Doctor's Visit

Had another Doctor appointment today. No protein in my urine, which is great! I haven't had protein show up in it for the last three visits! Yay! The doctor is having me do another 24 hour urine test just to make sure.

Today I had an ultrasound, which looked good, I had an NST (where they monitor the baby's heartbeat), which was also good. I lost two pounds since last time. My blood pressure looked good, and the baby looked good. Overall everything was doing good. The doctor did a Strep B test today, and did a vaginal exam. I have a feeling I know what the Strep B results will be, but I am glad that the test was done. The vaginal exam showed that my cervix has softened and I am 1-2 cm dialated and 20% effaced. Which means that my body is getting ready for giving birth to the baby. The doctor said that this is normal and is ok for me to be dialted at this point in my pregnancy.

Davy is moving around a lot. Last night I had some contractions, Braxton-Hicks I am sure. It seems crazy that Davy will be here soon. My dad pointed out last night that today we will be exactly 1 month from my due date. Craziness! Are we ready for Davy to come? Yes, but I still don't know if I am completely ready for the change that a baby will bring to our lives. Big changes, and they are all just around the corner!

Tests and more tests

So, last week I got further testing done, and had to finish another 24 hour urine test. The test results came back normal. But I didn't hear my urine test until today. Last Friday the doctor took me off bed rest. I had an ultrasound and another test that monitored the baby's heart beat and monitored whether I had any contractions. The ultrasound was cool, the baby is doing well and looking well, the tech did some 3D shots of the baby, it was very neat to see the baby's face. It looks like he has Kevin's lips, my mom says he looks like Kevin. After the ultrasound they did a test where they strapped two devices to my belly, one tracked the baby's heart beat and the other tracked whether I was having contractions. We listened to the baby's heart beat for 30 minutes. Baby is doing well and I had no contractions. Then we met with the doctor and discussed everything. The baby is growing well, and looks to be doing good, it's heartbeat is perfect, my test results were good, all except for my urine test which is showing more protein than it did in my first test. So back on bed rest again.

Doctor now wants to see me twice a week. She also wants me to have ultrasounds and the Fetal Heart Rate test twice a week as well. She wants me to repeat the blood work tests and the urine test each week as well. Oh joy. This is until my urine tests get better and stay better. Lets hope my protein pee disappears soon. In other news, I am 7 weeks away from my delivery date. On a good note, the baby's room is pretty much ready for him. More updates when I know more.

Test results

So as I may have mentioned I had to take a 24 hour urine test last week because my urine was showing protein in it. When my doctor's office got the results they still found protein in my urine so they called me and placed me on bed rest. This happened on Tuesday while at my parent's house. So essentially I have been stuck doing nothing this entire week. Kevin set up stuff for me so that I can basically sit around in a recliner for the entire time. Which is basically what I have been doing. Have spent most of my time surfing online and such. Boring! Next week I am going to meet with my doctor again and have some further tests run to check and see if this is actually pre-eclampsia or not. If it is I will probably be stuck on bed rest for the remainder of my pregnancy. If not then I should be able to return things mostly back to normal. Either way I still have to wait till next week to get things done. It is driving me crazy. I need to clear my head and get some things taken care of. With this and the craziness of the house I hope that things don't get too stressful.

Here is your Pee Bucket!

So yesterday I had my doctor's appointment. I was going to be today but with the whole closing scare I rescheduled it. At the appointment my doctor noticed that I had protein in my urine, which was also the case last visit. So because this can indicate toximia and/or pre-eclampsia she is having me do a 24 hour urine test. 24 hour? What does that involve (you may ask). Why peeing into a bucket for an entire day! Admit it, this sounds like great fun! Ok, maybe not.

So she sent me over to the lab where they got me all my pee bucket gear. This includes a "hat" that I can pee in and then pour into the bucket, as well as two bottles for collecting pee while I am "away from home". Yay! You mean I can carry my pee with me wherever I go!! How magical!!!

I figure the easiest way of taking care of this is just to get it done today and then take it in tomorrow. We are basically in the Rochelle area until Saturday night so no point not to. Besides, Kevin needs to have his blood drawn at a Quest location and I figure this is as good as anytime for him. He can come with me on Saturday morning when I go to drop off my "Bucket O' Pee", and we can let the vampires at him. Ok so phlebotomists are not really vampires, but they do take your blood.

Oh the joys of pregnancy!

On the other hand I am getting rather excited for Davy to come. I can't remember if I wrote about my work baby shower. It went really well, my managers and one of my co-workers put it together for me and it was super cute! And Kevin got to come too, he liked it quite a bit. And the gifts, we got some great gifts which will help out a lot since all our money is currently going toward the closing for the house in Rochelle. For those who don't know, we are closing on Monday. Yay for things moving forward!

Weekend Update

Last week I got a call from the doctor's office telling me that my glucose tests had come back abnormal and that I needed to have another glucose test run. This one needed to be 3 hours long and I needed to fast for it. I am pretty sure that I threw my first test because I had eaten breakfast before hand and I had grabbed four pieces of halloween candy and had eaten them on my drive up to Rockford for the test.

So Saturday I went to Rockford again for my second glucose test. I took my mom with me, which made the test go quicker. The tech had to take my blood four times, which wasn't the most fun experience, but it was part of the test. After the test we met up with my dad and Kevin and went to Five Guys hamburger joint. The food was pretty good, but expensive. Later that evening I was able to finish up three necklaces that I made as thank you gifts for the ladies who are putting together my baby shower at work. It feels good to have those finished as I don't know if I will have time to work on them this week. The baby shower is scheduled for next Monday, Nov. 15th.

Sunday went pretty well until we got to the evening. At one point a beeping alarm sounded, we finally figured out that it was one of the fire alarms. But there was no fire. So we checked the alarm and it looked like it was the Carbon Monoxide detector. We also thought it may be the battery. My dad tried changing the battery but all the batteries in their house were low on juice. Kevin and I finally talked my parents into leaving the house (because we were scared of a Carbon Monoxide leak) and we all went to Walmart and picked up some new batteries. When we got back Kevin and my dad changed all the batteries in all the detectors and once they got some new batteries in them the alarm stopped and did not come back on. All in all it was a bit of an unsettling night.

Monday I had my doctor's appointment. The results from my test on Saturday came in while we were there. Turns out they came back normal, so no gestational diabeties for me. Everything is looking good with the baby and I seem to be doing good too. Strange thing, I went down by 1 lb from the last time I had been at my doctors. My next visit is on the 19th.

Bag of flour, ready to burst

So next week (starting Saturday) my baby will be the size of a bag of flour or the size of a chinese cabbage (?). This week he is the size of a small pot roast or a head of cauliflower. Huh, again with the food comparisons. Next week I start the third trimester. Holy cow, already?? It seems like everything is moving so fast. Little Davy (as Kevin calls him) is still kicking a lot. It seems like when I lay down to go to bed at night is when he decides that he needs to start his dance areobics! At least I can still pretty much ignore them and sleep.

Yesterday I went to Michaels and while in the check out had my first slightly awkward pregnancy conversation (and when I say slightly awkward I mean slightly awkward about me).
Cashier: When are you due?
Me: January 28th
Cashier: Wow, so far away? You're so big already, are you having twins?
Me: Nope.
Cashier: Are you sure?
Me: Yep they checked before I was even 10 weeks along.
Cashier: Well maybe you are just having a big baby. Were you a big baby?
Me: Not really.
Cashier: Was your husband?
Me: I don't really know.
Cashier: Well maybe you will be one of those lucky women who have a 10 lb baby.
Me: I sure hope not. (Thinking, "I haven't gained more than 3 lbs this entire pregnancy, I pretty much doubt I am having a 10 lb baby.")
Cashier: Well you have a good day.
Me: You too.

I had read about these kind of conversations, the ones where people are just plain rude about how big you are. But up till yesterday I hadn't had any yet. I didn't really want to say, "Well I started out big so I probably look bigger than I really am." No need to puncture my self confidence a little more just to explain things to her. As it is I am excited still about the baby coming, just a bit nervous (ok more than a bit) about everything that has to happen before he comes.

Yesterday I spent looking at cribs and breast pumps. I forwarded Kevin what I found. There are some good deals out there on cribs. Mostly on Amazon. Maybe I should check out E-bay as well. Tired, so tired all the time. I could use a nap. Oh well...

Doctors Appointment

Tomorrow is my second Dr appointment with the Rockford doctor. I have put together a list of things I want to ask her about. One of those things is weight.

When I got pregnant I weighed myself, shortly after getting pregnant I lost five pounds, then I gained seven pounds, since then I have pretty much stayed even. Yesterday morning though I weighed myself and I am back at the same weight I was when I first got pregnant. And I am starting my 27th week tomorrow. I am hoping that I am ok weight wise, because otherwise I might have to start looking at gaining more weight.

Tomorrow I also have my glucose test to see if I have prenatal diabetes. I will also have my RH test (I think that is what it is called) to make sure that my blood is not having problems with the baby. I don't think it will, it usually happens if the father's blood type and the mother's blood type are different in such a way that the mother's blood tries to kill the baby due to blood type. Kevin is O+ blood type and I am O+ blood type. Considering that O+ is recessive I don't think our baby will have anything other than O+ blood type.

I don't know if there will be anything else that will happen. But my appointments will increase from once every 3 weeks to once every 2 weeks. I have been looking at classes to prepare for pregnancy. And trying to plan out which ones to go to and when they are scheduled for.

Birth Plan

Today I looked over week 26 information for my pregnancy. This week my baby is as long as an English hothouse cucumber, again, why do they compare the baby to food? In the info for the week they mentioned putting together a birth plan.

