September 22, 2010
Status: All normal
I’m still around. Can I say that it’s actually a relief not to feel quite so scared on a day-to-day basis? I’ve finally stopped ending every sentence about the baby with “I hope” or “if it all works out” (at least out loud—they still pop into my head often). I’m at 16w4d and getting kicked and poked all the time. It’s the best feeling in the world. I’m savoring every one, knowing for sure that this will be the last time that we do this. When I was pregnant with P, I just assumed that we’d get to do it again. This time, I know we won’t be doing it again and so I’m treasuring every little kick and punch. I always get this goofy grin on my face and when I’m not in class, I usually say “Hi baby!”
I’m actually going to return the doppler within the next few days. The baby moves frequently during the day. There’s almost always some between 1 and 3 p.m., and then usually at least one more series in the evening. In the last day or two, there’s more movement in the mornings as well. I can pinpoint where the baby is in my uterus (it’s easily big enough to feel it as a hard lump under my hand when I press on it—right now it’s on the top right side of my uterus), and it changes location frequently even when I don’t feel it. So I’m feeling more confident now, at least enough to return the doppler. I’m pretty sure this baby decided that I was neurotic enough as it is and would put my mind at ease in at least one way. Thanks, baby!
The kids are incredibly adorable about it. K likes to know where the baby is so that he can tickle it, and he tells me that there’s a baby in his tummy that’s doing the same things mine is doing. This morning I got kicked right when I woke up and said so to P, who had come in for a cuddle. He said “Maybe the baby is hungry!” Then he kept following me around while I got dressed, saying “Mama, you need to go feed the baby!”
J is coming around to the idea of homebirth. He said he’s read up on it a lot and wants to talk to some more people who’ve done it. The midwife that we would use gave us several references, several of my Bradley students have homebirthed with this midwife, and I told him I can get other references from people if he wants some sources who aren’t connected to me and didn’t come from the midwife herself. He said he doesn’t think he’ll need those. I’ve told him that I’ll continue to do shadow-care with my current midwives, and I think that’s helping him make the decision—he knows that if I need to transfer to the hospital at any point, I’ll have full medical records and a birth team already in place. I’ve been surprised at my own ability to step back from this one and NOT try to constantly push him on it, which I think is also helping. I’m sure I could push him into it and he’d agree, but that would be a terrible idea in the long-run.
Mind you, if we do decide to do a homebirth, and a home waterbirth at that, the reactions from our families will surely be interesting…
September 9, 2010
Update—nothing exciting
I did announce on FB the other day, and was shocked at how many people were so nice—and how few asked if we are hoping for a girl! It was a lovely change since I’ve decided that P’s drama over losing his second tooth was as much as I can handle, and I hear girls are much more dramatic than boys. It seriously amazes me how many people really seem to think that we’re just kidding when we say we’d be happy with either gender…and how many people are already being driven crazy that we’re not planning to find out.
It’s also been so nice to hear from several of my friends who are expecting, including the one who’s due only a couple of weeks before me and yet announced before I’d even done the IUI! A friend from high school is due a few days before I am, and she shared that she and her husband had to have medical help to get pregnant. She wants to get together and take pictures of our bellies if I’m up there, which I thought was very sweet. I think I’ll only be up there for one weekend before the baby comes, so it might not work, but it’s been so nice to reconnect with her.
I expect that we’ll talk about making the appt for the “big” u/s at my next midwives’ appt on Monday. I’ll be 15w2d, which floors me. Seriously, it’s going to be time to schedule that scan. I can hardly believe it.
I know that one thing I need to discuss with my midwife is the Braxton-Hicks contractions that have definitely started. I absolutely love feeling this baby move—and it’s extremely active (I feel it multiple times a day), thank goodness—but like last time, it came part-and-parcel with having Braxton-Hicks contractions. They don’t hurt but they’re definitely noticeable. I was hoping they’d hold off longer this time. Last time, I started having them at 15 1/2 weeks, about 2 weeks after going off the Metformin. This time, it was right around 14 weeks, just a bare week after stopping it. *sigh* Like I’ve said, my body barely tolerates pregnancy. I’ll just keep hoping it tolerates this one for another 5 months or so. I know there’s nothing to be done, besides making sure I’m drinking enough and taking it a little easier (at this rate, I’ll be a slug in no time), and I know they didn’t hurt P, but it still makes me worry. If things are happening 1-2 weeks earlier in this pregnancy than they did with his, and he was already born 2 1/2 weeks early, I’m looking at a 36-weeker. I’d really rather give this little one some more time to cook than that.
J gets freaked out by my using the doppler (he’s worried the baby will be born deaf because of the sound waves—I know, I know, but I love him anyway), so I’ve promised not to use it any day that I feel the baby move. He so rarely worries about things like that that I had to concede. I haven’t used it since Saturday. The baby’s been moving all over the place, especially yesterday and today. It’s such a bizarre and wonderful sensation.
I’m still in shock half the time that this is me, that I get to do this again. I’ve spent so long not being pregnant and yet wanting so hard to be that it’s still tough to wrap my mind around it. There are times when I’ll try to put something on and when it doesn’t fit, I start to wonder why before I remember. How could we possibly be this lucky? I don’t know, but I will not take this forgranted.
PCOS Baby 