Ready for another long update? Get comfortable....
On 9/6 we had another growth ultrasound with the perinatologist. Everything still looked great. He again voiced his opinion on doing a home birth....
Speaking of the home birth, I knew it was a long shot but it's officially off the table now. I had a feeling my IM wasn't fully comfortable with the idea even though my IF liked it. But I knew it would be official once I heard that my IM was going to have a meeting with the head of the Labor & Delivery department. No way was she going to come out of that one thinking that it was the way to go! So I'm not surprised but still a bit sad and a bit scared. Just a little bit though, nothing to worry about.
So I'll deliver at UCSF. They've assigned to me a midwife and a high-risk OB, however I'll see the midwife for my appointments. She was okay. I didn't feel the same level of comfort that I had when seeing my midwife at Kaiser. But I imagine that some of that is coming from me and my expectations and fears. She was a bit surprised that I had gone 24 weeks without seeing anyone, but everything was fine. My blood pressure was great, the baby measured just right, and I've only gained about 4 pounds.
We talked a bit about what delivery is like at UCSF. She mentioned the labor tubs but that you have to deliver in the bed. What made me nervous was that basically you'll have a midwife do the delivery if you're lucky enough to deliver in banker's hours, roughly Mon-Fri 8-5pm. I may look into hiring a doula to be there with me, especially in case I deliver when there is no midwife around. She did try to assure me that I don't need to worry about coming in expecting to battle with the OB's in order to get a low-intervention, unmedicated birth. I hope she's right!
Oh, there was other thing she said that really through me for a loop.... We talked briefly about what my plan would be once I get close to the due date. If I wait until I'm in labor to get to SF then I might not make it. So there's a good chance that I'll be "moving" to the city at the end of December. The midwife suggested that they could induce me if it would be more convenient! Ummm... NO! I was really surprised to hear a suggestion like that coming from a midwife especially when she already had in her files that I'd had a home birth in the past, we had a birth center delivery planned this time, and that I want low interventions. I just don't see where pumping me with pitocin to trick my body into delivering a baby early fits into that!
UCSF also has a protocol that all IVF patients do weekly non-stress tests starting at 32 weeks. I've never had one of those. From my understanding it's used for people who are past due or people who are high-risk. My IM is going to look into it and see if it's really necessary or if they're just doing it to participate in some sort of study. I asked the ladies on an online surrogate forum and nobody else who is pregnant with only one and not high-risk has been asked to do them weekly. Sounds like it's just a UCSF thing.
And finally, after my midwife appointment I had to go up to the lab and do some tests. One of them was the 1 hour glucose screening. I had to drink a cup of the nastiest stuff. It was like flat Sprite with 137x the amount of artificial sweetener. Then I sat around for an hour and had my blood drawn. They're looking at how fast my blood processes the sugar. I failed. So now I have to go back in 2 weeks and do a longer test. Failure this time would mean that I have Gestational Diabetes! This time I'll have to fast for 8 hours, then have my blood drawn as a baseline. After that I drink the stuff again (double the amount this time I believe) and have my blood drawn 1, 2, AND 3 hours later. I can't eat anything during the test either. That sounds like complete torture! I don't know how I'll keep from getting sick to my stomach...
(Oh, I've tried to adjust the settings on here so that comments could be left again. If anyone actually made it to the end of this novel, would you mind trying to leave a comment to see if it's working? Thanks!)
