And It's A........

GIRL!

So far, everything's been progressing in a healthy manner. We had an ultrasound on Monday, and we saw her little head, her little hands and feet, and the tech apparently saw her little peepee (3 lines? Really?). So she's about 95% sure that it's a girl. SB will be very happy to hear that she can play dress up and do makeup with Pearl.

We asked SB a while ago whether she thought the baby was going to be a boy or a girl. She insisted it was a girl. And that we should name her Pearl. After the whale on SpongeBob Squarepants whose father is a crab. If we asked her what happens if the baby is a boy, SB would adamantly say "No, it's a girl." Eventually she admitted that if it was a boy we'd name him Pearl too.

So thankfully, no boy has to endure his sister calling him Pearl for the early part of his life!

The heartbeat at this visit was in the upper 150's. On Friday it was around 140 bpm. I've been seeing a new OB, who was recommended by a friend. So far, they're really nice, although I've been running into issues with getting records from my old OB, to the point where they're actually getting rude.

But all that's straightened out now. I've gained way too much weight, I feel HUGE and am not even halfway though yet!

Is it August Yet?

OK I'm really starting to feel pregnant. And I forgot how much I didn't like it.

I do have to say that this pregnancy has been much easier than my last one.

There. I said it. Now here come the complaints.

I'm getting the occasional wave of morning sickness, especially if I go too long without eating. But since I'm feeling pretty decent most of the time, my appetite has been through the roof. Last night I brought my daughter to dance class, and we have a tradition of going to Chik Fila after class. She gets her nuggets meal and usually I get the grilled chicken sandwich, if anything, and we share a milkshake. Last night she requested we go to "the New MacDonald's" (which I have no idea what she was talking about because there is no new MacDonald's in the area, as far as I know) and since she was such a good girl at dance, I agreed to take her. To the old one, of course. Since there is no new one.

So she got her happy meal and I also got her a small milkshake. Me? I got a LARGE #4, which is the Big & Tasty meal, AND an 10-piece chicken nugget. I haven't eaten MacDonald's chicken nuggets since elementary school. We went home and I ate my burger (which I also rarely get from fast food places), my large fries, drank all of my large Sprite, and then immediately downed 7 of my 10 chicken nuggets.

OMG. I had to lay on the couch for about an hour after that because I was so full. I can't believe I ate so much...junk! My eating during the day hadn't been horrible- 2 eggs with breakfast potatoes and 2 slices of wheat toast at breakfast, fruit salad as a snack, a small serving of pasta with corn and an apple for lunch. Then it went a little downhill when I got home- mashed potatoes (not a lot) and ice cream (also not a lot) as a snack. Then the mega dinner.

I really hope that was a freak thing and I don't make a habit of eating like that, or I'll be gaining 100 lbs this time! And I already feel big.

I'm not sure if I mentioned here that I am not a pretty pregnant lady. I gain weight everywhere, not just in a bump in my belly. I have a feeling that I'm much larger right now than I should be. I'm trying not to let it bother me too much since I had absolutely no problems at all losing the weight the first time, and this time around I'm working out at almost 4 months, where last time I had to stop very quickly some time in the second month, I think.

My sleeping has been sucking, so I'm constantly tired. I try to sleep on my side because sleeping on my belly's not too comfortable for me, and I'm not really supposed to sleep on my back. So all night I wake up to turn from side to side every half hour to every hour. Add in there several trips to the bathroom (last night was 3) and maybe one time every night where I can't get back to sleep because I'm too hot (and I don't mean that like a compliment) and you have a miserable night.

Which then leads to a miserable day because I'm tired, fat and grumpy. Classes are harder for me to teach, and I don't look forward to them at all.

On the bright side, I think I might have felt the baby kick yesterday, but I'm not 100% sure. That was probably my favorite thing about being pregnant, so if that's starting then that's pretty cool.

So now it's just a waiting game until August. We got preapproved for a decent amount to buy a new house, so hopefully with busying ourselves selling ours and moving, that will make time fly by until this kid pops out of me and I can be myself again.

It's Not a Tumor, it's a BABY!!

Finally, at nearly 13 weeks I get my first real indication that there's a real live baby person living, growing and thriving inside me, instead of some freak tumor that interferes with my period, causes home pregnancy tests to come out positive, and causes the random pregnancy symptom at irregular intervals!

