Andrea’s Weblog

35 days and counting…

I recently discovered that a baby can hear a song in the womb and
remember it a year later, so now I’m trying to be more aware of what
the baby is listening to. I’m hoping that the baby does not think his
name is Coozie, due to the fact that I’m constantly conversing with our
cat. I can’t count how many times a day I say the name Coozie—only
because I get a little meow every time. Luckily the other cat only
responds to the head-scratch gesture, so the baby won’t have too much
of an identity crisis.

I decided to give the baby some more interesting things to listen to.
Frank made some mix CDs for my baby shower containing songs related to
birth, growing up, and being a parent. I was happy listening to this
until I got to the song about kicking. The baby definitely doesn’t need
any encouragement in this area.

I’m feeling more and more prepared for parenthood. My coworker hosted a
shower for my local friends last Saturday and we had a great time. I
was excited and surprised to get so many things from our baby registry.
I can’t believe nobody caved and went for the cutsie baby clothes. The
funniest part was the baby book I received. They embellished certain
pages with pictures of future events, such as “Baby McPherson wins the
Masters” or “Baby McPherson is Chef of the Year.” To craft the
pictures to go with these headlines they took the heads off of Frank
and my baby photos and pasted them onto other photos. The result was
hilarious. I won’t forget that Frank was sneaky enough to go behind my
back to give them the photos!

My body is also preparing for birth with some practice contractions,
braxton hicks contractions—at least I think that’s what was going on.
For several hours I felt I could not relax my stomach muscles no matter
how much I tried. It felt like I had been curled up in a ball all day
and was trying to straighten out. I couldn’t tell if there was any
contracting and releasing going on, just a general discomfort.
Hopefully this will pay off with extra strong stomach muscles! Between
this and the baby’s constant kicking, stretching, and bruising my
belly, I think I’m just about ready to get this over with. The new
trick this past week is sweeping across my bladder. This results in a
brief, yet intense, urge to pee, sometimes accompanied by a jolt of
surprise.

To combat this new sense of overall discomfort, I went in for a
pre-natal massage. It was definitely relaxing, but I got the feeling
that the woman didn’t really know what to do with a big pregnant chick
on her table. At least at home, I have a routine with my pillows, but
to the woman preparing for the massage, it seemed like a complex
puzzle. I ended up coaching her on where to put them. Next time I’ll
stick to pedicures!