Pre-Term Labor - Rough Day - Good NEWS!

Yesterday was a rough and nerve wracking day for me.

Apparently Squish decided they wanted a little bit of attention. I had some cramping and tightening in the pelvic area that freaked me out a bit. I debated quite a bit on calling, and whether or not it was worth bothering the doctors over. I'm really glad that I did.

Turns out I was in "pre-term labor" - having contractions about every 15 minutes. Surprisingly their machine was able to pick the contractions up, but it did. After about two hours of monitoring and the contractions going from about every half hour to every 10-15 minutes they gave me a shot of I think toradol to stop them. They warned me that it would make my heart race, which it really didn't - I just got the shakes pretty bad from it. After an hour with that the contractions were only about one every 45 minutes, but they gave me another shot and they stopped completely.

Since the main fear is contractions shortening my cervix, or even ripping my cerclage out (BAD) - they ordered an ultrasound of my cervix and to check on Squish. The woman who came up was really nice, and the first they did was check on Squish's heart, and such, make sure there was enough liquid in the amniotic sac for baby. The next thing was check to make sure baby is growing appropriately - they do this by measuring the baby's head, tummy, and thigh bone.

While they were measuring the thigh bone I caught a glimpse of three lines. I immediately asked the ultrasound tech if we that meant she was a girl. Of course Squish had moved by this point. The tech was really surprised we didn't know what we were having by this point - having so many ultrasounds... then I explained that baby is very uncooperative. This was something the lady doing the ultrasound agreed with since Squish was moving, bouncing, and dancing all over the womb. She did say that she would look to see if she could determine the gender for us though. Well - she looked and I knew right away - for boys you see just a little ball, and maybe something poking a tad. With girls you see -thats right, three lines.

SQUISH IS A GIRL!

We don't have any names picked out yet. Kelley and I really haven't thought about names so far, or at least we haven't talked about them. We'll have to see.

Having a girl is awesome, and never wracking. I *KNOW* boys, I took care of my brothers growing up, my best friends were guys, I was a tomboy, I've never been "girly". On top of that I ~DESPISE~ the color pink. Hate it. Sad to say. Also, and here is the part that freaks me out - the PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) that made my life hard for quite awhile and made it so hard to get pregnant is hereditary, so is the incompetent cervix that we lost Christopher too. I'm thrilled to know what we are having, and so long as this baby ends up happy and as healthy as possible, and stays in mommy long enough I could care less about the gender. At the same time, I'm nervous to be a momma to a girl. We will see.

So - for those who would like to know, since we've been asked. We ARE registering, I've sort of started, and will post where when we have it down. Kelley and I agreed a long time ago to a jungle themed nursery. We LOVE the Fisher-Price Rainforest stuff that is out there - and that's a lot of what we plan on getting. If at all possible, I would like to avoid the bombardment of pink, I know ITS A GIRL, but really, there are things out there for girls that aren't pink. Are we having a baby shower? I couldn't tell you. I wouldn't mind one, but know nothing about them, and it's a tad hard when you are on couch/bed lockdown.