Tuesday, November 15, 2005

7 months and counting. . .

Well I am now in my 29th week of pregnancy, and I started it out in the hospital having pre-term labor. Thankfully my contractions that were coming every 3 minutes or so were stopped after 3 shots of what feels like 1,000mg of caffeine and I only had to spend one night in the hospital. With Hayley I had NOTHING until 41 weeks. No dilating, effacing---nothing. And it's not like I wasn't under stress with that pregnancy. Maybe that's the problem with this one. It's like my body is saying, "Ok---we'd really like to get through a pregnancy without major stress so COOL IT!!" We ended up moving from Grapevine to Keller a few weeks ago and I know that had something to do with my early contractions. It's hard to get much rest with a 14 month old---period. Add moving to the equation and the word rest flies out of the vocabulary. I'm on temporary (hopefully) bedrest for now and I'm going to my doctor tomorrow. I'm hoping he'll just say to take it easy, but that I don't have to be down 24/7. I definitely want to take care of myself because the thought of having Jack so early scares me to death. I know it happens all the time, but I can't imagine having to leave him behind in the hospital. : ( Thankfully I have WONDERFUL friends who are bringing dinner over every night this week and who have offered to keep Hayley if I need them to. I have a hard time being on the receiving end---I would much rather be the one bringing the dinner over or keeping the kids. God obviously knows that and my guess is that He is using this time to work on my heart and teach me how to be a gracious receiver. Not only that, but He is STILL teaching me how to ask for help. : ) Why is that such a hard thing to do??? It's interesting to me to see that I wasn't making it up when I felt like God was telling me to slow down this year and clear my schedule so that included as little as possible so that I could focus on being a wife and a mom and get my house in order. That's basically what has taken up all of my time over the past 7 months and if I had one more thing I was trying to do right now (like BSF---which was hard to give up) I wouldn't be able to keep it up and I would have even more stress on me. I love to look back over my life and see that, as usual, God knows what He is doing and it works best for me to follow HIS will and not my own. How very thankful I am for my precious friends (and family, of course) who have been MORE than supportive over the past year with all we have been through. I pray that God blesses each of you 10 times more than you've blessed me!

4 comments:

christine pinson said...

Shelly, we love you guys and are praying for you daily. I had preterm labor three times with Jack and it is so scary. Fortunately, the first two times, they were able to stop it, and fortunately the Lord blessed us with a healthy boy, even at 5 weeks early. Just know that you are covered in our prayers...please keep us updated...I am bringing dinner tomorrow night...let me know if you have any requests...I'll call you tomorrow!
And...I know you probably have more help than you need...but Jack would always be happy to have a play date with sweet Hayley!

Shelly said...

Thank you so much, Christine! How have we gone this long without having a playdate yet?? We need to get that on our calendars! Looking forward to seeing you this evening!

Hollie Reese said...

Hang in there. You are so blessed to have such wonderful friends and support!

jettybetty said...

I am thankful for your strong faith--and pray that you won't have contractions again until it's time for the baby to arrive!
Take care!