Week 22 - Funky Dreams and Big Kicks

My computer has been on the fritz for the last week since a Trojan horse decided to make my life hell. I thought it was taken care of, but it looks like I get to reformat everything to get it back to a crappiness free existence. And by me, I mean Andy gets to do it. He had some unexpected dental work done this week and we both seemed to be affected by a stomach bug that had been making the rounds at work, so this post is a bit late but there's tons of fun stuff going on.

So, for the past several nights I've been having weird dreams. First, it was a hospital dream with all kinds of what-the-hell-was-that-about details (don't worry, I'll get to that in a moment). The next night I don't remember exactly what the context was, but there was a specific dollar amount that was really important that kept popping up. It was so important that even after waking up, I remembered the exact amount. Why I would need to have $28,245.10 is beyond me (not hospital bills, since our insurance puts a cap on out of pocket expenses, and not a reasonable down payment for a house, since that gets you a broken down shed out here), though if someone wants to give it to me, I will happily take it and start Little One's college fund. The night after that, Andy and I were touring a, um, ahem, adult film studio and critiqueing what we saw (this is what happens when you feel Frisky during Weird Dreams Week). Last night, it was a serial killer. Not a killer after me or anyone I cared about, but he was out there. He was a relatively friendly serial killer, seeing as he didn't want to kill me, but it's never any fun to have murderers running around.

But that hospital dream? One of those epic dreams that seems to go on and on and changes course several times and the details that might have some basis in reality don't really stick. At first we went to the hospital because of an infection I was having or something, which of course means I should be sent up to Labor & Delivery. But this hospital was a zoo. I mean that in a figurative way, but it was really crowded and not exactly clean, which is, well, BAD for a hospital. There were people running around not knowing where to go, and L&D switched to being just a general hospital but with too many people for the LDR (labor, delivery, recovery) rooms they had.

So we're waiting around for a room, and I'm deliriously trying to crawl around the cafeteria (which is in the same area as in-take) when my tray full of broccoli and jello went flying and I turned into a blubbering mess on the floor. At that same moment, my in-laws show up and expect Andy to give them all of his attention, because it's TOTALLY normal for someone to fly across the country when your expectant daughter-in-law goes to the hospital. For an infection. But I was back in L&D at this point, so of course I must be having my baby. (I should mention here that I love my in-laws; they're incredibly generous and understanding about how quickly Andy made me his top priority, so it's really weird that they would be so demanding in my dream).

Not actually being in labor, we leave the hospital (as in, just walk out like we hadn't registered with the in-take nurses, which I'm sure would be fun for them) and go...somewhere. Suddenly I don't have an enormous belly, but I'm still pregnant, and we're walking around deserted construction sites that have giant gaping holes and rotting floors because that's a perfectly safe thing to do. Until a floor gives out from under me and I have to cling to something to keep from falling down 10 feet, but Andy and his dad (who apparently were 10 feet tall) pick me up and carry me off to safety like a bag of potatoes. All that stress actually does put me into labor, so we go back to the hospital.

Remember when I said there were too many people at the hospital? Yeah, they decide to put me in a room which apparently had previously been occupied by a really wealthy woman and hadn't been fully cleared out yet. That, or all rooms come equipped with scary looking stuffed animals for all the newborns that aren't even aware of them and a professional caterer who makes food that would have been more appropriate for a cocktail party for everyone in the delivery room. The nurse keeps sneaking me canapes so I can eat something (seeing as I had a stellar meltdown in the cafeteria), and then they start prepping me for delivery and doing just about everything I've specifically requested to NOT have in my birth plan. I try to tell them "No, I'm only 26 weeks, I'm just here for an infection" and they just tell me to push, despite the fact that I haven't had any contractions, and in reality I was only 22 weeks. The dream kept going on and on with me telling them I was a different number of weeks every time, anywhere from 20 to 28 (apparently you can reverse your pregnancy in dreams). Then I actually started contractions and woke up. How's that for a doozy of a dream?