Look:


Yes, it is a close-up and no, he is not smoking. My tummy is a non-smoking area.

I will mention here that the only reason I got this confirmation is because I opted to take a test (which probably won't be covered by insurance since it was optional) to determine my risk for having a baby with Down syndrome or Trisomy 21. (I think). I'm naturally low risk because of my age and genes, but it was the only way I was going to see that there was a baby inside me so I went for it.

We didn't tell SB that I was pregnant since a) the kid can't keep a secret to save her life and b)I honestly truly half expected them to tell me something was wrong and there was no baby in there. So we brought her to the ultrasound appointment thinking they were just going to take pictures to see what's inside Mommy's tummy.

When the baby came up on the screen, the first thing I saw was the little heart beating and a huge relief swept over me. I called SB over and pointed it out and told her that's what was in mommy's tummy. She turned to look at me, I think she thought I was joking because she said doubtfully, "Mommy, you ate a baby??"

Ha ha.

Anyway, besides identifying about 42 planet-sized tumors on my one ovary, everything was completely normal and healthy. The baby's heartbeat on Thursday at the ultrasound was 151. When I went yesterday to my regular monthly appointment, it was in the 160's, which is still perfectly normal. My blood pressure is good (114/72) and my heart rate was a little high (98bpm)- to be expected since I had just finished teaching a step class about an hour prior in a very hot room- but still within normal ranges.

We were concerned about the BP and HR since I had had heart issues when I was pregnant with SB so it's good to know everything's still looking good. My weight had crept up 3 pounds in the past month, for a total of about 7 or 8 pounds in the first trimester. Not too bad, considering I gained somewhere around 65 pounds total last time!

Milk Duds

It's been so hard keeping this pregnancy a secret. In the back of my mind, I think everyone at work knows. I work in a fitness center and I teach a lot of classes, and even though I've only gained 5-6 pounds according to the scale, I feel a lot heavier and softer, and I feel like it's blatantly obvious to everyone who glances in my general direction. Not that I'm so self-absorbed that I feel everyone is always paying attention to me and how I look, and notices even the most slight changes.

I had one lady, who is a regular in my classes, and is actually a very sweet, intelligent lady, pull me aside after one class and ask me if I was pregnant. BUT--- this happened waaaaay before we even started trying. AWKWARD!! I had to swallow my pride and explain to her that it wasn't a baby in there, but a nasty combination of PMS bloating and constipation. Fun stuff!

But my point is that if they notice when I'm extra bloated one day, they should definitely be noticing that not only am I getting softer and bigger, but I also started putting only 1 riser on each side (which I never used to do, but am forced to now since I run out of breath very quickly and get tired fast).

There's a guy, Rob, who doesn't take classes at my gym, but he comes in a few times a week to work out. He's one of those guys who takes pride in the fact that he says whatever he thinks or feels, without any concern that he might offend or say something inappropriate.

Keep in mind that I work in a CORPORATE fitness center, so these people all work for the same large company.

Anyway, we were joking back and forth about how I was sitting at the desk with my feet up while the director of the fitness center was actually doing work, getting ready to teach a class. I didn't worry too much because it's a laid-back environment and my director knows that I pull my weight at work. It just so happened that I was chatting with a friend who had stopped by on a break from his desk, and had brought me some little boxes of Milk Duds. Which I was happily eating.

Rob then made the comment that I was sitting around so much that my rear end was starting to widen, and even resemble a Milk Dud. I just looked at him. He didn't really know how I was taking this, but he continued anyway, saying that my butt was getting wider and that I needed to get off of it and start moving.

Still just stared at him.

Then he said that what he was saying was bothering me, and that I'd be thinking about it for a long time, wondering whether he was serious about my butt getting bigger. And went on to talk about Mrs. Obama and whether she asked her husband if her butt looked big in her gown before going to the ball. He said that every woman wonders that.

At this point, I told him that I really didn't care about him saying that my butt was getting bigger - and I didn't! - but he insisted that I did.

Honestly I didn't care, because I know it is getting bigger. I don't think it's that noticeable to others, especially since I've been wearing baggier clothes (thank goodness it's winter!) lately. But weight gain with pregnancy is inevitable, especially for me.

