26 Weeks

It has been sort of a stressful past week or so. Last Wednesday I ended up at the hospital with more of the 'Braxton hicks' contractions. I wasn't feeling well that day and called my Dr. to see if I needed to come in, of course I did. They are actually like fake contractions that are the body’s way of preparing for the real thing. They are normal however; it is very early for me to be having them. They should occur closer to full term but because my belly is already measuring close to full term size for a single baby it thinks it is almost done doing its job. Needless to say this is not good and was slightly alarming. I was basically diagnosed with an "irritated uterus", meaning that the likelihood of me going into pre-term labor (before 37 weeks) is higher than what is ideal. It doesn't appear that anything is moving in the labor direction though so that is reassuring, but again this will be something that gets monitored closely. I had an apt with my OB on Friday and she advised me to start working only 1/2 days this week and next week we will take a look at the situation again to see if there have been any changes. I think I am close to being put on full or partial bed rest. I was sort of expecting this to happen but I was just hoping it wasn't until the end of June. Lying around if you can imagine is already getting a little old. I am so thankful that I don't have any other children to take care of, my only job is just to try and keep these little babies inside for as long as possible.... everything else can wait. If I have to go on bed rest I hope I will have lots of visitors....otherwise I think I will go crazy?!!!! All in all we are doing so well and every minute of this stress will be worth it. As you can see my tummy is getting BIG, I don't realize how much I actually have grown until I compare pictures from week to week. I just can't believe I have TWO babies in there, my skin already feels stretched to the max...but somhow it just keeps stretching!