So yeah, I'm hoping that my dreams get a little less bizarre, or at least don't happen every night. Though it could be worse, I guess. For the past month, I've been waking up to pee between 1 and 3 every single night (like you do when your bladder is losing real estate in your pelvic cavity), which has been stopping most of my dreams. Chances are some of the dreams would have gotten weirder before I woke up. Other fun effects of pregnancy include itching all ove and a constant appetite. The itching is probably half having my skin stretch out and half from the weather, but it's still no fun. But the appetite probably means just one thing: growing baby.

I'm pretty sure Little One has just gone through a growth spurt, what with me being hungry not long after eating and the huge growth of my belly, seemingly overnight. My coat is just about to the point that I can't even button it (you can see the belly even when I have the coat on), so I'll be switching to my fancy-schmancy maternity peacoat tomorrow. I'm also pretty sure that my earliest maternity shirts will be too tight by New Year's. Her movements are getting a lot easier to feel, and a lot of her kicks are pretty strong. Friday morning I thought it might be enough for Andy to feel soon, and that evening he got to feel her for the first time, making several kicks that were actually kind of painful at times. He looked so happy to finally feel it though, and it really made our day. I will have you know though, (TMI alert) it's really distracting to feel her kicking during the previously mentioned Frisky time. Kind of like having the dog watching, but with less noise.

As of last Sunday, Little One was a full pound and about 8 inches long. Her senses are developing, and by now she can feel enough that she grabs her umbilical cord just for fun. She can open and shut her eyes and see enough that if we put a flashlight against my belly (which I'm not quite cruel enough to try...yet), she would turn away and push against me to get it away from her. Her fingernails are completely formed, and her brain is rapidly developing. Her skin is getting thicker and thicker, so she's looking less like a transparent alien and more like a real baby, or a doll as so many books put it. And in just over four months (hopefully not too much more), we'll finally get to meet her.

Week 21 - About My Dad

I've been trying to figure out how to write this all week. There's somthing I've wanted to talk about that I haven't touched on much, but now seems like the right time. Go ahead and grab a box of tissues now.

Today would have been my dad's 50th birthday. He had a heart attack at 44, partially because of genetics, partially because of an enlarged heart that was weakened by working so hard, and partially because of a strong fondness for ice cream and other goodies. I struggled a lot after he died, having left some things unsaid. I wish I had just taken the 20 minutes and gone to see him and tell him I loved him the day before. My father-in-law was one of the last people to talk to him, and had told him that I had been in town the night before but decided to wait until Saturday to come by. It killed me that he died knowing I had decided he could wait.

Eventually I moved past my guilt and anger (he had done some pretty crappy stuff that we found out about afterwards, but I won't get into that here) and have been through some of life's biggest moments without him. Graduation didn't hurt too much, since I walked before actually finishing, having needed another semester after taking incompletes for some courses (one asshat professor felt that 3 weeks was plenty of time to grieve and catch up on missed material before taking the final - I seriously wanted to punch him). My wedding was joyous but still hard at times. Somehow I knew he wouldn't be there, I just had always thought it was because we would end up estranged. But being a parent? I never thought he wouldn't be there when I had my first child.

My dad was the moody-yet-funny one in the family. When he wasn't being grouchy (or downright mean), he was joking and good with all the kids. I had always imagined what a wonderful grandpa he would be, pulling the same jokes and stunts that my cousins and I had seen a thousand times, making our favorite foods when we came by for a visit. I know exactly how he would respond if we could tell him in person that he would be a grandpa: wrap me in the perfect hug and then proclaim "Outstanding!". I don't know why, but that ended up being my dad's phrase of choice for anything that deserved commendation or praise. Any time I hear it, I think of him.

