Third Trimester Recap

Since my last post, baby made her quick (and quite dramatic) entrance and we had our AMAZING wedding, so things have been beyond crazy over here. I cannot wait to share it alllll, but for now I want to revisit the third trimester because I like to remember these things.

SYMPTOMS

• Swollen fingers! I was starting to worry that my wedding rings wouldn’t be able to fit on my sausage fingers at the wedding.
• Lots more colostrum leakage. I remember getting frustrated that I’d have to wash my nightgowns every night because they’d have nipple spots all over them—I still refused to wear a bra then, little did I know I’d have to wear a bra with pads in them every day/night once baby actually arrived.
• Karate kicks, especially at night. Around 11pm she’d start having a dance party, but her feet were always in my right ribs.
• Chiropractor and midwives all confirmed she was head down and in a great position for birth.
• Hip pain! I would wake up with one hip aching, so I’d switch to the other side, then wake up to that one aching. For the last couple weeks I’d wake up and ice my hips on the couch because I wouldn’t be able to sleep through it (I don’t miss that part!).
• Startling myself awake with my own snores. I’ve never snored unless I had a cold or something, so this was bizarre to me.
• It was crazy hot out here in Florida at this point, so I was miserable on our few walks I did manage to get in. We took our dog, Leon, to training classes and they were an hour long outside so toward the end Jason had to just go without me. Being outside was my least favorite thing there toward the end.
• Basically none of my pre-pregnancy clothes fit anymore. I was living in nightgowns and borrowed t-shirts.
• Passed my glucose test, found out I was a bit deficient in iron but was able to get my levels up with supplements and a couple tinctures my midwives recommended, and once I tested negative for GBS at my 37-week appointment, I felt READY.

BIRTH PREP

• I’d been preparing for birth with the self-study Hypnobabies course since about 27 weeks so that I could use medical-grade hypnosis (no epidural for home births!) when it was go time. I cannot recommend this course enough, but more on that later.
• I started going to a chiropractor who was certified in the Webster Method right around the second trimester to encourage baby to get into the most ideal position for vaginal birth (if baby is not positioned correctly, you’re far more likely to need interventions and that’s when it’s better to be in a hospital setting instead of at home). I went once a week every week, including the day I went into labor.
• Aside from practicing my hypnosis tracks, I was eating six dates a day (to help soften my cervix), drinking about a quart of raspberry tea (I would put it in a big jug in the fridge because I couldn’t stand hot tea during FL summer, and it’s supposed to help with likelihood of going into spontaneous labor vs needing induction), and listening to positive affirmations about birth (a 40-min track I listened to every single day, which was SO helpful).
• I painted my favorite affirmations to hang on the walls during birthing time.
• Sitting on and doing exercises on my birthing ball (I looked up various birthing ball workouts on YouTube—ones not meant to induce labor but rather get baby into a good position). I also did the Miles Circuit a couple of times, including on birthing day. 
• Once I hit 38 weeks I started taking evening primrose orally (after discussing with my midwives and doula who both discouraged inserting vaginally).
• I ordered alllll the supplies for home birth, including a giant tupperware for my placenta. For some reason that part felt more surreal than all the other supplies we acquired, but we also had a waterproof sheet for the bed as well as several plastic shower curtains and sets of sheets to protect the mattress (this will be good to know for the birth story…), a giant trash bag labeled toxic waste (yikes), a net for the birthing pool (yep, for poop lol), puppy pee pads for me to lie on, receiving blankets, and so much more that we never got to use. 
• I read SO many positive natural (unmedicated) birth stories. I couldn’t get enough of these. It was important to me to read about and remember all the things that can (and most often do) go right in birth.
• I got a TENS machine from Amazon as well that I planned to use when contractions (or waves as I called them with my Hypnobabies course) got really intense, but I never used it so I can’t actually vouch for it. I have heard great things though.

FEELINGS

At this point, I was getting really excited and hyper focused on birth. Jason can attest to how much time and dedication I put into my Hypnobabies course—I’m certain he was annoyed at how often he’d come try to tell me something and I’d be deep in hypnosis and not available to chat for about an hour at a time, several times a day (but we both agree it was TOTALLY worth it). I talked to my mom (a retired nurse and 4-time natural birth goddess) pretty much every day, getting pep talks, talking through anxieties, dreaming about what baby would look like, and just marveling at how big my belly was and how much it would move when she’d kick. Jason would go on walks with me whenever I felt up to it, and we were just incredibly excited and so ready to meet our baby girl.