(First things first: I’m closing the comments for the time being. You’re all incredibly kind, sweet people, so don’t get the wrong idea, but based on the traffic I’m getting here, the emails, comments on Twitter and the Facebook requests, it’s the virtual equivalent of being in a pressure cooker. My nature is to get cranky and sort of turn inward when I’m feeling like there are too many eyes on me – Hi, strange quality for an extrovert who keeps a blog! – and that’s how I’m feeling right now. Forgive the cranky pregnant lady, because you’ve all been so wonderful and amazing and supportive.)
When Scott and I got married in 2008, Joanna Goddard featured us over at Glamour‘s blog. There was an incorrect assumption made by someone, somewhere, that because we were eloping, but had Twitter feeds on our wedding Web site, and would update the blog from Vermont, that we intended to “live blog” or “Tweet” the wedding. I now chalk most of that up to people being, well, kind of dumb about Twitter, and Web sites and the Internet in general, and it irritated me that it had been assumed that was our intent. Though of course in hindsight it’s easy to see why that conclusion had been made – people really were doing such things. But, that’s really not us. I’m not kidding. It’s just not.
So it never occurred to us to give moment-to-moment updates about when I go into labor, or even announce anything in particular as it happens. I have some boundaries when it comes to my life, and for as much of a presence as Scott and I have deliberately made for ourselves online, I swear to Pete we have limits.
And yet. Here I am. Writing at the blog.
Yes, today is my due date. As luck would have it, at 4:30 a.m. I woke up with some pretty intense cramping and then some contractions. And every 20 minutes, another one came. And another. And I sat up and Scott went and got me some tea, and I rocked back and forth a lot, and relaxed and took deep breaths, and just watched as every 20 minutes another contraction came.
I spent the majority of today resting and watching The Cosby Show on Netflix, breathing through each contraction. I even blew out my hair, something I haven’t done in weeks and weeks and weeks. It looks nice. Don’t ask me why I bothered.
I’ve been using the Contraction Master app, as I mentioned, because of the need to be in the habit of watching these things. And today that decision turned out to be a good one since I was able to discern the difference as I’ve actually been having consistent, trackable contractions all day and night. They’ve shortened some, only to about 12-15 minutes, but they keep coming. I promise you, had I not been watching this activity for the past week, I would have ignored everything happening today as normal pregnancy woes. I wasn’t supposed to have anything happen on my actual due date, you understand.
It’s hard not to feel a little silly, of course. Is it real labor? I mean, I don’t know. Everyone seems to have an opinion about what that looks like. I told Scott that despite the intensity and consistency, it’s tough after almost an entire day to not feel like, well, maybe this wasn’t it. I’m not so anxious about getting things over with as much as I am concerned that since we’ve let our families and friends know what’s happening, we’ve currently got nothing to show for it and maybe this is all false labor. It’s just such …a cliche.
I’m the only one, of course, who thinks this is false labor. There’s enough anecdotal evidence to suggest that plenty of ladies start actual labor this way – slow and steady. Lynette said she started this way with one of my sisters, with contractions on Wednesday and delivery on a Friday. My doula would like me to be sleeping right now. That said, if tomorrow comes and there is no change, well, there isn’t much I can do about that. It is what it is. She’ll come out eventually, she can’t stay in there for good.
I know a lot of you are hoping and expecting a lot of details as they happen, and as soon as possible. I’m sorry, but that probably won’t happen. I was just reading the NYT article about Heather Armstrong (and its unfortunate headline) and it touched on the concept of how many details a blogger really does share about his or her life. Like so many, I share what’s comfortable for me and my family. Maybe it seems like a lot, but it’s not, at least for us. I asked Scott if he was OK if I wrote tonight about what was going on, which he agreed to since he knows that writing helps me sort out whatever anxieties are roaming through my head, but we have a mutual pact that there will be no pithy Twitter and Facebook commentary and wants me to respect that. So I am.
Plus? We haven’t really decided how we’re going to handle being parents to this human being as it relates to how we talk about her online. I don’t have any judgment or issues as to how others handle talking about their kids online, really I don’t, but I see enough of the good and the not-so-good to know that we probably ought to have some lines in the sand drawn now, rather than later.
So I’m going to share whatever it is I’m going to share at this point – make no mistake there will be pictures and a birth story – but don’t look for me to say much until there is something to say. For now I just want to rest and be present for all of this, which had better be actual labor dammit because this is annoying.
