Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Uneventful Exhaustion

So the giddy excitement is calming and that has brought on the exhaustion. I just want to sleep a lot. I can take a two hour nap and still go to bed by 10pm. It’s a great thing J is on the same schedule as me and makes me turn the lights out by then anyway.

Everyone tells me that it’ll go by fast. That I’ll be popping out and being “pregnant” before I know it. But the truth is right now it’s pretty uneventful. The exhaustion and the bloating belly is the only thing I really have right now. Granted, I’ve started to buy maternity clothes (thanks to the bloating belly) but it’s not like I look like I’m pregnant or anything yet. Because of that, there’s not much to report. Nothing else is going on in my head since this is big enough to keep my mind occupied for the most part. So in turn, I have nothing to update or blog about.

One of the things I do think about is how J is going to react the first time he hears the heartbeat. In so many ways, I feel almost sorry for him. This is his child just as much as it is mine. And though I don’t feel tons, I feel something. To him, it’s just an elusive thought. To him, it’s a responsibility right now still. I can’t wait to share this baby with him more. I can’t wait to watch and see him realize that this is really a part of him already.

When someone asked me how I knew, besides loving him, that he was the man I should marry. I tell them I knew what a great father he would be and knew that I had to make sure to hold on. There’s this peaceful and patient quality to his personality. What’s odd is that it doesn’t make him any less happy and fun. In fact, it feeds into it. I know at times he’s skeptical of my belief in his parenting abilities. But it’s there. I think anyone that spends any amount of time with him can see it. And no matter how good a mother I think I might be able to be (and let’s be honest, I would never have tried to have kids if I didn’t think I could be a good enough mother), I honestly think he might actually be a better father.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Further along

Though it was a formality, the blood tests did come back positive reading that I was 5 weeks pregnant last week. That puts me at 6 weeks right now and still no morning sickness. Can I tell you how happy that makes me? I even read somewhere that if you haven’t started suffering morning sickness by the 6th week, chances are you’ll get away with never having it. I did have some pretty bad back pain toward the end of last week but it seems to have subsided. I mean, I get twinges but nothing as bad as what I was suffering on Thursday night.

Unfortunately, I have grown out of most of my pants. I bought my first pair of maternity pants last night (I wasn’t going to spend money on pants one size bigger that I would grow out of in 2 weeks) and it felt very odd. See, if work only allowed me to wear sweat pants, this wouldn’t be an issue.

I finally found an OB/GYN and made two appointments. One with a Nurse Practitioner to get all the stuff and info I need. Second with a doctor between my 8th and 10th week. I believe that will be the physical examination and all that jazz.

Emotionally, I’m doing okay. I’ve read that in some cases, pregnancy actually makes women very energetic rather then fatigued. Yes, it seems like I’m one of those. I think I have more energy now then I did before I got pregnant. And this is with no caffeine at all. I do have some trouble sleeping because of my allergies and congestion which is made worse by the fact that I’m not taking any meds. But surprisingly, I feel great. My fears are still there but only rear their ugly heads only once in a while. I keep on trying to be positive and hold on to the good feelings.

So now, the debate is over the sex. We have 4 months till we find out but the debate is on. Right now, the only people involved are sisters and mothers. I’m seriously thinking I might start taking bets. I’m leaning toward a boy based on my mom’s experiences early in her pregnancies. Apparently, my brother’s pregnancy was a breeze for her. Mine not so much. I also found out yesterday that both Josh’s mom and his sister have similar experiences when they compare their first/boy pregnancies to their second/daughter pregnancies.

The clincher is the Chinese Gender chart. According to that, it’s a boy. And EVERYONE knows that the Chinese Gender Chart is foolproof :P

Thursday, October 12, 2006

Comments

I apologize for my slowness in figuring out how to allow comments from non-registered users. But finally, I've figured it out!

Comment away :)

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Backaches and their causes.

I must have gone through 2 weeks of PMS. The entire time cursing the fact that Birth Control Pills mess with you so much. I went through hot flashes and the works. Then, this weekend was supposed to have been the week I got my period. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting it. I mean it would be very unusual if I became regular all of a sudden. I knew what to do though. Sometime this week I would take a pregnancy test as a precaution and move on calmly waiting for my period. Except things weren’t quite calm. On Saturday I started getting really bad backaches. Stress related backaches. The kind where I wanted to cry. I had no idea what was going on. I mean I was stressed but why? What was bugging me? Then it hit me. Maybe I just needed to take the pregnancy test sooner and get it out of the way. Maybe much of the tension would leave me then.

Sunday evening comes around, no period still. I decide to go ahead and take a test. J lays down to take a nap since he has to work the night shift. I turn the shower on and take the test while I wait for the water to heat up. About 3 seconds after peeing on the stick, the line starts to appear. No, not the control like. THE line starts to appear. I stare at it in shock. I run outside to tell J that we have a slight problem. Yes, I woke him up. I explain to him that it seems I might be pregnant. The first question out of his mouth will go down in history and be told to everyone. He looks at me dumb founded and says “How do you know?” Um, yeah…so I give the obvious answer and say “The stick in the bathroom told me so!”

Two hours and two more tests later, I’m still shaking while J is still hiding beneath the covers pretending to sleep. I described it in a pervious post I made, “happily terrified”. That’s exactly how I felt. I came downstairs to sit for a bit and figured J needed some alone time too. I was petrified. I didn’t know what to think. I was so scared I would find out that it was a false positive. I was so scared that tomorrow I’d get my period and know that it was over. It was never meant to be. I was so scared of being happy. I mean, it wasn’t supposed to be this simple.

That night, J didn’t go to work and instead we sat there and thought about the future. I had to alternate between calming my fears and calming his fears. His concerns are the future and financial. My concerns are about getting through the first trimester. That night we realized that for now, this is what our roles would be. Though this does not stop him from lecturing me about getting enough sleep nor does this stop me from going on about saving up money and such.

Yesterday I went to the doctor and she explained that these home tests do not give false positives, only false negatives. She told me it was safe to be excited and it was safe to start planning. We will go through the formality of a blood test to determine the amount of the pregnancy hormone I have in my body which will help indicate what the exact time of conception was. But I think I already know.

I’m still terrified that something will go wrong. And I may end up being right. But I do have to accept that something did go right as well. And if that’s all I get to be happy about, you better believe I’ll find a way to be happy about it.

For those that know me outside of the blog (i.e. WoW), please keep this news to yourself for now? J and I haven’t decided when we’d like to share it with all of our friends. And for anyone that I know in RL, I’m so sorry I haven’t had the chance to tell you personally before you read it here. Things have just been a bit crazy.

Monday, October 02, 2006

Allergy Shots

I started doing some research about allergy shots and came across this passage:

"Immunotherapy may be especially effective if you're allergic to cat dander, dust mites or pollen produced by trees, grass and weeds. In children, immunotherapy may help prevent the development of asthma."

From the Mayo Clinic

Reading this made me want to cry. Especially considering the doctor told me that if I had started allergy shots 10 years ago, I may have been able to prevent ever getting asthma.

History for anyone that doesn't already know...I acquired Asthma 4 years ago after I moved to DC one spring morning when I was suffering from my hay fever symptoms. In all the years that I've been on an inhaler, never once did my pulmoniary doctor suggest going to an allergy specialist. I guess he wouldn't make as much money if I had no need to see him.

If you know anyone that has themselves, or has children that have allergies. Strongly emphasize the importance of seeing an allergy specialist early.