This week has been mostly fuelled by vast amounts of refined sugar. I know. It makes me feel terribly guilty, but I just don’t seem to be able to stop myself from reaching for the sweets, the Coca Cola, the ice lollies. The simple remedy would be not to buy them, but it’s like an unstoppable urge. Mr AMR says I’m being melodramatic and that I’m not really eating a lot of sweets at all, but I suppose it’s because I don’t usually really touch them and so I feel as though my body is one big sugary mess! It all started when the midwives at the birth unit recommended stocking up on sugary treats to bring when labour was established: they find that it helps to boost energy and keep people going when they are just totally and utterly knackered. In my Zita West book they recommend you bring bits of celery and veg placed on damp bits of kitchen roll to keep them crisp, and dips such as hummus. The midwife almost pissed herself laughing when I told her that. After she’d finished rolling her eyes. And I felt myself starting to feel all protective over hummus and “the healthy way” but then thought sensibly about what I would really want to eat or drink if I was knackered and needed an instant energy boost. Jelly babies and flat coke. Ta very much.

I must write more about my session at the birth unit – I don’t know whether I’ve written about this, but because I’m “low risk” I automatically go to a midwife-led birth unit rather than a hospital. Which is absolutely DANDY by me, because I hate hospitals almost to the point where I’m phobic and I don’t see why I need to deliver my baby in one. Brilliant that hospitals exist, obviously, and great that they are there for labours with complications and women who have conditions or factors that make birth a little more trying, but if you have a straightforward pregnancy and birth then it’s wonderful that there’s a “home from home” option. I was considering a home birth, way back at Christmas, because I know quite a few who have had brilliant home births (and no horror stories from them, strangely!) and I like the idea that labour can just progress naturally, without interruption and having to get into a car and drive and go to an unfamiliar place. But I’m not sure the owner of my holiday-let would be too keen on me setting up a birthing pool in the barn – HA!

So the unit it is. We have done four test runs, now, and timings in the car have varied from 35 minutes to 55 minutes. Manageable. Though I’ll probably have eaten all of my sugary snacks before I even get there…

Head is engaged, baby’s back is facing forward (all good positioning apparently) and baby is of a “good, average weight” which is also reassuring. Though I balked at the word “average”. Fast-forward ten years to me at parents’ evening: “AVERAGE?! There’s nothing AVERAGE about my child!” Hohoho…

I can’t believe that I’ll be 39 weeks on Monday – time has really flown since I started writing this blog and I have loved every minute of it and especially sharing my experiences with you all and reading your comments. What fun that in only a matter of a week or so, I’ll be changing the byline of this blog to “Triumphs and Struggles of a Thirty-Something Mum” rather than Mum-to-Be!