It's my Due Date!

Well, 2 years ago anyway :)... This was my due date with Annalee...I woke up and still no baby!! But I had a doctor's appointment that day for an ultrasound and a biophysical profile of Annalee. At my doctor's office, if you make it to your due date, they do this just to make sure the baby is still doing well in utero and not in any distress.

I was already on Maternity Leave, and my plans were to have lunch with Carla and Dana and then meet Jay at the appointment, excited to see our baby girl again and try not to give in to the doc's about induction. I was hugely pregnant as you can see from the picture that was taken just a few days prior, and very ready to have her, but I wanted to go into labor on my own.

So we get to the appointment and they start the ultrasound, the biophysical profile is part of the ultrasound, where they check certain things as a way of gauging how well the baby is doing. They did a lot of measuring all her bones, and they measured my amniotic fluid and they checked for her practicing breathing.

Annalee failed the test. Apparently my amnioitic fluid levels were higher than they liked to see, she was measuring 9 lbs already, her leg bones measured at 41 weeks, and the scariest one...she wasn't practicing breathing... Jay and I sat in that room will Joelle the u/s tech (that I now know on a first name basis after these 2 babies, she's also the one that was with us and told us about the spot on Jude's heart) as she told us what she was and wasn't seeing. She gave Annalee a good 15 minutes of us just sitting and staring at the screen to start practicing taking breaths, and she just didn't. No amount of prodding would get her to do it.

I can't really explain what it felt like to sit there,willing this baby inside my body to please take some practice breaths so we could know she was ok. Up until this day, I didn't realize how important this was, but suddenly it seemed monumental. Their were a couple of questions running through my head "why isn't she practicing, has she not been practicing at all, are her lungs completely under developed to the point where she will not be able to breathe on her own outside of my body?? Are we going to have a sick baby that has to stay in the NICU for weeks until her lungs develop, or worse yet, is she even going to make it??? How can you have a full term baby with under developed lungs?"

It was a very scary time, and I really didn't know what to think or do. The doc came in to talk to us. They really wanted to go ahead with induction that night. Mainly due to her size, they were concerned about a possible c- section if she got any bigger. But I was terified of delivering a baby that couldn't breath on her own, and it was just to much for me to take in. I went in hopeful and excited and was leaving scared to death... We convinced them to give us 1 more day, to wait one more day...so we were to come back the next day for another u/s and biophysical.

I remember Jay and I leaving the office and we were so scared. We kept talking about it and all the possibilities, and what it all meant. I know we spent the rest of that day and night scared and praying and we let our friends and family know so they could also be praying. I prayed and prayed and prayed that when we saw her on the screen the next day she would be taking those practice breaths.... to be continued...