So now I'm grieving again, though not as hard as the first time. And through it all, I'm wondering if I'm ready for all this. Can I handle the stresses of daily life and keeping a career moving and supporting my kids? Will I end up a hard-ass like he could be sometimes, or go too far in the other direction, being too lax because I don't want my kids to ever be afraid of me? I try to keep tabs on my health so I catch any heart disease early, but I think of how much exercise he got in PT with the Guard (he served full time at our local National Guard Armory) and worry that I won't be around long enough for my own daughter. He was so young, and I could just as easily be at risk. And while I may be lucky enough to have not have inherited his dad's genes for major heart disease, that doesn't mean my size isn't an issue. You would think it would just be a bigger motivator to get healthy, but sadly my perfectionist tendencies leave me reluctant to start something that will be too hard for my body (like the prenatal yoga disaster) or that I don't like enough to keep up with. Which would have him lecturing me about being disciplined, blah, blah, blah. Dad's lectures were not one of his most endearing qualities.

But I do know there are a couple things I learned from my dad about what kind of parent I want to be. So many of my fond memories are just simple routines that we had. Mugs of chamomile tea with honey before a long drive early in the morning. Walking the dogs every evening and talking about our days. Learning to make different Hungarian foods that he had growing up. He was someone I could talk to when I was a moody teenager, and I really want that with my kids. To give them a place that they feel listened to and validated. Of course, Murphy's Law says I'll have teenagers who want me to leave them alone because I'm smothering them. Go figure. But I think most people just end up trying to give their kids the things they couldn't have, and it's hard for kids to understand where their parents are coming from because we strive to give them something else. Hence a lot of the tension in adolescent years.

So, onto happier things. Little One is about the size of a large banana. I would make an "are you just happy to see me?" joke, but I'm sort of fresh out of funny right now. She's learning to swallow amniotic fluid right now, and her taste buds have developed enough that she can taste the foods I'm eating. I'm sure she's sick of Thanksgiving leftovers and bananas by now, since that's what we had a lot of this week. Soon, she'll be getting a whole lot of eggnog as we set up our Christmas tree. Yum!

Ultrasound Pictures!

Hey look! Pictures from the ultrasound! And it only happened 10 days ago...

I was going to do a cutesy side-by-side explaining what exactly, these are showing. But if I did that, then you would never see these. So here we go:

Here's a nice profile shot with her nose which she was so damned determined to hide before.

And one of her actual face so you can see her eyes. The creepy looking lips are especially fun.

And this is a side-by-side of her feet. Why the tech got a shot like this, I don't remember, but...yay, toes!

And these two are the ones that need some help explaining. Basically, she was laying face down across my uterus, and then she tucked/crossed her legs sort of "Indian-style" giving us a perfect view of the three lines that say "this is not a scrotum". There are helpful arrows that the tech added for us in case you have no idea what you're looking at. Oh wait, that's everybody.

So there you go, pictures! Look for a full post tomorrow. It'll be kinda long and kinda sad. Sorry about that.

Week 20 - She's Shy Like Mommy and Daddy

Little One is a girl!! My ultrasound this morning was only marginally better than the last one. It still took longer than expected, and the tech still didn't get every shot that she was hoping for because Little One decided to lay face down  instead of being in a position where we could see everything. In the end, we got the few that were really important to me: a perfectly beating little heart, tiny hands, and the top priority between-the-legs. We were also able to see the feet again, the thigh bone, lips and the nose, and one ear. It looks like she won't have the lovely Nemeth ears that stick out a bit which seem to show up on boys in the family more than on girls. Which is kind of duh, since she's a girl. We're incredibly happy, and our parents are thrilled. We would have been happy either way, but it's so much more fun to shop for girl clothes. We picked up tiny socks with a pink lace ruffle and a book to start reading to her, I Love You This Much. Andy and I were looking at it in a children's store, and I started to tear up because it was so sweet.

I got my flu shot the other day, which is good since it is that season, but I really screwed up the timing since I forgot about the flu-like ickiness you get a few days afterwards. Fast forward 72 hours and I've got aches and chills and a mild fever. Then I threw up this morning and I've been nauseous almost all day. Hard to say if it's the shot or morning sickness, but either way it still makes life tough. I'm just hoping that I feel well enough to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow. I already had to give up on making homemade rolls or pie crust, and I'm not sure what else to cut at this point. Luckily, Andy is a fantastic sous chef with better knife skills, so he can at least chop onions and celery for the stuffing, take care of the potatoes completely, and prep all the veggies for roasting. Then I just have to get the turkey in the oven and cook the stuffing. Cranberry sauce is from a can (gasp! but it's what I always do when it's just me eating cranberries), and gravy I can practically do in my sleep. Our green salad is just baby greens with goat cheese and a dressing made from bottled champagne dressing mixed with cranberry juice. Spiffy! We might try an alcohol-free wine that a friend gave us back when we were first trying to get pregnant, but there will at least be sparkling cider. And then a pumpkin pie which should be amazing, given how frickin fantastic the batter tasted.

