"funny you should call..."

so, as i was getting out of the shower today and about to get dressed, i sneezed and had a trickle of fluid come down my legs. i might have actually even made the scooby sound when it happened ("whoohh'?!"). coincidentally, within seconds, the phone rang and it was dr. gentry's office calling to confirm my next appointment. i said "funny you should call... tell me again, how do you know when your water breaks?" she described it, and i described what i experienced and she said "hmmmm... sounds like that could be it." she then said she would leave a message for dr. gentry to call me back and tell me what to do. i figured, well if this is what's going on, i better make sure i eat a really good meal since who knows the next time i'm gonna eat. so we went to cactus taqueria for some crispy tacos... DE-lish! we also figured that since we were in the area, we'd swing by rockridge kids and pick up a few things.

dr. gentry called back while we were eating. she wanted to me to get to labor and delivery pretty quick. "but can i finish my lunch?" "sure, you can finish lunch" she said. "but what about stopping at home to get my stuff. can i do that?" "well, ok. you can do that" she said. "what do you think about us swinging by rockridge kids to pick up a few things?" "uh, no. you need to get to labor and delivery right away" she advised. she said that if my water broke, they want to admit you within 12 hours. it's possible that it happened this morning shortly before i got up so running errands would be pushing it. and then she says "and by the way, i'm not going to be around to night... i've been up for 2 days and i need to sleep." to which i replied "huh. ok. i see." what i didn't say was, "well then i won't be around either. me and pooty are just gonna hang on until you are rested and can be available." although i don't want to prolong this pregnancy thing any further, i prefer not to be delivered by an on call doc if i can manage it.

so we went home, gathered our things, loaded the car and headed off to the hospital for what i had already decided would be a quick round trip. i mean, despite all of this, i really wasn't having any discernible contractions so as much as i am ready for the baby to come, i figure it'll keep until the morning. plus, once we arrived at the hospital, i realized that i forgot my favorite sweats which i planned to wear home. they were fresh from the laundry but they didn't make it into my bag. we got to the labor and delivery triage around 5:00 p.m. and we're helped by this fabulous nurse mary, who actually turned out to be a friend of a friend. she was great! and after about 90 minutes of monitoring, she confirmed that my water hadn't broken. the baby is fine. she talked to dr. gentry and they agreed to send me home to which i replied "you know, that works better for me."

so it was basically a false alarm. for anyone who does not want to know more detail about what could have been leaking, you should stop reading now because this is a serious TMI alert. if you choose to read on, know that you have been warned.

for all other interested parties, nurse mary said that it was likely urine or watery mucus leakage. if it was amniotic fluid, it would have been a more obvious trickle and with greater volume. since i'm full term, it is unlikely that i have a high leak so she really didn't think it was that. additionally, they did the little litmus test they do and the paper did not turn bright blue (the blue indicates that it's amniotic fluid). what she did find was a lot of mucus that would be consistent with the "spotting" i experienced earlier this morning and a couple of times throughout the day. she said it could be the mucus plug coming out or it could be that i already lost it (i though i might have this morning) but it's hard to say. the monitors did show that i was having mild contractions, but frankly, i didn't notice. she didn't really check to see if i was dilated because i wasn't complaining of painful contractions and to check that would have involved her spelunking deeper into my lady business with a speculum which, as you can imagine, is not pleasant. while i was there, a lady came in clearly in active labor and i certainly wasn't moaning like her so i just didn't see the urgency in checking that since i don't believe i would be so mellow if there were any significant progress in that area. besides, as i mentioned previously, giving birth tonight really doesn't work for me since dr. gentry's not available. so that's the scoop. everybody do the labor dance so that tomorrow, when i imagine dr. gentry will be available again, we can really get this labor and delivery thing moving along.