First things first, this baby boy FLIPPED! It's a nothing short of a miracle for me.
I'll relay the whole story for anyone that cares to hear it momentarily. I've been thinking a lot about miracles in 2019. We've been studying the New Testament this year and my children are fascinated by the miracles Christ performed. They have such a sweet faith and spirit about them as they learn about all He did in his mortal ministry. What is more miraculous to me than walking on water, calming a storm, healing the sick and afflicted, causing the dead to rise, and all His other beautiful miracles, is how he acted and what he taught. To imagine myself being able to change to become truly meek, humble, forgiving, unconditionally loving, slow to anger, and utterly selfless is far harder for my faith to cling to. I struggle minute to minute to hold onto becoming that new creature I know I can be through Christ. It feels absolutely impossible most days. I find myself waking in the morning re-commiting to being better than I was the day before. To spend more time listening and less time talking. To remove "I" and "me" out of my vocabulary and mentality and add more "they" , "he", "she" and "you". Slow to anger has been such an embarrassing struggle lately. I find myself following that funny, but also sadly true meme of the cheery and kind Mary Poppins when telling my children to do something for the first time then morphing into Batman's deep, scary voice by the end of it. The miracle for me comes when I do receive that strength to be just a bit more patient in the moments I feel like being so the least. I know until that day my faith makes me wholly that person I want to be, I can still be of good cheer knowing it will happen someday. My kids will probably be adults, BUT it's going to happen.
Now on to that miracle that happened with baby boy flipping head down. I was SO anxious about him being breech. I feel like I'm particularly anxious while pregnant no matter what, but this just drove me crazy. I was incredibly touched by how many people reached out to me to comfort me and offer advice. It was such a relief to me and made my heart burst with gratitude and love for those who took the time to reach out for something that might not seem like that big of a deal to most. We found out at my 36 week appointment he was breech and were told 1/8 babies turn on their own past this point. I'd known he was breech since week 34, but didn't do much past a few spinning baby moves because I wasn't worried about it yet. I was super taken aback by how quickly we were talking other options at my appointment because I had barely let it cross my mind he wouldn't flip.
If he didn't flip by 39 weeks, I would have to be scheduled for a c-section. There were risks in letting myself go past 39 weeks that he might have a short cord and that stillbirth risk of breech babies past a certain point went up significantly. I was scheduled for an external version for March 11th, but Sel and I had decided against it after a bunch of research. I'd talked to plenty of people who had successful ones, but we just didn't want to risk the chance of having to have an emergency c-section if things went wrong instead of just having a scheduled one. My OB does an epidural for eversions simply because of the risk and because it can range from being mildly uncomfortable to more painful than actual childbirth. We decided to try everything we could and just hope he turned by 39 weeks. I did a bunch of headstands off the couch, had Sel prop me upside down on an ironing board (which was terribly uncomfortable), went swimming, rubbed pressure points, put an ice-pack on my tummy and played music downstairs. My SIL even made a fun playlist to draw him down under. I scheduled an appointment with a chiropractor (who Sel was adamantly against having me see) and was looking online for acupuncturists (shhhh my husband would equally dislike me seeing one of those). I was such a hot mess during the days following my appointment. I was talking to everyone I possibly knew about their experiences with c-sections/eversions/breech babies. I made a trillion threads on social media and got tons of responses. It was almost more confusing to sift through those because so many people had such varying experiences. Since I already don't sleep great for physical reasons (tiny bladder, giant belly, sore back), I was now barely sleeping at all because my brain wouldn't shut down. People were way too nice to me in my fragile mental state. It wasn't even like there was anything that serious going on, but I was seriously going nuts.
The miracle came in such a dramatically beautiful way. We went to a session at the temple and the MOMENT I was done and changing in the dressing room, he moved in this weird, painful way and I felt a tiny gush of fluid. I was so confused and uncomfortable, but moved on. The next day he kept moving in weird ways which was always accompanied by some more fluid. I started googling things wondering if maybe I was leaking amniotic fluid. After reading a bunch of things that described water breaking as a trickle instead of the dramatic movie gush, we decided I should just go get checked out at L&D to make sure it wasn't. The first test strip they did had two positive drops on it. The second strip was positive for amniotic fluid. They made me stop drinking water and said there was a chance I would have to have a c-section THAT night. I started to freak the freak out. I had left Sel at home with our sleeping kids and who were we supposed to wake up at 11:30pm to come over to be with our kids? I hadn't really packed anything but my contact case and was NOT ready to have a baby. Baby boy was so incredibly high up that they couldn't find his heartrate most of my stay there because he was up by my sternum. I know now he was transverse and trying to turn which is why his heart was jammed so far up there. They decided to run another test that was more accurate and I had to wait for the lab to send the results up. It was just so frustrating. I feel like this whole pregnancy has had really random, really weird happenings to it. Things that border on being potentially serious, but aren't as obvious that way and not things I could just dismiss. Finally, she came back to let me know I was clear and gave me an entire cup of delicious ice-chips to chew. I went to my OB the next day to find out he was all the way head down. Sel had even come (his first appointment probably since we had Rowan) because we figured we would be trying to sort out our options and it would be nice to be together for that. It was a blissfully anticlimactic appointment.
I do not find it a coincide he decided to start to turn in the temple. I had a friend later tell me she had put my name on the prayer roll that afternoon and I'm positive that was a factor. I'd felt so much peace after Sel gave me a blessing that everything was going to turn out okay no matter what. I was feeling calm about a c-section or not. I just kept feeling like my answer was "wait" and now I know why. I also feel really grateful for this brief period of worry. I was moaning about going over my due date and having to be marathon induced (since I go in the night before my inductions to get cervadil) and NOW I am so incredibly looking forward to the 41 week scheduled induction. I know I'll have people to care for my kids, I know what to expect, and I'm not left waffling between all these choices with unknown consequences. Things can always go different ways for birth, but if things follow the previous pattern, I'll be zero percent dilated at 41 weeks and never experience a contraction until I'm pumped chock full of pitocin. AND NOW I'M SO HAPPY. Life has such a beautiful, strange way of teaching me things.