TMI Alert: You know what's also awful about getting the chills? It makes sore boobs hurt even more! They've gained at about two cup sizes and are only going to get bigger, but the process of growing to supply enough milk is just painful. Every time I take my bra off, it feels like I sunburned every inch of my breasts. I've only ever burned the top half of my boobs, not being brave enough to go topless, but yeah, that's what it feel like. My nipples are squished if I try to wear my pre-pregnancy bras, which basically means they point sideways at the end of the day and scream bloody murder. Actually, they're screaming "Get new bras already woman! It's only going to get worse!" but the effect is the same. And now that I've channeled Diana Gabaldon in Drums of Autumn ("Nipples again?!"), I'll move on to other topics.

Little One is supposed to be 10 ounces, but the tech said she weighs about 13 ounces. Not sure if that's good or bad. But given that one book used "small cantaloupe" as a reference, I'm not too worried. I'm pretty sure based on today's ultrasound that she is not spherical in shape. Her senses are developing a lot, and she can hear me now and recognize my voice. This also means she was able to hear the incredibly loud fire alarms that went off Monday morning, and promptly started kicking me to show me her displeasure at the noises. "Make it stop Mommy, it hurts my ears!" Me too, Little One. Me too.

Week 19 - The Rant Smorgasbord

Bear with me as I get into a touchy subject for many a pregnant woman, but particularly for me as a person who started out pregnancy clinically obese and comes from a family where almost everyone can be described that way.

One of the many glorious symptoms that marks the fifth month of pregnancy is an increased appetite. I guess this would be a minimal difference if I had gone from "food? okay, I'll have some at regular intervals so I can nourish my baby" to "hmm, I'm hungry again, I'll have a healthy snack and then eat a normal meal because my body and the baby need it" over a couple of weeks. Instead, I've gone from "I guess I'll eat so I don't get nauseous, but it better have milk or garlic in it, and don't bother with chocolate because I'm 'meh' about it" to full on "I know I ate an hour ago, but my stomach is gurgling and I'll just inhale everything available" kind of hunger.

I'm also really suggestible right now, so watching tv can be dangerous, especially Food Network. It would be really dangerous for me to just throw in the towel and eat anything and everything that appeals to me, because all it takes is a 3-second mention of some food for me to want it, which means I sometimes want foods that just aren't all that good for me (or are really bad for the baby, like Bailey's [note to self, bring mini-bottle of Bailey's to hospital to celebrate with after labor] or sushi).

Luckily, with a full and overboard return of my appetite comes a renewed emphasis on getting the best nutrition I can. I'm back up to the right number on my veggies, and taking time to consider where my shortages are. Last night, for example, I had a mug of warm milk as an evening snack to boost my calcium. Exciting! Occasionally I'm indulging in oh-so-tasty but less-than-nutritious stuff (okay, yesterday I indulged a bit too much because a co-worker brought in some fantastic cookies after I half-joked about her not bringing us goodies anymore), but overall I'm trying to be good.

I want so badly to come out of this gaining exactly the right amount of weight, yet I haven't gotten a scale for at home because I know it's a tough road to take, being constantly obssessed about how much everyone weighs and how you fit into the general pattern and judging everyone's worth by whether they've gained or lost weight lately. Case in point, none of my friends or co-workers have said anything about my weight (other than to encourage me to be careful because they had the hardest time losing weight after the pregnancies in which they gained the most), but a family member brought it up (not to my face, but with my mom and sister). It kind of hurt a bit that someone who I know loves me would make a snide remark, but I know what I need to do and I'm happy with how I'm doing overall. Whether I'll be so happy when I get checked at the doctor's office, we'll see, but I'm not going to torture myself in the meantime because other people are so unhappy with their own weight that they have to judge others to feel justified about their own struggles.

