Barbara and Joy are now officially "concerned." Measuring big one month would have been fine, but to measure this far ahead for several appointments in a row could be an indication of bad things. My biggest worry at this point (being the kind of worrier that I am) is that we have polyhydramnios - too much amniotic fluid. Although not necessarily a horrible thing in and of itself (though it can cause preterm labor in the most severe cases), it could possibly be an indication of things being wrong with the baby, causing it not to swallow the fluid around its body. Other problems can result from too much fluid - postpartum hemorrhage or cord prolapse (the cord comes out before the head), for example. In actuality, it's a pretty rare occurrence; only about one in a hundred women develop polyhydramnios. Still, being the worst case scenario, this is the one about which I can't help thinking.

I still don't think I'm having twins. Barb palpated me pretty strenuously after taking the measurement, and she said that it really felt like just one baby to her. On the other hand, all of the midwives keep commenting on the strength of my upper abdominal muscles (I wonder what they'd do if they ever met a real trained music performer), making me wonder if they could possibly be missing a little one who preferred to hide up at the top of my uterus. When Barb found the fetal heartbeat, it was deep in my pelvis, but she then tried to listen up at the top, saying that she had thought she heard something there. When nothing really was found (we've had a difficult time getting a heartbeat for this entire pregnancy, anyway), we decided to chalk it up as an echo.

And I don't really believe I'm having twins. I've just got a gut feeling that this is just one baby.

The midwives would really have loved for me to be able to say that I wasn't sure of when I conceived. If there was a possibility that I was pregnant the month before, then my measurements could be off by only three centimeters, which isn't nearly so bad. You know, though, how closely I watched my cycles before we conceived. Those charts don't lie; on August 27, I had a huge dip in temperatures, and two days later I was greeting my last period. I know some women can bleed while pregnant, but they don't have temp dips like that, and they certainly don't find themselves reovulating two weeks later. Nope, I know when this baby was conceived.

So I'm left with a few more possibilities. One, this could be a really big baby. That wouldn't bother me so much; I trust that my body won't grow a baby that's too big for me. If I thought I had gestational diabetes, I might be more concerned, but Eric's been checking my blood sugar at random with his meter, and all signs have been normal on that front. Alternatively, I could just be growing large, like Mom. If this is normal for me, then I won't worry.

The only way to know is an ultrasound. I'll be calling Mary Ann on Tuesday to see if she'll write up an order for one as soon as possible. I'm trying to stay positive about this; I'll get to see the baby, which will be nice. Focusing on that helps me stop worrying about getting bad news. I called my mother after learning all this, and she really helped calm me down. We all agreed that Rita shouldn't be told until after we have definitive news. No sense in scaring her more than she already is over the whole homebirth issue, right?

What I need most right now is peace. I have to keep reminding myself that this is not in my hands, and nothing I can do will change things. God has everything under control; it's not up to me.

I can't wait to actually begin moving into the new place, though. My growing belly has been driving me to really begin planning and buying for the baby, and I haven't been able to do much of that while we've been in residence limbo. I've got a few small boxes of clothes and diapers sitting in a pile. We have no baby furniture; the swing that Eric's brother gave us for Christmas is still sitting in his office at work, to where we had it shipped from West Virginia. I don't even have a diaper pail yet, and the lack of preparation is beginning to make me a little nervous.

Of course, everything I've read strongly urges that I wait to buy much of anything until after I've been given any baby showers that may be coming. Well, the only one of which I'm aware will be from my group of online girlfriends, about which I'm really excited but which I rather don't foresee happening before the baby gets here. (Our recent track record for organizing those things beforehand hasn't been good.) Rita says that Eric's aunt wants us to come back to his hometown for a visit so that she can throw us one, but I unfortunately don't see that as possible; what with the move, our birth classes, and Eric's hefty work schedule, our weekends are booked up until the birth. The ladies at work? Well, they love parties and throw one every time somebody has a successful bowel movement, so I'm sure they'll have something for me. I'm not, however, sure it will involve more than baby rattle-shaped cookies over lunch.

So I have to wait, and run the risk that I'll have to send Eric dashing out for onesies as soon as the baby is born. I suppose every pregnant woman has this worry and I'm nothing unusual. At least I know that a baby can survive quite happily with nothing but diapers, breastmilk, and a warm set of arms or two. That's always a comfort.

At least I have no varicose veins as of yet. Unfortunately, Mom says that I shouldn't hope to escape them; she had them even before she was pregnant with me, and Grandma has a ton. "Keep hope, though," she says. "I don't have as many as your grandma. Perhaps they'll lessen with each generation."

I hope my daughters find that more comforting than I do.