So I started looking at birth plans out there and some of the interactive ones. A birth plan is basically your preferences when it comes to labor and delivery and post delivery. Having one does not ensure that it will be followed, but it does help the doctor and the hospital know what you want without you having to tell them every step of the way.

I sent myself a few links to some of the interactive ones. There is one that is very explainatory that I like and think I may use. It covers Strep B, which is one of my biggest fears, and the explainations help me understand what I am putting on the plan. The plans cover almost anything under the sun when it comes to giving birth. It makes me happy that I looked into them because I often feel like I just don't know enough yet for this major event that is coming up.

I also looked again at classes offered at the hospital I will be using. For $75 I can take a class that offers everything that I am currently looking for. I may also see if I can take a dog class at another hospital to learn how to prepare the dogs. I need to list off the classes that I want to take and their times for myself so I don't miss them. So much to do, and so little time! It feels so crazy!

Weekend and stuff

This weekend my in-laws came out to visit. It was a good experience. Things at times were a little hectic, but everything went well in the end. I was able to work from home on Monday, which helped things out and helped alliviate some stress that had developed between Kevin and me.

When I came back into work on Tuesday I found a gift on my desk, my senior manager had gotten me a necklace with the word "Preggers" on it. I think it is great! I have worn it every day since I got it.

In the meantime I am continuing to get bigger. My stomach area is getting huge, and the stretchmarks are beginning to increase in number. However, I weighed myself last night and I am still only a few pounds heavier than what I started as when I got pregnant. Which I am guessing means that when I have the baby I will go down quite a few pounds, meaning I am losing weight during this pregnancy. And it isn't that I am not eatting, I am eatting, I just eat little snacks and can't eat much during my main meals, so I almost feel like I am constantly eatting all day long. For example, this morning for breakfast I had a glass of apple juice, four almonds, a glass of hot chocolate, an apple, a cup of oatmeal, and I will probably finish it off with 1/3rd of my daily water requirement.

The baby keeps kicking me, and it helps me feel like there is someone here with me at times when I am feeling lonely.

Last week was really bad, it is difficult to keep from going looney with Kevin gone all week. I am trying to keep my head in a good place, but I continue to feel as if I am going off kilter. Everyone keeps telling me that it isn't for much longer, I am just hoping I can last that long.

What a weekend! - Baby shower

My baby shower happened on Saturday. And it went very well. The lady who threw it for me did a great job, she held it at her house. She and another woman provided the food and they also bought two cakes! Turned out we only needed one so they sent the second cake home with me. 22 people showed up for the shower, which was awesome!! Lots of cute clothes and only a few repeats which was fine because I will use them. I got two changing pads and I plan to keep one of them at my parent's house. It will make it easier when it comes to visiting with the baby, plus it means that my siblings will have someplace to change their babies when they come over to visit my parents as well.

It was good to see everyone, I was pretty happy about all of it and happy that I got to visit with people. The presents were awesome too, but seeing everyone was even better!

My mom and I traveled together so after the shower we drove back to Rochelle with my car stuffed with baby gifts. On the way home we stopped by a Salvation Army and I found a brand new carseat with stroller included. I say brand new because the thing was still in the box with the plastic wrap still on everything. I got the thing for $75, when I got home I looked it up and discovered that it usually sells for $175 brand new. Sweet!!

On Sunday my grandparents came over for an early Thanksgiving, my grandmother brought two bags full of clothes for the baby. All baby boy clothes. Then today I came into work and one of my co-workers had brought in a bag of baby boy clothes from her daughter who is cleaning out her closets. Yay for baby clothes!!

Over all I think we have a pretty good start with everything, there are still a few things I want to get before the baby comes, things like a crib, and a portable changing pad, and a diaper bag. But over all we have most of the stuff that I think we will need. Crazy thing is that my work is planning a baby shower for me here in November! They want Kevin to come which I think will be lots of fun for him. Yay for people who care!

What a weekend! - Doctor Appointment

What a whirlwind of a weekend! I will use this post to talk about the doctor appointment and another to talk about my baby shower.

So Friday I had my first doctor's appointment in Rockford. And I have to say that I am happy and impressed. The staff there are sweet as pie, not only the receptionists but also the nurses as well. The wait time leaves quite a bit to be expected. We got there early, just in case, so we arrived at 10 am for a 10:30 am appointment. I didn't get called back though until about 11:15 am. 1 hour 15 min wait time not fun.

Once I did get called back the service was great! The nurse was attentive, and nice. And the doctor was very nice as well. I was so afraid that I would not like the service there and would miss my old doctor, but I think things will be good. They gave me a goodie bag full of pregnancy magazines and a "Your Pregnancy: Week by Week" book, score! And they gave me a baby supplement sample (for after the baby is born). My next appointment is on the 29th and I think it will go well. They are doing my Glucose test and my Rh test.

I completely spaced on things I wanted to ask the doctor, so I will have to write down a list for next time.

Father to be

Last night you sat down next to me
and rubbed your hands over my belly
and spoke to the baby residing there.
You called him by name, called him
by pet name, called to him and told
him what lies in your heart. I watched,
at first surprised, then embarassed
then amused, and amusement finally became
love. For a man who will be the father
to our baby, who already loves the little
child who will make our family complete.
You take away the fear that I have
about what kind of father you will be,
you leave me glowing with the anticipation
of the family we will become for our child.

Kick, kick

Little David has been kicking a lot lately. It has been fun to feel him moving around. Yesterday I ended up dealing with another of the fun parts of being pregnant, gas pains! 7 hours straight of gas pain before it began to go away. Not a lot of fun.

This Saturday is my baby shower, I am pretty excited about it, especially because I have invited a few people who I haven't seen in forever and I am hoping that I will be able to see them! I figured out all my doctor stuff for Rochelle and have my first doctor's appointment out there on Friday. I think I may sign up for some classes out there as well.

Last night Kevin had insomnia, so he ended up coming to bed around 3:30 am, at that moment David was kicking, so I put Kevin's hand on my belly and let him feel David move, he thought it was pretty neat to feel our baby moving around. I have heard that babies tend to have the same sleep schedule when they are born that they had in the womb. Not sure how I feel about that considering that I have felt him moving at Midnight and at different times throughout the night. Please no taking after daddy and having super all night insomnia! Mommy wants some sleep when you come!

I do get the feeling though that he will probably take after daddy with hot foods, I have had a craving for hot foods all pregnancy long. At least Kevin will have someone else in our family to eat his super hot chili with him when he makes it.

Not a good day

Not such a great day so far today. Woke up, brushed my teeth, brushed my tongue, which is always a mistake, but I just couldn't deal with the taste of an unbrushed tongue anymore. Of course it made me gag, which made me heave, which made me sort of kind of puke. Nothing really came out, but I saw stars like I usually do, and I ended up spitting a lot, which I usually do.

Feeling tired, not such an odd thing, the baby always makes me tired. And I have this headache going on. Which makes me feel more tired. Earlier today I felt like throwing up, but thankfully did not. I need to make food tonight, I bought stuff for making yesterday but never got around to it. And tomorrow I need to drive to Rochelle, which means packing and washing clothes tonight. Blar.

On a positive note, only one more hour till quitting time. And I get to see my parents tomorrow, and I keep feeling the baby move, which is exciting. Tonight, food, house work, and sleep. I could have used a nap at work today.

Weekend and OB Woes

So the weekend went really well, I visited my parents, toured one of the hospitals, and pretty much decided on my doctor. My mom and I went to a woman's conference for our church on Saturday night. On Sunday a friend of mine at church handed out Baby Shower invitations for my baby shower.

Today I invited some of the ladies from work who I get along with, and then focused on getting my OB changed. Problem came from that. Turns out that the OB I had decided on did not do OB work for patients with my insurance, becasue he did not do deliveries at the hospital covered by my insurance. Meaning I have to go with an OB in Rockford, the hospital that I did not tour. *sigh* Oh well. Thankfully I knew which OB office I would go with out of the two in Rockford. So I switched to that doctor and hopefully will hear back from them soon telling me that they have accepted me as a patient. Otherwise I will have to do some thinking as to what I will do.

Dang!

So after a comment by one of my friends about Swedish American Hospital I decided today to look into the doctors I had on my list of possible doctors. I pulled up Consumer Reports Health, which really didn't give me as much info on the doctors as it did on the hospitals. But it did refer me to a government site that listed if any of the doctors had any diciplinary actions against them. None of the doctors on my list did. So I started googling the doctors starting with the one in Sycamore. I found a site that rated him, based on patient reviews he got a 4.5 rating. Then I found another site where patients rated him and included written reviews as well. Reading what they said about him was very helpful. Then I found a site from the hospital that he works with describing some difficult delivery situations that he dealt with in a good way. And I am thinking, "Wow, this looks really good, but he is a guy. How do I feel about that?"

So I looked up the Rockford doctors, two of them men and two of them women. One of the men scored a 4 rating on the first rating site. The rest of the doctors were 3 or below. One, a female doctor I was actually considering scored a 2.5. So I looked further, on the second rating site none of the doctors were scored except for the female doctor who had scored a 2.5 on the other site. On this site she was scored at a 1.5 and there were written reviews. One of the women who reviewed her said that the treatment she recieved from this doctor resulted in her changing doctors halfway through her pregnancy. Wow!

So after hearing about the way my friend was treated at the Swedish American Hospital, and based on the ratings of all the Rockford doctors I am seriously thinking that I will be going with the Sycamore/DeKalb doctor. Even though he is a male. A good doctor is a good doctor, regardless of gender. And if a good doctor means that I have a good pregnancy and that my baby will be taken care of during delivery then I am going to go with the good doctor. I still plan on going on my tours on Saturday, but I may just go with the Kishwaukee tour and not worry about the Swedish American tour. We will see how I feel on Saturday.

