Belly PIcs from 21w4d

Well here they are.... Me at 21w4days pregnant with a baby girl!! I should have taken pics weeks ago. Not sure if I was just being shy or what but I had a burst of energy tonight. Finally.... that "energy" the pregnancy books keep saying I should get back in the 2nd trimester. I hope it lasts. I knew I was showing but I didn't really realize how much till I see it in a picture. Luckily I love the look of a pregnant so I'm truly on freaked out by the thought of labor, mind you the stretch marks have not arrived yet.





Here's a closeup of the belly. Not sure if I'm carrying high or low? I'd say I'm carrying horizontally. Maybe someone can clarify this for me if I invited more than one person to look at my blog (Hi Meg :). My question is if this is how big I am already after 21w, what am I going to look like in another 18???

The Death of Pepperoni Pizza

Well this is my 5th attempt to eat a slice of pepperoni pizza with extra cheese.... a Friday night ritual with the kids I used to love and I just can't eat it anymore, not even if I pick the pepperoni off. I've had to start ordering a vegetarian pizza for myself with the wildest stuff on it, one week spinach and feta, the next was green pepper/onion/green olives and this week I tried bruschetta pizza, and even then I'm not all that interested. Goodbye my old love.

20w Ultrasound.....It's a ......

GIRL!!!! DH was right (damn) but actually I was secretly hoping for a little girl. I just thought for whatever reason it would end up being a boy, just from dreams I've had and feeling from the first miscarriage. I actually had a dream prior to going for this u/s that the tech told me it was a girl! but when I told friends and family everyone kept telling me "No Carol, it's going to be a boy, you just wait and see". So I'm paranoid the tech missed "the parts" so my delivery day will still kind of be a surprise after all because that dream has me going enough to make me not entirely certain, but I am just thrilled it is a baby girl for now anyway.

The girls called that night at 9pm to see if we found out what we were having. They were so excited it was a girl. It's what they were hoping for too. It was really sweet to hear them cause you always worry about how they'll feel when you're adding a child into a mixed family, whether they are feeling so form of nervousness that we will love this child more.

Now I'm going to have to take that blue bedding back to the home store and BEG them to let me take the pink set if they still have it. It's a final sale and they don't have to do it but I was hoping since I'm taking the same discontinued set in the other color, they'll be nice and let me hopefully.

I've been around a bunch of pregnant people but I just can't get over the feeling when it is actually happening to you. I am just is awe that I have this little person growing inside of me and it became that much more real after my u/s. I didn't post sooner because the girls' mother tried to ruin our special day by yelling at me and DH that evening into the next morning, and I don't want to pollute this post with that story but that is why I'm now writing about it two days later. I was just too upset. Who does that? Tries to take you down on a once in a lifetime day? I will never have that day again and unfortunately she has to be part of that memory. I am beyond disgusted, but I am over it today but so sad that I didn't get to fully revel in my baby girl fully but at least I had 7 hrs with nothing but that wonderful feeling before the drama started and while that was just unbelievable, nothing can take away the feeling of how happy I am and how I feel like everything is just falling into place.

I have a lot of dreams but don't remember them entirely, but last night I was dreaming about my baby and she was really big, like somehow I missed the newborn phase and I was asking my mother if it was normal that she got so big right away. It was kind of funny but I was holding her in my arms and it was amazing. Oh I could go on and on..... it's just a very magical feeling.

Braxton Hicks and Movement

I've been feeling the baby move on and off but for the first time was able to feel it from the outside with my hands. I had been out for a walk Thursday, grocery shopping and then picked up the girls. I felt fine until I went to get out of the truck, and had a cramping sensation the minute my feet hit the ground. It scared the hell out of me at first cause I thought something was wrong but I felt fine once I got in the house and sat down. I had a couple more of these and then realized this must be those Braxton Hicks contractions every talks about.