Ahem. Moving on. /rant.

The movements have slowed down a bit but it's still so early that I'm second guessing myself a bit. Plus, it's been just long enough since my last check-in at the midwife's office that I'm starting to get the "what if something is wrong?" jitters. I thought being stressed about when I was ovulating was hard, but this is really tough because it's not just me anymore. It's our baby, a tiny human-in-progress that I'm just beginning to bond with. (I'll take this moment to say that while I understand some people feel life starts the moment the sperm joins the egg, I know this fetus couldn't survive outside my body and still won't be able to for several more weeks. It drives me nuts that because some people think of pregnancy one way, they want to control a woman's body so she must act in a way that's acceptable by their morals. My body, my choice. Period. And that should extend to how I give birth. (See how I brought it back around to the usual subjects. Go me!) /rant again.)

Little One is now large mango sized, so I was wrong before. Whatever. It still was making me want to vomit after the simple act of, you know, EXISTING. or walking. or smelling Old Bay, which makes living in the mid-Atlantic a really crappy place to be pregnant. The all holy books don't have a whole lot to say right now about what Little One is up to, other than the fact that it's coated with vernix, that cheesy looking coating that does....stuff. Yum! Okay, actually it's to protect the sensitive skin from amniotic fluid, but apparently it might still be around by the time I give birth.

Wait, you mean babies don't come out clean and smelling like Johnson & Johnson's baby lotion? I might have to review this whole "where babies come from" thing. And then ask the stork for a refund. Stay tuned for next week. Little One will change from an "it" to he or she!

Week 18 - Flutters of Life

Tuesday morning, I woke up feeling really unsettled. I'd been feeling guilty about not getting any kind of nesting urge, or looking at baby clothes or furniture for the nursery. It was getting to the point of causing some anxiety about what kind of mother I would be, so that morning I just cried it out a bit while Andy held me, putting voice to a lot of my worries. Why am I not more attached to the baby? I wanted this for so long, and I still don't have any urge to look at clothes, does that mean I won't be happy when the baby is here? And why haven't I felt any movements yet? Am I just not paying enough attention? Does that mean I'm a bad mom too? Once I was finally calm again, we talked about what might be going on (we try to not jump to "it's the hormones" every time I get upset, so that if it is an issue that needs to be worked through, we do) and a couple good points came out.

One of the effects of waiting to think about names until we know whether Little One is a boy or a girl is that it hasn't felt like a person. It's hard to bond with something that you only refer to as Little One, "the baby", or it. It's even harder to bond when the only evidence of Little One's presence has been a growing belly and continued morning sickness. So we decided to start talking about names anyway and it quickly became apparent that there aren't a ton of boy's names that A. aren't already given to other family members, B. aren't so overly chic as to be the Jennifer of the 2000's (I'm looking at you, Aiden), or C. don't have some kind of negative connotation because of people we know with the name. We decided to give it some thought and come back to it later, but even that much made me feel immensely better.

So after all my bitching about not feeling anything yet, imagine my surprise later that afternoon to be standing in line at Costco and realize that my stomach has this kind of funny feeling. Not in a bad way, just enough to make me pause and think "What's going on now? I better not be about to get nauseous again. I'm not hungry, I just had a snack 30 minute ago. I'm not nervous, it's Costco for crying out loud. Nothing I ate would make me gassy, so why would it feel like there's bubbles in my...OHHHHHHHH." Then I got this huge smile. I kept feeling little butterfly flutters for the rest of the day and into the next morning, and then things quieted down a bit. Little One seems most active when I'm walking around fast, and after Frisky time, which is actually pretty common for babies. Wouldn't you feel good after getting an endorphin rush and going on a roller coaster?