Pregnancy brain

Pregnancy brain is something I heard of before I became pregnant, but it was not something that I really understood until becoming pregnant. At first it wasn't too bad, it made me forgetful and sort of spacy at times. But then it progressed, soon I was having difficulties typing words as correctly as I once had, my spelling skills went down the drain, I became easily distracted while driving and I began to develop problems with accurately clicking things with my mouse. Now I have begun to lose the accuracy of my speech. I will be talking with someone and suddenly it is like my tongue has forgotten how to function. It will begin to tie itself in knots while all the words that come out of my mouth become irrepairably jumbled and mauled to unrecognizableness.

What to do about it all? At this point I don't know if there is anything I can do, except hope that it goes away once the baby is born.

Hospitals

This Saturday I am touring hospitals. One in DeKalb and one in Rockford. I am leaning a bit toward the DeKalb hospital (Kiswaukee Hospital) but if I go with that one then my OB will be male. Not sure how I feel about that. But the OB would be closer and so would the hospital.

The Rockford hospital (Swedish American Hospital) works for two OB offices, so if I feel like going with that one then I will have to choose which office to use. One office would have me set up with a female OB and the other would switch me between their two OBs one of which is a woman and one of which is a man. Either way I am looking forward to getting a look at the hospitals and figuring out which one I like best.

The problem is it will really come down to how the hospitals look. Both offer classes that I think would be helpful. Both offer lactation consultants. DeKalb would be 20 to 25 minutes away and Rockford would be 30 to 45 minutes away (depending on traffic). We shall see what Saturday brings.

Last night I had a dream where I went over to my neighbors house and asked if I could borrow/have some water. To drink, I was very thirsty and just needed some water to drink. I woke up not long after the dream because the dogs needed out, but I didn't get a drink of water. Silly me. I did however get a ton of sleep last night. I went to bed at 6:45 pm, and proceeded to wake up and go immediately back to sleep every hour on the hour until Midnight when the dogs woke me up. After that I went back to sleep and slept soundly until 2:22 am when Kevin came in. Ronan woke me up again at 4:30 am, he puked in the tub, and then at 5 am I took him out to potty again. Why these dogs have to pee so much in the middle of the night beats me. I felt the baby kicking throughout the night but mostly at midnight when the dogs woke me up. From what I have read this likely means that the baby will waking up throughout the night when he is born. Thankfully midnight is Daddy comes home time when we move out to Rochelle so hopefully I can get Kevin to handle the baby at that time.

Tonight Kevin wants me to figure out how to use the Belly Buds, and figure out the camcorder, I also should pack up stuff so I can leave for Rochelle after work tomorrow. So much to do and it seems like time is moving so fast.

Weekend

Lots of things to talk about today, if you have been reading you know that on Friday we found out that we are having a boy. Then followed all of the many calls to family and friends.

Throughout most of my pregnancy I have had the feeling that I was having a girl, to the point where I had begun to make plans in my head. So the news that I was having a boy was a bit…strange for me. Not bad news, not at all, but rather it was odd trying to wrap my head around the idea. So on Monday Kevin and I went Baby Registry creating. We went to Target and Burlington Coat Factory (which has an awesome baby section). We scanned boy stuff, and Kevin insisted on us scanning sports stuff. It was a good experience for me. All that blue and all of those cute little boy outfits. I even had dreams last night about blue baby things.

It helped to turn my mind around. It helped to get me more boy focused than girl focused. When at Target Kevin mentioned church clothes for the baby, but Target didn’t have anything, but Burlington did, they had a whole section for baby boy church clothes.

On Sunday the woman who has offered to throw me a baby shower asked when the best time would be for the shower, currently it is looking like early October for the shower. I am pretty excited about it, the presents will be nice but mostly I am looking forward having a party to celebrate our little David. We are so excited about him!

I like putting together the registries because it helps Kevin and I figure out what we need for the baby. I am still currently at a loss as to which breast pump would be best for me. As well as which bottles and which pacifiers, it is difficult to decide because I hear so much about a baby taking this paci and not that or this bottle and not that one. Plus I don’t know how it will affect breastfeeding. It is just so much stuff to take in and I feel afloat in indecision. And diapers, I don’t know which to go with and which not and I hear so many differing opinions that I honestly have no idea. *sigh* I suppose we will figure it out at some point.

Surprise!

So the ultrasound was on Friday. It went really well. Our ultrasound tech was a guy, which was interesting because we are used to having women techs. But it went really well. He checked the amount of amniotic fluid in my uterus and then had me empty my bladder, which was a relief! Then he started measuring the baby. Turns out the baby was at 21 weeks and 4 days for size, which was very close to where we were at that point, we were on the last day of my 20th week.

The tech showed us the head and the arms and the legs and we discovered that the baby is now no longer an it but now we know that the baby is a little boy. A very little boy right now, but he will grow. It was a BIG surprise for both Kevin and I because we both thought that the baby was a girl. Having proof in a picture makes it undeniable though. We are planning on naming him David Isaac, but we may change that to Isaac David. We will have to see. What is funny is that while the tech was showing us the gender Kevin goes, "That is David." and the tech says, "You are planning on naming him David?" and Kevin says, "Yep." and the tech says, "That's my name." He had been talking about his son (a 6 month old baby) and told us that his baby's middle name is David. And I said, "Wait, so your baby is Isaac David, and our baby will be David Isaac." It was a pretty neat coincidence.

I am still trying to wrap my brain around it, I have been thinking girl for so long that I now have to do a mental switch to a boy. I think I may talk Kevin into going to stores tomorrow to do baby registries with me, putting a bunch of boy stuff on my registries will help me flip the switch to boy. It is exciting to know more about our baby!

Oh. Heck. Yes!

So wandering around the Baby Center I came across this post leading to a blog on pregnancy. There I found one of the best things I have found in a long time. Things I wanted to say while pregnant.
Please note that some of the things in the blog linked and some of the things I say below are about vomiting and boobies and so forth, read at your own disgression.

Ultrasound

Today is the day. I can't wait for it, even though I am nervous about it all. Last night Kevin came home at 2:15 am, the dogs heard him and woke me up. We talked a little bit about our plans for today and then we both went back to bed, except I could not seem to get back to sleep myself, I tossed and turned till about 4 am and then finally fell asleep until the alarm woke me at 6 am. During that time though as I lay in bed and tried to sleep, I thought about today, I thought over everything that was going to happen and what I should do. And through it all a thought came to my mind.

Yesterday my senior manager brought in a bunch of Ferrero Roche chocolates for our group to share. My thought was that if there were still some left that I would bundle up three of them to use as a thank you gift for our ultrasound tech. When my doctor talked to us about the ultrasound she made it sound like the ultrasound techs could be a bit tempermental and she joked that we might want to bring cookies or something. Before leaving home I looked around for something to wrap the possible chocolates in, and I found what I needed in the gift from my fertility clinic doctor that I had yet to unwrap. The gift was wrapped in clear celophane with a yellow ribbon. I unwrapped the present and took the wraping to work with me. When I got there I discovered that there were indeed one of each of the three types of chocolate that was in the chocolates box, so I wrapped them up and now have them in my purse. I feel happy knowing that I have something to give as a thank you gift and that hopefully it will help us to get what we want out of the ultrasound. The gender of the baby, and pictures. We shall see how it all goes.

Appointments and heat

My ultrasound is tomorrow, I double checked just in case. Sure enough they have me in the system, thank goodness. I also double checked on my OB appointment for Monday, good thing I did, they had me scheduled with a nurse practitioner, considering that I am looking for an OB out near Rochelle this will probably be my last appointment with my current OB and I would have been super disappointed if I hadn't been able to see her. I had them schedule me for a later appointment that same morning with my OB. So aggravating!

Lately I have been feeling hot, really hot, uncomfortably so. To the point that I usually strip down to my underwear and try not to touch things. Last night I slept with all my blankets kicked off. I woke up freezing but still feeling hot. I even took my temperature the other day because I felt like I had a fever, turns out my temp was low, at 97 degrees, but I still felt like I was burning up. I also have been feeling and hearing my pulse. Often, especially when I feel hot I can feel my pulse in my torso and belly areas, also in my arms. Sometimes I can hear it pounding in my ears. I plan to bring it up to my doctor on Monday.

I can honestly say now that I am feeling the baby. Every so often I will feel it move, almost like a sliding across my stomach. I am looking forward to when Kevin will be able to feel it, but then again I am not looking forward to the sleep people keep telling me I am going to lose from it. It seems more real now, the reality that I have something living inside me, a little person who will be born someday. It is an odd thing to have hit me at this point. It makes me happy and slightly spooked at the same time. It doesn't change anything though, I am still excited.

Tomorrow, it seems like it can't come fast enough, tomorrow I hopefully should be able to find out what gender I am having. I am looking forward to that.

It happened again

This morning I went to my doctor's appointment, just a checkup, I got there early at 9 am, my appointment was for 9:15 am. I signed in and waited to be called back. Instead one of the receptionists called me over and asked me if I had my appointment card. Unfortunately I had left my appointment card at work. So because I didn't have my appointment card they couldn't get me in that day because...I wasn't showing up as scheduled in the system. Seriously, two times in the same week I show up to an appointment and am told that I am not scheduled. So she rescheduled me for Monday. This time I am taking the card with me and calling ahead.

It has moved fast

So, tomorrow is my doctor's appointment, just a regular check up with my OB. Then Friday is my ultrasound. It all seems to be moving so fast. I can't believe I have 30 minutes left to my work day and then tomorrow the baby stuff starts again.

I spent a good part of today researching hospitals. I called around to the doctors in the Rochelle area that would take me and found out what hospitals they used, then I spent a long time searching for their ratings. Finally I broke down and called one of the hospitals and talked to an education person who gave me a lot of good info. I am thinking about seeing if I can talk Kevin into going hospital touring on Saturday. He has something else he wanted to do, but I really need to find out about these hospitals sooner rather than later so that I can set up my new OB before the end of the month.

