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How Far Along: 27  weeks

Baby’s Size: Baby weighs about two pounds and is about the size of a head of cauliflower.

Weight Gain: Apparently, I can’t do math. More like 17 this week, which is actually more what it should have been last week.

Symptoms: Lots of hip pain, and a fun sensation of everything “falling” when I stand up. Also, a couple of hours of seriously painful contractions, but more on that later.

Exercise: We took more walks this week, but nothing “formal.”

Clothes: All maternity.

Cravings/Aversions: I suddenly needed a chicken salad sub Saturday, and still looooooove chocolate. No real aversion that I can think of though.

Movement: Even stronger and more frequent than last week, but still mostly located at my belly button or below – nothing up in the ribs yet.

Gender: Boy!

Worries: I’m still doing good on this front, which is surprising considering some of the stuff that went on this week.

Milestones: Baby is practice breathing and now has regular sleep and wake patterns.

Best Moment of the Week: I’m changing this to “Most Memorable Moment,” because while this wasn’t a great one, it sure does stand out. Wednesday night, right before dinner, I started having pain in my abdomen, at the top part of my stomach. Weird pains aren’t unusual, so I figured it would go away and headed off to church, where I work with our 3 year-olds.

The pain got worse as the night went on, and moved to be all over my stomach. I called the doctor on call, who didn’t think I needed to come in since they didn’t seem to have a regular rhythm to them. At one point, while we were playing Duck Duck Goose, I thought the pain was subsiding, but they intensified again. By the time I left, I was in serious pain (about an 8 on a pain scale), and had been for about 3 hours. I tried to call the doctor on call again on my way home because while I didn’t think I was in labor or even having contractions, I thought 3 hours of intense pain is just not right. However, the call got sent to Oncology, but by the time I found that out, I had just decided I needed to go to the hospital. I had tried reclining on the sofa, but that only made my pain worse.

All three of us headed off the the ER, where I got an immediate wheelchair ride to L&D. At that point, I knew I was having contractions, since I could feel them in the middle of my stomach sort of squeezing it together. Of course, by the time I got a room, changed into my gown and got hooked up to the monitors, I felt a ton better (about a 3 on a pain scale). Still, they found after some monitoring that I was having small-ish contractions every 4 to 5 minutes apart.

That got me an exam, where everything looked nice and closed. They also performed a fetal fibronectin test to determine the likelihood I would go into labor in the next two weeks. That came back negative the next day, and when I followed up with my doctor’s office, they said they aren’t concerned as long as I continue to not have the same symptoms again. I’m really thankful I don’t need additional monitoring at this point and that I wasn’t in pre-term labor and “Noodle Baby” is still inside and not out.