37 weeks

Yesterday was a very gratifying appointment. My physical therapist called my OB with my adductor measurements and now she is very comfortable with me having a vaginal delivery :)  Also the baby is finally in position to be delivered, He has been transverse or sideways every other time he's been checked, I am relieved things are coming together!

As far as my legs go, pain continues to escalate and I am less able to do things independently. I did stand up for the first time today, about 50 minutes ago, after hours of attempts, and was able to make it to the toilet. My legs were incredibly tight though and moving was very painful. I’ve decided to stay down until my husband is home from work, he will be able to loosen my muscles through massage and help me to bathe. It is very difficult for me to lose my independence like this, but it should only be temporary and bringing new life into the world often requires sacrifice.   

36 weeks 4 days

Monday was my 36 week appointment, I’ll be going in weekly now. If things are interesting I will blog after each appointment. For this post there is good news, bad news and good news again. The first bit of good news is that as of my appointment I was dilated to a “one” ooowe :)

Specific to CP

The bad news is though that my adductors (thigh muscles) apparently were tight and my OB was concerned that they would be to tight to allow the baby though. It is true though my legs were tighter that day than usual due to needing to go up and down stairs. She then asked me if I thought an epidural would loosen my muscles—I had no idea. Then we started to discuss having a C-section, not my favorite idea because I would like to be pregnant again before the recommended recovery time of 18-23 months. She wanted my adductors evaluated, so the next day I went into the physical therapy clinic to get everything measured. I avoided stairs prior to the appointment but avoided any other special preparation so the measurement would be accurate. The final good news is that the physical therapist’s report stated that he didn’t think I would have a problem opening my legs. He didn’t have an answer about the epidural but that’s okay, no one seems too.

Those of you that read the post concerning my birth plan know that an epidural isn’t my favorite idea because I am fairly prideful about my pain tolerance. I think I’m tougher than most and could cite dozens of reasons why—it’s a bit of a problem. I think though that I will take the epidural on the off chance that it will loosen my muscles and make birthing easier. Even if it doesn’t loosen muscles it may well help avoid additional constriction of my muscles that might be brought on by the inevitable pain. Since I really want to avoid a C-section I don’t want to have any regrets about what I could have done to (potentially) prevent it.

I should mention before I close this post that I am experiencing considerable pain in my hip, knee, and ankle joints. I feel like I’m ripping them apart every time I need to stand or walk up stairs, and I feel that I am crushing them in unnatural directions when I put weight on them. I hope that these things do not cause permanent damage, but what will be, will be.  I’m not scared at this point of another pregnancy, I definitely want to have at least two children. Like I said before siblinghood is very important to me. I however feel that it is necessary to be as honest as possible in expressing my experience. These last few weeks have been very hard on my body.     

33 weeks-- Pain

This last weekend was a very eventful one. My wonderful sister-in-law and niece threw me a Baby Shower (my room is currently stacked high with gifts) and yesterday was my mother-in-law’s birthday party. It was so wonderful to see and spend time with a number of people on that side of the family. However, regrettably, there were consequences to my activity level…

Specific to CP

I’ve known for the last few weeks that the weight from my pregnancy has been causing an undesirable level of pressure on my knees and ankles. Up until this weekend, though, I was able to avoid focusing on the discomfort that it was giving me.

Last night I went to bed in a moderate amount of pain. I tossed and turned for an hour or so before finally being able to fall asleep. At about 2:45am I woke up in severe lower body muscular-skeletal pain. I desperately needed to go to the bathroom but it took me 30 minutes to get the bathroom, even though it was only a few feet away. Once I was back, I tried to lie down again but the least painful position I could find was sitting on the edge of my bed staring out my window. 

I thought and I thought about the mistakes I had made that weekend. The biggest issue, I think were the stairs I had climbed. I tried to think of a solution for the pain but couldn’t think of one. Tylenol is great for breaking a fever but not for taking away pain—I just have to high a tolerance to pain killers, I’ve gone essentially pain medication free since I was a teenager. In my desperation I thought of waking my husband, but the poor man isn’t getting much sleep any more, he is just too busy.

After about an hour my fruitless solution seeking, I did something I hadn’t done in nearly 16 years, I cried due to Cerebral Palsy pain. Of course I have cried several times in the last 16 years for other types of reasons, but CP pain wasn’t one of them (I'm "tough"). My crying turned in to all out weeping and that woke up my husband. He took me in his arms and somehow even though he didn’t take away the severity of my pain, he was able to push it into the background and we were able to fall back to sleep.

I’ve “hit a wall” so to speak, things are becoming more painful and difficult to accomplish. I’ve always been one to push myself from one task to another, but I think it is time to slow down. My goal was to make it to 36 weeks and then put up my feet and neglect everything except good books for my final weeks. I’m not ready to cast aside all my responsibilities yet but hopefully in the next few days I can have enough of my “affairs in order” to keep off my feet most of the time.

30 weeks

Today’s appointment went well, I don’t have gestational diabetes and all my recent blood work looks great, wahoo :) I received my whooping cough vaccine today and it’s made me feel fairly sick so that is a bit of a downside for today. The baby has been very active for the last several weeks, it’s pretty exciting to watch my tummy bounce around like boiling water. He particularly responds to music, namely piano and harmonica music, so I’m assuming that I have a musician inside of me—given his daddy and that side of the family I wouldn’t be surprised at all, if it turns out to be true.  

Specific to CP

There have been some changes in this area. Number one, I’m back to physical therapy. Why? To appease my father-in-law. Apparently he works for a physical therapy office owned and operated by his brother. So, voila! I have free physical therapy, whether I need it or not. So, nothing to complain about.

But alas, I suddenly might need the therapy—I’ve been pushing myself too hard this last week and I’ve hurt my left hip. It hurts to lay down, it hurts to stand,walk, bend, lift…it hurts pretty much to move. Oh, and sitting to long causes my feet to swell up and hurt. So essentially I’m very uncomfortable. But hey! When I go to my physical therapy appointment tomorrow we will have a project to work on. 

13 weeks + some

This is a break from the norm because I haven’t had a prenatal appointment. I just wanted to tell you about my daily walks. Before getting pregnant I exercised regularly on either a stationary bike or an elliptical machine; some days for 30 min and other days for 3 or 4 hours.  After becoming pregnant though, I found that I couldn’t use these machines for more than 20 min without becoming sick or dizzy.  I had to find a new method of keeping my legs strong.

In May we moved near my husband’s parents and I started doing daily walks (5 days a week) with my mother-in-law. We started out pretty slow, probably going only 1/3 of a mile but now we are approaching 4 miles.  My mother in law has lost 20+ lbs, I’ve of course only been gaining weight but my legs are becoming stronger and leaner.  I really hope that I can keep this up into the fall. 

I’m beginning to wonder though if I am pushing myself to hard, it can take the full day for my legs and back to recuperate. I keep my heart rate at a good place and my breathing never gets too heavy so I don’t think it is bad for the baby—or for my body in general.  My legs and back are just not enjoying the extra weight gain. If I don’t exercise now I worry that postpartum rehabilitation will be very difficult.  When it comes to my mobility I need to “use it or loose it”