Bumpdate - 32 Weeks

Only 8 weeks to go...just 2 more months...and I'm officially 8 months pregnant.

This has been a super boring week other than my hip...

How far along: 32 Weeks

Weight Gain:  Up a pound!  That makes 18 lbs total and we've hit 140 baby!  Definitely the most I've ever weighed, I know I hung out in the 130's at one point in my life but I've never weighed 140.

Food: I'm not hungry.  I have officially entered a period in which I have to force myself to eat.  I make sure to have breakfast, lunch and dinner and I TRY to have 2 snacks during the day...but I'm not always successful.  What can I say?  I think baby has squished everything and...I'm not hungry.  I never really experienced The Hunger in which I just wanted to eat and eat and eat...and that sucks because I LOVE eating!  I was honestly looking forward to all the eating.  There were moments in the first tri that I was hungrier than normal...but it was short lived.  Boo!

Maternity Clothes:  My beef with maternity clothes lives on.  Specifically Old Navy Maternity.  I've started to grow out of a few of my staple dresses, some non-maternity ones and I'm down to like 4 that I can still wear.  So I decided to give Old Navy Maternity a shot again, convinced that at 30 some odd weeks I would DEFINITELY be big enough even for the tent like maternity clothes of Old Navy Maternity...oh how wrong I was.  STILL TOO BIG.  But Old Navy has redeemed itself by continuing to have amazing NON maternity wear that fits great.  I swear as long as it's empire waisted Old Navy dresses will fit me to the end.  ALSO they have some pretty great NON maternity tank tops out now, called The Perfect Tank...super long and super slimming.  Loving Old Navy through this pregnancy...just not the maternity wear.

What's Up with My Body:  My hip/ligaments still hurt...but it's definitely getting better.  Unfortunately we have our group prenatal appt here at our house on Thursday (yes tomorrow!) and thus I can't just sit around on the couch all day letting my ligaments heal, I have to clean up the mess that we started on Sunday and which created the injury in the first place.  Oddly it now hurts more if I sit for too long anyway and to be up walking around is actually more comfortable than sitting. Have I mentioned how fucking brilliant we are for doing a million projects in the last 10 weeks of pregnancy???
ADVICE FOR THOSE NOT SO FAR ALONG: DO THE PROJECTS EARLIER IN THE PREGNANCY SO THAT YOU CAN HELP WITHOUT HURTING YOURSELF.

Other than the hip I'm still generally comfortable.  No swelling, no constipation, no heartburn, still not feeling huge.  When I'm not injured turning over at night is still pretty simple.  Peeing at night even seems to be slowing down!  I was only up twice last night!!!  So, honestly I don't have much to complain about as I know a lot of others start to get super uncomfortable around now and I'll shut up about my hip because I know others have it way worse.

At my last prenatal appt, which was almost 2 weeks ago we found out that baby is head down!  Whoop whoop!  Baby seems to have stayed in the same position as my midwife showed me how to feel baby and it's the butt that stays up by my ribs (I thought it was the head) and baby's smooth flat back running along my tummy.  OPTIMAL birthing position...STAY PUT BABY!  I'm hoping baby runs out of room to flip soon and will just continue to hang out head down with it's back to my front.  This is called Occipital Anterior for anyone who cares!

Movement:  Baby movements are not kicks and punches anymore, they are stretches and pushes and it's gotta be said...it hurts!  Baby is ALL OVER the place in there and I seriously feel like I have an alien ready to push it's way out through my belly button sometimes!  I can't believe how strong some of the movements are, it takes my breathe away!

Emotions:  Hahahaha!  Hormones suck.  I cried twice before noon yesterday.  And tears threatened several more times before the day was over.  What am I crying about?  God knows...I don't know.  I can cry about anything basically.  I almost cried at the paint counter at Home Depot because they couldn't match a color for me.  Yeah...it's awesome.  Honestly I'm overwhelmed because again...we're fucking brilliant doing all this shit to the house at the end of the pregnancy.  I hate the house being a mess like it is and I just can't believe that no matter how many people tell you the pregnancy flies by...first timers never listen and wait til the last minute to do everything.  Stupid, stupid first timers.

What I'm Looking Forward To: Homebirth Childbirth Class!  We had our first one on Monday and I LOVE IT.  I'm actually excited that this is what we'll be doing for the next 5 Mondays, makes me feel WAY more prepared to breeeeeeathe my way though childbirth.

Bumpdate:

Old Navy NON maternity dress.