I took a bath, not for the ctx but because I hadn't showered yet and my stomach just felt wild with new feelings so I pressed my hands firmly to what felt like my rock hard uterus and could feel the baby move. It was so awesome. I just laid there in the bathtub smiling, for the first time.... not caring that it only holds 6" of water.

Banking on a boy

I forgot to write that I bought some crib bedding prematurely. I actually saw this bedding last spring in a home store. I just loved it but sadly didn't have a "reason" to buy it yet and then it was gone. I had been dreaming about a little baby boy and every time I saw this bedding I just felt the most wonderful feeling, but then it was gone and I kind of regretted not buying it while I had the chance, not seeing anything since that I loved as much.

So now that I am pregnant I thought I'd ask the store manager on the off chance she remembered the bedding and might still be able to order it in? Well, better than that.... they still had the set in their storage marked down 1/2 price waiting to go out on a summer sale table. Well..... that was just too lucky not to feel like fate so I bought it. Now I just hope it's a boy! But even funnier, the girl tells me as I'm buying this, that they also have a set in pink in the back too. It was everything in me not to buy both sets to cover my bases. It's a final sale item so I'm just waiting to see if I cave and find out the sex next week to know whether I need the other set.

20 days later...

Well I guess that just shows how tired I've been the past couple weeks. It's been 20 days since I've written. It's up and down but by time I catch up on some things, the last thing I've felt like doing is writing.

Winter is depressing me now, as it always does come February. My u/s feels like forever away still and I still don't know if we're finding out the sex. I've started wondering if I should be feeling the baby move more than I have by now and am just generally starting to become antsy waiting for reassurance and grass.

I just feel remarkably blase about everything but this pregnancy, which in itself sometimes feels surreal. I go between wondering if I'm really pregnant, to feeling the reality of the baby moving, to evaluating my life and who this baby's mother really is. It's absolutely amazing when I feel the baby move, but I have to say it also kind of feels like a little alien invader... trying to wrap my head around the fact that there is something independent of me living inside my body sucking nutrients and energy out of me like a little parasite. Except you really love this little parasite.

I'm just feeling blase about not getting out more during the day, not having much ambition for anything, deciding what it is I want to be doing with my life career wise, which obviously takes a back seat for awhile now, but a decision I had been procrastinating on prior to becoming pregnant that I feel is important to reconcile through hobbies, designing and writing so I have more direction. I don't want to be this aimless mother who has nothing but her child as an identity.

I am just busting up waiting for my OB appt and u/s next week... March 4. I am going to drive myself crazy about finding out the sex till then. I probably would except that DH really would like to wait to find out but says it's totally my decision. Damn. I'm 50/50, I see both sides of it. It would be a big thrill after giving birth to be told "It's a boy" or "It's a girl" but I'm not sure that's worth the sacrifice it takes not really being able to have fun shopping ahead of time and the fun you can have with the nursery waiting for the baby to come. Ahhhhh... I hate yellow and green. I have 9 days left to stew about it.

Hospital Tour

OMG... what have I gotten myself into!

I just got back from hospital tour and got to see the birthing rooms. I was under the delusion it was going to be so much nicer since the staff raved on about all the new renos and the birthing rooms having a little living room setup and a private bath or shower. Rather than homey, it was more like a nursing home. It just really felt cold and it was just so odd thinking about how this is supposed to be the most special day of your life taking place in a room that makes you feel like you're going to die soon. Now I know why women want home births!

And then, the kicker was that they left me in the room to fill out paperwork and on the wall was a chart that showed the cm of dilation, from 1 to 10cm displayed in individual circles. Now 10cm doesn't seem so impossible when I imagined it on a ruler, but seeing it in a big circle has me traumatized. OMG.... I am going to need stitches. And I was considering NOT getting drugs. That's as bad as when I had a colonoscopy and they wheeled the machine with 100 feet of 2" camera pipe in BEFORE they put me out. Sorry that's all I can say today. I need to go curl up in a ball now.