We’re having a baby tomorrow! (Take 2)

 

I’m being induced tomorrow.  I was looking back on my blog at my account of Abbie’s birth and how I was feeling the day before I was induced with her.  (You can read that here.)  It’s kind of amazing how differently I feel this time around.  I really wish I felt the same way I did with her, but I don’t.  Honestly, I’m scared.  I feel guilty because everyone is asking me if I’m excited to meet my little boy, and I am, but I haven’t even thought about meeting him much.  I’m so focused on getting him out and all the problems that I could have with that, that I haven’t really thought much past the actual birth.  I’ll probably be so relieved to actually get him out okay that I’ll pass out after he’s born.  I did that once with a tetanus shot.  I was SO worked up about it that I passed out after I got it because I was so relieved it was over with.

Monday I had another NST and I met with the doctor who will be delivering our baby for the first time.  They have three doctors and a midwife on base, and I’d met the other 2 dr’s and the midwife, but not this dr.  I wish I had met him a long time ago.  I’d typically be nervous about having a male ob/gyn, but I REALLY like this guy.  He has a very calm, soothing demeanor about him, and he almost immediately put me at ease.  He was easy to talk to and smiled a lot and threw in a few jokes where appropriate and he knew when to be funny and when to be serious.  I pretty much drilled him with questions and he answered all of them honestly and without delay.  I didn’t feel like he was trying to beat around the bush at all, or sugar coat things for me, but on the other hand, he was very reassuring at the same time.  I told him all of my concerns, what I was afraid of, my experience with Abbie, what I was hoping for this birth and he was agreeable with everything I said.  He told me that he doesn’t see why there’s any reason I won’t be able to deliver vaginally and if that’s what I want, then he’ll do his best to make that happen.  I told him how people have me all freaked out about a shoulder dystocia with this baby and he said part of that is because on of the doctors here had a shoulder dystocia when they were in their residency and they lost the baby.  So that person is extra sensitive to shoulder dystocia’s and takes a very cautious approach to them.  But this doctors approach was that he thinks everything will be okay.  He said it’s his job to worry about that if the time comes and that he will be prepared for the worst but planning for the best.  There are a whole list of maneuvers they can do if a baby does have a shoulder dystocia and he said he’s never had to go past the fourth maneuver in his 10 years of being an ob/gyn.  So all of my chat with him was pretty reassuring, but I’m still scared.  I just want the birth to be over with, so I can start focusing on my baby boy and not worrying about the birth.

I had an ultrasound on Friday.  I was 38w1d and he was measuring 40w5d and weighed 9lb5oz.  My dr was laughing because the cut off for them offering me a primary c-section was 4250g, and baby boy was like 4232g, so he BARELY missed the cut off for that.  But it’s a moot point anyway since I don’t want a primary c-section at all.  If it comes to that, eventually, then fine.  But I’m just happy they’re going to give me an opportunity to have him vaginally.

I’ve been having some contractions lately.  They’re not consistent, but my whole belly gets as hard as a rock and it gets a little hard to breathe and is just kind of uncomfortable.  They don’t necessarily hurt, but sometimes I have to breathe a little funny through them.  I was timing them a few nights ago and they were coming about every 10 minutes and lasting about 2 minutes.  If I’m out and about, I have them pretty regularly, but if I lay down or put my feet up, they usually go away.  I had one of them wake me up last night, but it was mainly because I had to pee and the contraction made that even more noticeable.  Hopefully that means I’ll be more than 3-4cm dilated tomorrow when they induce me.  A few of my friends have said I look like I’ve dropped quite a bit, but I have no clue.  I can’t tell if I have or not.

So tomorrow is the big day.  I’m hoping and praying that everything turns out okay and that he doesn’t get stuck.  I’ll be very glad once the birth is over with.  Abbie is pretty excited about having a baby brother.  My friend, Jennifer, is going to come over early tomorrow morning to stay with Abbie for a day while Mark is with me at the hospital.  Then he’ll come home to be with her and he might drop her off with other friend later on so he can spend more time with us during the day without having to chase Abbie around.

Time to go get a few more things done and ready around the house!

38 week appt

Today I had my 38 week appointment.  Mark was able to go with me, so that was really nice.  My blood pressure was a little high (140/85ish), but that’s not surprising since I was a little nervous about the appointment.  She checked me and I’m 3-4cm dilated, either 25 or 50% effaced (can’t remember what she said) and he’s still at a –3, so his head isn’t engaged at all.  Normally those exams don’t hurt, but wow…  This one hurt a lot.  I don’t know what she was doing, but it wasn’t pleasant, that’s for sure.