I need to do shopping tonight after work and get things ready for Friday. I need to put my paperwork in the car so I don't forget them. Oh and I forgot to make a list of things that I need to ask my doctor about. 20 minutes till quitting time, better get on the ball.

What a day

So this morning we woke up early got ourselves ready, I drank 32 oz of water and we went over to the office that would be giving me my ultrasound. I was supposed to be there at 7:30 but I showed up at 7 am just in case. The receptionist looks for me on the day's schedule, she doesn't see me, so she looks me up on their computer. And she finds me scheduled for August 30th at 8 am. Wait what?? Somehow the scheduler communicated the wrong time to both me and the doctor's office.

So I ended up having to contact the scheduler again to schedule me for another appointment. The soonest they could get me in for though is Friday at 1:30 in a different location. *sigh* So here we go again, another wait till the ultrasound.

Week 20, Ultrasound and Doctors

Tomorrow I enter week 20, the halfway mark. It seems odd that I am halfway along already, the months really seem to be flying by. Maybe it is because we are so busy with everything, finding a new house and all that is involved.

This upcoming Monday we have our ultrasound that should show us the gender, we are hoping that the baby will coorporate and give us a good look so that we can tell. My next doctor's appointment is next week as well, it is scheduled for next Thursday.

I also need to look into finding a doctor out in the Rochelle area, my manager suggested that I find out what the hospitals out there are like and pick an OB based on which hospital they use. It is a good idea and I may just do that. I am going to speak with my senior manager about possible working from home on the days I have Dr appointments so that I can begin to visit a doctor out there. That way I will have a history with the doctor out there and will know what to expect from the hospital. I will wait till my senior manager is back in the office and then see if I can put that into place.

Boobies

Warning, this post is about breasts, so if you would rather not read about them, do not proceed further.

Yick and Yay

Still sick, made the mistake last night of brushing my tongue while brushing my teeth, and last night's dinner ended up in the sink. Thankfully Kevin was there to help me clean up. Today I have been feeling nauseous as well. Before lunch I nearly lost it, and then when I walked into the break room I nearly lost it again, but the second time was due to someone having a seafood salad for lunch. Fishy smells really just sets me off. This Saturday starts my 20th week, halfway there and I am feeling like the throwing up is not going to end. I think once I accept it then it won't be so bad because I won't be hoping for it to stop. I will just wait till the baby comes.

Five more days till the ultrasound. Yay! I am hoping that the baby will coorporate and that we will be able to see what gender we are having. Now that it is so close Kevin and I are getting really excited about the ultrasound.

Because we are looking at moving I decided to look up a OBGYN in the Rochelle area and see 1. if they are accepting new patients, and 2. how late in my pregnancy they will accept me. The office I called is accepting new patients and will take me up to my 30th week. So I basically have 10 weeks in which to move. I may also call a OBGYN in Rockford and see what they say. Either way my OB will be about 25 to 30 minutes away from us if we move to Rochelle, and who knows how far away the hospital will be. Oh joy. Then again my current hospital is about 25 to 30 minutes away as well. It just doesn't seem as long. I am looking forward to us finding a house so that I can figure out the details of new doctors and such.

Odd Week

It has been a rather odd week this week. What with the nausea, and throwing up, the belly pain and not getting to bed early enough I have been feeling rather strange about this entire week. I am still arguing with myself over whether I want to drive out to Rochelle this weekend or not.

On the baby side of things I am hitting my 19th week this Saturday, almost halfway there! I am almost to the "one more week till the ultrasound" point. And I think I have been feeling movement. Last night in the middle of the night I woke up and could swear that I felt something poke me from the inside. And throughout the day I have felt little things that could be gas or something, but very well might not be. I don't know that I want to tell people about it verbally yet though, blogging about it is fine, but giving my suspicions voice makes it seem more definate. If it is movement it will still be a few more weeks before Kevin or my parents wil be able to feel it.

Proven Wrong

So on Sunday I went to church and everyone asked me how I was doing, and I said, "Oh, I am doing better, less nausea, feeling good, yea I am doing good." Well, the baby likes to prove me wrong. First thing that happened this morning, I woke up brushed my teeth and proceeded to vomit. Yay, morning sickness not gone yet. All day I have felt ill, nauseous. I have been trying to snack and eat things to keep it down, but nothing is helping. Week 17, and still sick, really? People keep telling me that it is healthy. Ugh.

On the other hand I feel like I am getting bigger all the time, every morning in fact. It seems strange to wake up each morning, feel my belly and think, "Is it just me or is it bigger this morning than it was last night?" And I am still tired all the time. Having Kevin around is nice, because I don't get to see him often enough as it is, but when he is around I get to bed later than I usually do, so I am sooooo tired when morning comes. Pregnant morning person and night owl hubby just don't mix well when it comes to sleep.

Oh well, hopefully I don't puke again today, the way things are going though I am not counting on it.

Updates

This weekend I was able to have a voice chat with my sister, except I could not find my microphone so she talked and I typed. While we talked she informed me that it had been four days since I had last posted a baby post, and that she was yearning for her fix. So here we go.

This Saturday started week 17, the nausea is getting better but not going away, this morning I almost threw up again, and last night too, but my jedi mind tricks are keeping it all down so far. From what the different websites say I should start to feel movement soon, either this week or in the next three or four weeks. I think I may have been feeling something, but I am not completely sure.

We recently got BellyBuds which is a sound playing device that will allow us to play music and voice messages to the baby while it is in the womb. I sent out an invite to my parents, Kevin's parents, and my sister and brother. So far only my sister has made any messages for the baby. Five in fact and all of them awesome! In about three of them there is Sariah (my sister) and sometimes Sydney talking, and in two of them we have Sydney singing the baby a song (Twinkle Twinkle little star, and Frere Jacques), so cute!

In about two weeks my ultrasound happens and we (hopefully) find out what gender we are having. Exciting stuff!

Yesterday Kevin was talking to me and he says, "What day of the week did you have your Irish Dance lessons?"
Me: Saturday
Him: Ok, I was trying to figure out how this will work, because Milwaukee is quite a ways away.

It is a funny little conversation to have. Kevin and I have had discussions about what we would like our kids involved in as they grow up. Kevin would like to get all the kids involved in martial arts, no matter the gender. Recently he saw a video of a girl who gets into an elevator and is followed in by a guy (the video is from the elevator camera), the guy proceeds to try and attack her as if to rape her, the girl supplexes (a Greco Roman wrestling move) the guy and when the elevator doors open the guy runs out chased by the girl as if she is going to kick his butt. He likes the idea of one of our daughters being able to protect herself in that way if needed. He also likes the idea of any boy we have being able to protect himself as well. My only rule about it all is that all martial arts will be practiced only at the dojo, none at home. And we would also like to get the girls and maybe the boys into Irish Dance.

I was in Irish Dance when I was in my Senior year of high school and I loved it. I really wished I had gotten into it sooner in life. I think it would be a lot of fun for any girls we have and possibly for any boys we have. I say boys because I saw the reception the boys in our dance school got and everyone loved them, people cheered them more than the girls, and the air they got, dang. Anyway, it was a fun conversation to have with Kevin, considering that we have talked about it before. It is neat to see him planning things out in his head.

Kevin is funny, most of the time he acts like the whole pregancy, baby thing isn't really much of anything to him, and then every so often he will make a comment that makes me realize, "Wow, he really does think about the baby quite often."

Today I went online and looked at some cribs, I even put a few on my Amazon wishlist. They had some on sale and the prices for some were really good considering. Depending on how long the sale lasts we may end up getting one in the near future. We will see.

Diaper Bag of Holding

Last night Kevin and I started discussing diaper bags. I asked him if he would be willing to carry around a diaper bag. He said, "Only as long as it doesn't look stupid or pretty, if you make sure it looks ok with no flowers and stuff on it then I will probably be fine with carrying one around."

Thus started our grand design to have a "Diaper Bag of Holding" created. For those unfamiliar with this let me explain. In the game of Dungeons and Dragons you can have all sorts of gear for your characters. One of the most useful items is a bag of holding. These bags basically open into an alternate demension or a pocket in space. The premise of the bags is that you can pretty much hold anything and everything. Think of Mary Poppins' bag.

Anyway, the website Think Geek offers a bag of holding, but what we really need is a diaper bag of holding. So we are setting out to see what can be done. If it all works we will have a diaper bag that Kevin is comfortable carrying that screams out our geekyness the whole world over.

Depending on how much it might cost the bag will probably look like this:

Appointments and the Doppler

So this morning I had my doctor's appointment. We listened to the baby through the doppler again, but this time Kevin was there too. He got to hear the heartbeat, and the sound of the baby moving. I guess my baby is quite active according to the doctor. I asked her about nausea, she didn't have any suggestions. I asked her about acne, she said I shouldn't really take anything, and that the best I can do is to keep my face clean and dry. She gave me the information to schedule my ultrasound and told me to schedule another appointment with her in 4 weeks.

I called up the place for the ultrasound and got it scheduled for September 13th, hopefully the baby will cooporate and we will be able to find out the gender. My next doctor appointment will be on September 16th. She mentioned that I should start looking into doctors that are covered by our insurance out in the Rochelle area and see what is covered. I have this feeling that they will all be up in Rockford. Joy. She said that I should check to see if they are accepting new patients before we move. Yay. We will see how this all goes.

