23 weeks and growing!

Here I am, 23 weeks and growing! I am feeling good. My appetite is increasing, I'll be curious to see at my next doctor appointment if my weight increases too. Up to this point I am down about 3 pounds from my starting point, 9 weeks pregnant. I am not too worried because the baby has always measured right on and as you can see I have the tummy to prove that she is growing.

I am starting to get cravings again. I love love yogurt and fruit. Still bananas remain a staple of my diet. I also am starting to get my sweet tooth back. I was scouring the stores earlier this week for pumpkin ice cream and I found it. All it took was a bowl to satisfy my craving and I haven't had it since then. I am really trying to eat as healthy as I can but this is getting hard. I wake up in the middle of the night only to want cereal or jello or weird things that I know we do not have in the house. For the most part the cravings are the fun part of being pregnant.

My umbilical hernia continues to hurt off and on. I can have a really good day and then out of the blue I hurt, and hurt and there is nothing that I can do to keep the pain down. The doctor continues to say put an abdominal binder on to hold down the hernia but that hasn't seemed to help. For the most part it really only hurts when I eat, walk a lot, or stand... so not to often.

The little princess is moving like crazy. I can lay down and feel her wiggle and kick constantly. I can even start to see movement on the outside of my tummy. My kids are dying to feel the baby kick so now that she is getting stronger they will put their hands to my stomach and wait... most of the time they don't have the patience to wait long enough to feel her kick but soon they will. I can't wait to share that feeling with the dads.

It's crazy to me that as of Sunday this baby will be viable. That is a huge milestone for a NICU RN. When I say viable I mean that she could live outside of me and survive. But we have had some serious talks and she will not be making an appearance for a lot of more weeks. I see and work with babies that are about 24 weeks and its surreal to know that's what she looks like inside of me.

A very long overdue update!

   I know that I haven't posted in a while but things are moving right along. From weeks 17-19 I really didn't feel like myself. I was super moody, per my husband, always wanting to lay down, and never wanting to do anything with anyone. I am not sure why I was so out of it, whether it be that I was feeling so crappy, or just a funk I was in. My family couldn't do much right, my friends were non existent and I just wanted to be. But I am 21 weeks now and finally starting to feel normal again. Well as normal as you can when you are pregnant. I have a bit more of an appetite, yeah! I haven't taken my nausea medicine in over 1 1/2 weeks, knock on wood, and I am rarely nauseous!! I continue to feel a little better each day and hope it continues. My husband also says I am in a much better mood more often and my kids and I are doing more activities as I feel better so that really helps.
   Last week I went to the OB for my normal check up and all is good. I have an umbilical hernia that is now causing me pain, as I grow and stretch, but it is so hit or miss. But when it hurts it really really hurts. And of course it seems to bother me most when I am working and the only thing that relieves the pain is lying down and of course I can't do that at work so for now I just deal with it. The OB said that the worst time with my hernia will be this next coming month so I really hope it doesn't bother me too much.
   Also at the OB last week we got our big 20 week ultrasound!! The dads got to come up and it was a quick visit but a good one. It was pretty funny cause they haven't seen me since the 9 week ultrasound and the first thing that one of them said was "wow you have a belly!" Luckily I take that as a good thing in this situation. We got such great news... baby is healthy! We got to see all kinds of details and it was amazing! As the tech scanned me it was awesome to see the dads face and just take in all the excitement. I could tell they were a bit overwhelmed with the whole ultrasound but so nice to hear that baby is growing great and looking good. I am constantly reassured with all the kicks that I am feeling but it is nice to see it for ourselves.

And here is the little PRINCESS!

Yes that's right it's a GIRL!!!

Me and the proud papas right after we found out!

After all the good news it really started to sink in that we are over half way there and things will start happening before you know it. There is still so much to discuss and so many plans to make. But it is all very exciting for us all. I am hoping to get to go to Utah, (the dads home) for either a baby shower or a quick visit to meet the families of these two guys. And we are hoping for another visit up here to meet my kids and family. It seems like we have tons of time but really delivery will sooner than we think, but not too soon. I have never made it to my due date and really I am not expecting this time to be any different.

I promise I will try to post more pictures, including a baby bump pic, as soon as I get a good one. Really soon I hope.





 

dreams are scary!

