...my past few days have been consumed by the mystery inside my womb and the type of birth we are going to experience...i now have a lot more peace about the whole thing...thanks to everybody who's been praying and sent me lovely emails...ted & i both feel much better about everything now...we're still hoping for a natural birth, and we're going to do everything we can to make this possible...one of things we've decided to try is the webster technique...it is a chiropractic maneuver that gently realigns the mother's pelvis and relaxes intrauterine constraints to give the baby more room to move around and hopefully flip...we went to see a chiropractor this morning and would you know it, my pelvis on my right side was like 3 inches higher than my left side...i was crooked in several places, and the doctor could feel some major constraints in my uterus, and that's probably why our baby has squished itself all on the top portion of my uterus...we're going to try this procedure every few days in hopes that the baby will turn on its own before my scheduled c-section on october 1st...the webster technique has had a very high success rate (up to 80%) in turning breech babies...most likely, if the baby doesn't turn with this procedure, there's a reason for it that baby knows that we don't...



...the other thing we're gonna try is a chinese herbal remedy called moxibustion...basically, it uses the principles of acupuncture except that instead of needles, you take this spongy herbal stuff called mugwort and put it on specific pressure points and burn it near the skin with an incense stick, or something like that...i remember watching my parents do this to each other when i was a little girl...moxibustion has been documented to have a high success rate in turning breech babies...between the webster technique and the moxibustion, we're hoping our baby will flip and lodge its lovely head in my pelvis so that we can have a vaginal delivery...



...our chiropracter's office is just north of the merchandise mart, and when we got out of our appointment, we noticed a lot of bells going off...turns out they were trying to get the wells street bridge to go up and let a really tall sailboat pass through...this particular bridge is interesting because the brown & purple lines of the 'L' also have to go up, so train service gets stopped too...i don't know what the problem was, but it took quite a while before the bridge finally went up to let this one boat through...it was a lovely day in chicago, and after being on house arrest per doctor's orders for so long, it was nice to be outside for a change...



...speaking of doctor's orders, i am officially home until i have this baby...i can work 4 hours a day in the confines of my apartment, and i never thought i'd be grateful to be able to work, but i was so relieved when my doctor said i could work half-time, because i think i would literally go crazy if i had nothing to do...not only that, because my leave started so early and unexpectedly, i have a lot of loose ends to tie up at work...i thought i'd have another month to hand all this stuff off, but i don't have that luxury any more, so i'm going to have to do the best i can in the next two weeks...luckily, my coworker who is taking over a lot of the stuff i would normally do lives just a block from me, so he can come over if i need to explain anything or show him how to do something on the computer...



...it's hard to believe this pregnancy is finally coming to an end...we don't even have a name yet! yikes! our crib's not even gonna be delivered until the beginning of november...not that we'll need it for probably at least 6 months...the baby's room is currently still our storage room...teddy is going to try to clean it out this weekend, but it is such an overwhelming project, and with me out of commission, it's a daunting task to ask of one person...so if you come to visit me after the baby's born, and we still have the door shut tight to one of the bedrooms, try and understand, ok?

daddy,



can you hear me? it's me...sarah...jung-ah...your favorite daughter...daddy, i'm having a baby...i know you know this, but daddy, do you know how scared i am? i really really need you right now...i don't understand what's happening to my body...the doctor says the baby's gonna come early, but it's upside down, meaning butt down not head down, and it's big, so she says i have to have a c-section in two weeks...daddy, i don't want my baby to come out of my tummy...i know it's better for the baby to come out naturally, and i'm scared...daddy, i don't know what's going on with my baby, why Baby won't turn the right way...is Baby ok? can you please ask the Dude and make sure everything is ok inside my uterus?



i'm all puffy, and my blood pressure is still high, and i am totally unprepared to take leave from work this early...daddy, i feel so discombobulated...and this morning when i peed there was blood...i've never had bleeding before during this pregnancy, and i think that means this baby is gonna come out soon, and daddy, i need one more week so the baby's lungs are fully developed...but what do i know? i know the Dude knows what he's doing, and i guess i'm gonna have to trust that what happens is for the best, but i seriously can do without the drama...it's been enough for me the past week ever since that crazy night at the hospital...which made me think a lot about you, by the way, and all those nights you spent in a hospital room...



remember when i was a little girl, and every year i would come down with a really high fever and a hacking cough, and you'd stay with me through the night? i wish you were here with me now...you always had a way with the young ones...i'm sure you could talk this baby into flipping the right way with your gentle voice...



i know everything will be okay...it's just not turning out the way teddy & i had envisioned, but i guess we learn to adjust...if i have to deliver by c-section, there must be a reason that i can't see with my limited awareness of reality, esp. the reality of what's going on inside my uterus...if we came with windows to the womb so i could see what was going on, maybe i'd be like, 'oh, okay...baby is in that position cuz of xyz...'



daddy, can you just ask the Dude to keep the baby from coming out until all its little body parts are fully developed? i just need one more week...after that, i'll feel much better about the baby coming early and even about having a c-section...i just don't want to go through the craziness of an emergency surgery right now...



i just want you to know that teddy has been wonderful to me this whole time...he cooks, cleans, tells me to eat, and showers me with love and affection...i don't know how i could've gone through all this without him...i can't wait to see him as a father...



daddy, i still miss you every day...and i'm thinking about you as i go through what's gonna be the scariest and most joyfullest thing i've ever been through in my entire life...