It's All in the Hips

"Oh pregnancy is so easy!" Isn't that the general attitude I've been splashing all over my blog?

Well, joke's on me...cause I completely fucked up my hip.

I didn't even DO anything to it, I just...did too much one day.

I've mentioned we're doing some house projects before baby comes, A LOT of house projects.

One of them involved patching, texturing and painting 5 different holes in 5 different walls in 5 different paint colors.

You can see why we've been putting that off...getting 5 different colors of paint out is a pain in the ass.

Anyway, we finally started the damn project and I spent all day going up and down stairs, up and down a step ladder, squatting and moving and just generally "busy" doing one thing or another.

I rested when I felt tired, at no point did anything hurt, but obviously I hurt something because at 3am OMG, I thought I was going to die.

I got up to pee and as soon as I stood up pain shot out from my right hip in EVERY DIRECTION so that my entire middle from mid-thigh to belly button was screaming in pain.

And then I had a Braxton Hicks contraction.

So that I was under the illusion that my uterus hurt as well.

ODDLY ENOUGH I did not think I was in labor, BUT I decided right then and there that if labor hurt THAT MUCH I was not going to make it through the ordeal au naturale.

I'm really dramatic at 3am.

When I got back in bed the pain went away if I stayed in one position but anytime I tried to move, sharp shooting pains from my hip had me almost in tears.

I was convinced I had somehow dislocated my pelvis or my hip...except surely that would require an "incident" in which you knew you dislocated said pelvis right?

Yesterday the pain continued whenever I moved, walking was especially painful.

Pregnancy is no longer easy.

As the pain dissipates I can tell you now that I seem to have strained/pulled my ligaments that hold my uterus up.  You guys know how round ligament pain hurt like a bitch sometimes?  Well, my round ligaments, both front and back are UPSET and holy shit they hurt!  

I can't put on underwear without help.

Pregnancy is awesome.

32 Weeks and Loving.  Every.  Minute.

The Traveling Preggo

I hate flying while pregnant.

DESPISE flying while pregnant.

It is a little slice of hell.

Mind you, this is mostly because I have irrational fears of going into preterm labor on the plane...but nevertheless...still hate it.

And yet...I keep doing it.

No matter how many times I say I'M DONE, I'M NOT GOING ANYWHERE ELSE WHILE I'M PREGNANT, somehow I get roped in (ok, willingly plan) to go somewhere else a little bit further along in this pregnancy.

Remember back at 17 weeks when I gave you this little list of all the different instances of flying messing with my cervical mucus?  And it led to the No Good Horrible Very Bad Day?  Well, after that I was convinced I would never fly while pregnant EVER AGAIN.  I was done.  I was staying close to my midwives for the rest of my pregnancy.

Well...that didn't last very long.

At 23 weeks I flew the hour and a half home to Oregon.  No problems other than I couldn't NOT pee for that hour and a half and those tiny planes have the smallest bathrooms EVER.  It was torture waiting for the chatty stewardess to hurry up and serve drinks with her giant aisle clogging tray so that I could rush to the bathroom half an hour into the flight.

Then at 29 weeks I decided to accept the offer of a baby shower thrown in my honor in NYC and hopped on a plane again.

In a nutshell, it was completely fine, but I hated every moment of it.

It starts with the airport.  It seems that they have started putting those full body X-ray machines in ALL major airports these days and since I'm not convinced those are safe for pregnancy I have to get a pat down.

Great...I love getting felt up at the airport.

Kuddos to JFK airport on the way home, they had the old school scanners (which are fine, they're not X-rays) available for children and preggos and I didn't have to get a pat down at JFK.

Why can't all airports do this?  They all still have the scanners set up for their own personnel to go through, why can't the preggo ladies go through rather than get a pat down?

Anyway, after getting felt up at the airport, the flight itself wasn't HORRIBLE as I was in first class (purchased with air miles!) and the flight attendant gave me a HUGE bottle of water without me having to ask for it.  But because of said bottle of water I was up to pee A LOT, at least once an hour, so every time I would get comfy and settle back down to watch my movie I would then need to get up and pee again...and REPEAT.

Other than that I really have nothing to complain about.  I wasn't uncomfortable, except for always needing to pee, the Braxton Hicks stayed at a minimum, just a few the whole flight, no swelling, and since I was in first class obviously the seats were pretty comfortable.

But I still hated it.

And wouldn't you know it...I'm still not done.

In 3 weeks...at 34 weeks pregnant I'm doing it again.

I'm going back home to Oregon one last time before we have this kiddo for another baby shower being thrown for me.