After working all night I went to bed and had the scariest dream... I dreamt that I went in for my next ob check up and he put the doppler to my stomach and we heard a lot of confusion. So he sent me over to the ultrasound lady and she found 2 babies. ugghhh. So then the doctor and I were talking and he said well that would explain why you are so big for 17 weeks and why you are still feeling sick, the baby must have produced another baby. He was all excited because it was such a medical miracle and I was not so excited.
It is kind of funny how dreams can scare me but then I realized it must scare the IF even more. But the good news is I have had many ultrasounds already and nothing abnormal found.

15 week update

   Well I'm now 15 weeks and not much has changed. I am still without an appetite and feeling tired and nauseous. I have been taking some medicine to help with the nausea but it has other side effects that aren't very pleasent. But I have been eating a bit more, although it is very forced on my end. I continue to struggle with eating but hoping any day now it will get better. It's so different because my kids were never like this.
   About 4-5 days ago I started to feel what I think is the baby moving. That was really exciting. It's not the same as feeling my own move but it was more exciting for the IF. I was at work and couldn't wait to tell him. But it was 3am and knew I didn't want to disturb him at such an hour. I text him when I got out of work and he was super excited. It just feels like gas bubbles right now and as the baby grows I am so excited for the IF to be able to share in this feeling.
   On Friday night I went to a party with lots of my girlfriends to be read by a psychic. I went in feeling pretty unsure of what he would tell me and what he could tell about me. He had no previous information about me or my current situation. I was shocked at the information he was telling me. Not sure that I am a believer yet but it was pretty neat. The first thing he says to me is "I see babies around you". I was sitting down in a big comfy chair with a loose fitting dress on so there was no way to see my little baby bump. Then he tells me that I will have 5 children total. (not sure if that includes the miscarriage or not but hey maybe I'm meant to do this again someday). Then he tells me not to worry because the baby is super healthy, which is such a relief because we haven't received any results from the early screening testing yet but hey, no news is good news to me. And also being a NICU RN I was constantly worrying with my kids that some freak genetic thing would occur and it has not changed even though this is not mine. Then he carries on and asks me if I want to know what it is and I say yes and he says it's A GIRL! Which doesn't really surprise me because I had a dream a long time ago that it's a girl. He carried on about my personality and things to happen in my life in the future and most of it was right on. Some things he was off a bit but he described my husband to a T, and he wasn't there and had never met me. So I guess at my 20 week ultrasound we will get to see if he is right. Either way as long as the baby is healthy like he said I will be happy.

ugghhhh not again!

I thought that as you enter the 2nd trimester things were suppose to get better. Nausea was suppose to lessen, vomiting was suppose to disappear and the extreme tiredness would fade... well maybe I'm not in far enough because I am more nauseous, vomiting more often and so tired I can barely keep my eyes open at times.  I was started on Zofran, a medication to help with the nausea, yesterday and the does seem to help me have some kind of interest in eating but man once that stuff wears off... I am just forcing myself to eat and most of the time it comes right back up. I think that is why I am so so tired too. If I am not processing enough food then my body can't take advantage of all the goods. So I have also started drinking protein shakes that the OB recommended. They seem to help a bit but I am hopeful.
Baby and I had a talk tonight. I told he/she that if baby is nice to me I will promise to feed it whatever it wants whenever it wants. And I will promise to take such great care of he/she until Daddy takes over. So lets hope that he/she was listening.

13 weeks and out of the miscarriage zone!

I went to the OB's today and heard two super duper great things. First I heard the baby's heartbeat from the Doppler machine, a basic microphone that is applied directly to my stomach, and it was strong and steady! And second I heard the Dr. tell me "you are out of the miscarriage zone!" So holy moly I'm having a baby!

Today is the first day of the second trimester and supposedly you start to feel better at this point but today and the last few have been rough ones. I am super duper nauseous. No vomiting but I can't eat anything. The doctor wasn't too concerned and neither am I, I totally remember this stage, and I hope it ends soon. I also have been so tired the last couple of days that I really could sit on the couch and do nothing all day if my kids and life allowed it. But they don't.

I took this video for the IF's so I thought it would be fun to share. Its kind of hard to hear but listen close and towards the end you hear the strong heartbeat!

12 weeks and med free!

The pics are hard to see but the top one is the baby waving at us, and the bottom one is baby chillin in my uterus. I went in today for my early screening ultrasound and blood work and baby looked great. Measuring a day ahead and a strong heart rate of 153. It is such an awesome relief everytime I get to catch a sneak peak at this angel. And to top it all off I am offically weaned off all medication!