Next week, I will probably be having a baby.
Due to what my the ob/gyn feels is "poor control" of my gestational diabetes (yet what my endocrinologist and the midwives see as good control) he wants to do an amnio next Tuesday to see if the lungs are ready. If they are, I will be sectioned on Thursday. Yes, sectioned. Since my last caesarian was so recent, they can't do anything but a straight pictocin induction. My last induction lasted three days, and everyone was obsessed with the machine that goes 'ping' instead of what was going on with me. I had envisioned JH's birth as a quiet and joyous event, with me and my husband in a whirlpool at the birth center, with one of the midwives and a doula in attendance. Instead, I was in the hospital practically strapped to a bed, and at one point I think there were twelve people in the room. Since JH was posterior, there was practically no chance of him coming out without me being able to move around the room a little, and there was also the problem that once they turned off the pictocin my contractions stopped.
Ugh. Anyhow, looking back on how crappy my birth experience was last time, I deicided just to go with the c-section. I just don't see the point in having to go through all that crap again only to probably wind up with a c-section. I'm just a little surprised that it's so soon...36 weeks. If the lungs are ready. Which one of the midwives assures me is full-term, and she used lovely cultural examples to prove her point. So I learned that Asians give birth at approximately 37 weeks, and us white girls usually go late.
The other thing I've learned is there is no uniform standard of care for gestational diabetes. My endocrinologist says one thing while my ob/gyn says another. Actually, my ob thinks I was diabetic before the pregnancy, but my A1C test shows I was not. In fact, it shows that the GD came pretty late in the pregnancy. But that's neither here nor there as I have to take insulin, which is where the apparent danger lies. Yesterday the ob basically told me there was no communication between endos and the ob's, and that they weer both working from different standards of care. Which made me furious. I mean, what's the point in sending me to the endo if it won't affect my care at the ob? And searching the internet brings me no closer to answers...everyone has a different story as to how their GD was handled.
So, next week I will probably be having a baby. Hopefully he will be as happy and healthy as my lovely little baby-pie, John Henry. Hopefully I will recover as quickly as I did with the last section. And hopefully, this will be our last child so I can wash my hands of the giant, messy, over-intrusive machine that passes for maternity care in this country. If not, we're hightailing it to The Farm.
I'm so sorry you have to gve up the birth you've been hoping for. I hope the birth you do have is good and that you recover speedily and your new baby will absolutely be as wonderful as your older son. Best wishes to you.
Posted by: Beth | February 17, 2005 at 10:19 PM