Of Contractions and "Cankles"

So earlier this week I had some contractions... not the Braxton-Hicks ones they tell you about where your tummy gets SUPER TIGHT (you could bounce a coin off of it easily)... no these are the ones the books and websites say to call your doctor about if you have them prior to 37 weeks (I'm finishing week 35 right now). They start in your lower back like a menstrual cramp and then wrap around your belly and then your belly tightens. Fun. Yep. Super. So I wake up at 5:50 am and begin timing them at 5:52 am and keep timing them until 8:00 am when the doctor's office opens. Now I CAN call before they open, but I also know that they are not frequent enough or consistent enough to totally freak out, so I wait until 8:00 and then call because, duty bound by literature, I'm prior to 37 weeks.

When my doc calls me back I say... "uh yeah, so I've beeh having contractions since about 10 'til 6." His response? "Fabulous!" and then silence (I love my doctor... seriously, I do, he cracks me up). So I say "uh huh?..." And he laughs, "oh, of course you're wondering what you should do now!?" (yeah... kinda why I'm calling here). "Nothing!" he nearly shouts, "well, not nothing... but honestly, I'm sorry to say this, these could go on for weeks. So keep track of them and call me if they get worse, but this could seriously go on for a while." WEEEEEKS!!!!??? Helloooooo. No one mentioned this part. I thought contractions were the beginning of the end, you know? I know there's "false labor" (Braxton-Hicks) - which is actually a misnomer, there's nothing false about them, they are practice and they are to get your cervix into place and all... but I digress - but I'd never heard about contractions going for WEEKS.

Well kids, they can. You see your happy little uterus starts contracting way before you'll actually notice it and some women never notice them until they are the "real" ones. But 3-4 weeks before you have a baby your cervix starts moving around ("ripening" they call it) and thinning and that's what these contractions might be. Lovely... because I'm not grumpy and uncomfortable enough, now I can look forward to weeks of this shit.

You know the only awesome part about the whole thing... my hubby's reaction. He was SO calm. He rolled over that morning to see me with my handy-dandy notebook tracking contractions and just said, "is everything okay? do you need to call the doc?" Seriously... calm as hell. Ready to grab bags, call folks and head to the hospital. I love this man. He will be fabulous when I'm in labor.

So now I'm in day 4 of this contracting stuff and getting used to it. It doesn't go on all the time and doesn't always hurt. I'm just trying to rest as much as possible. In the meantime, I'm experiencing yet another fun part of pregnancy... swelling. Oh yeah, that's attractive. Today my boss tells me that she wants me to work the rest of the day from home because she's worried about me and I have no idea what she's talking about. She tells me to look at my feet (something I don't see much of these days). And now I see why she's worried. I have "cankles." No nice separation between calf, ankle and foot... just one swollen cankle. Eeeeeeew. This is why pregnant women resort to only wearing flip-flops at the end (I'm preferring large soccer slides). Nothing is more disgusting than seeing "cankles" shoved into shoes. So I get home, start GUZZLING water and put my feet up while I work... it helps... the cankles are resembling (resembling, not back to) normal sized feet and ankles.

Good god... now I know why women want it over with at the end. I'm rapidly approaching that stair-climbing, castor-oil-drinking, spicy-food-eating, get-this-freaking-thing-out-NOW pregnant lady. God help my husband and those near me.