Things that don't go bump in the night

It is hard not to go straight to panic mode when you realise you haven't felt your bub kick all day... this is what happened to us on Saturday

I had acupuncture in the morning and every other time Tricky has either gone completely mental during or immediately after the treatment and stayed really active for at least half an hour. After the session he hadn't moved and I thought nothing of it, assuming he was sound asleep (a Saturday morning sleep in, who could blame him?).

At 3pm when out with Hubby I mentioned in passing I couldn't feel him moving at all, but I still wasn't concerned, just very aware. A few times I thought it was him moving only to realise it was a small Braxton Hicks contraction.

I decided to have a bath at 7pm and if I laid really still and wrapped my arms around my belly I could feel the tiniest little movement, really similar to those first flutters – nothing like the footballer who had taken over my belly in the last two months. Where had my robust Tricky gone? By this point I was had passed being aware and had moved on to full blown concern – not panic, because after all, I could still feel him very slightly.

Hubby encouraged me to phone the midwives at the hospital, reminding me that we were told at antenatal classes to call for any reason and not to feel silly. But I still felt silly as I made the call... and then felt even worse when as soon as I introduced myself I burst in to tears!

My problem is I've never done this before – what is normal?! I've read the books so I know that foetal movement slows toward the end because they run out of room, but was it normal for him to go from being the number one draft pick one day to almost nothing the next? Surely it would be more gradual than that? The midwife, Louise, was fantastic and said we should just come in, have it all checked out on the monitor because then “you'll feel much better knowing he is fine”. She could not have used better words.

At the hospital Louise strapped me to a cardiotocography (CTG) machine which measured Tricky's heart rate and any contractions I was having. There is a speaker on there so you can hear the lovely swishy noise of the million miles an hour heartbeat. The standard monitoring is 20 minutes and in that time they like to see a good base heart rate (between 110-160 beats per minute) and two positive variations – meaning their heart rate spikes up twice as a result of their moving or a contraction. In the first 20 minutes Tricky's heart beat was nice and strong but only spiked once so they decided to go another round. Sure enough he decided to play along and his heart rate spiked again after I felt a small movement. Hooray!

The verdict? Louise and the other midwives think he's engaged (congratulations, Tricky – it's a lot earlier than I expected – oh wait, different type) and as a result can't squirm around as much as before. They figured this by having a bit of a feel around of my belly and because he didn't respond to the 'lemonade trick' where they try to give you and therefore the baby a sugar high by making you drink lemonade.

I like to find the silver lining in things that aren't the best. Not as a way to sugar-coat the sometimes negative or depressing parts of life, but as a way to remember that it is life after all and there are no guarantees. It might sound a bit stupid but the whole time that I've been saying that I'm having Braxton Hicks I actually had no idea if that was really what was happening... I was just going on what I'd read. I could very well have been feeling indigestion for all I know! But there it was in black and white on the machine print out – I was having small contractions (silver coloured ones). So now that it's confirmed that those feelings were what I thought they were, I'm no longer concerned that I will not realise I'm in labour – even after everyone telling me YOU WILL KNOW!

Did you have any dramas with your pregnancies? How did you manage to stay calm and not think about the worst case scenario?

Pins and needles

Today I had my first “Pre-Birth Acupuncture Treatment” at a great little place called East Meets West, a Traditional Chinese Medicine practice in Tuart Hill.

So what is a pre-birth treatment and what does it do? Starting from 36 weeks gestation you go in for weekly pin-cushion sessions that are designed to prepare the body for an efficient labour by ripening and softening the cervix, helping position the baby (they offer a separate, more intense treatment for breech presentation), promoting blood flow to the uterus and encouraging optimal energy and stamina.

They also claim that research at a major midwifery practice in New Zealand showed that these treatments are able to reduce the number of inductions, reduce the need for epidural anaesthesia and reduce the need for emergency caesarean sections (their site has some statistics but I won't bore you with them here).

The service was recommended to me by one of the women I met in antenatal class (the one who also wanted delayed cord clamping), because she did it and found it very helpful. Mind you, it appears to have worked so well for her that her baby came a week early! She experienced a quick (less than twelve hours start to finish) and natural birth, required no artificial pain relief and was absolutely thrilled at the way everything turned out. That's what I want!

I'm feeling really positive about it, not only because of a personal recommendation but because during the session (the tiny needles are left in for 20 minutes) I was simultaneously treated for a bout of heartburn I was experiencing – and by the end of the appointment the heartburn was gone. Whether it was the dozen or so miniature stab wounds doing their thing or it was the placebo affect I don't really know... but I also don't really care – either way it was gone and that was BRILLIANT! After taking out all the needles, the practitioner then put “seeds” on these heartburn spots – a tiny little metal ball on what is basically a little bandaid – for me to press whenever I feel the burn or to use as a preventative three to four times a day for 30 seconds. Plus as an added bonus, on the third session Hubby is invited along to learn the pressure points he can press for labour pain relief (although whether he decides to press his or mine remains to be seen).

Acupuncture isn't for everyone though, and I'm sure some will think I'm just going way too hippie freak. But I'm going to try everything I can to help me get through this birth as naturally as possible for as long as possible. I've already trained in meditation but having never meditated DURING LABOUR before I don't know how good I'll be – so a few other bits and pieces might be necessary. Next stop, the aromatherapy store!