21st Century Contractions

For a week I've had what I considered Braxton Hick's contractions. They were usually mild with only the occasional zinger and were extremely inconsistent.

At my last doctor's visit (as I've mentioned before) I was 2 cm dilated and 50% effaced. Basically, things were starting to move along. I was grateful that the Braxton Hicks were actual (though mild) contractions and that my body seemed to know it needed to kick in gear for baby.

Yesterday morning the real fun began. Although they were still inconsistent, there was a definite difference in duration and intensity. We ran a few errands in the morning with the kids and then drove down for Steve's sister's (Lauren) senior basketball game at Rowan. I was pretty uncomfortable, especially when chasing the kids around, but didn't think about timing anything.

On the car ride home, we whipped out our handy-dandy iPhone contraction. This baby is amazing. It has a start/stop timer for contractions and will document intensity, duration, etc. I don't know how people kept track of these things before the iPhone.

The contractions were running roughly 30-40 minutes apart but seemed to be maintaining the same pain level. It wasn't until this evening that I began to understand why women moaned, leaned against walls, and generally turned into the unintelligible and irritable Sloth from The Goonies.

We had friends over for dinner, and though I apologized for my 15-20 pains, I was grateful to have them there to keep me distracted so I wouldn't be looking at the clock and dreading the next round. We went to bed, but it wasn't 10 minutes later that I was up again pacing the room and leaning on the walls. From that point on, it was consistently 20 minutes until I began to hit the 12 minute mark with the occasional 9 minute jump. I jumped in the shower to relax and to be ready for what lies ahead. And so, here I sit on my laptop trying to stay distracted and mellow.

Who knows what the rest of the evening/morning will hold! Like everything about pregnancy, it's a waiting game.