Better…really?

No real queasiness today.  I had my share of low blood sugar headaches and feeling icky from that, but my stomach was fine.  There are still some foods that are completely unappetizing (bread is chief among them) but my list of edibles is expanding dramatically.  I was able to eat a spinach tortilla with cheese and onions tonight, and wanted another.  About halfway through the second one I was full, and then I felt queasy when I finished eating it anyway.  There seems to be a fine line between hunger and eating too much.  In happy news, I was also able to take my vitamins without gagging on them, after about a month off of them.

I’ve been craving animal protein the past few days, which is difficult around here.  I can’t eat meat.  I lost the ability to digest it long ago and it makes me very sick.  I’ve tried.  I want to occasionally have a steak or Thanksgiving turkey, but my attempts to re-introduce it to my diet have left me sick for weeks afterward.  Fish is good, but expensive.  Eggs are appealing, but the smell of them makes Husband ill.  It is odd that eggs are appealing.  They are one of the foods most commonly avoided during pregnancy.  But everyone is different, and every pregnancy is different as they say.  I believe that now.

I felt relatively decent yesterday.  Son and I went to a birthday party in the evening, and I wasn’t sure what to expect.  It was at one of those places where they have lots of huge inflatable obstacle courses that you can bounce in and climb.  He has been a huge fan of climbing lately and is almost always pushing a chair somewhere so he can stand on it and reach things we don’t want him getting into.  The party venue had a toddler area where Son started out.  It took him a few minutes to stop looking worried and realize that while he couldn’t walk normally, he could moonwalk wherever he wanted to go and climb on things.  Before long he realized that there were bigger places with more to do.  He thoroughly enjoyed the Disney Princess castle, where he discovered that he could throw himself into a partial barricade and then bounce and roll through it, and he learned how to climb the ladder up to the slide.  He had no fear of heights or of sliding down and squealed with glee as he crashed into the bumper at the bottom.  After he tired of that he ran to a really big one where I couldn’t see the entire insides of it.  I thought it would be too difficult for him to climb into it himself, but he did so quickly and was off toward a very tall, steep ladder.  Since parents were allowed inside only to assist if absolutely necessary, I left him be.  I didn’t think he would get more than a couple of rungs up before it was too steep, but he climbed all the way to the top, all 20 feet or so.  Then he circled around and slid down the equally tall slide next to it.  What fun!  He wanted to do it again and tried to go back up the slide despite my attempts to call him to the door.  Not only could he not scale the slide, a minute or so into his trying a larger child lunged into it without seeing him there, and managed to kick him in the head quite accidentally.  I crawled in and pulled Son out by his foot while the little girl apologized profusely.  Son cried terribly, but it didn’t take me long to realize that he wasn’t crying because he was hurt, but because I had pulled him out.  About then the birthday girl’s older sister came along and asked if she could help.  So she and Son went back in and she guarded him from larger children and steered him in the right direction when he came out of the slide.  He had great fun, and she seemed to enjoy it too.

We arrived home exhausted.

Today I felt even better.  I wasn’t up to eating the dinner that Husband made – that meal is questionable even on good days and he had been planning to cook something else for me anyway – but other than that I felt great.  This was the first day in weeks that I haven’t felt nauseous.  Was it just a teasing respite, or can morning sickness cease so suddenly?

This afternoon when Son woke from his nap he kept grabbing at his crotch so we went to change his cloth diaper, and it was dry!  Son wanted to sit on his potty chair, and after about half an hour of reading books and naming body parts he peed in the potty chair for the first time.  He was very happy and ready to get up after that, but I’m not sure he understands the magnitude of what happened.  My hypothesis is that he likes being diaperless, and he figured out that if he sits on his potty chair he can let everything hang free, so he is willing to trade running around for some time as a little naturist.

Not Much

Not much to report tonight.  Here it is Friday night, and here I am, the last person awake in my household, grading papers.  We’re getting toward that end-of-semester crunch which is just as stressful on my side of the classroom as it is from the students’ side.  I’m still not able to eat much.  I’m generally pretty functional other than that.  Son is doing great with his big boy bed.  That’s about all there is to say.  Have a good weekend.

Good Intentions

Well, I meant to write last night.  Really I did.  Instead, I arrived home from work at about 9:00 and found Son still awake.  He had been about to go to bed, but Mommy was very exciting and he had to spend a while running in circles around me and dancing to the tunes that one of his toys plays.  I did eventually get him to bed, and around that time Husband suggested cuddling on the beanbag chair.  We both promptly fell asleep, and that was that.  I had put my computer in sleep mode before leaving for work yesterday, and it was still asleep when I got up this morning.

