General Tso's Chicken

Just a piece of advice: when nine months pregnant, don't eat a meal that could cause you to mistake labor for gas pains or indigestion.
Tuesday morning began much like any day--the alarm went off for Yale at 6 o'clock and he got up to get a shower. I had had trouble sleeping the night before but this was not a new development; I hadn't slept really well all night for about 4 months. I laid there for a bit, thinking that my General Tso's Chicken from the night before hadn't settled well. I thought, like most pregnant women, great, I get to deal with having gas today on top of everything else I need to do.
I had some breakfast (which I strangely can't remember) and got back in the bed after Yale went to work because I was feeling so crappy. My mother had taken the day off because she too had had the GTC for Monday night's dinner and wasn't feeling well either. I watched some of the Olympic coverage with Deuce and Tess, all the while getting really angry about the Chinese food. I wasn't doubled over in pain but I certainly wasn't ready to go to the grocery store (which I needed to do desperately) or do laundry (which, again, really needed to be done).
I began to think that maybe I was feeling so bad because not only had I eaten that evil food, but I was also having Braxton-Hicks contractions. I had been having them off and on for a few weeks, possibly longer that I just didn't notice, with the latest bout having been on Sunday. I had felt wonderful Monday, Rachel even came by for a visit during which we watched Platinum Weddings and insulted the rich bitch bride for spending $12,000 on a custom made Amsale gown that looked like it was made from synthetic satin.
Fast forward to lunchtime. Yale is very concerned, as he had been whenever I even mentioned feeling slightly odd, and tells me to call the doctor. I really didn't want to because my symptoms were so vague: just a slight discomfort in the lower abdomen that I had already dismissed as indigestion and cramping that I had explained as very normal Braxton-Hicks contractions. I did as he asked, however, and called and left a message for the triage nurse, as my doctor/nurse combo was in surgery. She called back about an hour later, I described my symptoms and what I thought they were, and she agreed with me that it was most likely a very normal, very inane event with a woman who was 36, almost 37, weeks pregnant. I was advised to eat some lunch, take some Tylenol, relax in the tub, and call if any signs of labor developed. I had my weekly appointment with my doctor the next morning and I decided that I would just wait and go to that before freaking out and demanding to be seen that afternoon.
By late afternoon, around 4 or so, I was beginning to get irritated. I had been looking all day online for a definite way for me to tell if I was in labor or not. My back was hurting but, again, I was 36 weeks pregnant and had gained about 35 lbs. by this point--of course my back was hurting! But my abdominal cramps were getting more painful, which I attributed to my impatience at the situation and my exhaustion from having been dealing with them since the night before, and I just wanted to know what was going on. I got back in the hot bath and was trying to decide with my mother what to do. She is not a person to get birth advice from and she was as confused by my symptoms as I was. The lists online for "Labor" and "False Labor" both had symptoms I was having. I still didn't think I was in labor, although I had to admit that if I wasn't it was a pretty convincing false alarm.
My mom had made dinner for herself and my dad, and made some for Yale and I also since I had been feeling so horrible all day. She brought it over right before it started raining.
Yale got home around 6 and commenced asking very reasonable questions, which just served to annoy me. I was so convinced that this was false labor I wouldn't entertain any other options. We sat down and ate, me stopping every few minutes to deal with a cramp. After dinner I decided, at the urging of Yale and my parents, to call the doctor's office and get the on call doctor to discuss my symptoms with me. She called and I told her I didn't think I was in real labor, my water hadn't broken, and that I hadn't been timing the "contractions" because there was no rhyme or reason to them--nothing regular, nothing to time. She told me to try and start timing them for an hour and to call if there were any developments. This was about 7 pm. We tried to use an online contraction timer for a while but it kept messing up--it was saying that my contractions were about 2 to 3 minutes apart, which couldn't be possible (at least I thought so). I finally looked at Yale around 8 and said "If this isn't real labor than it's a really mean joke. Let's go to the hospital so that they can either stop this or can go ahead and get real labor moving." Yale called the on call doctor and told her the new developments and she agreed that we should go to the hospital, if for nothing else than to be reassured that nothing was really happening.