Cinco de Mayo is a holiday celebrated in certain regions of México that commemorates the Méxican Army defeating the larger, better equipped French Army in the Battle of Puebla on May 5th 1862. In the United States these days it is a celebration of Méxican heritage. Well I don’t have any Méxican heritage. Okay we did go on our honeymoon to México, and on our cruise a few years ago we had a couple of stops in México, but my real make-believe heritage is from Argentina, so I am going to use this day to celebrate my pretend Argentine heritage.
When I was in Argentina I met a fellow who was a folk dancer, and he showed me this really cool dance with boleadoras. Boleadoras are a weapon used by gauchos (gauchos are Argentine cowboys) that consists of three heavy balls on the end of three ropes that are all connected.
It was modified and used as a prop for a type of Argentine Folk Dance. The modification is one ball on the end of a rope. The dancer holds one in each hand and swings the balls so that they strike the floor to make a noise. Here is an example of the dance.
I think it is pretty cool. Now if I just had some mate (pronounced mah-tey).
I was on the monitor the morning, and (surprise, surprise) I was contracting. Not too strong as far as I could tell, but enough. We went through all of the things to stop it, such as drink water, go to the bathroom and lie on my side. Not good enough, the nurse still came back with my (daily) terbutaline. This is scaring me because I wasn’t really feeling any contractions by then, but they were still showing up. So if and when I go home, if the baby hasn’t already made her appearance, I’m afraid I won’t know when to come back to the hospital. People say that I’ll know, but I’m not sure I believe them. When I was at home I apparently had “productive” contractions, but I didn’t realize it. As we’re getting down to the nitty gritty I’m getting pretty nervous about the whole thing.
Dr. Schweichler just came in to see me. She said she’s been pretty busy today. We chatted for a minute about me, and as she left I told her to take it easy, and not work too hard. She said she has two people in labor right now, so I guess she still has some work to do. I told her I would do my best to not contribute to her workload.
I love the Argentine dances! and be careful with those contractions. I doubt Jeff is very interested in helping you deliver Gaby at home on his own. : )
That was awfully sweet of you not to add to her workload. I have to say that I am a little worried about the contractions that you are obviously not feeling. There are those rare cases of people not realizing that the baby is COMING, and coming NOW! But, hopefully, you will know, and Jeff will drive fast!!!!
That was some cool dancing. That is strange you are not feeling contractions. I feel every little cramp my uterus has and it doesn’t contain a baby. You must have a very high pain threshold or your uterus is so buff, contractions for it are nothin’.
That sounds familiar–everyone could not believe it that I didn’t know when I was in labor. I was having really strong contractions and I couldn’t feel anything! I had Brigham at home (by choice), but that actually turned out to be a scary experience–those Drs. and nurses better not leave you alone for a minute!! Unlike most people, even when it came down to the moment of truth, I couldn’t feel anything! So don’t let anyone tell you that “you’ll just know”, ’cause if you’re anything like me, you won’t know and you’ll end up in a scary situation, like I did! Luckily (I was extremely blessed), everything turned out okay, but I definately would not do that again! I don’t want to cause you any alarm, just wanted to give you a heads up! I love you!
Wow, Rachelle, that is so interesting that you felt nothing. Right up until the moment of birth?
yup! There’s a certain amount of convenience to that under the right circumstances, but under other circumstances (such as Brigham’s birth) it was very scary–I wouldn’t wish it upon anyone!!My water broke in the middle of the night and I woke up delirious, not knowing if I just peed the bed or if it was indeed my water! Even then I couldn’t feel anything!! My midwife had a time frame of 10 minutes to get to my house before he was born! If I had just stayed in my bed it wouldn’t have been so scary, but because I wasn’t sure of what was going on, I didn’t stay in my bed and was trying to go to someplace more comfortable… (bad decision)In the end my midwife walked in the door at just the right time and everything turned out okay, but I shudder to think about what could have happened had she not walked in at that time. The funny thing is that I kept on telling my midwives that I couldn’t feel when I was in labor, and that I was concerned about it and they didn’t believe me and kept on saying, “oh, you’ll just know when it’s time”. Well… I didn’t. Thankfully, we’re all okay! 🙂