My stomach is still pretty unhappy.  The midwife that I saw on Monday said that usually morning sickness gets easier with each pregnancy, but that it was the opposite way for her, too.  Thinking about what I have eaten the past few days, I can see how I’m losing weight.  Almost everything is unappealing, and nothing is good in large amounts.  The cheeses that I can handle the best are expensive and I can’t eat all I want of them.  Milk goes down well, but if I drink too much homogenized, pasteurized milk, it gives me gas – and our goats are done milking for the winter.  Aw, bother.

I would count down the days until the first trimester is over, except that people seem to disagree as to whether it lasts 12 weeks or 13.  And besides, my body doesn’t obey people’s rules about when nausea is supposed to end.  It will end whenever it does.  But it is heartening to know that this should start to improve in a fortnight or so.  Lately it has just been getting worse, and I’ve had enough.

Resolution

One nice thing about having the ultrasound image (though hearing the heartbeat on doppler would have been almost as good) is that now my mom should stop telling me how great and how much fun it would be if this turns out to be twins.  I’m very glad that there is only one fetus in there.

It’s not that my mom is trying to live vicariously through me; she has twins of her own.  She just isn’t thinking about the situation very thoroughly.  When my mom gave birth to twins:

1. She was a stay at home mom.
2. Her husband maintained the office for his business in our home and was home (although working) most of the day.
3. Her only other child was an 11 year old daughter (me) who could not only take care of herself pretty well, but could help with the new babies some.
4. She had plenty of extended family nearby, including her parents and her two sisters both less than a 2-hour drive away.

Now compare this to my situation:

1. I work full time and bring home the primary income, so cutting back or quitting is not an option.
2. My husband works 30 hours a week outside the home.
3. My only other child is a toddler who needs lots of attention himself.
4. The only family we have within driving distance is my husband’s parents, and none of my family is nearby or even sure they could come visit.

So no, twins would not be fun.

First Visit

The visit with the midwife went well today.  I was pleased to see that it was not the evil midwife who scolded me for gaining too much weight and pigging out the week before Son was born.  I don’t remember her name – I didn’t like her at all and only saw her the once, but she sure left an impression.  Especially since she scolded me for the entire visit about how I would never lose the baby weight and would regret treating pregnancy like a license to eat all the junk food I want.

Not only was the evil midwife wrong about how I would never lose the baby weight, but in fact I’ve lost 2 lbs over the past five weeks.  The nice, non-evil midwife that I saw today was not concerned.  She said morning sickness will do that to a person and that I’ll gain weight later. I have to admit I never expected to hear from a medical professional that I should go with the cheese cravings because the fat and calories would be good for me.

They only took three tubes of blood today instead of the six they took at my first visit last time.  I guess they already have all the results from things like blood type and genetic tests on file, as well as my immunity to various ailments.

The fetus was hiding.  She couldn’t find a heartbeat with the doppler, so she tried an abdominal ultrasound.  She could locate my uterus as a big black circle, but not see anything in it.  She had to use the vaginal probe, and even then I couldn’t see the flickering heartbeat that she did.  But I did see it squirming a bit, so it was obviously there and alive.  Being a mutant with a backward-tilted uterus does have its advantages, like getting a photo when most people just hear the heartbeat on the doppler.

You can see the arm and leg buds pretty easily, too, but I thought it would be too busy if I labelled them.  I think you can also maybe see the base of the umbilical cord, and I’m not sure which is which and I don’t want to label things wrong.

First appointment

Tomorrow morning I have my first appointment with the midwives.  The way they operate is probably not what you’re thinking, so let me elaborate.

The nearest hospital to us is about 20 minutes away.  It is a world-reknowned teaching hospital which is part of a private university.  They have cutting-edge technology and do cutting-edge lifesaving treatments.  I’ll give them credit for that.  But for mundane things, like giving birth, all the locals agree that they’re less than stellar.  About 15 minutes further away there is another teaching hospital, smaller and less famous but part of a well-respected public university.  They are uncommonly open to things like holistic medicine and alternative therapies.  They also treat patients like human beings.  I will refer to them from here as UXX.

UXX hospital has a fairly nice birthing center.  It’s cozy and well-appointed, tastefully decorated and generally comfortable.  A large number of local Ob/gyns are afilliated with the university and attend births there, and the university also has a midwifery practice.  The UXX midwives’ group has about 8 CNMs (certified nurse midwives), with two offices for pre-natal visits, one at the hospital and one at the north end of town, about 20 minutes from where we live.  The midwives are on rotation 24/7 at the hospital, so there’s no guarantee about who will be there to attend your delivery, but one of them will be there when you arrive.  So that women are comfortable and familiar with all of the midwives, they make a point of scheduling at least one pre-natal appointment with each midwife.

