I had a sandwich from Panera for dinner last night. I realize that I had bacon with every meal yesterday. Yay eating out!

I really want to go to Trader Joe's on my way home tonight and buy All The Things, but I should probably clean out the fridge and freezer first, right? Meh.

Woke up last night with bad cramps that I thought might be contractions (I'm 35 weeks today, so it would be early but, as I understand it, not too dangerous for Sprog if I were to go into labor now). The fun part: M is out of town for the weekend. So I lay there for an hour or so trying to figure out what was going on and what I should do: call the midwives? call M? go to the hospital? Fortunately they passed (I'm guessing the issue was digestive in nature) and I was able to fall asleep again eventually, but man, I'm sleepy. And it's grey and rainy here and I just wanna stay on the couch and watch movies all day. t /whine

Have you had Braxton-Hicks contractions yet, Kate? It could have been that.

Can you call in sick for the day and take it easy?

Amy, that seems like the other likely possibility. I thought that B-H contractions were supposed to be painless, but at my last midwife appt she said they could sometimes feel like menstrual cramps, and I've felt some mild cramps in recent weeks that were probably Braxton-Hicks. The ones last night were more intense, but from what I can tell, that's not unusual.

I'm saving up all my vacation/personal time for after the baby comes, so I'd rather not call in sick unless I'm actually too ill to go into work, but it sure is tempting today!

For me, the B-H contractions felt more like cramps and Actual Labor felt like...going into labor. It's really hard to describe, but I remember spending the last few weeks of pregnancy going "huh...contraction?" and then when they finally started for real it was more like "AHA. CONTRACTION."

Yeah, B-H contractions were more uncomfortable than I imagined they would be, but when you're in actual labor, there's no mistaking *that*. It's hard to tell until you've been through it, though.

Both my parents think it's really gross to have a glass of milk with a meal that includes meat.

I'm not Jewish, yet with your parents on that. Milk is something to drink with pie or cookies after the meal.

We had milk at every meal. I've always been a big milk drinker.

Perhaps growing up on a dairy farm had something to do with that.

Amy and Jess -- that's good to know! The other thing about the cramps I've been having is that they don't seem to have a real specific beginning and end, so I don't feel like I can count them or time them -- I just feel crampy for a while, and then eventually the feeling lessens. Would you say actual contractions are easier to tell when they start and end?

(I'm suddenly reminded of when I was maybe 13 or 14 and intensely curious about what an orgasm felt like, but all the definitions/descriptions I could find were frustratingly unhelpful. It's just your muscles releasing? Really? But it feels like waves? Or warmth? Then I finally had one and, whoa, okay, now I understand!)

It's hard to say, Kate -- when I had B-H, it felt like my whole belly tightened up like a drum. And sometimes it was pretty uncomfortable, especially the later in the pregnancy it was.

With actual labor, you could be having preliminary contractions and not really feel them at all -- with Ben and Sara, I didn't get that I was in labor until almost transition time, at which point contractions = OUCH MOTHERFUCKER MAKE IT STOP. (For me, anyway.) It is easier to know when they start and stop, though, at that point.

Call the nurse at the doctor's office if you're at all concerned, really. They know the deal, and they also get how hard it is to know precisely what your body is doing when you haven't been through it before.