They have agreed to induce me in a week, so on December 8th, if they have room.  Since there are only 3 beds available at this hospital, they fill up rather quickly, especially since so many people are due around this time.  So HOPEFULLY I’ll be induced next Thursday, or even more hopefully, if I go in to labor on my own before then, they’ll have room for me.  I really don’t want to have to go to the Italian hospital, but I guess I’ll survive either way.

I also had an NST today – my quickest one yet.  I’m still fairly certain these things are pointless and they’re just covering their own butts by following protocol, but I was only hooked up to the machine for 10-15 mins and he was so active they got all the info they needed.  That’s usually the case, but I think today they needed the bed for someone else, so they wanted to get me out of there.  Whichever works, I guess, I just wish they wouldn’t waste my time on days when they’re not in a hurry.

My GD glucose numbers are a little bit all over the place, so I asked her if she could put me on a low dose of the meds to help control it and she’s putting me on 1/2 a pill, once a day.  Some of my numbers are in the 150-160’s, and they should be under 140, so she agreed to let me take the pills.  I just want to make sure he doesn’t have blood sugar issues when he comes out and I’m still trying to figure out serving sizes and what triggers my blood sugar to spike and what doesn’t.  I would rather take the pills to help me out in the meantime, even though I’m still going to be watching what I eat and trying to stick with the GD diet.

My next appointment is tomorrow for an ultrasound and then they’ll discuss those results with me and talk more about the induction on Monday, if I haven’t had him by then.  Part of me is excited we’re so close to the end, and part of me is pretty nervous.  They have me really freaked out about this birth and I’m worried about something going wrong and either him or me not being around for Christmas.  Morbid, I know, but it has crossed my mind more than once.

So we could use your prayers if you have any to spare – that they have room on base for us when the time comes, and that everything goes fairly smoothly.  T-7…..

PS:  And maybe one of these days Mark will have time to take pictures of me when I don’t look like crap.  We only seem to think about it when I’m around the house in sweats and a t-shirt, which I suppose is about 90% of the time now anyway.  Hopefully we’ll get a final picture of my belly before I give birth!

More to think about.

