It is the end of Week 32 of my 40 week journey.
Part of the things you learn about having a small, living human as a co-resident of your body is that they like to move just as much as you do. And when you get to the point where you can actually feel them moving about, it becomes of interest to note how often they are nudging, prodding, kicking and generally elbowing.
Specifically it becomes important that they are continuing to move. To make sure that they are, your midwife may provide a simple kick chart for you to note the 10 movements per day that seems to be the baseline measurement.
In our case there is very little chance of a mellow 10 movements per day.
Miss OhWaily is destined to be a sports person of some kind. We are debating whether it is likely to be tennis, golf or some sort of sport requiring great hand-foot co-ordination. Even with all this activity I thought I would do the kick chart to keep the midwife happy and for my own curiosity.
Not surprisingly the most activity seems to happen early in the morning or later in the evening when I am lying down and there is plenty of elbowing space.
During the day she makes her views known about the upright, working mother mode and chooses to show that through some serious foot-in-rib pushing combined with elbow prodding directly on or around the bladder. Apparently we are truly in competition for the space that I once fondly called my own insides.
I have chosen to rub, push and use the force of gravity to try and remove the offending foot and/or feet from my ribs. Sometimes it works, sometimes she is stubborn (must get that from her Dad - yeah right!) and keeps right on pushing.
I can vouch for the fact that it is not fun to have a baby stubbornly pressing their feet into your ribcage. It makes for tender spots and constant aches.
Fortunately Miss OhWaily appears to have shuffled into a new position and has become much less inclined to express her need for space through vertical stretching.
I made up my own chart for doing this as the one provided only covered the hours of 9 am to 9 pm and this didn't match my movement patterns. It's a simple thing to create in Excel, but as Wordpress only allows images or document files I have uploaded it as a table in a word document. Feel free to download it if it meets your needs.
OhWailyWaily's Kick Chart
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Hi!
The description of your baby’s movements sounds sooo familiar! I have a beautiful 2 month old daughter now but when she was in the tummy, boy did she not let up for a second. I didn’t actually keep a chart, but her pattern of movement was so regular, I could set my watch to it. She started around 10:30 everyday, took a small break late afternoon and started up again until 11:00 at night! I didn’t attach too much significance to this pattern until I figured out a couple of weeks ago that she still has the same waking/sleeping rhythm! This mommy is kept very busy! I’m slowly trying to change her schedule so that she’s up in the morning, gets good and tired and takes a nice long nap in the afternoon.
She was also very “vocal” in her movements. Her head turned down week 32 and she was all in the front of my belly so I could feel every little movement. The most ridiculously painful movements were the little feet that would press so hard against my belly that you could actually see the outline of her foot. One time, I swear you could even see her little toes! She would always “exercise” her legs in the same place every day just under my ribs. I was 10 days overdue and at the end I was pushing against her feet just as hard as she was pushing against me! Sometimes tickling worked too. As long as the souls of her feet were turned up, I could tickle her into moving them
I think the most annoying thing was the hiccups! The first time it was amazing. I couldn’t believe how clearly I could feel it. The second time I was all excited for my husband to feel it too. Every time after that, it simply drove me nuts several times a day and once just as I wanted to go to sleep at night. Her hiccups were so violent, my whole tummy would shake. Well, her hiccups haven’t changed a bit, their still every bit as violent (and loud) except that their all hers now!
My little girl did not want to come out all the way to the end. Her head was never engaged and even when I was induced, she tried to keep from heading down as long as possible. With every contraction, she would actually move up higher in my belly kicking like no tomorrow against my ribs. When all was said and done, I actually ended up with a bruised rib and it hurt more than all the other aches and pains!
Best wishes to you for the rest of your pregnancy and a speedy and safe delivery. I actually have a post-pregnancy blog and would love to have you visit!
Looking forward to hearing from you!
Mala
http://postbabyfitness.wordpress.com/
Hi Mala,
Welcome.
I'm not sure whether to be a little bit worried about the activity pattern following through to her sleeping patterns. So far I have had fairly peaceful nights (not necessarily 8 hours straight sleep) without too much internal action, so perhaps we might be lucky and have a good night sleeper. I'm going to keep my fingers crossed on that one.
As for the pain and bruising of being shoved in the ribs, I think that this is only truly comprehended once someone has it happen to them. Otherwise it's just a bit too abstract.
It sounds like your daughter was quite happy to stay snuggled and warm, and I guess you can't blame her for that. Birth can't be that much fun for them after a warm and cosy environment.
Thanks for the good wishes. I'm supposed to have arrived in a rush according to my mother, so I am waiting to see if my daughter is going to follow that example. Of course, too much speed has its pitfalls too.
I'll try to pop over and take a look shortly - but as you can probably see from other entries, we are not only in the throws of a baby, but renovations and serious work stuff too...
Ah the joys. Still, I am definitely up for any hints and tips for getting back to some sort of fitness after this stage of the parenting journey ends.
Cheers for now.
Hi!
My little one just slept 9 hours for the first time last night. She's always slept well during he night but this was the first time at such a long stretch. When I was pregnant, I noticed little or no movement during the night, so I suppose that was a sign of things to come!
Staying in was definitely the position of choice for my baby. Once I was induced, things did go fast and as far as I have heard, contractions are also much speadier and heavier from the artificial catalyst. My heavy labor was 50 minutes (that was the fast part) at the end of 14 hours. I think this is about average for a first child.
Good luck with the renovations, looking forward to hearing how it all goes for you.
Mala
http://postbabyfitness.wordpress.com/
Post a Comment