough.  It’s well worth the investment.  I’m really looking forward to seeing how the Bellefit girdle continues to benefit my body as I go the recovery period and I plan on doing a second review at the end of using the girdles.

As added proof, here’s some before and after pictures:

Here I am at 39 weeks.  Just 2 days before I had my big baby!

And here I am at 6 days postpartum:

Not bad, eh?!

I’m feeling so glad to be home!  I hate being in the hospital.  We welcomed Gwen Elizabeth Miller on March 19th, at 10:23am.  My induction went very well that morning.  Dan and I arrived at the hospital at 5am and by 6 I was in my room getting hooked up to all the various medications, fluids and such.  I was started on  Pitocin and then I asked for my epidural.  After my epidural started taking full effect, they broke my water.  I was still only 3cm at this point.  I was then rolled over to lay on my side/belly and promptly took a nap.  (The only way to have a baby!)  About 45 minutes later I started feeling a little crampy and some pressure.  I called the nurse to check me and sure enough I was fully dilated and the baby was on her way.  I pushed through about 2-3 contractions and Gwen was born!  All the nurses started exclaiming how big she was and saying she had to be at least 10 pounds. I admit, I didn’t believe them.  How was it possible for me to have a 10 pound baby?!  No one warned me she was measuring so large.  Gwen hung out on my belly for some extra time because we decided to not clamp or cut her cord until it was done pulsing.  (Something we had never done before.)  After Dan cut the cord, she was taken to be cleaned up a bit and measured. She was so big and pink!  I was more shocked than anyone when they told me she was 10 pounds, 9.6 oz and 21 1/2 inches long!   And the crazy thing was that her delivery was not difficult for me.  Boy was I feeling very grateful for that epidural and not having to feel any pain!

Later the next day we found out that Gwen’s right collar bone was broken during delivery.  The pediatrician said that is a fairly common problem when delivering such large babies and that it will heal on its own in about 4-6 weeks.  We just  have to be careful when we pick her up.  Then later we found out that she was also slightly tongue-tied.  Dan and I debated for a little while about whether or not to do anything about it while we were already in the hospital or just wait and see how breastfeeding was going.  In the end, we decided to go ahead and have her frenum clipped a bit.  Right away I could tell she could move her tongue better so I’m glad we did it.  I feel very thankful for doctors that could tell us about these minor complications and help us know what our options are so that  neither the broken bone or the tongue tie will be a big problem.

All in all her recovery and mine are both going well.  It’s not easy missing my sleep but I’m hanging in there.   We’re very thankful to have Dan’s mom, Christy here helping us.  She’s picking up a lot of the slack and giving me plenty of opportunities to rest when I can.

We’re all so glad to have Gwen in our family!  The kids have welcomed her with open arms and everyone is adjusting well.

I went to the doctor today.  I’m 3cm dilated.  He said my cervix is soft and that the baby’s head is right on the cervix.  Pretty much I can’t get any more ready to have a baby without actually being in active labor.  Unfortunately, I don’t have a great history of labor starting up on its own.  I’ve got 4 inductions under my belt.

So I went ahead and scheduled an induction.  My doctor says that I’m a good candidate for induction since my body is already ready to go.  My induction is scheduled for this Monday, March 19th at 5am.  Unless this little girl decides to arrive sometime before then, because who knows what could happen.  There is an end in sight!  We’ll have two kids with back to back birthdays.  Baby on the 19th and Scott on the 20th.  :)  I’m just grateful that Dan’s mom will be here this Saturday and she can be with the kids while I’m in the hospital.  Thank you Christy!!

I had grown up eating meat and had never given much thought to it before.  But  with a combination of pregnancy and that strange dream, I really started to think about where meat comes from and what it actually was that I was eating.  Animal muscle.  I found it very disgusting.  So my main motivation at first was just a major gross out factor.  Since then I’ve never missed meat.  I don’t crave it or feel sad that I don’t “get to” eat it.  Also since then I’ve learned a lot about the cruel conditions of slaughter houses and how bad eating excess meat is for the body.  So it just reaffirms my desire to stay vegetarian.

My family is not vegetarian but most of the meals we eat do not contain meat.  I don’t push this on my family, but if they have questions about vegetarianism, I answer them honestly.

I can’t believe that when people ask me when my baby is due, I can actually say next week.  Just 11 more days until the due date.  Sure, that’s more than a week away.  But looking at the calendar, that’s still next week.