My appointment on Thursday went fairly well.  She checked me and I’m not at all dilated, which I’m a little bummed about.    By 36 weeks with Abbie, I was 4.5cm dilated.  The midwife told me that they’re not going to force me to do anything.  That they’ll give me my options with the risks and benefits of each option and they’ll make it known what they would prefer me to do, but ultimately, the decision is mine.  Good to know.
Saturday I had my third glucose test, and I failed it.  I passed my fasting test.  My 1 hr was 170 out of 180, my 2 hr was 165 out of 155 (failed) and my 3 hr was 142 out of 140 (failed).  So I’m not a “full blown” diabetic since my number were close, but they have diagnosed me with gestational diabetes at 36 weeks and now I have to start in with the finger pricks to monitor my blood sugar and they’re going to try to have me control it with diet and exercise, I think.
Honestly, I feel guilty about this whole GD thing.  I feel like I have it because I was overweight to begin with and if I was athletic and in super good shape, I wouldn’t have GD issues.  I’ve had to go this whole weekend without really knowing what I can and can’t eat and it’s made me paranoid to eat pretty much anything.  I always feel hungry, but I don’t want to eat a lot because I’m afraid it’s going to raise my blood sugar, which in turn, raises baby boy’s.  I know I’m supposed to avoid carbs, so I’ve been reading labels like a mad woman and EVERYTHING has carbs in it.  I know I’m supposed to eat the good carbs vs the bad carbs, but besides knowing sugar is a bad carb and whole wheat is a good carb, I don’t really know what that means.
Tomorrow I need to go in for another NST and fluid check and they’re going to show me how to use the finger poker and give me all of that stuff, and then I’ll have to make an appointment with a nutritionist to figure out this diet, but I probably won’t be able to do that until Tuesday at the earliest.  It’s great having to go on a diet RIGHT before Thanksgiving….  I’m frustrated and angry, to say the least.  And I’m worried that I’ve really had GD this whole time and for some reason was just passing the tests and I want to know what that’s done to baby boy in the meantime.  I have a lot of questions and I’ve had a lot of time to dwell on them over the weekend, which isn’t good.
And because I am officially a gestational diabetic now, they’re going to treat my delivery differently also.  As I said before, because of my GD, they now lower the maximum birth weight to 4500g, which is 9.92lbs – almost Abbie’s exact birth weight.  So if he’s measuring over 9.9lbs according to an ultrasound (which can be up to 20% off, easily), they’re going to recommend I have a c-section.  It’s easy for my first reaction to be to dig my heels in about that and say no way, I’m not having a c-section, but it’s much more complicated than that.
We had a squadron dinner the other night, and I managed to corner the flight doctor, who has experience delivering babies, and ask him a TON of questions.  His whole take on my situation was that doctors would prefer to do a c-section because it’s a very controlled situation.  Since shoulder dystocia is a known problem with macrosomia (large babies), you have to weigh the risks and benefits, and the bottom line is that delivering a large baby can be risky.  It’s not always, but sometimes it is, and how much am I willing to risk?  His take, partially because he’s a doctor and partially because he’s a guy, I’m sure, was, as long as I take home a healthy baby, why does it matter so much how I deliver him?  I told him I’d like to have one or two more kids (maybe) and that I know c-sections have their own risks involved also and how that could affect my future pregnancies.  He said they were valid concerns and something to think about.  I should also add that the hospital on base is very small.  They don’t have a NICU and they only have room for 3 people in labor at once and the ONLY thing they do at the hospital is deliver babies.  So that also needs to be factored in.  I have no doubt in the base doctors capabilities, but they have very limited resources to work with.
So basically I have to decide what I’m more comfortable with.  Since we don’t have any absolute positives, besides the fact that I’m having a baby, everything I have to make my decision is going off of guestimates, which makes this REALLY hard and is causing me to lose quite a bit of sleep.  I could just agree to having a c-section, have a major operation, with a longer recovery time and possible complications later on with future pregnancies, but most likely baby boy would be fine.  Or I could say I at least want a trial of labor, which could end one of two ways.  One, everything goes fine without complications or two, he does get shoulder dystocia, which could end very, very badly.  So what do I choose?  Something that I want to do, that could potentially be life threatening to him, or something that I don’t want to do and might not be necessary at all?  How do you make these kinds of decisions when it could literally be the difference between life and death and all you have to deal with are the “what if’s”?  Can someone else just make this decision for me?
I’m hoping and praying that I’ll go in to labor on my own before the date that they would induce me and then the choice won’t be mine anyway.  That would be the ideal situation, except for the whole trying to figure out what to do with Abbie last minute, but hopefully we’ll be able to deal with that when the time comes, if the time comes.  I’m just ready for it to be mid-December and have the birth and all these decisions and unknowns behind us.

Third times a charm?

I promise this blog isn’t going to turn into only talking about this pregnancy for the next month, but right now, it’s a subject very near and dear to my heart.  Bear with me and I promise that eventually I’ll start blogging about the cool stuff like traveling.  I don’t see me being in a “travel-worthy” state anytime in the near future though… Just saying.

I pretty much feel like, in the month I’ve been being seen here in Italy, my pregnancy has fallen apart.  The clinic here seems to be very “doom and gloom” and they don’t have a positive outlook on anything.  I feel like they’re just looking for problems and grasping at straws to come up with things, and it’s making it really hard to feel comfortable with giving birth here.  I honestly feel like the OB clinic here is scared about something, and they’re doing everything for their own best interest, instead of mine.

I had an NST appointment on Monday.  Again, everything is fine.  My bp was like 130/78 (aka: not hypertensive) and baby boy was fine.  So then a new doctor, that I’ve never seen, comes in to do my fluid check (which again, was fine).  He no sooner gets the ultrasound wand up to my belly and gets an image on the screen and asks, “Have you had a growth scan lately?”  I laughed and said, yeah, I know, he’s huge.  He kind of backtracks a little bit and then starts laying it all out….  He said that he wants me to do the 3 hr glucose test for a second time since one of my four numbers was close to the cut off and one was under.  So I failed one of the four tests, and here, they only allow you to fail one.  He told me their numbers are pretty conservative, and I passed the 3hr, but he wants me to do it again, just to make sure.  I asked him about inducing me before 39 weeks (as in 38w4d), and he said that they don’t consider size to be a reason to induce.  And then in the next breath, he said, but if the baby is measuring over 9.5lbs, that would be a reason to do a c-section.  …. um, what?  So you’re telling me you won’t induce me before 39 weeks due to his size because that’s not a “medical reason”, but yet you find his size to be reason enough to do a major surgery and not even let me try to labor naturally first?  Give me a freakin break.  Every time I start asking questions, they pretty much say ACOG (American Congress of Obstetrics and Gynocology) recommends it and that’s always their blanket statement.  I feel like they’re putting me between a rock and a hard place and it’s either their way or no way and they’re not going to let me have any say in the birth of my own child.