No first class, just a tiny little plane with a tiny little seat and a tiny little bathroom...I hope I fit.

Anyone else hate flying as much as I do during pregnancy?

Or have you all kept your feet firmly planted on the ground?

Bumpdate - 31 Weeks

Just 9 weeks to go guys...just 9 more weeks.

My expectation lately has been that I'm about to get really uncomfortable.

As the weeks go by and we get closer and closer to the end everyone keeps telling me that I will experience the following:

Insomnia
Achy hips
Sore back
Swelling
Incredible Weight Gain

I'm still waiting for all of this.  Waiting to get more uncomfortable, waiting to feel really sore, not just minor aches and pains, waiting to get so big that I really FEEL big, waiting to have trouble sleeping, waiting for the pounds to just start piling on, waiting for giant swollen elephant feet and accompanying cankles.

But so far...we're doing good.

How far along: 31 Weeks

Weight Gain: Same...+17 lbs.  Holding steady at 139, if I gain 1 pound a week for the next 9 weeks we're right in the "goal" weight of 25-35 lbs for the whole pregnancy.  If I don't I'm gonna come in underweight, to which I say...fuck it, I don't care, baby looks fine, that's all I really care about.  I'm not gonna start sucking down milkshakes unless I want a milkshake just to gain the "right" amount of weight.

Something amusing I have to share about weight gain and my diet.  Apparently constipation is the key to a healthy diet and minimal weight gain ;-)  I can't tell you how many times I've turned down pizza or a sandwich or pasta in lieu of something else without carbs for the very simple reason of wanting to be able to poop!  Nothing else has ever motivated me to eat well in the same way as constipation.  Which is ridiculous because you would think the health of the baby would be the MOST important thing ever and yet...when it comes to cravings, it's not.  I can ALWAYS convince myself that it's the baby who wants the eclair or the pizza or the cheeseburger and that what baby wants baby gets.  But knowing if I eat cheeseburgers and pizza and pasta for several days in a row we're gonna run into some bathroom trouble stops me dead in my tracks and I'm like ok I'll have the pizza today but SALAD tomorrow and amazingly I do it without a second thought.  Anyone who's ever suffered from chronic constipation, my heart goes out to you, I have so much sympathy for you, and at the same time, DIET HELPS IMMENSELY.  If this was something I struggled with outside of pregnancy I would be the healthiest eater EVER.

What's Up With My Body:  Speaking of constipation...it's gone.  I really haven't struggled with it (minus the traveling constipation!) since the beginning of the 3rd trimester, so for now I can say that constipation was exclusively a 2nd trimester issue.

I am tired a lot of the time, NOT like the first trimester exhaustion, just generally tired, but napping is impossible.  I find this so annoying because I LOVE to nap, but naps are elusive these days.

I've started to get really irritated that I can't do certain tasks just because I'm you know...really pregnant.   Normally I love to be waited on and can find any excuse to get someone else to do things for me but apparently I hate not being ABLE to do certain things.  I know I need to slow down and ask for help when I need it, but apparently pregnancy really brings out my desire to be independent.  It's driving me nutty...and my husband too.  There's nothing quite like discovering you can't do something simple like hang a curtain and then find yourself breaking down as you tearfully explain to your husband why it's so upsetting to not be able to hang curtains when normally that's his job anyway and you would never dream of hanging the curtains when you're not pregnant because YOU CAN GET YOUR HUSBAND TO DO THAT.  Yes, still very emotionally unstable over here.

Food: I didn't mention it but that sweets craving completely went away a few weeks ago.  It was intense and lasted for a week and then...gone.  Back to my normal "not a big fan of sweets" self.

Some mornings I'm hungry at 5am, but I just can't get up to eat...it's a whole debacle where the cats want to be fed and let out and a simple bowl of cereal turns into me going through the whole "getting up" routine with the kitties and then it's like I'm UP for the day.  So, I ignore 5am cravings.

Gender: I made a decision on a girl name, that's right I, not we, LOL.  I asked the families to look into family trees as I wanted something with meaning, remember?  And VOILA, a name popped up a few generations ago that was already on the girl name list.  It's not popular, it's not made up, it's feminine.  Dom won't agree to ANY names until he sees the baby, but he likes the name too.  Of course this means the baby is BOUND TO BE A BOY because we're still stuck for boy names.

Bumpdate: So, the bump seems to have started to take on a more "basketball" appearance than it was earlier on.  I have a plethora of piccies to show you what I mean as the side view doesn't always do it justice.  I also think it looks HUGE in pictures, whereas in real life it doesn't feel very big.