I’m amazed at how decent I’m feeling.  I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I feel good, but I am doing very well.  I’m having less sciatic pain now that the baby’s head has settled into my pelvis.  My biggest complaint these days are my swollen feet.  They get big and uncomfortable and I just don’t have enough free time to sit around with my feet propped up.  But hey, that’s not so bad!

I found out at my last doctor appointment that I tested positive as a carrier for group B strep.  It’s not really that big a deal, but I will  need to be on antibiotics while I’m in labor to prevent passing it on to my baby.  Certainly there are some risks and possible complications, but over all this is a pretty common situation.  Hopefully everything will go fine with the delivery.  My biggest worry now is that my water will break and labor will go so fast that I won’t have time to get enough antibiotics in my system before the baby is born.  That would be no good.  My doctor said they’d be willing to induce me as early as 39 weeks.  (That’s this Saturday!) I’m not too thrilled with being induced, but it may be a wise option for us especially considering my need for medication during labor for the whole group B strep thing.  I go to the doc again this Thursday and I’ll see what he has to say about all that.

So much is going on lately and it’s hard to believe that on top of everything else we’re going to have a new person in our family soon.  Scott turns 10 years old next Tuesday,  March 20th.  It’s been tricky to figure out how we can make sure he has a special birthday and not let the baby overshadow his day.  That can be difficult since we don’t know when our little one will arrive!  Scott really doesn’t want her to be born on his birthday.  That’s understandable.  And if we schedule an induction, we can certainly avoid that problem.  :)

We’re all so excited and it’s very hard to believe that our baby will be here in a matter of days.  I don’t feel like I could really have a baby at any moment.  Pregnancy and childbirth sure are crazy!

38 weeks pregnant.  I think today I’m going to follow the advice of Thumper and his mother:

It’s not easy to get a picture of my own belly.  I have to use a mirror.  At any rate, there it is, in all of its huge glory!  I don’t know how people manage to have multiples.  I feel like my stomach might explode!  As of March 3rd, I’m officially 37 weeks pregnant.  Even though that’s considered full term, I have no hopes of the baby arriving anytime soon.

I was thinking today about the day before I had Ezra.  What a horrible day that was for me.  I posted about how depressed I was feeling.  (You can read that here.)  And then the very next day, labor started up for real and I had Ezra.

I was remembering that day because I was feeling so low again today.  I guess that’s fairly normal during the last few weeks of pregnancy.  I think it’s especially normal after 37 weeks when the baby is considered full term, and yet moms have to sit and wait for several more weeks sometimes before labor starts.  I’ve never had a baby arrive this early before, so I’m not holding my breath for that happening.  But I am still struggling with feelings of depression and boredom with pregnancy.  I’m tried of being so huge and uncomfortable.  I feel like I still have a ton of cleaning and organizing to do but as soon as I get everything clean, it gets messy again in a few days.  It’s hard to keep a house clean with 7 people living in it!  I did manage to get quite a lot cleaned today which does a lot to improve my mood.

I’m feeling very anxious to meet our daughter and I hope she’s healthy and well.  And I’m also feeling very anxious to get my body back.  My belly is getting so big now that I can hardly fit in my biggest maternity clothes!  That is just super depressing.

I know that pregnancy won’t last forever.  Even though I’m feeling rotten right now, I know that soon our baby will be born and all this frustration with be worth it.  Just holding on, one day at a time.   Last week when I went to the doctor, he said I was 2 cm dilated and 75% effaced.  I go to the doctor again tomorrow morning and hopefully I’ve made a little more progress.  We shall see.

In fact, I just left church early after sacrament meeting.  I should probably be resting right now but I had to get this out of my system first.  I feel so guilty for leaving church early today.  My ankles are so swollen and uncomfortable that I had to wear flip flops to church today.  Nothing else fit.  As I was sitting there during church, I kept thinking how I really needed to put my feet up to help with the swelling but that’s not really possible at church.  Plus I’m tired and my nose is drippy.  Ugh.  I feel especially guilty because I’m the only church librarian around these days and now that I’m home there’s no one to cover that job.  I’m sure someone is taking care of things in there or maybe people are just helping themselves.  At any rate, it drives me nuts to not be able to take care of my responsibilities.  I don’t like to be a burden to others.

I keep trying to remind myself of the rewards of this sacrifice that I’m currently making.  Very soon we’ll be able to welcome our new daughter into our family and that is SO worth this sacrifice.  But for now, I can hardly wait for this pregnancy to be over.