Do I really have to relive this week? Let me just tell you it’s been awful and I’m saying good riddance and hoping for the best as we take on week 17.
As expressed here, the crampy leg saga pretty much consumed my week. It made for very sleepless, painful, uncomfortable nights, and that made for long, sleepy days. By Thursday of this past week I’d had enough and finally called the doctor. Turns out (more…)
Our second week in to the second trimester and I actually started feeling normal, for the first time since we got pregnant. Still tired, I feel like that part’s not going to shake. Twelve hours of sleep a night is not abnormal for me and something I actually crave by the time I crawl all limp-eyed into bed at night. But when I’m awake during the day I have more energy than I have had, which is a really nice feeling. I also don’t feel the nagging, constant hunger that has taken up residency in my gut since August. When I do eat, I’m eating less as I fill up more quickly. But the between meal snacking isn’t as persistent as before, and again, it feels nice.
Unfortunately, new symptoms arrived this week. I thought the aches and pains weren’t supposed to show up until much later, but I guess that’s happening now. I think it was Thursday night that I literally had the worst night of sleep of my entire life. It didn’t matter how I positioned myself, nothing was comfortable. I had charlie horses, nightmares, heartburn, aches, pains, and apparently a conversation with Shelton about kids and marshmallows. It was miserable. During the day, I’m just achy. If Shelton places his hand on my back in the evening I feel like I could swallow his hand with my muscles – the pressure feels that good.
Some days the achiness radiates more from between my shoulders than elsewhere. I attribute that to the new set of breasts I’m hauling around. Last week I bought my first double-D bra. And unfortunately I feel like that’s not the end of the growth spurt I’m experiencing. Other times the pain radiates from my tailbone/lower back, and that’s the pain that feels nearly impossible to get rid of. It gets to the point where it hurts to walk, and of course sitting doesn’t help. This morning Shelton commented that the shape and curve of my back had changed. Clearly my body is shifting and changing in ways neither of us expected.
That was really about all that happened in week 15. Today we began week 16 and hoping that it goes just as smoothly.
OK, so it’s official, we are in the second trimester. Woo woo! Huge relief. We both feel like a bit of weight has been lifted, and yet we know we’ve still got a long way to go.
The whole thing is still unbelievably surreal to us both. The only thing that slaps us into reality is my ever-expanding belly. Yes, it’s getting rounder and rounder by the day. For now it’s a perfect little bump, nicely centered. I do hope it doesn’t expand on a horizontal plane. Nevertheless, being pregnant still feels foreign and intangible to me at times, and I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever get past that. I think of everything we’ve done and where are lives have gone in the five years we wanted/tried to have a baby. It’s then that I realize how truly long we really did wait to get here.
So we embrace. I just keep reminding myself that this is all worth it.
I do have a new pet peeve (as if my list had room for any more!). The psuedo “I told you so comments.” For instance, I say I’m so hungry all the time. And people reply with – well, this is what you asked for. I say I have heartburn that would make a dragon cry. And people reply that this is what I signed up for. I mention that none of my clothes fit. And people kindly remind that I knew what I was getting myself in to.
“No shit!” is what I want to scream back. As if I needed a snarky reminder of exactly what it is we got ourselves in to. I’m pretty sure I was there the day I handed the clinic two credit cards and a check to make our lump payment of more than $10,000. So, I’m pretty sure I knew as she was swiping and stamping that I wouldn’t feel well, that my skinny jeans wouldn’t fit for a while and that I might be all around uncomfortable for a period of time. But again, I also know just how very worth it all of this is.
Anyhow, can anyone else tell the hormones arrived? I laugh and I cry and I get really, REALLY frustrated.
We did have an appointment last week (read week 14 OB appointment) and got the a-OK from the doctor. My weight is progressing normally and everything else checked out perfectly. You can’t ask for more than that. And I started pre-natal yoga which I’m so pumped about and will take every Monday.
It was a fairly uneventful week. I just keep growing, and eating, and sleeping, and popping Tums like Halloween candy.
Yesterday we started our second trimester, and I cannot even begin to express the sigh of relief that exhaled from my lungs as I woke up. I know we’re not out of the woods completely, but we’re through the thick of it. I won’t consider us out of the woods and 100% until this little monster is at home with us, and I’ve counted all of the appendages ten times.
But, this post is not about the second trimester, it’s about the final week of our first trimester. Week 13.
I spent Sunday-Saturday in NYC. It’s a trip I take three or four times a year for work, and one I always look forward to. I work at home, so my days are spent with me, the dog and my laptop. I work with the best group of guys and I thoroughly enjoy getting a chance to work in the same room with them. And have real conversations.
