Life's Never How You Picture It.

I haven't been to either of my doctors yet, but I've made appointments with both (already well over a dozen with my endo!) and spoken to my endo's nurse.  My blood glucose goals are now below 100 before meals, and below 120 two hours after meals.

I'm actually very close to those goals even when I don't quite meet them (and I've just made a change to my insulin pump's "target" that should finally nudge the less than perfect numbers under), and I've managed to get my spiking blood sugar to chill the hell out.  Primarily, I'm figuring out that I need to have a little more protein and healthy fat with my breakfast (when things are most likely to spike), and the same true to a lesser degree with lunch.  Dinner is never a problem.  If I eat pretty well, my evening numbers are always fabulous.

I can totally do this.

For the most part, I feel pretty good about things.  I had one night where I felt very sorry for myself...  I was realizing that this pregnancy isn't going to be "what I always wanted."  Not that I've ever been the "daydream about pregnancy and babies" type, but I always had a basic picture of how things would be:

I'd enjoy my pregnancy, dealing with whatever minor inconveniences (like morning sickness) come my way and feeling a little like an earth goddess as I bask in the miracle of creating life and letting my body do what it was designed to do.  Then when delivery came around, I'd labor at home for as long as I could, go to my hospital, and labor naturally until my doctor said, "It's now or never for the epidural."  (You see, though I fully believe the female body knows how to do this stuff on it's own, I'm way too much of a wimp to accept the level of pain that comes with pushing!!!  :p )

That's not the picture I see before me now.  I'll probably have something like 20 or 30 doctor appointments between now and then, tests that aren't normally done on "healthy" mothers, there's probably no way any OB will let me carry to full term and labor when my body decides to do it naturally, and there's likely to be much more monitoring and a higher chance of a C-section.  It's like my body is a liability instead of a miraculous tool for creating life.

Sounds crappy, doesn't it?  But it's the most bleak view (short of imagining all the things that could go wrong will go wrong).  I totally let it get to me the other night and I cried all over Chad.  (He's so sweet.)

But now, I'm realizing that everything's been pretty normal so far, so and I don't have a reason to believe that everything will be horrible the second I set foot in a doctor's office.  Yes, things are likely to be more medicalized than I want.  I accept, grudgingly.  But I can't focus on that; I have to keep it all a part of what supports me and a healthy baby.  Just like diabetes management isn't the focus of my life, but part of what supports it.

I'm also looking into having a doula, a trained professional who is there to support mom, dad, and baby through pregnancy and delivery (and sometimes for a while postpartum).  I think it would both help me focus on the wonderful things that are happening, and stay more informed and in charge during delivery.

As everyone says, the thing that counts most is having a healthy baby in the end.  I agree with that, but I also believe that is most likely to happen if the pregnancy and delivery are no more medicalized than actually necessary.  (Thank god we have OBs and the interventions that are sometimes necessary, but the US has both incredibly medicalized births and some of the worst birth statistics of the industrialized countries.)

I'm saying all this like I'm afraid I'll be swept into an O.R. the second I arrive at the hospital, but the truth is that I'm going to do everything humanly possible to keep my blood sugar normal and my OB has never given me the impression that she's big on intervention for intervention's sake.  For all I know, she'll support me in my desire for normalcy to every extent she is able.  I meet with her nurse practitioner on the 5th of January, so I'll have a better idea then of what is in store.