I'm not one of those tiny little women who gets a cute little bump that later disappears. I gain it EVERYWHERE, up to my shoulders! I remember trying on cute summer maternity clothes last time but not being able to buy anything sleeveless because I looked like a freaking linebacker.

So as much as I hate it, I'm expecting the weight gain. Everywhere.

But there was no need for Rob to point this out. Granted, he was only looking to get a rise out of me, and he doesn't know I'm pregnant. But at the same time, who says that to any woman? It's just not nice. Even if he's not being serious.

I tried not to think about it too much, but I did feel better when my friend Eludius, who was the one who brought me the Milk Duds and witnessed the whole thing, emailed me later to ask if Rob was always that inappropriate. Thanks, E!

Besides, I can't have gained that much weight- I still fit into some of my regular jeans, and I'm almost 11 weeks along with my second! And on another bright note, my stomach is actually starting to feel a little tight and hard down in the lower part, which makes me feel more pregnant and less like this is some freak disease (since I still don't have any HSG levels, a heartbeat, u/s, anything).

And now I'm down to only 2 weeks until I get my first ultrasound, and can tell the world that I'm pregnant and not a fat lazy Milk Dud!

No News is Good News...I Guess

I had my first real prenatal appointment yesterday. I was super excited about it because I thought they would check for a heartbeat, and I even entertained the idea that they would whip out the ultrasound machine, just for a quick peek, even though there was no real reason to get an ultrasound.

Too bad they did nothing- zilch, nada- that they wouldn't do at a normal non-pregnancy gyno visit. She violated me with her fingers and with her duckbill-looking thing, then she scraped valuable necessary pieces of my cervix off, felt me up inside and out, and sent me on my way bleeding for the remainder of the night, telling me that everything "feels healthy".

She said it was probably too early to hear the heartbeat, actually said I was kind of right on the border between where they could hear it and where it was too early. Luckily, I opted to get the first trimester screening test, which involves bloodwork and an ultrasound, and is supposed to give me an idea as to whether I am at increased risk of having a baby with Down Syndrome. I didn't get that with my first, because my doctor neglected to tell me about it until after the window of time during which the test must be conducted had already passed. But I'm young and low-risk anyway, so I didn't really need it this time either.

But because I have no concrete evidence that there's even a child growing inside me, as opposed to an empty sac or a tumor, or some freak disease that causes positive pregnancy tests but isn't a real pregnancy, I chose to take this test. So I will hopefully be able to see the baby on 2/5.

Which is a lifetime away.

Until then, I have to bide my time and deal with the side effects of this pregnancy/freak disease. So far, I have pregnancy-induced laziness, extreme fatigue, all sorts of disgusting weight gain (which was only really 5-7 pounds but feels like 50 already), and the increasingly occasional bouts of "morning sickness" (which comes all the time and doesn't involve puking for me, but extreme nausea). And unbelievable constipation. Which is probably contributing to those 5-7 pounds.

AND while dealing with all that, I still have to show up for work at 6am to teach step and bodysculpt classes without letting on that I feel like crap and just want to sleep, but still deliver a kick-butt workout to the people in my class who are now just about all lightyears more fitter than I am.

It's A Boy!....Maybe.

I ran into this gender prediction chart while looking for a cute ticker to add to my blog. This site says the chart is for entertainment purposes only, but I think it's pretty funny.

I'm only really posting it because, between you and me, I'm thinking it's a boy. Only because I think one of each would be pretty cool.

Why?

So this is my pregnancy blog. I started it because I wanted an outlet where I can moan and whine and complain without the risk of losing all my friends who aren't interested in hearing all that.

This is my second pregnancy. My daughter is 3 years old now, and was a difficult child, pretty much from the second she was conceived. I had just started a new job, and since my husband is 11 years older than me and he was not really a spring chicken anymore, we decided it was time to start thinking about having a kid. But since I'd just started this new job, I didn't really want to, or expect to get pregnant right away. I figured it would take us about a year or so- especially since we weren't actively trying. I wasn't charting my fertility or sticking thermometers up my vag to try to figure out when I was ovulating. We were just going to try to have fun for a while.

Of course, since the Mother Nature of Babies hates my guts (evidenced further by the Hell my life became during my daughter's first year), we got pregnant right away. On the first shot. So two months into my brand new job, I had to tell them that I was pregnant.