On any other trip to NYC, I come home completely exhausted. It’s a completely different pace out there and I’m gung-ho and ready to take it on the first half of the week, but by Thursday I’m fading fast and the airplane never delivers me home soon enough. So I had my apprehensions about taking on this trip pregnant. I have more good days than bad days, as far as how well I feel. But good days can turn on a dime and I knew we didn’t have time for me to be laid up in bed. So my first plan of attack was to take my anti-nausea pill each morning with my pre-natal. And I like to think it worked because I didn’t get sick once. (Well, once, but completely unrelated.)
We also do a lot of walking. A lot. And I have days where a lap around the grocery store can send me in to a three-hour nap. Fortunately, I now stay in Brooklyn, rather than Upper East Manhattan, and the pace is slower. It probably also helped that I didn’t drink every night I was there.
I managed to stay well fed. And if you keep up with my pregnancy story at all, you know that that is a must because I eat round the clock. I took a trip to the grocery store and stocked up on healthy snacks. And then made sure to get my breakfast, lunch and dinner each day. The food there is always amazing and so delicious, and I love how each restaurant seems so authentic, handmade and like they really put their hearts into the food.
I did have one lunch that could have gone badly. On the walk to the restaurant I could feel my blood sugar crashing. I was getting the shakes, so I reached in my bag and started munching on some almonds. By the time we arrived at our table, I was sweating and light-headed. I asked the waitress to bring me food, anything, now! She did and I inhaled the chips, salsa, bread and butter that she delivered. Then I plowed through my lunch and felt back to normal. I hate, hate, hate that blood sugar crash feeling. It’s like there’s not enough food, soon enough that can pull you back to safety.
This past week I also discovered the club soda & cranberry juice. When everyone around me had glasses of wine and beer, and I jealousy smelled the aroma in the air, I got to sip on a fun-having drink, too! (I’ve since named this the Mama Cocktail.)
I returned home Saturday evening, in time to see my Sooners beat the Jayhawks!!!, and I collapsed. I rolled up into a corner on the couch and I didn’t move the rest of the night. I’ve also been home for two days now, and knock on wood, I don’t seem to be getting sick. I was concerned with flying in the germ tube that I’d come home with some horrid strain of some disease. I feel like I’m in the clear, and I’d like to thank my incessant handwashing (my hands are so dry they hurt!) for keeping me healthy.
I also brought a little more home with me than I left with. My belly. BIG changes in that this week and Shelton was just awe-struck when I lifted my shirt to show him the expansion project I underwent while in Brooklyn.
Now that I’m home, I’m starting to feel better and things feel like they’re slowing down from the insanity of the first trimester, I’m so anxious to get back on track with my eating. I went WAYYYY off the deep-end and I can’t even tell you how much I’m looking forward to salmon, brown rice and veggies tonight!
Week 12 started on a low note, but ended high. My morning sickness returned. I had several people say they’d never heard of that before, but I had no other explanation. I spent the first half of the week just feeling classically pregnant sick. This entire pregnancy so far, as soon as I wake in the morning, I have about a five-minute countdown to get food in my system or I’m miserable the rest of the day. So each morning last week I jumped out of bed to fix a bowl of cereal or eggs and toast. Within an hour, I’d lose it. By mid-week I started taking my nausea pill before I’d eat anything and managed to get through the end of the week without getting sick.
Everyone asked/argued if it was the flu. And it was not. Definitely morning sickness and I’m sticking to it. There were no other symptoms at all.
My fatigue continues. I’m easily getting ten hours of sleep a night, with 12 on the weekends. My mid-afternoon, I’d give someone $5 and a candy bar to let me take a nap. A simple trip to the grocery store leaves me worthless the rest of the evening. Shelton’s schedule has been so insane lately that having him tag along hasn’t really been an option. So either save errands for when he is around, or just write them off as not that important.
This has left me fairly “homebound” lately and it’s making me mental. I work at home, so my 8-5 is in the same place my 5-10 and Zss are. I’ve been trying to make a point of getting out at least once a day – a walk to the mailbox, a lunch with a friend, working the afternoon from a wifi coffee shop. Just something that changes my environment a bit.
Which brings me to exercise. No, I have not partaken (partook) in any exercise since the start of my pregnancy. With the blood clot, I just couldn’t bare the thought of doing anything that might put me or the baby in some kind of jeopardy. And while the doctor told me I didn’t need to lie flat on my back staring at the four walls until it passed, I just couldn’t do it. However, I’m so unbelievably excited that next week will start my second trimester, for all intents and purposes the bleeding is gone, and I can start prenatal yoga! A woman I work with is a yoga guru, so I had her shop all the Wichita yoga classes and she found one with an instructor who sound just right. Classes are super cheap, about $60 for a month of once-per-week sessions. Everything I’ve read about the benefits yoga lends to pregnant women makes me want to run not walk to my first class.
