This is it. Ten days till Baby Trotz is due. From here on out, I plan to try to blog daily as we enter the final stretch. And stretching we are – Amy feels like it’s a whole new ball game recently – the baby’s new head-down position has made the last few weeks a whole lot more interesting. We bought a large inflatable birth ball to help ease the stress on her pelvis. Amy loves it. As for other preparations, we picked up the glider from The Baby’s Room on Saturday, and it looks great in the room. We also had to visit our new neighborhood Target on Moreland Ave (Yay! No more trips to Buckhead for Target!) and picked up a CD/ClockRadio/Nature Sound Machine for the room. And I’ve finally found a good use for that old Lava Lamp – it’ll make a groovy night-light. We also picked up one part of the artwork we were having framed for the room on Saturday. As you faithful readers know, we’re going with the animal theme for the room. Amy saw a nice idea where three book illustrations were matted together into a bigger piece, but we’ve done something similar, except with photos of mine from the Atlanta Zoo. We’ll have three of these in the room, and the first set featuring a lioness yawning, a zebra looking over his shoulder, and a giraffe stretching his neck looks great! We used a spiffy brown glossy burlwood frame and safari-esque pale green rice paper for the matte. Come on by and see it sometime!

The ECV this morning was successful! After a dose of terbutaline (which relaxes the womb), Amy took a deep breath and the doctor proceeded to knead her belly, gradually pushing first the head, then the feet, into a head-down position. It took two attempts, but the baby finally turned. Amy showed incredible strength during what looked pretty darn uncomfortable. We then stayed in the labor and delivery room to monitor the baby. The expected outcome is a fairly active baby after the procedure, but Baby Trotz stayed very quiet for quite a while. An IV sugar drip was one attempt at kick-starting activity, and then, a small drip of petosin, to see how the baby would tolerate actual labor. If they saw anything negative at that point in the baby’s heartbeat, they would have induced right then and there! While we were mentally ready for a Cesearean, we had no concept we might have a vaginal birth today. Obviously, things turned out fine, and the doc was happy with Baby Trotz’s reactions to mild contractions, so they fed us some yummy hospital food and sent us on our way. Stay tuned!

Just a quick note – we’re going in at 9am tomorrow for the ECV to see if this stubborn baby will turn or not. The doctor says it’s 50% effective – and we’ll know quickly. And, reassuringly, less than 1% of ECVs result in fetal distress, so Amy and I are both reassured. It’s a very slim chance baby Trotz will arrive tomorrow from complications. But if the ECV doesn’t ‘take,’ we’ll will likely schedule the Cesearean birth between March 21st and 31st. Mark your calendars!

So, we’re in week 37. Can you believe it? But baby Trotz has decided that nestling transversely across Amy’s pelvis is the place to be. We are heading into the doctor’s today to determine if a external cephalic version (ECV) is in order – that’s when the doc tells you to take a deep breath, and manually pushes the baby around in your womb to try to get them head first. In preparation for this, Amy has been lying more or less on her head (supposedly makes the baby move around to a more comfortable position). But any slight moves by the baby in the right direction seem to go away as soon as Amy starts playing her horn. Baby Trotz seems to want to turn their head right back to the bell! A budding musician, I guess. Did I mention that our house smells like an opium den now?

Last night Amy broke out a Chinese herbal ‘do it yourself’ solution. The heat from burning moxa sticks can also be used to stimulate the baby’s movements and encourage it to turn. There’s a great site which explains the procedure, and the basis for the process in Eastern medicine.

Traditional Chinese medicine uses moxibustion (burning herbs to stimulate acupuncture points) of acupoint BL 67 (Zhiyin, located beside the outer corner of the fifth toenail), to promote version of fetuses in breech presentation.

The process involves burning these sticks less than 1″ away from the little toes on either foot (see photo). I hope it works, cause they stink up the house something awful! Anyway, this treatment is succesful with approximately 70% of patients.