Welcome to yet another partially written, ill-conceived weblog by Holly. This will be blog number three that I’ve started and will likely entertain for a few days or weeks before abandoning it like a pair of overly trendy, impulsively bought shoes. Unlike my prior blogging efforts, however, this one is intended to be temporary, and perhaps that will be the key to its staying power. It’s temporary because I envision it ending with the arrival of Baby W, due in nine weeks but expected at any time between now and then.
Who is Baby W? And how did we get here? To refresh my old readers’ memories and bring anyone new up to speed, the Holly saga began online several years ago with Mean Reds, an internet distraction chronicling my life during study for the bar exam and first year of law practice. The Colonel is the same man of several different roles, beginning with boyfriend and progressing to fiancé and husband and now playing the unenviable role of handservant. Our first child, begotten out of wedlock, is our standard poodle, Molly Golightly, Poodle to the Stars.
Blogging effort number two was a food and restaurant critique blog called the Marietta Slammer. I abandoned it in small part because my father suggested it sounded overly critical and incredibly spoiled and in larger part because Marietta is Restaurant Siberia where all the food is bad and you can only hate so much.
A little background:
When two people are married and they love each other very much and take a nap together, sometimes they make a baby. That’s our story, and we’re sticking to it.
The Colonel and I began our journey into parenthood approximately seven months ago, and in that time, I’ve had a very contented and uneventful pregnancy. We’re having a little girl, whose name is not to be disclosed prior to delivery, Colonel’s orders. Our happy little gestation period was interrupted last Monday when I started experiencing very frequent contractions. I had been having practice contractions (called Braxton-Hicks) since about week 20, but they were highly irregular and infrequent. Given the sudden onset of these contractions, my doctor’s office saw me on Tuesday and sent me over to the hospital to see if I liked the standard issue hospital gown. I didn’t.
While trying out the gown (ample in the front, open in the back), the triage nurse had me sit on the fetal monitor for approximately four hours. She and the midwife on call confirmed with some surprise that I was indeed having contractions every couple of minutes. The results from a fetal fibronectin test reassured them I would not likely go into labor for at least two weeks, so I was given a bag of IV fluid and a terbutaline shot to stop the contractions.
The contractions resumed on Wednesday, and at my followup appointment on Thursday, another midwife from my doctor’s office made it quite clear that I could either rest at home or spend the rest of my term at the hospital. While we were all hoping serious rest would quell the contractions, I had to start taking as-needed doses of terbutaline (prescription crack as far as I can tell) after having at least 8 contractions in ten minutes in the wee hours of Friday morning.
Now I am doped up, drinking lots of water, and lying horizontally for the foreseeable future. My dear sweet husband is waiting on me hand and foot, and he doesn’t even know yet that I’m going to ask him to clean my bathroom today. The grandparents-in-waiting are taking turns preparing meals and calling worriedly, and I am amusing myself, and hopefully some of you, with these postings, a 101 (or so) Things To Do on Your Back … Except That.
Enjoy.
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