I got home and called my OB I went to in the States, just to ask about their cut off for the 1 hr glucose test, that I passed by 1 point.  She basically said that that’s the standard their lab came up with and that’s the number that they go by and it’s worked fine for them.  She also told me that in their practice you can have two numbers in the 3 hr glucose test over the limit and still pass it.

Tuesday I had another growth scan ultrasound.  (I was 35w5d.)  Baby boy was measuring 38w3d and weighed 7lb14oz… and I still have 4 weeks to go.  So I’m pretty sure he’s going to be a big boy.  Honestly, he just feels bigger to me.  I don’t ever remember feeling this big with Abbie, not even at the very end, let alone with a month to go.  That kind of scares me quite a bit, but I’ve given birth to one big baby, so I think I’ll be able to get another one out.

I have yet another appointment tomorrow, so we’ll see what they say about his size and what they want me to do.  I’ve talked to Mark’s squadron commander’s wife about it and she’s said that if his commander needs to get involved in the whole situation, he will, but that’s about the last thing I want to do.  I don’t want to piss everyone at the clinic off and make them feel like I’m going over their head, but at the same time, I don’t want them to push me into doing something I don’t want to do either (aka: a c-section), unless it’s absolutely medically necessary.  I would much rather have them induce me a few days early than just automatically schedule me for a c-section.  Wish me luck!

Pushing for an induction

(34.5 weeks pregnant)

I am much more nervous about giving birth this time around than I was with Abbie’s birth.  The size of this baby alone, is enough to make me nervous, but there are more factors than just his size.

But just for kicks and giggles, let’s talk about his size first.  I am hoping and praying with all my might that the u/s’s are off and he’s not actually 3 weeks ahead of schedule, but I really don’t think they’re that far off, for a few reasons.  Abbie was 9lbs 9.2oz at birth, and boys tend to be bigger than girls at birth.  Big babies run in Mark’s family and since Mark and I are both tall, our odds of having another big baby are pretty high.  I have a ton of stretch marks from my pregnancy with Abbie, except already, at 35 weeks, they’re getting bigger.  Not wider, but they’re getting higher on my belly than they were before.  Hopefully that means that I’m just carrying him higher, but I don’t know.  And this little guy moves a LOT.  Like almost non-stop, to the point where he’s bouncing around in there so much it actually wakes me up at night.  The NST’s they’re making me do are a complete joke.  His heart rate is supposed to go up at least two times in 20 mins while I’m hooked up to the monitors, and I think the least amount of times his HR has gone up during one of our sessions has been four times.  If he’s, by chance, actually being still, all I have to do is poke him and he squirms.  I’m not sure if I feel him so much because he’s so big and just doesn’t have much room to move or he’s even more active than Abbie was.  Either way, it’s scary.

“Shoulder dystocia” keeps being brought up because of his size.  This is a huge fear of mine – that he’s going to get stuck.  I would love to give birth vaginally, but it scares me to think about what could happen if he does get stuck.  I’d like to think my body can handle giving birth to a 10+lb baby, but that’s a BIG baby.

I’m also worried about the possibility of having to give birth in an Italian hospital due to space not being available at the base hospital.  Since they’ve labeled my pregnancy a “complicated pregnancy”, I really don’t want to have to go through a complicated birth in a foreign hospital and having to deal with the way they do things and the language barrier.  If things are going to go wrong during the birth, I want to know exactly what’s going on and not have to rely on a translator to relay info to me.  Plus if I end up needing a c-section, they don’t allow dads to be in the room and they immediately take the baby away from you for a few hours and don’t let either of us see him.  (From what I’ve heard anyway.)  I’ve also decided I do want an epidural in case there are complications.  I’d rather not have to go through a bunch of maneuvers and stuff while I can fully feel everything if he does get stuck.  And if I give birth in an Italian hospital, there’s no guarantee that you’ll get an epi, even if you ask for it.  It basically depends on if someone is around to give one or not, and if they’re not, they won’t call an anesthesiologist in to do one unless they deem it necessary.  I’ve also heard people say that they didn’t let the baby stay in their rooms with them while they were recovering.  They kept the babies in the nursery.  So pretty much having to give birth in the Italian hospital terrifies me… like REALLY terrifies me, and I’m not going to know if I have to go there until I go into labor and call base to see if they have room for me there.