Rosie Pope Maternity Dress, LOVE this dress, although I've never felt more pregnant than when I wear this dress, I think the white REALLY accentuates the bump and makes me look huge. 

Does it look like a basketball? 

My view....although I swear it doesn't look this big when I look down... 

You all know where I'm going with this right?  Basketball bump is supposed to be boy!  LOL, let the bump analysis continue...just 9 more weeks of speculation to go!

More Babes In Heaven

Mary Francis had to deliver her triplets this weekend, just one week shy of viability.

The downside to this community is that you hear about these situations more than you would IRL, which is why we're all desperate to hit 24 weeks and we all breathe a sigh of relief when we get there.

As much as we'd like to believe these things don't happen...they do.

There are no words.  I can't imagine what Mary Francis is going through right now.

Back to my blogging hiatus, there will be no blogging about nurseries, bumps, birth and baby showers for a few days.  It all just seems so unimportant when things like this hit the community.

Everyone please hit up MF's blog and send her some love...she and her husband need it desperately right now. 

Nursery, Nursery, Nursery

When I wrote yesterday about feeling stalled on the blogging front a bunch of you expressed interest in hearing about my nursery.  Well, I wrote this post back in March just after our 18 week ultrasound.  I have no idea why I didn't post it then but I'm gonna go ahead and post it in it's entirety now because it's amusing and then I'll add a bit more at the end so you can all be up to speed on my nursery!

You all know I've had trouble with the nursery.

Trouble even saying the word nursery not DECORATING the nursery!

Decorating a nursery has been really really REALLY far from my mind.

So I've pretty much just ignored it.

BUT, that damn ultrasound kind of pushed us into action.

Instead of seeing a baby with no heartbeat (oh yes that's totally what I was imagining) we saw a little wiggler, heart pumping away...and it made me realize maybe we're actually having a baby in August!

I must say the growing belly helps immensely with the acceptance.  As it grows and makes certain activities more uncomfortable I'm forced to accept not only that we may be having a baby but that I may need to prepare for it.

So, we finally stepped foot in the nursery (that's right we don't actually go in there) and decided on a few things.

First thing we decided on? (Ok, fought about in a pregnancy induced hormonal outburst) is that the room we had designated for the nursery was not gonna cut it and that we needed to switch the guest room with the nursery.

The guest room is the best room of the house, it faces away from the street toward the garden, light pours in most of the day, it's a nice shape and the closet is actually a closet.

Our nursery (former nursery now) was rather dark with the only window on the side of the house that has a neighbor's house right next to it, it's kind of an oblong, long shape rather than square, and the closet is full of shelves, perfect for storing boxes and organizing but not so much for hanging baby clothes and baby things.

So we switched the rooms.

And I realized this might have been a huge reason why I was so hesitant to do anything with the nursery...I think I hated the room that we had designated as the nursery.

I'm much happier with the new arrangement.  I think the former nursery works MUCH better as a guest room and the former guest rooms works much better as a nursery.

So, now that furniture has been moved around we now have to decide on a nursery theme and pick out a damn crib.

Since we don't know the sex I'm thinking gray for the walls.

And then I googled.

Oh, how I hate google!

I googled gender neutral nurseries and guess what?

There are a million BEAUTIFUL nurseries and I am officially so overwhelmed that I'm back to being paralyzed.

Shit.

But then I stumbled upon this:

source

And remembered that I have this tucked away in a closet waiting for a baby:

And voila!

I THINK I DECIDED ON KOALAS!!!

Gender neutral, goes well with gray...perfect!

It also represents Australia a bit for us, since that's actually where we began our journey and of course where I bought the baby koala and also where I got the PCOS diagnosis and where we learned that baby making wasn't going to be easy.

It's fitting somehow.  Brings it all full circle.

So, while I reserve the right to change my mind at any time for now I have settled on koala as my nursery theme!

And now almost 3 months later I've kept the koala theme, started painting my walls, bought a crib, bought that cute koala decal above and...well that's it so far.

So, the crib and wall color looks like this:

I love my crib by the way, I think it's BEAUTIFUL.   It's also fully convertible to a toddler bed and then into a twin size bed as well.  WELL WORTH THE MONEY I SPENT ON IT.

The koala decal will go above my crib just like it is in the piccie.

I'm not done with the rest of the room, so that's all you get so far!

