Nearly Here!

Speaking of baby and mother, that is.

I had a bit of a worry last night when I got a sore tummy. But it wasn't a pain in my back, which is where my other labours were. I got a tummy rub (at one stage all three of them were rubbing me!) and lay down and then had a bath and felt all better again. No more painful contractions, but lots of painless ones.

I called Mum last night to see how the packing was going, and convinced her to swap a cardy for a sarong and a couple more t-shirts! I know how hard it is to imagine how hot/cold you are going to be when the real temperature around you keeps interfering, and I could tell the cold winter was making Mum worry about being too cold here!

But it really is still stiflingly hot here, though I had thought it would have cooled down a bit by the time she got here. But I spent yesterday morning outside at the 'Mini Sports Day' (regular school day full dress rehearsal for the real deal School Sports Day next Sunday) and that got me thinking about how hot it still is, and what a shock poor Mum is going to get, because it's still hotter than a NZ summer. I informed her that is has cooled down just enough that I now need - sometimes - to put a sheet on at night. And I don't need to put the air conditioner on until nearly lunchtime, as opposed to around 9-10am. I usually change my clothes at least once a day (making three changes counting pyjamas) just because I get so sweaty.

Kanji is all set to go pick up Mum. Mum was a little worried about what would happen if I went into labour while he is gone, and it is a concern. I asked Kanji and the only answer he had was to pray! Okay, so I'm not allowed to start until lunchtime tomorrow. I think I can hold on that long. The contractions continue, but my dilation hasn't changed at all. I think it's rather silly checking actually, since it means absolutely nothing.

I wasn't too pleased with the clinic visit this morning. I got a very sore back lying flat on my back for the non-stress test, a situation that was not helped by my believing such tests to be mostly unecessary and pretty useless. After all, it only tells me how she's going for that particular half and hour, and I don't usually lie on my back, so it's all wrong anyway. It's not so easy to endure discomfort and pain if you don't believe it's necessary. I hope they are lenient with the goddam monitor during labour! I know from experience just how much less it hurts to simply sit upright or lie on your side.

The other thing was, the doctor started to tell Kanji about how long they'd let me wait to go into labour naturally - while I was in the next room getting ready for the (useless) dialtion check, no less. Lucky I heard through the door. Medical personnel ALWAYS do this to us, and I have come to prefer not to have Kanji there, so that they will make an effort to communicate with me. Usually the doctors, although shy of using English, do know the technical terms, and are much better than Kanji at explaining things to me - he not only just nods and agrees whether he understood or not, he then forgets half of what they said. This is not a good way for me to get information about my health! Not to mention he is unlikely to - god forbid - ask questions or disagree.

So I had him promise that 'on the day' he would ask them to direct their questions, explanations etc, to me. He's quite happy to do that! He knows he can't relay it all to me in either language, and I think it makes him extremely nervous when they do start telling him stuff, as he knows he's going to get questioned intensively by me later on!