I know this post doesn’t have much to do with ranching, but it’s about where we are in life. We are now 35 weeks pregnant! This is a huge deal for us since our last birth (our daughter Cecilia) decided to come at 35 weeks, so we are now feeling a lot more confident that this baby is going to wait a little while longer before he/she decides to come.
With that said we are aiming for 37 weeks since we use a midwife service and we have to be at least 37 weeks in order to have the baby at the birthing center, so we aren’t quite in the clear yet, but everyday gives us more hope.
The other day my husband called me a “calving ease heifer.” Doesn’t sound like the nicest compliment in the world, so to those who don’t understand what that means… Including me at the time… It means that some cows are bred to have their calves with very little difficultly, their calves have a tendency to be lighter in weight, but are fully functional and extremely healthy and the mother’s gestation period is shorter than the average cow, meaning they grow their calves faster. Sean believes that I grow babies fast and am completely capable of having an extremely healthy baby earlier than most other women. When I had Cecilia she was born at 35 weeks was 6 lbs 3 ozs and was extremely healthy and had no complications during birth, delivery and post-natal. Maybe it was a fluke, who knows, we’ll find out with this next baby.
As I watch the days slip off the calendar and pray hard everyday for baby to just hold on a little longer I am in a peaceful state knowing that my baby is healthy and kicking me to death everyday (more like every minute). I have been experiencing pre-term contractions and have been told to “take it easy” during these last couple weeks, so I haven’t been doing as much as I like, but I know it’s better for both baby and I that I take more time off my feet and resting for the “big day” when baby decides it’s time to enter the world.
For those who have had babies, or who are about to have babies knows about the whole “nesting” instinct. I’m finding this extremely difficult to combat, even though I completely understand that being on my feet causes contractions and resting helps me not have as many contractions. The urge to clean, de-clutter and organize is strooongg. Everyday I tell myself not to do certain tasks, yet by the end of the day I have another room cleaned or my car detailed. However, baby does remind me quite frequently with either a swift kick to the ribs or a strong contraction that enough is enough, so that’s good enough for me.
I’ve been told by the midwives that they expect me to “come fast” this time around, so not to fool around when I start to have serious contractions… That’s always re-assuring since we live an hour and 15 minutes away from the midwives and I have a tendency to handle pain fairly well so I drag things out until I can’t take them anymore, but I’ve been told not to do that this time. Our neighbors did have a baby on the side of the road once, so hopefully that won’t be the case with us… If it is, at least Sean knows how to handle a newborn calf, which is practically the same thing… Right?
I’m going to try to keep up with my blog as best as possible, but if there is a long period of silence, it most likely means baby is on it’s way or that baby is here and I will try to update when I can when that happens.
Thanks for the prayers and support!