...remember what i said last week about having 5 more weeks left before baby's due? well...i might be wrong...it might be more like 1 or 2 or 3 weeks...LET me TELL ya about my past few days... ...



so i started breaking out in a rash on the tops of my feet and on the backs of my hands and fingers a little over a week ago...it got to the point where i almost went insane last wednesday night from the itching, and of course it was the one evening teddy wasn't home but at a drum clinic out in the burbs, and i called him literally a million zillion times to tell him to please pick me up some benadryl...i got so desparate i almost called a cab to take me to the 24 hour cvs...what really scared me was that my feet had puffed up so much they looked like really fat hobbit's feet (minus the hair), and i thought there was something REALLY wrong with me...so the next morning, i decided to go see my doctor even though i didn't have an appointment...luckily, when i got there when the office opened at noon on thursday, there were no patients there yet...they saw me right away and the nurse got worried because my blood pressure was above normal, i had a trace of protein and some glucola in my urine, and my feet looked like they were gonna explode...she didn't even care about my rash...



...i got sent over to the antepartum testing unit at the hospital, and they hooked me up to a fetal heart monitor and to a TOCO, which measures contractions, and was told to push a button every time i felt the baby move...well, baby must have known it was being monitored cuz it went nuts, and my thumb got sore from pushing that button...the heart beat was always strong, which was good, but the folks monitoring me got worried about all the contractions i was having...they gave me some water, which helped slow down the contractions...i was probably dehydrated from having rushed around that morning and not having my usual fluid intake...they did an ultrasound to see how the baby was doing, and they got worried again because the baby was so huge for the size of my uterus...they asked me if the dad was big, and i said he's tall, and they told me the baby's femur length is that of a 40 week fetus...and the estimated fetal weight is like 7lbs 5 oz...ouch...and the amniotic fluid level was on the low side of normal, which i think is again cuz i was dehydrated...not only that, the baby was in a frank breech position, which means it's butt down with its legs crossed over its chest...this is what worried me the most...and that's not all...they said i should be fine, that the contractions were probably just because of dehydration, but they wanted to check my cervix to make sure it was still closed because they did not want me going into labor until the baby was developed enough, which wouldn't be for another 2 weeks...so they check my cervix and find that i'm dilated to 1.5 cm...they're like, uh oh, gotta call the doctor cuz i'm probably gonna have to stay overnight at the hospital, get drugs to stop the contractions and be monitored all night...



...like holy crap...that's not what i wanted to hear...so i called teddy, and he wasn't happy with everything they were gonna do to me...i told him to bring me some stuff, and he had to take 3 trains to get to the hospital cuz i had the car...



...so yeah, i had to spend the night at the hospital, and let me tell ya, now i know why folks rip off their IVs and sneak out of hospitals...you really feel like you're held captive...i thought about my dad a lot and wondered how he spent 6 weeks in the hospital...esp. when he had to be alone at nights...we started taking turns spending the nights with him towards the end, but for the first month or so, we got sent home after visiting hours were over...i know i would've cried all night if teddy had left me alone for my one night, and i wasn't even in any pain...i just don't know how my dad did it...



...they put me through 2 bags of IV rapidly, and then another one slowly, and i didn't get solid food until midnight (my last meal had been at 11am)...and i had to have these monitor thingies strapped to my tummy all night, and cuz the baby kept moving, we kept losing the heart beat, which meant searching for it by dragging this thing covered in goo all over my tummy...that gets old really fast, and if you don't find the heartbeat soon enough, the nurses will come in your room, and i felt bad for teddy who was trying his best to sleep in this lounge chair in my room, so i really didn't want anyone coming in at 3 am to adjust anything on me...oh, and everytime i had to get up to pee, i'd have to take those things off of me and then put them back on when i got in bed, and this baby kept playing hide & seek w/ the heartbeat...



...well, the contractions stopped for the most part after i got one dose of that drug and all those IVs...i probably didn't need to spend the night at the hospital, but doctors have to cover their butts, even if it means making the patient extremely uncomfortable for a while...i'm just glad we survived...now they've got me on modified bed rest for a week...i don't have to stay in bed, but it's kinda like house arrest...



...now teddy & i are diligently trying to get the baby to turn...we've decided to join the galter life center, a nonprofit health facility associated w/ swedish covenant hospital and the evangelical covenant church...they have these really great therapy pools that are really warm and relaxing...they say that floating in water is a good way to get the baby to flip, so we're gonna do that as much as possible...and i love being in the water...it really makes me feel good...it's also good for swollen extremeties, which i have plenty of...



