My Last Week Of Pregnancy
I am in my last week of pregnancy and I am ready for this baby to get here.
Physically, I’m feeling OK under the circumstances. I’m huge and tired. I also have a baby foot constantly kicking into my right rib cage most of the day. But I’m still able to take care of our daughter and all of the things I need to at home, despite some of the physical discomfort.
This is the last week for my daughter to be an only child.
I am relishing in spending quality time with our daughter as I know that things will be a little different for her with a new infant in the house. It makes me a little sad for a second but then I remind myself of what a great big sister she is going to be and how our son will be so lucky to be able to learn from her. They will be good for each other and I am excited to watch them grow and play with one another.
For the last week I have been spending a little extra snuggle time with her before nap and bedtime. We have a ritual of things we do before I put her down: she gets all of her blankets out of the drawer, one by one, and lays them on me. Then she climbs up on my lap and we read a few books, followed by about ten minutes of snuggle time with the lights off. That might seem like a lot but I don’t know how long I will be able to spend with her after the baby is born, so I am taking advantage of it now.
Feeling slightly foggier then normal has become my new normal.
Over the last several weeks I have not been feeling as sharp as I normally do. This is partly due to the fact that I have “pregnancy brain” and my brain is restructuring in preparation to care for a new infant. But if I am being honest, I am really looking forward to eventually getting my old self back (and finally having our new baby boy at home).
I’m ready to stop talking about being pregnant on my blog.
My last 6 blog posts have been all about pregnancy, or preparing for a new baby, or pregnancy health related things like doing fetal kick counts. I’m ready to stop talking about being pregnant and start talking more about other mom and registered nurse stuff.
But pregnancy is on the forefront of my brain at this time, especially since I am in my last week of pregnancy. And I’m having a hard time thinking about much else at this time. So for now I guess I just have to go with it. Eventually I will have the time and mental ability to write about a few other things.
My last week of pregnancy has started off on a productive foot.
Yesterday my husband and I finally bit the bullet and bought a new car. We decided on the Subaru Forester due to the excellent safety ratings. I love my Prius, but having two baby seats plus all the gear in the back was just not going to fit. This afternoon we installed our toddler and newborn car seats into the forester. Its still pretty tight but it works and I love the car. I feel a lot safer since it is a lot bigger too.
We also went through the garage and brought all the 1st year baby stuff that we needed for our daughter back into the house: bottles, breast pumps, newborn sleepers, floor mat, bassinet. I washed, cleaned and organized for most of the day.
I have not packed a hospital bag yet.
This may sound surprising coming from a registered nurse during her official last week of pregnancy. However, my first pregnancy I had no hospital bag and everything went just fine In fact, I realized that there was very little I actually needed from home.
Therefore my list of things to bring is pretty short: picture ID, clothes to wear home from the hospital (for me and baby), a few toiletries, cell phone and charger, earplugs and eye mask (to help with the little bit of sleeping I will actually get).
This was the most productive New Years Day I have ever had.
Normally, New Years Day has always consisted of some sort of recovery from an event from the night before. My husband and I are normally much more social especially for big holidays. But as we are expecting to have a baby pretty much at any time we decided to stay in. We were in bed by 10:30pm and I am happy we were since we accomplished a lot today.
2018 is going to start off big for us, that is for sure!
Thank you for reading!
Sarah, Mother Nurse Love
