This is old news now that Hailey is here, but here’s a Week 40 update.
We went in for an ultrasound on Monday 9/10 since that was the original due date and doc wanted to get a weight estimate on our baby girl. She’d been insisting that I had a big baby for a couple weeks, but I didn’t buy it. The ultrasound estimated that I was carrying an 8 pound, 10 oz hunk of baby, plus or minus a pound. If you look at the plus side, that is a lot of baby! I still couldn’t believe it, and even though we were warned ultrasounds don’t really estimate size well, we talked over when we should induce and some of the risks delivering a bigger baby with and without an epidural. I was only dilated 2 cm, so my doc seemed convinced I would need to be induced.
My birth plan was basically to see how it went and decide about an epidural once we knew how labor was progressing. However, the thought of inducing made an epidural sound like a better option. At the end of the day, I decided that I would just let go of anxiety and let Baby Girl come when she was ready, trusting that she would come before 9/17, when we would need to schedule an induction.
Everything had gone so smoothly so far, so why wouldn’t Baby Girl decide to come on her own time? I had already had that big burst of energy that I appropriately funneled into last-minute baby prep, housecleaning, and working out. I was time to just wait and see, and this new outlook brought me a sense of peace about the process.