The UXX Midwives do not do home births; everything is done at the hospital where all the technology and doctors are right there 300 feet down the hall if they are needed.  Considering how far out we live, I like this idea.  It’s not like an ambulance could get me from house to hospital any faster than Husband driving reasonably in his car, and I don’t want to be 35 minutes from the hospital if I need to be there.  The midwives encourage natural childbirth and having given birth at the hospital birthing center already, I can say that it was very comfortable and felt like a very nice hotel room, or maybe a nice guest room in somebody’s house.  The hospital equipment faded into the background very easily to my labor-addled brain.  Considering my mental state, I don’t think I’d have been any more comfortable at home.

So my first appointment with one of the midwives is tomorrow.  With Son my first appointment was at 11 weeks and they couldn’t find a heartbeat with the doppler, so they had to do an ultrasound and we got to see him extra early.  Likely as not, my uterus is tilted forward instead of back now, so they may have a much easier time with the doppler tomorrow at 10 weeks.  We will see!  Just so long as they find something alive in there one way or another, I’ll be happy.

Stomach Ills

So maybe that wasn’t especially bad morning sickness I had yesterday.  This morning Husband woke up with stomach cramps, and by mid-morning he had lost his breakfast and was weak and shaky.  He is doing better now, though still not great.  It came and went all day; keeping food in his stomach helps him feel better.  It sounds just like I was feeling yesterday.  Hopefully Son isn’t next in line.

I, on the other hand, have been feeling pretty well today, especially compared to yesterday.  I’m not spectacular by any stretch, but back to the dull roar of moderate queasy here and there.  Son seems to be fine so far.  He had fun spending the day with his grandparents so Husband could get some rest.  He didn’t have a nap at all today, no doubt due to the excitement of being at their house, so we put him to bed about an hour early.  So far, so good.

My breasts are getting more sore and more enormous with each passing day.  I’ve got Son on a routine of only nursing once a day, though occasionally he gets a second suck.  That hasn’t happened for at least a week now.  Of all the silly things, the big and sore breasts are the first thing that’s really making me feel pregnant.  The cravings and queasy just feel like some chronic, mild, stomach bug.  The expanding waistline feels like weight gain in response to perpetual eating to keep the chronic, mild stomach bug at bay.  But the breasts – now that feels like pregnancy.  Maybe we really will have a new baby next summer.

Yikes

My stomach was so bad today that it didn’t get better with time and breakfast.  I called in sick to work.  I spent most of the day curled up on the beanbag chair feeling like I was going to wretch at any moment, though I never did.  Very few foods are appetizing.  At lunchtime Husband kindly went to the store and got ingredients for a Stinky Salad, which seemed like about the only thing I could stomach: spinach with roasted garlic, roasted red pepper, bleu cheese, crumbled egg, and bleu cheese dressing.  Bizarre for an unhappy stomach?  Of course!  I would never have believed it if it didn’t happen to me.  That and some naan with butter and garlic and I felt a lot better for a while, until it was digested.

The weather here has been miserable the last few days, and our power finally went out about 10 minutes ago.  Hooray for laptop batteries and the battery backup that’s powering the wireless router and DSL modem.  The power lines on our property are underground, but that’s very unusual for this area.  I would bet that a tree fell on the line down the road toward town.  On the bright side, we live on a major road and nowhere near the end of it, so we tend to get power back pretty quickly.  We put our lines underground so that we wouldn’ have to keep a tree buffer, but it turned out to be a smart idea all around since it minimizes the possibility of damage to the lines on our property.  Once power is restored to the main lines at the road, we’ll be back up and running.  And since the three (3!) obnoxiously bright lights on our neighbor’s property are out, we know for certain that it’s not just us.

Son is doing well with his big boy bed.  At naptime Husband accidentally put him in his crib and he cried immediately, but when moved to his new bed he went right to sleep.  At bedtime I put him in his bed and he seemed to stay there.  A few minutes later he cried at the gate in his doorway and I pointed out that it was nighttime and time to go back to bed.  About 10 minutes after that it was silent so I went to check on him, and he was on his bed, head on the pillow and everything.  Of course, he was not under any blankets.  I eagerly await the day when he realizes that blankets keep you warm and pulls them over himself instead of kicking them off and waking up cold in the night and needing one of us to cover him back up.

Caffeine

I’m usually very careful with caffeine.  I drink my one cup of coffee in the morning, and then it’s decaffeinated tea, milk, water, juice, etc., for the rest of the day.  Today the weather was lousy and miserable and sleepy.  I opted for more coffee around dinner time, because I knew I would have a long drive home in the rain tonight.  Yes, it increases the risk of miscarriage, but if I wasn’t alert and crashed into something, that wouldn’t be good for the fetus either.

Son is doing well with his big boy bed.  I’m sure there will be some regressing, but I’m pleased so far with his progress.  He slept on it last night and went to bed in it again tonight.

My stomach has felt terrible for most of the day today, and I’m thinking about going to bed early.  Son was such an easy child at this stage of pregnancy.  This one is completely different.