I'm feeling pretty good myself. I've been outgrowing my everyday shirts pretty steadily, but I still have a few left. I tried to order stuff online, and apparently I'm between sizes because they tell you to to order your pre-pregnancy size, but I was swimming in half the stuff. Unfortunately, I will not be swiming, since the only plus size swimsuit at Motherhood Maternity is no longer available, and I can't find anything from other retailers. I guess it's on to walking and the Wii. I'll probably enjoy walking more now that I know I'll be able to feel the baby a lot afterwards. Perhaps it will even be incentive enough to do it every day.

Little One is about 5.5 ounces now, which is charmingly described in What to Expect When You're Expecting as a cuter version of the chicken breasts I eat for dinner. Seriously? That's all they could come up with? I guess I won't be eating chicken for dinner. Something that is cute: Little One has fingerprints, even though the finger and toe pads are tiny, I'm guessing maybe the size of a grain of rice. Little One is also starting to yawn and hiccup. I have no idea what that will feel like, but at some point, I'll feel that just as well as the little kicks and rolls.

Week 17 - Great News!

More news from the most recent doctor's visit, which I wrote about a bit last week. When Andy and I went in for my 12 week appointment, we were told that I was being tested early for Gestational Diabetes because both my weight and my PCOS history put me at elevated risk, and I should schedule my next appointment so I could stick around for one hour. So last week we had the 16 week appointment, and I got to drink the Fruit Punch glucose stuff (infinitely better than the Orange-flavored crap I've had to take before), meet with the midwife, and sit around until my hour was up. I finally called to get my results since I hadn't heard from them, and I got an all clear. So I don't have to take the 3-hour test, and I don't have to retest until the third trimester. Awesomeness. Good thing they didn't want to test me this week. I've had so much leftover candy because of my co-workers bringing it in that my blood sugar is probably more than a tad off right now.

Another result of the visit is that we're waiting a bit longer than we expected to find out if Little One is a boy or a girl. Until right before Thanksgiving. And if I'm feeling really, really mean, I'll wait until the last appointment of the day, just to drive my mom nuts. Granted, this might not be in my best interest because she will ask every time we talk if I can move up the appointment/find out sooner/buy a sonogram machine so she can fly out and do it herself/etc/etc. (Hi Mom! Thanks for following me. Sorry if I said anything that pissed you off...)  Looking over the order from the doc, I realized that I'll be getting a 3-D ultrasound along with everything else. I once heard someone describe the images as looking like dead aliens...and I kinda agree. Maybe I'll feel diferently when I'm seeing my own child, but fer cryin out loud, the faces look so distorted! Creepy, I tell you.

So I'm almost at the end of my fourth month. Kinda freaky really. Also sad is the realization that I haven't had much wine for the last 6 months. I went to a great wine tasting in May, and some wine tasting in June for my birthday, but that's been it. I had no idea I would miss it so much. Sparkling cider has been nice, but I remember it feeling it much more special when I was a kid. My mom doesn't drink, so we never had wine for holiday meals or champagne at New Year's Eve, always sparkling cider. But I'd gotten used to the joy of picking out just the right wine to match a carefully planned meal, or trying to find the perfect balance of dry and sweetness for toasting at midnight. (Cava is the way to go, in case you're interested). I think my alternative will be to try making mocktails, like cider and pomegranate juice, or eggnog and...eggnog, because the only stuff I like to add to eggnog is Kahlua or Bailey's. Andy does brandy, but that doesn't really do anything for me. I wonder if I can count eggnog as a source of calcium? Probably not, unless it was part of a steamed milk. Mmmmm, steamed milk with peppermint syrup, that's yummy too. I must be hungry, because this all sounds really yummy. Thank heaven for Christmas drinks at Starbucks.

Little One is about the size of my hand. Apparently the pregnancy books can only come up with fruits for the first trimester. Still a mango? I can't even think of fruits near that size. Maybe a zucchini? I know, not a fruit, but it's about right for 5 inches and 5 ounces. Oh the places I can go with that bad line. And I'm still not sure if I'm feeling anything that I can be sure of as movements. But apparently, if there's a sudden noise, Little One might jump. And Little One is figuring out to suck his or her thumb. How precious is that?