big fat baby...

A few weeks ago we gad a scare and I ended up spending the morning at the hospital. Everything turned out to be ok, thank goodness. Both babies were fine, but my progesterone levels were pretty low. I didn't know that, until the nurse called me from the waiting room while we were waiting for the ultrasound. When she came to the door of the waiting room, I saw she had a big fat syringe in her hand and I thought, "Dude, sucks to be that person!" and then she called my name. Dude, sucks to be me. I don't exactly do needles. I'm the person who passes out cold when they give me a simple TB test. That's not even really a needle! It's like a little half second poke in the arm. Big whoop. Yeah, not to me. To me, it's the same as when they draw 8 vials of blood from my skinny limp arm.

Now, this needle-phobic gets to get twice weekly injections of progesterone in her butt. I'm not kidding when I say that it takes me a good 2 days to work up the courage to go get them done. They hurt. They hurt bad. It takes anywhere from 60-90 seconds to get the stuff injected, and did I mention that it is actually OIL they are injecting into my butt? I'm not a turkey! I don't need anything injected in my behind for tenderness. I have plenty of that on my own. In fact, I'm pretty sure this is the one time in my life that I could get away with wearing one of those obnoxious pairs of track pants with "Juicy" written all over the butt. I swear, if you put me in a warm room, you'd have to come and baste me every 30 minutes because I'd be secreting so much oil that I'd eventually dry out.

I have learned a few tricks on how to cope through the shots, thanks to some amazing friends who have had to go through them before. Really though, I've found the amount of pain comes down to the person who has the unfortunate task of injecting me. Nurse New made me pass out-- it took her almost 2 minutes to get all of the oil into me. Nurse Nice is the best at it, but sadly, she's only been able to give me one. Nurse Tough Love though... she's, well, though. She is a very very pleasant person, until you give her a needle. There's no small talk. Just pull down your pants and let me see your booty. And then poke, shoot, and we're done, and then I cry. I wonder if she would be gentler to me if I brought her chocolates, or even a bottle of wine? The worst part is that she doesn't heat the oil to room temp, so the oil goes in straight out of the fridge. And that is what burns the most. But she says she warms it up, in her hands. Yeah, no, that doesn't work.

Of course, I will do whatever I have to for these babies. There's no denying that and honestly, this is probably just my little introduction to the world of needles during this pregnancy. I have a feeling that by the time these babies are born, I might not be so needle phobic. You get over your fears by immersion, right? Lord help me.