Popping my L&D cherry

Well today certainly didn't go as planned. It began as expected with me going to my 39 week appointment. I had contemplated throwing the hospital bag in the car just in case but decided that was silly and unnecessary. Little did I know... So I get back with the nurse, and she takes my blood pressure. She looked concerned and switched to the other cuff. She shook her head and finally said it was coming back high. 170/100 to be exact. Yikes! So she had me lie on my left side until the doctor came in. The doctor did the usual drill, including an internal, and discovered I'm 3 cm dilated and 70% effaced. When she took my blood pressure again, it was only down to 150/90 so she decided I needed to go to L&D for monitoring and for induction if they couldn't get it down.

As I walked over, I called C and my mom. C wasn't sure whether to come or not, so I told him I'd keep him updated. My mom was panicked, of course. I got up to the L&D waiting room and after a little while they brought me back to a room. After talking to the nurse, I decided I wanted C there so he headed over. They got me hooked up to the monitors and put the blood pressure cuff on to take a reading every 15 minutes. After about an hour or so, someone came in to wheel me down to get an ultrasound, which was unexpected. Everything looked great on the u/s, thankfully. He's definitely head down, and the tech said he was "right there" so she predicted pushing wouldn't be an issue. She confirmed the 3 cm. dilation, and I'm pretty sure she confirmed the gender. She was being sort of cryptic about the whole thing, which was annoying, but I think she would have said something if the original u/s was wrong, especially since we discussed it. Anyway, they brought me back to the room and hooked me back up, and C decided to grab some lunch, close things down at work, and get the hospital bag from home just in case. After another hour, the nurse had me turn on my left side for another hour's worth of readings. Those two hours were definitely lonely since C had left, the nurse rarely came in, and there wasn't much on TV. Plus, I had to pee horribly (TMI?) and was too shy to use the call button to have the nurse take the monitors off. I can promise I won't be that bashful once I'm actually in labor, but everything felt so weird today since it was all unexpected.

Finally the doctor came in. She was pleased that my blood pressure was coming down once I was on my left side (it got down to about 130s/80s) so she sent me home with orders for strict bed rest until I deliver. She was predicting that I'll probably go into labor in 3-4 days, even being on bed rest, but if I don't go on my own, I'm scheduled to be induced on Tuesday, so in exactly one week. I have to go back for a blood pressure check on Friday to make sure they don't need to induce earlier.

Apparently, I was having contractions as regularly as every 7 minutes, but I had no clue. I thought I noticed a couple, but it was hard to tell since I was so uncomfortable to begin with. This of course only increases my fear that I'll be in active labor without realizing it...

As anxious as I am to meet the little guy, I'm sort of glad that today didn't result in an emergency induction. Now I have a better idea of what things are like in L&D so I can better prepare. Plus, I'd only eaten a bagel for breakfast, and I cannot imagine laboring without any fuel. As it is, I still have a headache from lack of food!

So that's the plan. I can only get up to go to the bathroom and take one shower a day, which could get rough, especially around lunch time. Hopefully I'll go into labor soon on my own, but if not, I'll be induced on Tuesday. In other words, I have one week of pregnancy left, max. Wow.