After the appointment Kevin said that we should get a prenatal music system, well not exactly those words but that basis idea. A prenatal music system is a device that allows you to play music and voices to the baby. Very often this allows the baby to absorb things such as music as a calming thing and voices as something it will recognise when it is born. There is one being sold at Think Geek for $99, which is too pricey for me, but there are some others that I think we could afford. I think it is cute that Kevin wants to do this. One of his ideas is that we can play scriptures on tape to the baby. For his birthday he asked for the Bible on tape, which he has been listening to on his drive to and from work. He is cute.

It is odd to think that soon I will begin to feel the baby move and soon we will find out (hopefully) what gender it is. Yay!

Name Changes and Registries

This weekend I ended up driving out to my parent's to celebrate my birthday, which went well, but that is a topic for another post. What I want to focus on for this post is baby registries and a name change in our list of names.

On Saturday evening my mom and I went to Rockford to do some registry building for any baby shower I may have. We first hit up Babies R Us, which is a neat store to do a registry in. The sign up is nice and they give you a gift bag at the end of it all. Together my mom and I went around the store and scanned things that I figured I would probably need. Finally after awhile there we called it good and headed over to Walmart to start another registry. When we got there I discovered that their scanner was not working and that I would have to do my registry somewhere else, either at another store or online.

Sometime this week I think I may stop by Target and one of the Walmarts around here and do some further registry scanning. I think I am going with a baby safari theme for the nursery, it is gender neutral and it is cute. So we will have little giraffes, lions, tigers, and other baby African animals. Babies R Us had a whole bunch of safari themed items there. Maybe I am thinking too far ahead on the whole thing, but I like to be prepared ahead of time.

On to the name change. When it came down to girls names Kevin and I had quite the argument over the last few years. Finally we agreed recently on the name Evalisa, however it was a name that I sort of created and though I liked it I was a bit worried about possible nicknames. Not long after creating it I began to think about alternatives. Along with this was the fact that because we created the name we really didn't have a meaning associated with it. Which was something we have put great importance on.

This weekend we all watched the movie Nanny McPhee. Which is a way cute movie that has a Mary Poppins type feel to it. In the movie there is a character who is named Evangeline.

I really liked the name Evangeline when I heard it in the movie and it had what I wanted in it. Eva as part of the name, because I want to incorporate my great grandmother's name as part of our baby's name and it is a real name so it has a meaning attached to it. So I brought it up to Kevin, at that time I didn't know what it meant so I told him I would look it up. Otherwise he liked the name, but thought my reasons for wanting to change were kind of silly.

So when we got home I looked up Evangeline to find out the meaning. Turns out the name is Greek in its origin and it means "like an angel" which is truthfully perfect. When I told Kevin he loved it and said it was perfect. So I think our name choice for our first daughter has changed from Evalisa to Evangeline. I like the change, I like the meaning of this new name, perfect for our little baby if it is a girl like an angel come down from heaven.

Baby Showers

I have been thinking about baby showers for awhile now. And when I say that I mean since about week 9 or so. And I have good reason to. I know there are people in my life who are going to throw at least one baby shower for me. So last night after running some errands I went over to Babies R' Us and looked around. Kevin has kept me away from a lot of baby stuff so far so I haven't really gotten a good look at what is out there. I looked at bottles, and pacifiers, and breast pumps and breast milk bags, and blankies (I ended up spending a lot of time near those just touching them, soooo soft), and cribs (I think I want a crib that converts to a bed later), and strollers, and pack and plays (I had no idea what those were until I saw them. How cool, a play pen with a sleeping area, and on some a changing area. Neat!), and car seats, and then finally baby clothes.

I was meeting up with two of my friends from church and we were all planning to meet at a restaurant that was just across the parking lot from the Babies R Us, and what do you know, but I met up with both of them in the store. It worked out well because when we went to the restaurant we discovered that the air conditioning was not working there so we took the food to one of their houses and spent the night talking. And of course baby showers came up. Which was interesting because I have already had one lady ask if she could throw a baby shower for me, so I told them to hook up with her (she is also in our church) and start the planning. I am currently wanting to register at a bunch of places, that way people can shop wherever, and don't have to be tied down to just one place. So I have to figure out stores.

I am currently thinking:
Babies R Us
Target
Walmart

And I am not quite sure what else. I will have to look around online. See what I can find. I am already signed up with MyRegistry.com which allows you to put all your registries in one place so people can see the whole list. I am thinking that I will see about registering for stuff possibly this weekend if I get a chance.

Week 15

I am currently in the last days of week 15 of my pregnancy. On Saturday I enter week 16. According to some of the sites I have read I may start to feel movement this week. Have I? Not really. There is a good chance I won't feel anything until week 20. It does seem strange to realize that I am just a little over a month away from being halfway done with my pregnancy.

The baby should be able to hear soon, and that will be interesting. I need to start practicing and begin to talk to it. Yes it will probably increase my chances of people thinking I am some crazy woman who talks to herself. But it would be nice to begin talking to the little one. I don't know that I want to tell my co-workers about it, because I'm not really keen on the idea of people talking to my belly. I have had a few people reach out to touch my belly already, and it is awkward. I can see where some women get aggressive about people touching them while they are pregnant. Who knows, maybe there is a materinty shirt out there that says, "Hands off!" I might look into it.

For those who are wondering, yes I am still sick. I nearly threw up this morning. I have been able to use my jedi mind tricks enough to keep from throwing up as much as I have, but I am still nauseous most of the time and my list of food I can eat keeps getting smaller and smaller. This week the tamalies that I have been using for lunches finally betrayed me, so I have moved on to mac and cheese. I discovered that Velveeta makes a mini mac and cheese bowl which you can buy in a four pack for about 80 cents per bowl. I can deal with that. And it has a cook time similar to the tamalie so I feel pretty good about it so far.

I weighed myself this morning, I have currently gained about 3 lbs from what I was at the beginning of the pregnancy. So here is the record so far: Got pregnant, 1st trimester lost 5 lbs, got to 2nd trimester gained 1 lb, three more weeks into the 2nd trimester gained 2 more lbs. I am ok with this so far. I haven't done as much exercise this week as I usually do, tonight I may walk the mall (one mile each way and I walk from one end to the other end and back again). It has just been far too hot for me to go outside and walk. And I don't want to get heat exhaustion again.

Kevin is hoping that the pregnancy might fix my metabolism. And considering that I plan on improving my exercise routine once I have the baby I am hoping he is right. I would like to drop the baby fat afterward and the extra fat I have as well. And as a plus, if I lose weight it will inspire Kevin to lose weight, he likes competition.

I have been looking at baby stuff again. I think tonight I will stop by a Babies R' Us, and get some ideas for baby shower registry items. Would it be odd for me to put a breast pump on it? I might see if this weekend my parents would be willing to go to Rockford with me and do some baby registry shopping. I get the feeling they might be a little more excited about going with me than Kevin is. With my birthday coming up it has been difficult for me to get my head out of baby needs mode and into Rachel wants mode. I kept thinking of things that we could get for the baby until Kevin told me he refused to get something for the baby and that my birthday was about me and not about the baby. My parents sided with him as well. Ah well.

Heat Exhaustion

Today I am cold, I wore my maternity capris to work today, trying to use up the jean stickers that I have gotten. I like them, they stay up, unlike my maternity jeans, but they also leave the lower part of my legs cold in the office environment. The short sleaved shirt that I chose does little more for my exposed arms.

Such a change from yesterday. Saturday night we got home late because we drove from Rochelle, I had taken a nap before coming to pick up Kevin from work, so I was wide awake the entire ride home. Sunday morning though was difficult to wake up to. But I forced myself up and got Kevin's meds for him and started on his programs for church. He had taken a sleeping pill to get to sleep the night before and now was having trouble waking up. I fed the dogs, ate some cereal, did all the things that usually work for me. Then while printing off the programs our black cartridge ran out, with no way to finish the programs without another cartridge Kevin had to go to the store for a refill.

While he was gone I started my shower. The water felt warm, maybe a little hotter than usual, but I figured I would be ok. I had left the bathroom door open so that I had more cool air in the room, but the shower felt so warm, and then suddenly too warm. I was halfway through the shower, I had just finished shampooing my hair and was just about to put conditioner in, when I began to feel weird, wrong, light headed, wobbly, wrong. I turned off the water and opened the door, sucking in cool air, hoping it would clear my head. It didn't. So I stumbled from the shower, nearly passing out in the bathroom as I reached for my towel and stumbled to the bed.

Thank goodness for Kevin's sister who got us huge bath towels for Christmas, I spread out the towel on the bed and lay there, my wet hair thankfully seeping into the towel and not my bed. The fan above spun, cooling me but not fast enough. I felt like passing out, but instead I clung to conciousness and waited for Kevin to come home.

Finally he got home and I told him I wasn't doing so well. I told him what had happened and he said it sounded like heat exhaustion. He asked how much fluids I had so far that day. None. He let me lay there for a while, finally I felt good enought that I got up and put some conditioner on my hair and then covered it with a shower cap. Letting conditioner soak into your hair for awhile is good to do every so often and I did not have enough energy to finish the shower yet.

I went out and sat in one of our computer chairs. I felt tired, no exhausted, like all energy had been sucked out of me. I told Kevin and he said fatigue was one of the signs of heat exhaustion. He brought me a jug of Gatorade and a jug of water and told me I had to finish at least one of them. I finished off the Gatorade as I watched his programs print for him while he took his shower. I was feeling better by the time the programs were done and folded but I still was only halfway through the shower. And Kevin had to get to church. So he left me at home and left, saying that I should call him when or if I felt ready for him to come and pick me up and take me to church too.

I waited a little longer, and then when I felt good enough I went to finish my shower. I made the water cooler than before, and took less time, but by the time I got out I was panting again. I finished getting ready, putting up my hair, putting on my lotion, but I still felt about to pass out. So I called Kevin and told him I didn't think I would make it. He told me he was coming home to me, which sounded wonderful to me.

