Week 39: Bump, kick, nudge, ouch, baby, don’t you want to come out yet?

38 weeks, even.

Ok, so it’s 4:30 am on Sunday, but I’m still up and just about to go to bed on an enforced-bedtime-so-that-I-don’t-sleep-too-late-Monday deadline. Yeah, yeah, 4:30 am is too late by anyone’s measure, but it was 6:30 or something yesterday, and so I figured if I can turn it back to 2:30 by tomorrow, I’ll be doing well.

Small Monster, for those of you keeping track, is still in there. He’s increasingly cramped, which makes my belly dancing especially interesting (note: I do not belly dance. My belly dances. Like does the wave all by itself. Big difference), and there are times when I really feel like he may just claw his way out through my belly button. I am so big and round right now that I might not even complain.

Kid, I am so ready for you to come out. It’s like, I knew before there was a baby in there, you know, the size and kind of baby they show in pictures in A Child is Born, but your size and the power of your muscles make it clear that there’s a full-grown baby in there. As in the kind we have here on the outside. So it’s time for you to come out.

But so far, kid seems to be staying in, and happy about it (I’m a little afraid he’s going to start ordering Domino’s for delivery to his little house. That delivery man is so not coming to the door, I’m telling you, child). None of the things they tell you might work is bringing it on so far (pineapple, spicy food, squats, walking, the full moon, etc), but I figure it just means he isn’t quite ready, so I’ll keep on walking and squatting and eating peppers like a fool. Oh, don’t get me wrong, there’s some early labor stuff going on – I’m crampy and all, and my back aches like Hell sometimes, so I figure (pray) my cervix is probably progressing some more, but as far as I can tell, he still hasn’t dropped all the way into my pelvis – he seems to much prefer sticking his fist in there, or at least that’s what it feels like. It’s creepy. And that’s as far as it goes. I’m just hoping they don’t get to the point where they decide they have to induce on my due date.

So, as a special message to my son: Come on down, Small Monster! You’re the next contestant on The Price is Right! (N.B.: Price = $300, which is about $293 more than my parents paid for me – $260 more, really, adjusted for inflation – but then, I was born in special circumstances )

Anyhow. Mostly it’s just waiting now. I got another 6k out on the novel, which puts me within easy striking range of the big 50k, but like the last time I won, the novel isn’t nearly done (my last one hit about 90k by the time I finished it, and I figure I’m about halfway through the storyline on this one). There’s no way in Hell I plan on trying to finish this one before the kid comes, but it gives me something to do other than to check websites going, “Is this a sign of labor? how about this? does this mean I’ll deliver this week? come on, kid, come out!” Not that I don’t have more to do than that, but it’s a favorite pastime of enormously pregnant women.

Other than that, I cooked a big turkey breast today (Grothoff tradition – don’t buy turkey until the day after Thanksgiving. We’re weirdos like that ) and did a wee bit of coding. Not much accomplished, but then, I didn’t have to I’m totally not going to stress and tire myself out in the next couple of weeks – I have labor to look forward to and all, and I figure that’ll be enough work for me.