By way of updates

I'm completely and utterly exhausted. On top of that, I feel guilty because my daughter didn't get to celebrate her 2nd birthday yesterday. I know she doesn't know the difference yet, but I do and that's the point.

Tuesday afternoon and evening I started having contractions regularly (about 3 to 4 minutes apart). We contacted some friends and decided to wait to see if they would settle down. They lasted about an hour and a half and then let up. I had my weekly appointment on Wednesday (is it really only Thursday today??) and was told by the doctor that if I had more contractions like that to just go in to the L&D Triage and see if I could have a baby.
Wednesday afternoon the contractions started up again and were about 2 to 3 minutes apart. We made a call to the doctors office to see how long they wanted us to track them before going in. While waiting for them to call back, we settled Audrey at her little friend Theo's house. When the doctors office finally called back, we'd been tracking the contractions for about an hour and a half. They told us to just come on in.

So, I was thinking to myself: Okay, this is it.

Yeah.

Let me tell you, an IV is only worth-while if you get ADMITTED. Never mind if they can't get it right the first time and have to do it over again...

They pumped me full of fluids to see if dehydration was causing the contractions. A liter and some later, no dice.

After more than 4 hours they decided that even though I was having regular contractions, they weren't doing anything. So, apparently, I have a stupid, lazy uterus that doesn't want to do it's job. By this point, I was nearly delirious and couldn't even think straight. I wasn't too tired, however, to be a bit ticked about being told to go in for no good reason. Grumble, grumble.

So, we let Audrey stay at her friend's house rather than get her up out of bed at 9pm. Poor thing! No birthday!

We picked her up early this morning (no sleeping in) and have been running ever since. We went to the mall to see if we can walk this baby out. Then we went to her 2 year check-up. The Dr. K thinks she's doing very well and is quite surprised at how observant she is. He toyed with the idea of autism for a few minutes but quickly threw it out because she doesn't follow the normal patterns for that. She's just a smart girl who notices EVERYTHING (including what we don't want her to).

She got two pokes today. One in the leg (Hep B, I think) and one on her finger. They were checking for diabetes because we mentioned how Audrey seems to be constantly thirsty. Everything turned out okay but we did take a very tired, very sad girl out of the office and had to talk to her all the way home to keep her from crying herself into a fit. Poor girl.

Oh, when they checked her blood sugar, that little finger poke bled like crazy. She got it all over her leg, the exam table, her foot, her stomach, her other hand and I don't know what else.

As I sit typing this, she is on the couch yawning. I'd like to think she'll have a nice, long nap this afternoon.... but I know better.

Cat Burglars and The Pregnant Belly Massacre

I am not always happy about Ben going to work overnight. Most of the time I accept it as a necessary evil, but occasionally I hate it with a passion. Such a time was 3am Tuesday morning. I woke with a start upon hearing

"CLUNK-THUMP-BANG!"

To my sleep addled brain, it sounded like a door being shut. I remember thinking, "What is Ben doing home?" After throwing out that idea, I thought, "WHO'S IN MY HOUSE?!?" I was up and out of my bed faster than any pregnant woman should be able to move and out the bedroom door. In hindsight I am not sure what I would have done if I HAD found someone in my house that shouldn't be there. Granted, a hugely pregnant woman running around her house in her underwear would be scary to just about everyone, including herself.

After wandering round my house for a minute, I went back to bed and laid there wide awake, adrenaline pumping. I was thinking to myself that it must have been one of the cats trying to scale one of the baby gates to the kitchen. In spite of this irritating but comforting thought, I continued to obsess about the sound. I convinced myself shortly that the culprit must have been hiding while I was streaking through the house and must be quietly stealing all my stuff now.

I left my room again and inspected my house again, this time with lights on. Not completely satisfied, I went back to bed but grabbed my phone so that I could text Ben about my silly behavior. I figured he was the one who could make me feel at ease.

Three messages and no response later, I left my bedroom and went to cry on my couch. Horrible ideas coursed through my brain as to why Ben wouldn't answer me. Though, how the invisible burglar got from my house to Ben's work and incapacitated him, I don't know. I finally called Ben, who had been taking a cat nap and didn't hear his phone, and talked for a while. He managed to make me feel a tiny bit better. However, by this time I was far too awake to go back to bed. I turned on the TV and watched terrible 4am programing.

Now, here is the icing on the crap cake of my morning. While curled up on the couch, Squeaky (the little monster we are cat-sitting) decided to pick on Patches. I discerned a flurry of movement out of the corner of my eye and a series of hisses assaulted my ears. Just as I was looking around to see what was up, Patches chose to use my giant tummy as an escape springboard. After chasing the offending critters around and whispering my yells at them, I returned to the couch to examine my wounds.


Please note the two scratches on the upper left and the two scratches on the lower right, along with a couple of small punctures. Owwich!