He came home and we slept for the next few hours. I still felt tired the rest of the day, but better than before. It was a scary reminder that I need to keep hydrated.

Belly Pictures

So I have had some people ask me about belly pictures. Not that I am showing much yet. My mom thinks I should take some, and my grandma want me to send her belly pictures and so it got me thinking.

Maybe I should take some belly pictures. Today Kevin called me to talk about house stuff and while talking to him I was wandering around online and happened to look at my e-mail and see from one of the pregnancy things I am signed up with, "Did you take a belly photo? Record this milestone." And so I said to him, "I am going to need you to help me take some belly pictures of me." And he said, "Why? It's not like you are showing much." And I said, "Because people want them." And he laughed and said, "Ok."

So what are your thoughts, belly pictures, no belly pictures, wait till I am showing more, or do an update every few weeks to show how I am getting fatter?

Pillows and Dates

I can't remember, but I am pretty I haven't told you all about my new pillow. Awhile ago, I can't remember how long, probably about a week and a half or so, Kevin and I were at Aldi, for those of you who don't have an Aldi near you or have no idea what one is.

Dodging the bullet

Or the $4738 hospital payment.

I have found that when going through any medical proceedure that requires you to go to the hospital it is so very nice to have insurance. I learned this first when we went through cancer with Kevin and a $17,000 bill came to us saying that it had all been paid by our insurance. Those are the kind of bills that stop your heart and then get it started again in a leap of joy.

So when I received my first bill for the egg extraction I had a similar reaction. 4738 dollars? Oh, wait, it is covered entirely by the insurance company, and I only have a $200 co-pay. Whew!

So imagine my surprise when I got a letter yesterday saying the following:
"The claim for this patient was reviewed based on additional information received. We have completed an adjustment, and have determined that an additional payment is not available.

*Your total responsibility to the provider of services is $4,738.18.* This total includes any amount you may have previously paid your provider for these services."

This is not the kind of letter you want to receive, especially when you have already jumped through all the necessary hoops. Done all the unpleasant tests that the insurance company required to cover you, and used the referal just like they required you to. When you have done every little thing the insurance company asked you to this is not what you want to see.

So I called the number they listed for questions. And got a lady who looked into it for me. I ended up sitting on hold for about 30 minutes while she looked at things and got things taken care of, but at the end of it all she said that it was covered, and that we didn't have to worry about it after all. Another big whew! My only worry now is that this bill was only for the egg extraction. The bill for the embryo implantation was another $3000. Hopefully I will not have to go through the same thing with that one.

Stuffed animals as pacifiers!

So while wandering around facebook today I saw a little side ad for Pacimals. What are Pacimals you ask? Well they are a stuffed animal that is also a pacifier. I have not really decided where I am on the whole pacifier debate, but I am currently leaning toward, "if it keeps the baby quiet then let the baby have it." And what better way of keeping a pacifier there then with a stuffed animal!

After looking them up online I found the place that had the most of them was here:
http://babybungalow.com/pahulopa.html
While the place that told the most about them was here:
https://www.pacimals.com

Way cute! Doesn't hurt that I am a huge stuffed animal fan.

Heartbeat

This morning I had my doctor's appointment. They had me pee in a cup again, no misshaps this time, other than someone opening the stall door on me (stupid lock didn't work). Then the doctor had me go into an exam room where she used a doppler on me. For those who don't know a doppler is used much like an ultrasound, except you don't see anything, instead you hear. We were able to hear the baby's heartbeat and every so often her it move around. I told her about how sick I have been and she said that it is a good thing and that the baby is probably a girl if I am so sick. I told her that I had a feeling it was.

Kevin wasn't able to come due to some awful insomnia last night, he finally got to bed about 2 hours before my appointment. Poor boy. I told him he better be there for the next one, even if he has to take a sleeping pill.

My next appointment is on August 19th. And then the next after that will probably be my ultrasound to see the gender. Yay!

Still sick

This morning I brushed my teeth during my morning routine and when I began to spit my stomach went all the way. Early morning vomiting seems to effect me less than midday vomiting. I can shake off the shakes, and wipe away the tears, and go about my day. I still feel like I could use a nap though. Which doesn't help when I am tired. Which I am always tired.

I bought chicken fingers and onion rings last night, because they both sounded super tasty and I was hungry. Turns out I couldn't handle the smell of the onion rings. The chicken fingers I ate with nothing on them. Sometimes BBQ sauce is too much for me too, and Ranch dressing seems to have become my enemy.

I want ice cream, and I know I have some cherry vanilla at home waiting for me. The idea of a Wendy's frosty sounds very appealing as well. Other than that nothing sounds good. It seems to be a vicious cycle, I find myself having to eat, but nothing sounds good, so I eat very little of what I can handle, until I am at least a little full, hoping it will last longer than what it will, soon, too soon though my stomach is making sounds again and I find myself having to eat. Then throw in that everytime my stomach is empty it punishes me by making me nauseous. Makes sense right? Stomach empty so throw up whatever might be in there. No, you are right, it makes no sense what so ever.

But, no icecream for me. I have a beef tamalie waiting for me for lunch, that and a can of ginger ale. Can I make it that long though? The sour candies that I brought to keep my stomach calm say no. The crackers tell me they are not for me. I hate food, why does it always turn on me just when I thought I could trust it. I am not looking forward to the day when the tamalies turn on me. They have been a reliable lunch food, I don't know where I will go when they betray me.

It is odd, it is this week that things are supposed to get better, I am supposed to start feeling better, I should stop feeling sick and everything should be all happy. But no, things are getting worse instead. I seriously fear that I may have another six months of this.

How is the little one?

How is the little one? This is a question that frustrates me to no end. At this point all I know is that I am getting bigger and feeling sick and out of sorts at times. I don't actually "know" how the little thing that is growing inside me is doing. I don't know it's feelings or even if it can hear me yet, I don't know what gender it is or even if it is doing ok. All I know is that I seem to be ok and hopefully it is too.

This question though is one that one of my co-workers loves to ask me on a daily basis.
"How is the little one?"
"I don't know, I just feel sick."

"How is the little one?"
"Not a clue, still sick though."

Finally today I guess I kind of broke.
"How is the little one?"
"I don't know, I don't know, I never know, as far as I know it is fine but I really just don't know. It makes me sick, that I all I know."
"Uhh, ok, didn't mean to make you upset, just wondering how it is."
"I'm not upset, I just don't know."
"Oh, well some ladies will say, 'Oh, he's moving around, or he is kicking up a storm.' So I just wondered, I will ask how you are from now on."
"Thats fine, it is still too early for me to feel it move, so I really have no clue now, it is still pretty early on."

I didn't really mean to make her feel bad, but then again I really hate that question since I don't have an answer to it. I thought about appoligizing, but she seemed fine a few minutes later so I think I will let it go. Maybe she will stop asking.

As it is, I am in the middle of week 13 now and still sick as a dog. I hope I am just late in losing the nausea, but I could very well just have to deal with this all pregnancy long. Ugh.

Adventures and Week 13

So tomorrow is the start of week 13, or as it is also referred to, the beginning of the second trimester. This also means that chances of miscarriage go down significantly. Yay!

On the other hand, I have been peeing a lot lately. Our local community college (the one we live right next to) is has a play called Urinetown. Every time I pass the sign that announces it I have mixed feelings, mostly I don't want to see it. But it also gets me thinking, someone should do something called Urine Nation. Hehehehe, ok enough bathroom humor. Seriously though I have to plot out my day based on the bathroom and how soon I can next use it.

With that in mind, today was rather interesting. Today I had an outing for work in downtown Chicago. Chicago is not my favorite town, in fact of all the big cities I have been in Chicago is my least favorite. Probably due to the fact that every time I go to Chicago I get nervous and have a slightly scary to terrifying experience. So there I was with my two bottles of water, bag of munchies and candies to keep me from vomiting, wandering (thankfully with another co-worker) through Chicago to the meeting place. It is bad when you have to pee often and every place smells like a sewer. On the way home today I was telling my co-worker (who lives in the same town as I do and was getting off on the same stop) that I wanted to go home and take a nap. I said to her, "It is going to be 'Home, pee, nap'", and she said, "In that order?" and I said, "Well actually it will be, 'Home, pee, dogs, nap' in that order." Which I wish I could say was what happened, but it actually happened more like this, "Home, pee, dogs, shopping, no nap." Tired...

Well wanted to post this before I pass out, so here it is, Week 13, Adventures in Chicago, and Pee. What more could you ask for?! :)

I have strep where???

This post deals with medical issues...

Not such a good week

This post contains more nausea stuff.

They made me do it

So I was thinking back on my doctor appointment from earlier this week and some of the questions they asked me. For example they wanted to know the last day of my last period. Which I suppose most pregnant women know as it tells them how far along they are and when their baby is most likely due. But my period was started by the Fertility Clinic and the date of it has less to do with how far along I am as they had me take things to keep from having another period. In fact my due date and such is based off when the embryos were implanted. So when the nurse asked about my period I told her it was April something, but I was pretty sure there was paperwork on it somewhere. She gave me a strange look until I explained that I got pregnant through a fertility clinic and that they started my period on a certain date and had it end on a certain date so there would probably be paperwork on it. I find it interesting that there are so many parts of my pregnancy like that, where everything was scheduled for a certain time and thus everything is documented somewhere.

As follow ups to some of the things I have brought up in other posts. Regarding my extra meds, I called the Fertility Clinic to see if there was somewhere I could donate them to. And they told me I could bring them in to the clinic, so yesterday I dropped off my box of extra meds, which cleared up a big area in my house.

