39 Weeks - Enjoying our Last Days as D.I.N.K.s

In the six years that Eric and I have been together, he has taught me quite a few new vocabulary words...mostly slang terms he's picked up over the years, a smattering of "Pittsburgh-ese" and many that he's just made up to fulfill his need for a non-existent word. We've melded many of these terms together to devise our own "Frueh language". I often wonder if someone were a fly on the wall in our home if they would have any idea what we were talking about most of the time. One of the terms Eric has used to describe us is D.I.N.K.s (Dual-Income-No-Kids). He claims it's a real marketing term. Well, our time as D.I.N.K.s is about to come to an end. It's a change we're excited about and definitely ready to embrace. To celebrate our last days in D.I.N.K.-dom, we had a mini-golf date night with a late dinner at a local favorite, Huey's Oyster Bar, live music and all. There are things that I will definitely miss about this phase of our lives, such as going out to restaurants without working around naptimes and feeding schedules, or deciding on a whim to take a weekend trip. But, we're both excited to begin sharing our lives with Molly. I can't wait for Molly's first trip to the ocean with us. I'm excited to show her around our favorite spots in the 'burgh and help her build her first snowman at Marmee and Poppy's house in NY. Eric and I are both excited to share our lives with our new little girl. Good-bye D.I.N.K.-dom, Hello Parenthood!

We've reached the 39-week mark. Molly is considered to be "full-term" anytime between 38 and 42 weeks, so she could choose her birth-day at any point in this 4-week period. My Type-A personality doesn't like the unpredictability of this part of pregnancy, but I guess that's the nature of the process. Molly is preparing herself for the outside world at her own pace. She is producing more surfactant to mature her lungs. She is also shedding the last of the vernix and she's sloughing off her outer layer of skin to reveal the first layer of newly produced mature skin cells underneath. She's already started misbehaving and disobeying her Mama's instructions. For the entire 3rd trimester, Molly has been a perfect angel, positioned "just right" for birth, head down and back out (her back against my belly and her face toward my spine). Well, for the last 2 weeks, she has started a gymnastics routine that involves rolling herself over from back to front and back again. At the last two midwife appointments, she has positioned herself "sunny-side-up" (her belly facing my belly). We don't want her sunny-side-up at delivery time because this usually results in a long labor with lots of back labor and a longer pushing stage. So Molly, if you're listening, this is your Mother speaking, "No more sunny-side up, please!!!".

I believe Molly really does have a sense of what's happening here in the outside world most of the time. For the last few days, I've experienced some fleeting labor signs...scattered Braxton-Hicks contractions, pressure in my legs and lower back, and an uncontrollable urge to clean out the refrigerator. At our last appointment, the midwife said that my cervix had begun to efface, but there was no sign of dilation yet. But I think my Molly knew that she couldn't come until her Marmee was here from NY. Well, today Marmee arrived and Molly knew! She's only been here for about 8 hours and already the Braxton-Hicks have picked up both in frequency and intensity and labor feels much more imminent!! Everyone's ready to meet you, Miss Molly, so let's get this show on the road...sunny-side-down please.