I’ve Been Duped

Don’t get me wrong, I feel better. I’m not nauseous all day, most of the time. I’m not puking 2-3x a day. It’s great. However, I was told that, on the morning of week 12, I would wake up, refreshed, renewed, de-nauseated.

I didn’t.

I woke up, and puked in the middle of the night.

I feel much better now, and I’m praying that will be the “last puke of the season.” At this point, however, I’m convinced I’ll be going at it for the next 6 months. It’ll never let up again. Even after I have the child. I will be puking daily for the rest of my life.

This Week in Pregnancy - Week 12

Your baby’s hit the 2-inch mark (about the size of a lime) and weighs half an ounce. Her face is beginning to look more human. Her eyes, which started out on the sides of her head, have moved closer together on her face, and her ears are near their final positions on the sides of her head. Your baby’s intestines, which have grown so rapidly that they protrude into the umbilical cord, will start to move into her abdominal cavity about now. Her kidneys are secreting urine into her bladder. Her nerve cells have been multiplying rapidly, and synapses (neurological pathways in the brain) are forming. Your baby may have acquired more reflexes by now, including sucking, and she’ll even squirm if you prod your abdomen, though you still won’t be able to feel her movement for several weeks.

This Week in Pregnancy - Week 11

Your fig-sized baby is now fully formed — measuring 1 1/2 inches long and weighing in at a quarter of an ounce. His skin is still transparent, allowing many of his blood vessels to show through. Some of his bones are beginning to harden, and tiny toothbuds are starting to appear under his gums. His fingers and toes have separated, and he may soon be able to open and close his fists. He’s already busy kicking and stretching, and his tiny movements are so fluid they look like water ballet. These movements will increase as his body grows and becomes more developed and functional. As his diaphragm develops, your tiny tenant may also start to get the hiccups. Because he’s still so small, though, you won’t feel any of his workouts or intrauterine gulps until sometime between weeks 16 and 20.

Symptom Check-in - Week 10

Well, this week has rocked. Seriously, rocked. I’ve never felt so not sick. I got to see my little one and I’m not quite as tired as I was. My face is looking slimmer, while my hips are beginning to stick out like a table…I guess I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that part.

I did, however, have three nights in a row this week where I awoke at 2:25am and yakked. I have no idea why, and it really came out of no where. Hasn’t happened since, though.

DOOF!

I am so hungry. I need food. The moment the nausea (daytime…nightime is a whole other story) passed, I began getting hungry. Hungry like I have never been before. I want to eat pizza and dulce de leche ice cream. Correction: I need to eat pizza and dulce de leche ice cream. I know cravings are normal, but I didn’t expect them this early.

A few ladies on Babycenter have mentioned how “well meaning” people keep “mentioning” what they’re eating may not be the best for the baby. I cannot imagine giving such advice unsolicited, and were someone to say anything of the sort to me, I may have to kill them.

Although, I do understand that ripping a person to shreds with a piece of pizza in your mouth and a carton of ice cream in your hand probably isn’t the best look for a new mother, I don’t think puking their suggested health food of the day all over their car isn’t such a bad thing. Right?

Flailing Limbs

When the tech first put the little one on the screen, it was laying on its back, still as a rock. He said he saw the heartbeat (I saw nothing but a baby not moving and my worst fears realized), pointed the little arrow at it, and nothing. No noise, and no movement for an entire 1-2 seconds. Did he really see a heartbeat? Was he guessing? Why isn’t there a sound? I killed my child with botchulism.

And there it went. Vum-vum-vum. And then…it moved. I’m not talking little movement, either. I’m talking flipping over, flailing it’s limbs, kicking and twisting as if it was on the olympic gymnastics team. I was surprised.

“Is it…moving,” I had to ask the tech because I wasn’t sure if I was insane or not.
“Yup, it sure is.”
“That’s…that’s…weird.”

It really is weird to know there’s a little one in there flopping about like a crazy person and I can’t feel a thing. It’s even weirder to know it has a huge head, and looks like a human. The weirdest thing, though, is this little, 3cm, big headed human is flailing around like a crazy person inside ME. I hate to make this all about me, but it’s strange to be pregnant for the first time. It’s just not normal.

We have a baby. A real, live kicking and flailing baby. It’s all of 3cm long, with a heart rate of 162 bpm. The baby is “growing like a weed” (so says the tech), and is measuring a week ahead of schedule. This is typical for my family, we tend to have long babies that are estimated to be extremely tall in life, but we never are. So even though he changed the due date to June 25th, I’m sticking with July 1st.