I finally got a chance to look through the folder that I got from the Obgyn appointment. It has a lot of helpful info such as when to call your doctor, what you can do for certain things, exercises you can do throughout pregnancy, tips on nausea, tips on baby movement counting, tips on labor and false labor and how to tell the difference. And it has a pregnancy planner, a Fit Pregnancy magazine and a magazine that goes through the different weeks of the pregnancy and what happens.

The travel pack of formula expires February of next year so if the baby does come on its due date of Jan 28th then we should be good.

Missing the Fertility Clinic already

Today was my first doctor appointment with my regular Obgyn, it was interesting. I am already missing the fertility clinic. Appointment was at 9 am. Got to the doctor’s office early, and they had me fill out paperwork. That was interesting, seeing as they were my obgyn office before I went to the fertility clinic. Filled out the paperwork, got my paperwork from the fertility clinic from the car. And sat and waited with Kevin in the waiting room. Finally about 9:30 am they called me back. A nurse asked me a bunch of questions about myself and my pregnancy and everything. One question was what is my religion. I was a bit surprised by that, but I suppose it makes sense as some religions require certain things. Then she took my blood after asking when the last time I was tested for STDs was. Then she took blood to test for that and who knows what else. So this means that within a year I have been tested three times for STDs. Then she asked me for a urine sample. The cup she gave me was odd, and I wasn’t quite sure how to work it. So I tried to use it how it seemed to work, but I got it wrong. I think I got enough urine in the cup for them by the end, but I am not sure. To give an example of how weird the cup was, I accidentally pricked my finger on the cup. That’s right, I stabbed myself with the cup hard enough to draw blood. Weird cup.

After that whole ordeal they took me and Kevin to a room where we met with the doctor and talked a bit. She discussed the pregnancy with us, and how we got pregnant, took a look at the paperwork from the fertility clinic, talked about her expectations with the pregnancy and what we should expect. Then she took us to another room where she would be giving me an exam. Inside was a paper shirt and paper lap blanket. So I put on my paper outfit and Kevin and I wait, and wait, and wait. At one point I say to Kevin, “I just love it when they put me in nothing but a paper outfit and leave me to wait for 30 minutes in a cold exam room.” He asked me if this had happened before and I said, “Yes, but it is better this time because I have someone to talk to while I wait.” Finally the doctor came in and gave me my exam, which was more like a physical, with PAP smear and everything. I asked her a few more questions, about exercise, and pregnancy tea, and sleeping positions. Yes I can exercise on the elliptical, but I have to start slowly, no she didn’t know anything about pregnancy tea, as for sleeping positions I can sleep however I want to just as long as I get lots of sleep. Then she gave me a folder full of stuff, a travel bag with what looked like formula in it (weird), and told me to make another appointment for three weeks from then.

So my next appointment is on the 29th and my next ultrasound is in September at my 20 week mark. I want to see the baby sooner, but I guess I will have to wait. Yes, I miss the fertility clinic greatly. Speaking of which I need to call them and see if I can donate my excess fertility meds somewhere. We don’t need them and probably won’t need them for another few years. So I want to get them out of the house as we need to get the house ready for selling.

Maternity products

So today I decided to visit the website of a pregnancy magazine I saw at the fertility clinic. The magazine is Fit Pregnancy (for anyone interested). While there I signed up for a few sweepstakes (everyone can afford to win free stuff, especially expensive strollers and such) and checked out their "finds and favorites" page, which is a list of different types of products. Looking through the page I see baby dopplers (for hearing your baby's heartbeat in the womb), tummy wraps for after delivery, maternity clothes, baby carriers, diaper bags, gender prediction tests, and then I come across two products that boggle my mind.

Now these boggle not because of what they are but rather because of their names. The first is "Mother Tucker", the description is as follows: "Mother Tucker is the ultimate compression tank top. Don't nip it or suck it, just Mother Tuck-it!" Yeeeaaahhh. Ok, was I not the only one who saw through their little sound alike name? Yeah, don't think I will be using that, don't want to say to someone, "I'm using a Mother Tucker!" and have them mishear me.

The second is a shop for breastfeeding. Sounds ok so far right? The name of the shop is, "Yummy Mummy". Thats right Mummy is yummy... ok, so very wrong. I get what they are trying to get at with their name, but still, it is just not quite right.

Sometimes I wonder about what message some of these companies are trying to get across to their customers.

No more shots!

So I had my exit appointment with my fertility doctor. She gave me a gift, told me congratulations (this is the first time I had seen her since she put the embryos in me), gave me the stuff that I need to take to my first appointment with my regular Obgyn, and told me I could stop the progesterone shots.

Yay for no more shots!! It is the first time since April that I will not be sticking metal needles into me! Yay for that!

I am not sure how I feel about going back to my regular OB, I will miss the prompt service of the fertility clinic. They asked me to contact them when I have my baby and let them know that it arrived healthy. I will happily do so, they are the ones who got me pregnant, they should know when I have the baby.

My next appointment is next Tuesday, right after the holiday weekend. This weekend's plans involve Rochelle and hanging out with the family. Should be fun!

Sea Bands and Meds

I must be messed up or something. Last night I went to Walgreens to pick up my prescription of nausea meds. While there I also picked up some Sea Bands. Sea Bands are a natural form of anti-nausea treatment. The way it works is with pressure points. The product is two fabric wrist bands with button things that when placed correctly rest on a certain pressure point on your wrist that will combat nausea. Supposedly it is supposed to work well with motion sickness and morning sickness. Well there must be something wrong with me. I tried wearing them last night and did not feel well. I wore them while at the mall and ended up needing to stop for preggie pops to make it the remainder of the way to my car.

This morning I woke up and put them on as I got out of bed. A few minutes after putting them on and I began to feel nauseous, so I took them off and began to feel better. Who knows, maybe they just don't work with me.

On the other hand I took one of my nausea pills today (they say on the bottle take one pill three times daily as needed for nausea), I took it in the morning and felt great till about lunch time, then I combatted my nausea the way I usually fight it and so far have been able to make it the rest of the day without another pill. I am hesitant about taking drugs while I am pregnant and even though these have been prescribed by my fertility doctor I still want to be careful with them.

In the meantime I have been on the hunt for large focal pendants. Mostly of the donut or teardrop variety and all in Jade. I want to make a few nursing focus necklaces, as I have seen a few online and am interested in the idea. The premise is to have a sturdy necklace with a large pendant that a baby can focus on and play with as they nurse. I am thinking serioiusly about creating a few and seeing if I can sell some online. Let me know what you think about the idea.

Amusing interactions

Today I had quite a few amusing interactions with different people and I wanted to share them.

Setting: Phone call from Kevin
Me: Hello?
Kevin: Maple Meeper.
Me: Yes, I know, I remembered.
Kevin: Maple Meeper?
Me: Yep, I have it with me and have written out the check.
Kevin: Maple Meeper!
Me: Yep, love you bye.

As a background for this, we have a bill for our storage location which is with Maple Storage. I needed to get a check in the mail to them this week for the rent. Kevin was supposed to remind me about it today before I left for work, but he was sleeping so I reminded myself.


As a lead up to the next one, I have a habit which I have actually picked up from Fae, I tend to look up at the ceiling at random times, often to see if there are any creepy crawlies up there. This habit confuses Kevin and he has often asked me what I am looking at.

Setting: Phone call from me to Kevin
Kevin: Hello?
Me: Hey, you know how you always ask me why I am looking up at the ceiling?
Kevin: Yea...
Me: Well I have a good answer for it.
Kevin: Ok...
Me: Ninjas, you never know when one might be up there!
Kevin: (chuckling) That is pretty good. Is that it?
Me: Yep, that and I wanted to say I love you
Kevin: Ok, love you, bye.
Me: Bye


And by far the best interaction of the day...

Setting: Walking through the mall on my way from one end to the other end, Lotion Booth Guy (LBG) notices me.
LBG: Hi ma'am, can I interest you in...
Me: Hi, I'm sorry but I am pregnant and dealing with morning sickness, if I have any scents near me I may throw up, it is probably best that I keep moving.
LBG: (Suddenly looking not so sure about me) Ahhh, yea that is probably best, have a great evening.
Me: You too.


And lastly, something Kevin said when he got home while I was waiting for my shot.

"Society is based principally and primarily upon the fear of pregnant women."
-Kevin

Nausea Meds

Yesterday was good in regards to vomiting, none happened, but I felt sick most of the day. This past weekend was so bad that I finally broke down this morning and called the fertility clinic and asked them to give me nausea meds. So when work is over I can go to my local Walgreens and pick up some nausea meds. I am so happy about that. It will be nice to have a little bit of a break from all of this.

This Thursday is my next and last appointment with the fertility clinic, and this weekend shoud be the end to my progesterone shots. That will be nice.

It is kind of funny, for Christmas last year Kevin's mom sent me an Anne Geddes calendar, which as you might know is full of babies as that is what she photographs. She said it was in hope that something might happen this year. I have used it as my work calendar and I have to say that it is very fitting. Especially since I use it for writing down all my doctor appointments so that my managers and my co-workers know where I am on any given day.

So, yay for meds, yay for shots ending soon!

Not such a fun day

Not so much fun, this post discusses my troubles with vomiting, if you would rather not read then do not click on link.

Hot Cocoa

Today I entered my work breakroom and smelled cocoa. And having smelled it I realized that I wanted some. So I had a cup, and then another cup and then another cup. In total I think I have had about 4 cups of hot cocoa today. Great thing about it is that I have not felt nauseous much at all today. Not that I plan on drinking four cups of cocoa every day, but maybe a cup a day would be nice. I guess the baby likes cocoa.

