Getting Real
The fetus inside me finally feels more baby than fetus: a full live entity that stands up against the inside of my belly when I lay on my side, feet poking my skin down to touch the ground.
I've been told it's about the size of a coconut this week. Remember, the placenta grows apace. If I look down at my belly, it seems entirely plausible that there are two coconuts in there—but it must be getting tight.
If I gave birth today, the resultant baby would have 90-95% odds of survival. Four weeks from now, it's not even really considered early; NHS is clear that the go-bag should be packed by then. We have a doula as of this week, antenatal classes starting next week, a bassinet coming to live by Robert's side of the bed by the end of the weekend. I'm not traveling; we've decided it would be a good idea to stay close, just in case.
We're not expecting the baby early. Statistically, first babies come late. Though it wouldn't be concerning at this stage to start getting Braxton-Hicks contractions, I haven't been.
Mostly, I've been feeling good. I flashed a V2 at the bouldering gym last weekend, long walks no longer make my abs feel like they're breaking, and my novel is coming along on-pace. Pregnancy itself is a lot more fulfilling, too, when the fetus gets interactive. It wiggles after a poke, or a flashlight beam to the belly. You can usually see it when it moves.
But the third trimester is its own entity. In the last couple of days, I've been starting to feel Symptoms. My joints are okay, and I'm not nauseous (thank god), but once again, I rarely make it though the night without getting up to pee. My energy crashes hard after lunch, and by evening, it's full-on exhaustion most days, with or without a nap.
It's a strange contrast: in some ways, this is the best I've felt all pregnancy. We're staying on the fourth floor in our dogsit, and I can do the steep flights no problem, physically, though I'm out of breath sometimes by the top.
It's more the motivation that flags: a possibly concerning amount of time on the couch with the lapdog. Little desire to go, think, do. I work on the crossword puzzle. I read. I try to appreciate the peace of this strange and tired moment. Even when I wake from sleeping, my heart rate is high.
When we return to our own apartment in Bow, I discover tiny drops of colostrum have hardened in the fabric of my bra: that's new, a system test. I guess they're working.
We go out to lunch, but my stomach is compressed; I can't eat much, but I'll be hungry later. We drop by the neighbor's place to pick up the Snoo.
The Snoo smart bassinet is supposed to react to the baby's cries, automatically soothing it back to sleep with sound and motion. So once we (mostly Robert) carry it down three flights of stairs, across the lawn, and up two, we plug the thing in to test.
Nothing happens. We haven't read the manual. Robert pulls advice from Reddit: stick your phone in with a video of a crying baby. These are surprisingly hard to find: for some reason, people seem to upload mostly videos of infant soothing, rather than just throwing the crying baby up on YouTube and calling it a day.
After brief searching, he finds the sound effect and our loft fills with the sounds of newborn displeasure. Robert looks at me with already-tired eyes.
I discover a button on the end of the Snoo and switch it on: a soft whooshing white sound manifests, and the mattress starts to rock itself: harder and louder the longer we leave it.
"I guess it works?"
"Yeah."
We let the video run out. Ready, I guess.
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