 He did, however, say that the food poisoning bleeding probably came from the placenta. It’s sitting over the cervix. He said that would, most likely, grow up with the uterus and it won’t be a worry later on. I’m trying not to worry about it and am hoping it will correct itself.

It’s Normal, Really

I went to my 3rd OB appointment yesterday. I love the women in that office and I love my doctor. Seriously, they rock.

The appointment started off with the same ol’, same ol’. Weight gain = 1lb. Pee = Still pregnant. Blood pressure = Perfect. The nurse asked if I’d felt the baby moving yet. NO! Am I supposed to? Ack, there’s a baby inside me! What the hell?!?

When the doctor came in, she ran through the usual questions. Any cramping? No. Any bleeding? Yes, but I wasn’t worried about it. It was during the heavy yakking of the food poisoning. Well, that did warrant a worry, apparently, and I have to get another ultrasound. Not that I’m complaining! I’d love to have another picture of the little sucker. I’m just worried now.

She put the cold gel on my belly and popped down the doppler. She warned me that we probably wouldn’t hear the heartbeat since I was all of 10 weeks, and it’s normal to hear it at 12. 1 minute of strange gurgling noises out of the machine later, no heartbeat. “Don’t worry, it’s normal.” Great…bleeding, ultrasound, no heartbeat.

My appointment is tomorrow and I’m scared they’re going to tell me the baby’s heart stopped beating when I gave it botchilism last week. They’re going to tell me my body is so f’d that it didn’t even eject it itself. They’re going to tell me all my hopes went down the drain with a polish sausage and onions.

I’m scared and I’m trying not to freak out but it’s incredibly hard. My nausea is almost gone, that’s not helping. I’m scared, which is probably normal, really.

This Week in Pregnancy - Week 10

Your baby is no longer an embryo! Though she’s barely the size of a kumquat — just an inch or so long, crown to bottom — and weighs less than a quarter of an ounce, she now has completed the most critical portion of her development. This is the beginning of the so-called fetal period, a time when the tissues and organs in her body rapidly grow and mature. Her vital organs — the liver, kidney, intestines, brain, and lungs — are now in place and starting to function (although they’ll continue to develop throughout your pregnancy). Her liver continues to make blood cells, and the yolk sac, which previously supplied these cells, is no longer needed and begins to disappear.

During the next three weeks, your baby’s length will more than double to nearly 3 inches. Her head is proportionately smaller now than it was a few weeks ago, but it’s still almost half the length of her entire body. Her forehead temporarily bulges with her developing brain and sits high on her head; it will later recede to give her a more human appearance. Each day, more minute details — including tiny fingernails, toenails, and peach-fuzz hair — start to appear on her body. Her fingers are now completely separated; her arms bend at the elbow and curve slightly; her hands are flexed at the wrist and meet over her heart; her legs are lengthening; and her feet may be long enough to meet in front of her body. She is busily swallowing amniotic fluid and kicking her legs.

If you could take a peek at your baby this week, you’d be able to clearly see the outline of her spine through her parchment-thin skin. Spinal nerves are beginning to stretch out from her spinal cord.

Symptom Check-in - Week 9

This week has been the greatest of all weeks - if you ignore the food poisoning. I’m not sure if I should be worried or not.

Trial By Fur

As you know, my dog is sick. He’s gotten loads better but he’s still not 100%. Last night was one of those nights where he made that very clear.

It was at about 4:30 am, when I was holding and petting him until he’d stop whining, that I realized this is what I’ll have to look forward to in a few months. Being awakened out of a dead sleep at 2am by incessant, loud cries, trying 40 different things to make the crying stop, and ending with laying next to the crier, praying they’ll either fall asleep or learn English so they can just tell you what the hell is wrong.

I have never really had to be around any child under 1 longer than a few hours. Diaper changing is foreign to me. It was something someone else did in a room far, far away. In the past week, I’ve learned not only how to diaper a dog trying to crookedly run away from you, but also rig a double disposible + cloth diaper hookup that I can get down twice a day, in less than 3 minutes. I’ve mastered the half-asleep walk with a medication syringe full of water in one hand and a bowl of water in the other - depending on whether or not he feels up to doing it himself. I’ve gotten down not kicking violently everytime he whines in the middle of a great dream. I’ve even learned to not want to slaughter him after the second hour of trying everything to calm him down.

At least I can say I’m going into this not entirely blind. I’ve got a taste of what to expect and it sucks.