39 weeks!

I am 39 weeks today! I have never been 39 weeks pregnant before!

This baby seems to be taking his/her good ole time! On Thursday the doctor said I was 4-5cm and 80%. At 39 weeks the doctor was willing to induce and we were thinking of doing it. josiah's first answer to me was, are you sure this is safe for the baby? Are you sure there is no risk to the baby? Mom K and I stopped and prayed for wisdom in knowing what we should do as I started to research it. At first I was reading all minor, rare side effects to the Mom and I was sure we could do it. Then we prayed again and I started finding the side effects to the baby. Josiah and I then decided against being induced for now at least. I already have precipitous labor which means my labors are less than 3 hours and the contractions are stronger, longer, and closer together than normal. Pitocin makes them even stronger, longer and closer yet.

I had pitocin with Jay's birth b/c my water broke and 8 hours later I still was not having any contractions, but he was born with his face as gray as gray could be. But it all made sense as I was reading about pitocin it said that when you have contractions the blood (and therefore oxygen) supply to the baby is cut off. So when I had almost back to back contractions with only extremely short breaks in between for 30-45 minutes so it would have been decreasing the blood and oxygen supply off for most of the labor time. I read a lot about how women are given pitocin then later the baby goes into distress and then they need a c-section and the doctors say "wow, we saved that Mom/Baby" but the truth is the baby went into distress only because of the extra stress from the pitocin which was given often just because the labor was taking longer than the doctors wanted.

We decided it was not worth any risk to the baby to try inducing him/her early. We are going to wait a little longer and see what happens. This baby is only about 6 pounds so maybe he/she needs more time to grow and get stronger. If it is necessary to start my labor at some point that will be different, but we see no reason to try to induce - risk any possible harm to the baby - for our convenience.

This just means we have to trust God to work out the details of when this precious little one arrives. We don't have family here the whole time so working everything out so we will have someone to care for the other 3 kids so we can quick run to the hospital. Mom K is planning to leave sometime between the 4-6 depending on her back (she hurt it while trying to pick Jay up and is not able to sit/walk very well - please pray for a quick full recovery for her). My parents will be coming the 9th, if the baby is born already. Otherwise it will be the 10 or 11 until other family arrives.

So we are waiting, waiting, waiting......

I can't wait to see if I have a fourth little man or a little lady!