Last night I stopped by the mall and visited the maternity store there. I picked up some shirts because I really don't have many casual shirts that work with my maternity jeans for casual Fridays at work. While there I noticed "Preggie Pops" supposedly a natural way of releaving morning sickness. They come in 7 flavors: Peppermint, Spearmint, Lavender, Ginger, Sour Lemon, Sour Tangerine, and Sour Raspberry. Today I tried the Sour Lemon. Interesting. They are suckers that are flavored to help with morning sickness. I don't know how well the others will work, and the lemon one only lasted so long before I was done with it. I think I might stick with gum. It's cheaper than the suckers anyway.

Kevin's problems with his car/driving is all taken care of now so he is finally returning to his commute life of driving to and from work. For those of you who have been missing us at church this also means that you will see us this Sunday. The last two weekends we have been stuck in Rochelle and thus have not been able to attend our own ward/congregation. It also takes the stress of the situation off of my shoulders.

Kevin called me today from home to talk about distribution of work around the house. Since I have started my morning sickness phase of pregnancy I often get home and start to clean something just to get too nauseous to continue. It has been aggrivating because with Kevin stuck in Rochelle nothing was getting done. Now that he is back he is looking at figuring out a way for all of this to work. So here is his solution, he will take care of the physical parts of upkeep of the house and I will take care of the secretarial aspects of the house. This includes but is not limited to: paying bills (which I already do), opening and sorting mail (which I already do), managing our medical (which will include changing his doctor, and possibly making appointments for him), filling out and submitting any paperwork needed for selling our home. I am completely fine with it. I am much better at doing this kind of stuff and I keep things better organized when I am taking care of this stuff, besides by doing it I can make sure that things get done (like getting him to an oncologist).

Anyway, hopefully this will help him feel more helped out around the house. I really do have a wonderful husband I mean how many women can claim that their husbands clean the house, wash the dishes, do the laundry, take out the trash, take care of all the yardwork, and cook meals without complaining about it? He is pretty awesome!

8 weeks

Yesterday I went to my third ultrasound appointment. My baby is now the size of an olive or grape and looks as the ultrasound tech said, like peanut with legs and arms. The appointment went strange compared to how it usually goes. The usual ultrasound tech was on vacation and so their back up tech was filling in for her. She was unfamiliar with that specific machine and got frustrated during the ultrasound. This resulted in me not being able to see anything except for the picture she printed out for me, which Kevin said later was not a very good picture of the baby. It makes me kind of bummed out, but it is ok. Kevin was able to be there and he was able to see it all he even got to see the heart beat this time. Since he missed the last ultrasound I am glad he was able to be at this one.

Ironically after the appointment Kevin and I went to get lunch and ended up at the toll road oasis. He got chicken strips and I got a smoothie and a pretzel. Here is the ironic/sort of gross part, one of his chicken strips looked like the silhouette of the baby in the ultrasound picture. Kevin shared his chicken strips with me, but I was unwilling to eat that strip. I could not eat it when it looked like my baby (even if it was a chickeny, breaded version).

I am currently 8 weeks 3 days along. At 10 weeks I get to stop my progesterone shots/injections, and hopefully at 12 weeks I will stop getting sick. Hopefully. Next week is my last appointment with the Fertility Clinic, and the week after that is my first appointment with my regular OBGYN. I am hoping for another ultrasound at that time, but we will see. By that time I should be off the progesterone. Yay!

I need to find a better scanner to scan the ultrasound pics onto the computer. Once I do then I will post the last two ultrasound pics. Until then you will just have to be patient.

New friend

The trashcan has become my friend, it sits by me waiting for the next emergency. The last few days I have needed it at least once a day. I am finding that if I keep my tummy full that it will happily stay mostly quiet. However, finding foods that will fill me up and not make me feel sick seems to be a harder and harder prospect to fulfill.

Things that make the tummy happy:
Pasta
Starbucks Strawberries and Crème
Mint gum (helps to fight my nausea, does not fill me up)
Stacy’s Simply Naked Pita chips
Almonds
Slightly salted rice cakes
Homemade mashed potatoes (the fake stuff makes me feel sick)


Other than this list it really varies, some days I may be able to eat something and then not be able to eat it the next.

Things at home are going crazy, we are having issues with car/driving abilities, which has resulted in some crazy maneuvering of schedules. Hopefully it will be able to be cleared up before the end of this week. Here’s hoping for things to work out.

Foods

I have surrounded myself with food at work. And all of it is stuff to help my volitile stomach. Today I am snacking on oyster crackers, their hexagonal shapes creating interesting designs on the napkin I have spread on my desk. I am not so good with oysters, or clams for that matter, but oyster crackers and I do great together.

On the other side of my desk lies the growing pile of other food. My lunch banana sits watching me, joined by the baggie of animal crackers, the Kix which form little flowers in their bag, almonds, cheese crackers, fruit snacks, saltines, and my lightly salted rice cakes.

Last night I had to go shopping, the dogs were out of food and I could not come home without food for them. Ronan would have thrown a fit. So I bought dog food and then went over to Target, because I really needed some maternity tops to cover my maternity pants. Target has a maternity section, but none of the tops, pants or other things worked. In fact nothing in Target worked, except for a tiny purse that I found for $5. I have been getting fed up with carrying my wallet around because the maternity pants either have no pockets or pockets so tiny I can't fit my ginormous wallet into them. The purse carries it all, my keys, my wallet and my cell phone. It is a change for me, because in general I HATE purses. Have no problem with other people using them, but can't stand using them myself. Having a purse is unusual for me.

After Target I went over to Walmart, where I found two shirts that worked, and picked up more lightly salted rice cakes as I had finished off what I had the day before. While there I also picked up naked pita chips (not really since they have sea salt on them), which I idiotically left at home today (they would have been tasty), and a bag of sweet potato chips, which I ate some of last night and found them tasty but strange, something I will have to eat when I feel like them and not at any other time.

I thought about eating pickles last night but ended up eating some of the oyster crackers instead. Remembering the oyster crackers is what brings them here today. All this food, and all of it so bland, but if that is what it takes to keep it all down I am good with it. Prenatals stayed down today, and I am feeling good. Got probably about 10 to 11 hours of sleep last night, I don't know whether to feel happy about that or embarassed. Oh well, hopefully tonight I can keep awake enough to get some housework done.

Tossing Cookies

As a warning, this entry discusses vomiting, if you would rather not read then stop reading now.

What to expect

Yesterday I came home from work and discovered a package in my mailbox. Turns out my sister sent me a book. "What to expect when you're expecting", it is a book I have been wanting to read for awhile now. I looked through it last night and have to say, "Wow, what a fantastic book!" It contains a ton of great information and not just for expectant moms either, it has good info for expectant dads too.

Kevin and I talked about it yesterday and today, I still need to give my sister a call and thank her for it.

The book goes into so many aspects of pregnancy, what to eat, what to expect each month, what drugs are ok and which are not, what to expect from the doctor appointments, what happens after the baby is born, and much, much more. It is a very nice book. I am looking forward to having some time to just sit down with it and read through a good bit of it. So far I have only skimmed it.

Counting by Weeks

Over the weekend Kevin asked me how much longer we have to continue the progesterone shots. And I told him till about week 10. Currently I am in week 8 and next Saturday I will begin week 9. So we have about 2 to 3 weeks left of shots.

This of course brought him to one of his pet peeves. Counting by weeks. So he says, "Why do we have to count by weeks?? I hate counting by weeks!! How long do we have to count by weeks for??" And I say, "Oh, probably until the baby is a few months old."

I then explained to him that different things happen each week, things change and the best way to track those things is by weeks. Then once the baby is born there are different check ups and such that happen based on how many weeks old the baby is, thus you have to know how many weeks something is.

He still hates it. He hated it when the dogs were puppies. "Why do we care how many weeks the dog is?? Can't we just count by months??" "No sweetie, the dogs get certain shots based on how many weeks old they are, we have to keep track of the weeks so that they get their shots on time."

Thankfully after a few months I am sure that things change (at least that is how it seems) and the counting by weeks will be over until the next one. Hopefully Kevin can make it till then without going crazy over the weeks.

Oh noes, the tadpole!!

Those of you who have played WoW might be familiar with the title of this post. We are on week 8 of my pregnancy, and my baby looks like a tadpole. On the parents connect website they have a 3D pregnancy calendar that shows what the baby looks like each week. They also have a description of what changes are going on this week and what I am feeling and they have great tips on foods and other things. I think it is a great website. So here is what we have for this week.

"This week, your little tadpole is starting to look a little bit more human. Other exciting developments include:

Your baby's eyelids, ears, upper lip and the tip of his soon-to-be adorable button nose are forming.

Junior will also sprout webbed fingers and toes this week—which you'll be well aware of in a few months, as baby starts early gymnastics classes inside you.

Baby's tiny heart has separated into four distinct chambers and is really ticking now—at a rate of 150 beats per minute. That's more than twice your resting heart rate.

Your baby is now a little more than ½ inch long."

It is neat to see what changes are happening and how my baby is developing. This weekend I was out in Rochelle again. Kevin got stranded out there and so I ended up having to go out and help him. We were able though to get a good part of our house loaded into a moving van and taken out to our storage unit. One step closer to moving. Hopefully once we get our house on the market it will move quick.

Over the weekend I asked Kevin a silly question. I sometimes ask Kevin if he loves me, not because I doubt it, but because I want to hear him say it. So I asked him a variation of that question. I said, "Kevin, do you love our baby yet?" And he said, "What a silly question. Of course I do, I have loved our baby since I was a child. I have always looked forward to becoming a daddy." I thought it was such a cute answer.

I bought maternity clothes over the weekend too. And I discovered something about them. Though I don't really need them yet, because I have not gotten really big enough for them to be justified, I have found that they don't press on my stomach and tummy very much and thus I have less nausea. Less nausea equals a happy Rachel, so today I am wearing my brand new maternity work pants. There is something almost ridiculous about nice work slacks with a maternity belly, but I am grateful to them all the same.