Darek + Stacie

Well, I spoke too soon. We ended up at the hospital late last night.

Everything is fine and they sent us home after a few hours, but it was a little scary.

I’ve been having the very occasional Braxton Hicks contraction for the past month or so, but only rarely and very sporadically. Then last night, I was suddenly having them every 7-10 minutes. After two hours I called my doctor, because we figured it was better safe than sorry, and she told us to go up to the hospital.

So at 11:00pm, we headed to the hospital, checked in at the emergency entrance (because the main entrance was closed by that time), and took a wheelchair ride to L&D on the other end of the hospital. They put me in a room, gave me a gown, and hooked me up to three monitors – one for each baby’s heartbeat and one for my contractions. Except it took nearly an hour to get Baby A on the monitor – she decided it was more fun to not cooperate. Eventually we were all hooked up and spent the next three hours being monitored. They also checked my cervix and did some kind of a test that can tell you if you’re likely to go into labor within two weeks (I had no idea such a thing existed).

In the end, my cervix was great, the 2-week test came back negative, and both babies were doing great. Even though I was having regular contractions, they weren’t affecting my cervix in any way and I wasn’t showing any other signs of labor. So they sent me home with an Ambien and instructions to spend most of my time laying on my left side, drink a ton of water, and pee a lot (dehydration and a full bladder can both cause contractions). We left the hospital at 3am.

Early on, the nurse told us that they’d like the babies to stay in a few more weeks, but if they were born last night it’d be ok. And I just thought “noooooo! I’m not ready!” I’m glad they’re staying put for now.

I woke up yesterday and thought “oh my gosh, 33 weeks?! I need to get ready!”

It’s bizarre.

Our last measuring appointment was 2 weeks ago, at 31 weeks. Both babies measured at 4 pounds (give or take a few ounces; it’s not exact) so 2 weeks ago I was carrying around about 8 pounds of babies. This week, 9 or maybe even close to 10. They’re so big that it’s getting hard to make anything out on the ultrasounds; it’s just a big jumble of baby parts. In past ultrasounds we’ve gotten 20 or so pictures, but for the last one we only got one, because you could barely see what was going on. They’re in the 70th percentile, so they’re big babies, especially for twins.

The fluid levels have gotten better and are evening out a bit. Baby A’s fluid has gone from over 13 to around 8, and baby B’s fluid has gone from around 4 to around 6. The doctor says he doesn’t know why the fluid levels did what they did, but the babies should be fine.

I feel and see baby parts moving around on a regular basis; sometimes I’m pretty sure I feel them doing advanced gymnastics, based on the way my stomach jumps all over the place and the way it feels. I wish I knew what was what – what was a hand or foot or elbow, etc. But they seem to be healthy, strong babies. That never sleep. They move all. the. time. They also don’t seem to like being laid on – whoever is on the bottom starts flopping and kicking around when I lay on the side they’re on. We have a little talk and I shift a little and we usually work it out, but not always.

As for me – I don’t post much about how I’m doing because I don’t want to complain and I really don’t think it’s very interesting, but people keep asking, so in case you’re interested – it’s rough. Everything hurts. My back is killing me. Sleeping is quite the challenge – I wake up constantly to switch sides because I get so sore on the side I’m laying on, especially in my hips – and I have to get up to go to the bathroom several times throughout the night. My feet ache and swell up so much they’re unrecognizable as my feet (and almost feet in general). I’m exhausted all the time; I get tired doing barely anything. Breathing is awful; sometimes I feel like I can get barely any air. I get out of breath just talking on the phone. I have carpal tunnel in my hands; some mornings I can’t even move them when I wake up, and I can’t open things like water bottles without serious pain. I have reflux, which is lovely. Getting off the couch takes a ton of effort. Everything does.

But I’m so lucky to be where I am – 33 weeks with twins and no bedrest or complications. I hesitate to write that because I don’t want to jinx myself, but I know how good I have it and I don’t want to complain about all the discomforts.

Oh! And our babies apparently have  lots of hair. Four separate people commented on how much hair they have. So lucky for the babies they got Darek’s hair and won’t be bald until kindergarten like I was.

We’ll be meeting them soon!

Corn! Or maybe it’s not corn. It looks like corn to me.

We’ve gone to Ikea a lot these days. This one was Darek’s vision.