Mommy Unplugged

****WARNING! I'm talking about gross stuff again.****

This past Tuesday, I was sitting in Husband's office as we were finishing up our break. All of a sudden, I felt something warm between my legs. Husband saw the look of surprise on my face as I jumped up and closed his door.

I shoved my hand down my pants, but I didn't feel anything wet. I thought that maybe I'd started leaking amniotic fluid.

"Something just happened. Walk me to the bathroom?"

Husband and I found this situation amusing because just as we pulled into work that morning, Husband's low-gasoline light started blinking. "Wouldn't it be ironic if my water breaks today?" I'd said. Not that we wouldn't have the time to stop and fill up the gas tank, but it just seemed like the kind of thing that would happen. Boom! My water breaks and the first thing we have to think about is where to get gas for the car.

When I went to the bathroom, there was no liquidy fluid, just a lot of discharge.

I already knew about the mucous plug that keeps a lady's cervix sealed against germs until shortly before the baby is born. I knew that it can come out all at once or bit by bit. I wasn't quite sure what it looked like, though. Descriptions I'd read said that it was clear and jelly-like.

This did not accurately describe what was all over my pantyliner. It was kind of white-ish, snot-like, and there were little flecks of blood in it. I thought that maybe I have an infection.

I cleaned up, went and told Husband what was going on, and called my OBGYN's office.

"Sounds like your mucous plug is coming out," the nurse told me. I explained that it wasn't clear and "jelly-like" like I'd heard it's supposed to be. I thought "jelly-like" meant it would be a little denser than what I was experiencing. I mean "mucous plug" sounds like it has some substance to it, right? Not like it's the consistency of concrete, but the goopy stuff that came out of me didn't seem like the kind of thing that could stay wedged up in my cervix for months on end. It didn't seem viscous enough.

"Is it the consistency of snot?"

"Yeah, I guess so."

"It's probably just your mucous plug. It could have been mixed with the normal discharge that comes with pregnancy, so it doesn't look clear. The blood is normal, too. As your plug comes out, it can take little pieces of blood with it because the whole reason that the plug is coming out is that your cervix is starting to dilate and that can cause some light bleeding..."

That night, I had more come out. Then more Wednesday (yesterday) morning. I had a check-up at my OBGYN's office yesterday afternoon and I talked to the midwife about it.

"Was it the consistency of snot?"

"Um. Yeah. Pretty much."

"Sounds like your mucous plug. But I'll look at a sample under the microscope and make sure that nothing else is going on."

Turns out that I have no infections. Just my mucous plug coming out.

More came out last night, and more has come out today. I have this image of Elise slowly tunneling her way out of my uterus.

In fact, I made myself laugh yesterday as I got a Bugs Bunny-like image of her popping her head out, looking around, and saying, "I knew I shoulda taken that left turn at Albuquerque."