Baby Update - Week 20

At week 20 of 40, we're halfway through this pregnancy adventure and halfway to holding baby in our arms. We had the anatomy scan last Friday and, despite baby's hiccups, we were able to take a close look at the brain, spine and kidneys and even the tiny little fingers and toes. After assuring that everything looked healthy we got to move on to the little tidbit of information everyone has been desperately waiting for: It's a Girl!

Here's a picture of our beautiful baby girl's head and shoulder in profile.


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This is my contribution to Candid Carrie's Friday Foto Finish Fiesta


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Baby Update - Week 17

At week 17 of 40, we're nearly halfway through this pregnancy. We had a doctor appointment on Friday that went very well, although the doctor was concerned that I haven't gained any weight and I was told I need to eat more. She used the doppler to listen to the baby's heartbeat. I didn't cry during any of the sonograms, but for some reason, listening to that heartbeat made me well up with tears. Perhaps just because I had my eyes closed which made it possible for my imagination to take over.

Things changed over the weekend when I started feeling a great deal of discomfort. After several calls to the consulting nurse and a handful of tums, the consulting nurse sent us to the ER on Sunday afternoon. By this time the discomfort had graduated to excruciating pain. After 5 hours in the ER, they determined that I have gall stones. Baby is fine. Now I'm on a non-fat diet. They gave me some pain and anti-nausia medication and told me to call my doctor in the morning. I have an appointment to see my doctor today to figure out how we will treat this moving forward. It may just be a watch your diet and wait and see kind of thing as they really don't want to operate during the pregnancy.

I'm still in some pain but feeling much better now, although completely exhuasted. My big task for this week is getting caught up on all the homework I fell behind on over the past several days.
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Baby Update - Week 12

We had another doctors visit on Friday. The schedule said we were just supposed to listen to the baby's heartbeat with a special microphone. Nothing. After several minutes of pushing the microphone around on my belly and not hearing a bit of the baby's heartbeat, the doctor decided to do a sonogram anyways. It was a long wait while the doctor went down the hall to get the portable sonogram machine. Then we had to wait for it to boot up. But as soon as the picture started to materialize on the screen, we could see all kinds of bouncing, kicking and arms waving. Not just a heartbeat - we've got an active baby in there.

I, on the other hand, have not been so active. I'm promised that in the second trimester I'll get my energy back. In the meantime, I have to squeeze 12 hours of rest into anything else I manage to accomplish on any given day. I'm already a little behind in school this quarter, but I'm determined to get back on my game. I think it will be at least another month before I get back into the swing of things with managing the blog and commenting. But, aside from the fatigue and the homework and a house in desperate need of cleaning, I'm doing really well.
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Baby Update - Week 9

I've been doing really well. So far still no nausea or morning sickness although I sleep all the time. Mr. H is starting to understand what life will be like with a little one: every five minutes it's "I'm hungry," or "I'm tired," or "I have to go Potty," or just unexplained tears. We have also discovered the "three minute warning," or the range between "I could eat" and "If you don't get me food this instant, I'm going to eat your eyeballs." He's doing fine and adapting to this strange new world quite well. He gets extra brownie points for singing and talking to my belly on a regular basis (although that is occasionally the source of the unexplained tears).

We had our first prenatal visit on Friday. We'll be having the baby at UW Medical Center. I love the Clinic, and I absolutely love my new doctor. Everything about the appointment and all the support I've received from UWMC so far has been amazing.

The baby is doing very well. So far the baby is 3.5 cm long and has a very strong heartbeat which we could see in the ultrasound. There is one thing we are going to have to keep an eye on, I seem to have a cyst on my right ovary that at this point is bigger than the baby. At this point the plan is to watch the cyst and see what it does. Hopefully it will shrink and go away.
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Baby Update

I'm really doing quite well. The biggest concern has been staying cool enough. So far I haven't had any morning sickness although there has been quite a bit of heartburn and I still have the dizziness.

Food Cravings: I've had several people ask me if I've had any strange food cravings. I would stand there on the phone (barefoot and pregnant in front of the stove) telling them "no, no food cravings at all" while I'm making myself another cheese and cranberry quesadilla. I eat at least one of these a day, sometimes more. I was actually thinking of writing up the recipe and posting it to my blog. It took a while for it to occur to me that this food pairing might be a little strange.

We went to the doctor last Monday and they gave us a couple books and a bag full of brochures, sent us on our merry way and told us to come back at the end of the month. I really thought they would have checked me out at that point, but aside from checking my blood pressure, they just asked a lot of questions about my health history. It was a little frustrating, but I guess it's normal operating procedure to do the first real checkup at week 8 or later.

We are nearly at week 6, the baby is due April 8.

Mr. H has been wonderful. Yesterday he sent me to my mom's house so he could disinfect the house. He didn't want me to breath the cleaning fumes. And he holds my hand when I cross the street. A little protective?
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What I Didn't Know

I am humbled and wowed by your response to my Wanna-Be-Mommy post about infertility. We've been trying to conceive for four years and I was feeling hormonal and tired and cranky and quite frankly nearly giving up hope when I wrote that piece. Your response lifted my spirits.

It is amazing to me that I can post a message to the internet and receive such an outpouring of support and comfort and hope. So many of you I could not pick out of a police lineup, yet given a paragraph of your writing I'd know exactly who you are. Thank you, all of you.

This week has been busy for me. My world has been turned upside down and sent spinning. I've fallen behind on my blog reading and commenting, in fact at the moment I've got well over a thousand posts in my reader. I've been extended another award, to which I have yet to respond. Thank you, My2Boyz! And I'm trying not to let myself get too far behind on my homework from school.

You see, the dizziness, and the hormones, and the fatigue were not just in my head. What I didn't know when I wrote that post last week, was that I was already
[happy dance]

Thank you, all of you, for your support. You have no idea how much it means to me. I imagine I'll need your support and advice even more over the coming months and years.

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This is my contribution to Candid Carrie's Friday Foto Finish Fiesta


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