24th Week - Midwives & Doulas

Friday we had our 24 Week prenatal appointment at our Midwife's office. Unfortunately, we showed up at 3:30 and our appointment wasn't scheduled until 4:30... luckily, one of the other 2 midwives on staff at Western OB was able to see us at 3:30. We were glad to meet her because, just as with most OBGyn practices, the midwife that will actually be with us during labor and delivery depends on who is on-call that day. She was very easy to talk to and answered my questions about the low pelvic pain I've been having... just as I read online, the pain has to do with making way for Baby Frantz and it completely normal. She suggested sleeping with a thicker pillow between my knees and perhaps investing in a pregnancy support band. I plan on trying the thicker pillow to see if that helps, if it doesn't I might try and find a support band :-)

We also got to have another quick ultrasound to capture the last required shot of Baby Frantz - the elusive profile shot. Once again Baby Frantz had his/her hand up by his/her face and made it difficult to get a decent view, but eventually the hand moved away and this is what we saw! Another successful prenatal visit :-) Today Matt and I went to our first doula interview. This particular doula was recommended to me by someone I met through ICAN her in the Twin Cities. She helped my friend successfully VBAC completely naturally without any interventions/pain medications so we were very excited to meet her! We met at her at Starbucks and chatted for about 1 1/2 hours. She answered all of Matt and I's questions and seems to have a lot of the qualities we are looking for: Dedicated to learning how we want the birth to go - so she can remind us of the things we really want during labor, completely supportive of Matt doing most of the hands-on support - yet showing us many new approaches to natural pain management, non-confrontational - really emphasizes establishing a positive working relationship with the hospital doctors and nurses, seems to have a good knowledge of when to speak up and when to let things progress on their own, doesn't seem to have her own hidden agenda - truly wants us to have the experience we are hoping for, & became a doula for all of the right reasons!

We plan on interviewing at least 2 more doulas over the next couple of weeks, and making a decision by the end of February. We've gotten a lot of good recommendations and just need to set up a couple more interviews :-)

Another good note... no more issues sitting down this week - I'm really hoping that was an isolated event ;-)