...the possibility that i would have to deliver this baby in a breech position is disconcerting to say the least, because it greatly increases the chances that i will have a cesarean...i guess i just have to stay positive, pray for the best, and just be glad that they have ways of delivering babies safely in the vast majority of circumstances...i have to acknowledge that there is so much out of my control, and that is scary to a great degree...and yet i still believe that there is someone who IS in control of my situation and somehow he's gonna make it all turn out the way it's supposed to...yeah, that's god's job...teddy & i will do our part, but we can only do so much, i know...



...in other news, teddy's little sister lauren has just launched her website designed by big bro david...it's for her espresso bar catering service called Tropic of Coffee...you can see the site here...she is a phenomenal barista, and we love getting our coffee fixes made to order by her at parties @ ted's parents'...



...so here i am working from home...my coworker andrei who lives a block from us brought me my laptop from work as well as the wireless router that i had ordered which was shipped to the office so that we could set up wireless internet in our apartment...the timing couldn't have been better...somehow i managed to install the router so i am surfing from the living room...i haven't gotten the wireless network adapter to install on my work laptop though, so i'm still having to connect from our office room...oh well...at least teddy & i can now be on the internet at once...



...we're meeting with our doula tonight to make sure she's gonna be a good fit for us...i'm sure she will be...she came highly recommended by everyone who knows her, so i am sure she'll be invaluable to our birth experience...esp. now that we've had a practice run at the hospital, we know for sure that we need someone else to be on our team when we deliver...

... 5 more weeks! 5 more weeks! 5 more weeks! of course, that doesn't really mean diddly squat...it could be 3 weeks...or 9 weeks (god forbid!)...



...i am obviously talking about when the baby's gonna decide to emerge from my womb...it's gotten to the point that every now and then, i break down sobbing because i really really really wanna be done with the pregnancy...between all the aches and pains i've been going through and the paranoia-inducing suspense of whether the baby's healthy or not, not to mention the plethora of hormones riding through my bloodstream like it's a big waterpark, it's no wonder to me that pregnant women start acting kooky...



...ok, baby is totally boogying to gillian welch right now, if you can believe it...or maybe it was the mexican food i just had for lunch...yeah, i found my headphones, so i've been subjecting my unborn child to the music which i believe he/she should be familiar with from birth...the very first album our baby listened to on headphones was bill mallonee's dear life, which i thought was a lovely and deep beginning for anyone's musical education...i've also been playing a lot of sam cooke, and today it's gillian welch...i was hoping to treat the baby to some LIVE gillian welch, but being the lazy ass that i am, i didn't get any tickets for this saturday's show and there aren't any good seats left...oh well...i guess i'm just gonna have to wait another couple years to see her live...



...instead of seeing that show, i think we're gonna see a showing of afro-punk, that documentary about african-americans on the punk scene...it's playing @ the empty bottle sat. afternoon, and i can't wait to see it again...i think the filmmaker (james spooner) will be there for q&a...

...hi foks! here we are, teddy & me & baby-in-utero, at 33 2/7 weeks...yes, it's less than 7 weeks left for us now, and I CAN'T WAIT!!!! i had a dream a couple nights ago that i delivered the baby while in my sleep on our bed, and it was a piece of cake...all of a sudden here was this big slimy baby in my arms while i was lying in bed...i didn't see whether it was a boy or girl, so that's still very much up in the air...or maybe i should say it's very much 'in my womb', cuz the baby is definitely a boy or a girl by now (probably), we just don't know which yet...



...we've had some HMO woes the past week...we found out that our neighborhood hospital, swedish covenant, has a full nurse midwife staff and all their labor & delivery rooms have a jacuzzi tub in the bathroom...it would have been great to deliver with a midwife and do a water labor, so we tried to switch providers because we felt that overall, the staff and facilities at swedish were more in line with the type of natural birth we were going for...unfortunately, the way HMOs work is that they prepay for services to negotiate low prices w/ medical groups, so my delivery has long been paid for, even though i haven't given birth yet...and of course the HMO doesn't want to pay twice for the delivery, so they refused to let me switch to another medical group cuz that would mean they'd have to pay the new group all over again...although i feel that i have a legitimate quality of care issue that would override this policy, i just don't have the time to formally appeal this decision...the HMO still will not admit that it's a money issue...i only know because my parents' good friend and family doctor dr. shin told us that's the way it works, and my director of benefits confirmed this...i am going to submit a written complaint and try to get the HMO to admit that they won't let me switch providers because of the money thing, even thought it would probably mean better care for us and our baby...



to increase our chances for a safe, natural delivery, we've decided to hire a professional labor assistant (called a doula) to support us during the labor & delivery....we'll probably work with birthways, a doula service in chicago...they have a really good record and their staff are know not only for their ability to provide emotional support during labor, but also for their clinical knowledge...many have training in midwifery or are certified professional midwives...we just want to make sure that there's someone in the hospital who will make sure the medical staff honor our birth plan...it's amazing how little control you have during labor & delivery if you go in without knowing what choices you have as a patient, and you can end up receiving a bunch of medical interventions that you don't need...anyways, we of course have no idea what will happen between now and the time the baby is born, but we want to be as prepared as possible...we will do whatever is best for the baby's and my wellbeing, whether it's doing it all naturally or using some of the interventions that are available and can be life-saving in the right situations...