I’ve only taken yoga once in my life, years ago. And I got the giggles when people tooted and what not, because hidden inside me is a 14-year-old boy that I can’t shake at times. Plus my mother-in-law was attending the class with me and was ultra-bendy and six-packed, and was/am not, so I stopped going. I’m a completely different person now and I’m actually anxious to embrace these prenatal yoga classes, and will of course keep you posted on how I feel about what I’m gaining from them.
In other BIG news this past week, I’m full-on showing. I’ve had a minor bump for a few weeks now, really only noticeable to myself or Shelton (and my sister). But I swear I went to bed one night and woke up the next day and BAM there was a belly. There’s no denying it now. I can’t get over it. I can’t stop rubbing it or holding it. The feeling is so much different than the 12 pounds of chubby tire I lost a couple years ago. It’s solid and round and centered. And that’s the part I can’t get over, is that I keep thinking it’s going to squish or wobble or whatever like love handles. But it’s not. It will continue to get bigger and I cannot wait!
Speaking of “how I’m carrying,” I’ve yet to talk to a single person who thinks this is a boy. Every vote so far has been cast as a girl. Neither Shelton nor I have an inkling of what it could be. Frankly, we don’t care. I’d prefer not the hermaphrodite I dreamt about a few nights ago, but otherwise we’re open to whatever we get. My sister, and the “women’s contingent” in my family have decided that I’m “carrying high” and “all in my belly” and “nothing in my back” and the “wind’s blowing from the east,” and so on – all apparently meaning that I’m having a girl. When and if we decide to find out before this baby arrives, we’ve still got a long way to go.
Other than that, I’m excited that this begins the final week of our first trimester. What a relief it is to get to this point. I’ll spending this week in NYC, currently sitting on a three-and-a-half hour flight. On the downside, my flight was delayed; on the upside, that meant I got to eat! I had to SWEAR and PROMISE Shelton that I would take it easy on myself and try not to push myself; I made him SWEAR and PROMISE not to worry. The only thing I can SWEAR and PROMISE is that neither of us is likely to hold up our end of the deal.
I think week 11 can be summed up in one word – tired. Make that exhausted. I’ve reached the hibernation point of this pregnancy. I sleep about 10-12 hours a night, and by noon/early afternoon each day I’m ready for a nap, and by the time evening hits I’m completely worthless. A friend told me that she slept through the entire third month of her pregnancy, just missed the entire thing, doesn’t remember it. Isn’t that nuts? I don’t think I’m there, but a close second.
It’s still just so insane to me how much, and how quickly, your body changes. To that, I still have days where I have to go oh wow, I’m pregnant! This is real! If it weren’t for the symptoms I think I’d never believe it.
The sonogram and the picture of the real baby helped. We had a sonogram last Monday, as my bleeding had returned. Thankfully all signs of the blood clot are completely gone and the doctor believes it’s just the last little bit draining off. I’m still seeing very faint, very mild spotting here and there, but I think we’re completely out of the woods on this. Thank God! I’ve been told that some women will spot their entire pregnancy. I’m hoping that’s not me, but at least now I can take a deep breath and not completely panic.
Toward the end of the week I started feeling sick again. Nauseous, everything stinks, nothing sounds good, just miserable. So I spent the majority of the weekend lying right here on this couch vegging in front of the TV, eating crackers. I’ve also learned something about pregnancy that can be filed under the “things no one ever tells you.” I can’t brush my teeth. The thought of having to brush my teeth makes me want to run to the toilet. And I thought I was being weird so I tried to get over it. Until I told a few friends who all either concurred or told me about three other people they know who have resorted to gum or rinsing with mouthwash. And I’m thinking, well, that would work but I cannot live with the fuzzy slipper teeth. Since I work at home, and I don’t have to come into contact with humans for the majority of the day, I’m not making it the first thing I do in the morning. Because I’m not kidding, I will vomit. So I have breakfast, let that digest, and closer to lunch I brace myself for brushing my teeth. And I use the TINIEST dob of toothpaste and we get in and get out. Fast. And I try not to breathe while doing it. The entire task is horrendous and I really, REALLY hope this passes. I need to make a dentist appointment and I’m avoiding it because I am one hundred percent certain I will puke on the hygienist. And maybe the dentist, too.
The bump is continuing to grow, getting more bumptastic all the time. Depending on what I wear it’s completely obvious (for instance, today I’m in yoga pants and a slim long sleeve t-shirt). It’s fun, makes this entire thing a bit more real. I think I’m about at the point of having to give up my regular jeans. Sigh. I’ve held out as long as I could. But yesterday, squatting, bending, sitting or just moving was too much. They were so tight and so uncomfortable. The downside is that I’m not quite big enough for my maternity jeans, they slide off of me like an 8-year-old boy with no hips. And who knew they didn’t put belt loops on maternity pants?! What the hell?!
Week 12 is starting off a bit rough, and I’m going to spend week 13 in NYC. So I’m really going to take it easy on myself this week and hope it gets better and that I have the energy to take on the Big Apple.