Another quick note on cribs, I felt like such an idiot when my crib arrived.  Like the biggest baby dummy EVER.  I did not know that the crib did not come with a mattress.  YES, I EXPECTED THE CRIB TO COME WITH A MATTRESS.

And then, after I did my research and bought a mattress I discovered YOU NEED A MATTRESS PAD.  Seriously?  WTF?  WHY CAN'T IT ALL COME TOGETHER?  

THEN I discovered I need a crib BUMPER!!!!  Really?  Did you guys buy crib bumpers?  As you can see I don't have one yet.  It's just one thing after another!

So, yeah, baby dummy over here...I know nothing about baby things (don't even get me started about how I had no idea what a pack 'n play was, not buying one of those unless I need it after baby is born btw).  My husband kept turning to me while we were building the crib asking me all these questions about mattresses and cribs and I'm like I'VE NEVER HAD A BABY!  WHY ARE YOU ASKING ME?  Does being female mean I know cribs don't come with mattresses???

And that my friends is where we are with our nursery currently...I will do a finished post...when it's finished, I'm thinking that might not be for another 10 weeks!

Bumpdate - 30 Weeks

Guys, I still have NOTHING to blog about.

I just had a baby shower in NYC, I should blog about that.  I just took another flight while 29 weeks pregnant and I hated every moment of it, I should blog about that.  I have a nursery theme finally, I should blog about that.  But I've got NOTHING.  The posts will not flow, I can't put anything together.

I DON'T KNOW WHAT IS UP.

But until I can get a blog post out of my head and onto the computer screen I guess we're just gonna keep bumpdating away.

So here we go.

Everyone always says how quickly the 9 months of pregnancy fly by ( it's really 10 months!).

I used to think they were full of shit.

Especially after those first 12 weeks DRAGGED on.  And I had to do them twice.

Longest 12 weeks of my life...twice.

But...I must admit, since 12 weeks, the time has flown by.

It's June already and I'm due in August.

There are only 10 weeks left!

Eek!

Baby is almost cooked.

How far along: 30 Weeks

Weight Gain: Traveling constipation hit with a vengeance while in NYC and I thought I had gained 4 lbs. in one week.  Once I was back home on Tuesday and my body finally decided it was ok to poop in the comfort of my own home, I'm back down to where I was last week at 139...so, I pooped out 4 lbs and I am still up 17 lbs total.

What's Up With My Body: Oh dear god the traveling constipation was HORRIBLE.  I left Friday, luckily pooped before the plane ride and then...NOTHING.  I had to wait all the way until Tuesday when we returned to poop out the 4 lbs I gained while eating nothing but crap the whole time I was in NYC.  DELICIOUS CRAP by the way, but there was a lot of pasta and bread involved in the weekend.  On day 2 I started the constipation tricks and tried them ALL before I returned home.  Oranges, kiwis, dates, prunes, oatmeal, aloe, chia seeds, roughage, I did it all...with nothing.  Oh so thankfully this was the kind of constipation in which you just don't have the urge to go at all.  I call it traveling constipation as it seems to happen whether I'm pregnant or not.  It had been 3 days but I had no cramping or uncomfortableness, THANK GOD.  And it doesn't seem to be a return of constipation as all is back to normal now that I am home.

Sleeping in hotel beds and friends beds and other beds that were not my own definitely left me with some sore hips over the weekend.  They felt better sleeping in my own bed last night, but they definitely bothered me more than normal.  I'm hoping this is not a symptom that is here to stay and I just need another day or two in my own bed for my hips to feel better again.

I have a stretch mark.  On the underside of my left boob.  To give credence to the genetic link to stretch marks, this is the only place that my mother and sister got stretch marks in their pregnancies also.  My boobs have not grown since 15 weeks, we're holding steady with our D cups, but out of nowhere...a stretch mark.  No, I don't use lotion or oil on a regular basis to avoid stretch marks because I don't believe you can avoid them if you're going to get them.  Still none on the belly.

And the top of my belly button officially sticks out.  Not the whole thing, just the top.

Emotions: I'm a wreck.  It's impossible not to cry...over nothing.  I was on the plane heading home, I hadn't pooped in 4 days and my media player wouldn't play...i got so upset I started crying.  Yes, constipation and crap technology made me cry.  It's awesome, I love being so in control of my emotions.

Gender:  I am still pretty set on girl for this kid BUT I had another baby boy dream.  I think that's 2 for boy and 1 for girl...and I still call it a 'he'.

Bumpdate:

Damn, I was trying to show you guys the belly button, but you really can't see it in this piccie!