Why did I have to tell them so early? Because I was working in the cardiac rehab department of a hospital, where part of my job was to teach group exercise classes. And my morning sickness, which was more like 24/7 sickness, prevented me from teaching any class that involved moving around. Which was all of the cardio classes.

But I was still excited! There was a baby growing in me! My little bean! That euphoria only showed up every now and then. Because I don't make a good pregnant person. And here's why:

-I became enormous. Partly because I had to stop exercising cold turkey because I was sick all the time, and partly because I had horrible food aversions in the first and second trimester, and the only foods that appealed to me were mashed potatoes with frozen peas mixed in, potato salad, and similar high-carb, high-fat foods that did nothing but contribute to my growing waistline. I gained around 60-70 pounds during this pregnancy.

-I was constantly nauseous. Everywhere I went, I carried with me Goldfish crackers, ginger ale and peppermint gum. During the first three and last three months, if the nausea went away, I got worried. That's how infrequently it happened. I was miserable.

-I developed heart problems. They started with palpitations, then I realized that my resting heart rate was 166 bpm. Since I worked in Cardiac Rehab, we would strap me up to the ecg machine and I saw that I would occasionally go into supraventricular tachycardia. Not a good thing. I was given a Holter monitor to wear for a few days so they could see what my heart was doing, and they determined that I had a tricuspid valve prolapse, which was most likely there before I got pregnant, but was aggravated by the increased blood flow. Great. I was given a prescription for beta blockers to slow down my heart rate, but I refused to take them since I'm a paranoid freak about medications.

-At about 4 months along, I got into a car accident with the Wench from Hell. I was going straight through a light, and she was coming out of a parking lot to my left just before I reached the intersection, and making a right turn onto the street that I was planning to cross. Apparently I got in her way. We pulled over and she apologized, and asked to pay out of pocked instead of getting insurance companies involved. Because I'm not a moron, I got her information anyway but said I'd get an estimate first and give it to her. I also warned her that I was 4 months pregnant (wasn't really showing at this time). I told her I wasn't hurt, and that I had a scheduled appointment coming up in the coming week. I didn't anticipate any problems, but I don't know how easily a fetus is affected so I just wanted to put it out there that I was pregnant.

Turns out her husband is a lawyer and wanted me to sign all sorts of crazy things releasing them of any and all liability after paying for the estimate I gave them. I told them that if I went through their insurance company, I would get a rental. He wouldn't agree to that, and he also wouldn't agree to pay supplemental damages should any be found when they actually start work on the car. It was a mess and I was miserable.

-I did stupid things. I dropped a can of beans into a pan of brownies that were cooling on the counter. That I had made to celebrate a co-worker's birthday. I also dropped the back brace used by medics onto my foot while I was doing the morning checks at work. It fell on my toes and I bled right through my sneaker. I was sent home, since even if I broke the toes, the ER probably wouldn't do x-rays on a pregnant woman, and all they could do for a broken toe was wrap it up anyway. I was in an unbelievable amount of pain. All I could take was extra-strength Tylenol.

The nail on my big toe was cracked, and I'm pretty sure the toe was broken. I eventually lost that nail, so I had to keep it wrapped up for the entire summer. When I went into labor, I kept my socks on even though they got all bloody (sorry, TMI) because I didn't want to have to look at my toe all wrapped up. It did eventually grow back, but it's not quite the same.

-My daughter felt the need to lay on my ureter constantly, which causes immense pain in my side/abdomen. I couldn't stand up straight when she did that. And she did that a lot. She also kicked me a lot. Hard.

Her first year was not much better than the pregnancy. She had horrible acid reflux. She was on medication from about 2 days old until about 9 months old. She screamed constantly, refused to breast feed, and would ONLY sleep face down on our chests. Which meant that someone had to be up with her constantly. And since she only slept for about an hour or two at a time, we were useless those first few months. She got better as she got older, but she was a very difficult, LOUD child. And still is sometimes.

But despite all that, we decided to have another. So here I am, at about 9 weeks pregnant, starting to feel the wonderfulness that comes with being pregnant. The morning sickness, the constant bloat, the fatigue and lethargy. And I would, more than anything, like to share it all with you!

Welcome to my world!