Whimsical - Yeah we're basically ready for baby and everything's done except the part where she actually shows up.
Had my 39w appointment yesterday. Sorry in advance for long update!
After talking to doctor she suggested that I consider going back onto my anti-depressant that I was taking prior to pregnancy. She said the one that I was on before is safe for pregnancy, and especially fine now that I'm less than 2 weeks away from delivery, and is 100% safe for BF. She doesn't usually push meds, in fact she told me it was perfectly okay with her if I didn't want to do it. But, I have SADD and struggle significantly in the winter here (when I lived in Texas I was fine but since moving back to Washington, I do not handle winter well at all), and based on our conversation regarding sleep, and the amount of crying I've been doing in the last few days, she's concerned, particularly about postpartum. I've been really great emotionally all pregnancy but now it's getting to a point where it would be worth looking into because the meds take a few weeks to kick in, if I'm already on it now it'll be better if I end up in a bad place post-birth. And, knowing my own past mental stability, I suspect I'll need it, at least through the winter. I usually do really well in summer/spring/fall but a northern winter is very bad for me. Prior to TTC I had actually used herbal remedies (St. Johns Wart with other stuff) and those were sufficient and worked well, but those are dangerous for pregnancy and dangerous for BF, so it's actually safer for me to be on the sertraline instead of the St. Johns Wart until I'm done BF.
She's having me start half pills on the lowest dose until after baby comes, so it'll just start to build up. I'm okay with that. I know my limitations emotionally and mentally and I know that I need to be emotionally stable to care for my baby.
In positive news: she said that the nausea I'm having, plus the extreme emotional stuff is a sign I'm close to labor. She offered to do a check and "stir the pot a little" (Membrane sweep is what I think she was doing, lol). I agreed because I was curious as to how my cervix looked. I'm 50% effaced and she said my cervix is 3cm dilated on the outside and 1.5cm on the inside. I didn't realize you could be two different dilations, but whatever. She said it looks good. And told me to drink lots of red raspberry leaf tea to help things along (I love having an actual doctor who still encourages herbal and natural solutions!). I told her I'm already drinking 2-3 cups a day and said she thinks it's working and to keep it up
She does NOT induce patients unless they are way overdue, she's not a fan of inducing unless there's a strong medical need, so theoretically I could go to 41+3 before she'd induce but she suspects I won't need it.