Lastly, if I do go in to labor on my own, I’m worried about what we’re going to do with Abbie last minute.  I’ve asked a few friends if they’d be willing to watch her for us, but one of them works full-time, so that really limits when she’s available and one of them works part-time and lives 45 mins away, so if we’re in a rush, I’m not really sure what we’re going to do.  Another one has said that she’d help, but I really don’t know her schedule or if she’s willing to stay at our house.  I think it’s going to be a matter of us scrambling last minute to get Abbie and all her junk and her car seat to someone else’s house on our way to the hospital, which really isn’t the ideal situation at all, but it’s either that or Mark stays with her and I go by myself.

So basically, I want them to induce me.  If they could induce me between 38 and 39 weeks, that would be ideal.  I would like to experience going in to labor on my own, but there’s so much at stake here.  If they induced me, he wouldn’t be as big as he would if he came on his own, they would induce me on base, so I could give birth there, and we could set up care for Abbie in advance.  It would pretty much solve all of my problems, with the exception of him getting stuck, but again, he’d be smaller than he would if I carried him full term, so that would help.  However, they said that they wouldn’t induce me unless he’s measuring over 10lbs or I have blood pressure issues.  (Which, by the way, at all my NST’s, my blood pressure has been 100% normal…)

I’ve pretty much lived at the clinic since Mark got back.  Two weeks ago I was there Mon, Tues, Thurs and Fri.  Last week I was there Mon, Tues and Weds.  This week I’m there Mon, Thurs and Fri.  Next week I’m there Mon, Tues and Thurs.  It ridiculous.  Between NST’s, fluid checks, growth scans, OB appts, and classes, I might as well just move there.  My 36 weeks appointment is next Thursday and I’m going to talk to them about inducing me then, to see if they will.  I’ll let you know how it turns out.  Wish me luck!

Strong like bull!

 

Monday of this week I had my first OB appointment at Aviano.  It was just a consultation appointment with a nurse, going over my records from the States.  However, she did an excellent job of completely freaking me out by telling me numerous things that could have gone wrong during Abbie’s birth.  She brought up shoulder dystocia and how when the shoulders get stuck they put your legs up by your head and a nurse pushes really hard on your belly to get the baby to pop out.  Sounds pretty pleasant if you ask me….  (By the way, Abbie didn’t really even have shoulder dystocia, so her telling me all of this was pointless.)  And then she asked how many times the vacuum popped off of Abbie’s head.  It popped off once, and she said, well that’s good because if it pops off three times, that’s an automatic c-section.  …  Yay.  Again, probably didn’t want or need to know that just then.  She then made me an appointment with the midwife for the next day, which I thought was a little odd since I pretty much had to beg to get the consultation appointment before 36 weeks.

I should preface this by saying that I have been told the OB care here at Aviano is pretty relaxed.  They don’t do urine tests every appointment like they have done at all the other OB’s I’ve been to.  And you go every 4 weeks until 36 weeks, and then you have appts at 38, 39 and 40 weeks and they normally don’t do any extra ultrasounds unless absolutely required.  My OB that I was going to for the first 7 months of this pregnancy switched to bi-weekly appts at 28 weeks and then at 36 weeks you started going in every week.  My OB for the majority of my first pregnancy did ultrasounds at every visit, which I know is pretty rare.

So when I went to my appointment on Tuesday, I was completely overwhelmed and frustrated by what she was saying to me.  She started about by saying, “So I see you didn’t pass your 1 hr glucose test?”.  I told her I had passed it by one point and I was worried about it so I had triple checked with my midwives in IA about it and they kept reassuring me that I had passed it.  This midwife basically said that by their standards I didn’t pass it and that I had to come in to do the 3 hr test this week.  That was the first blow.  I think part of the reason it bothered me so much is because I was really worried about it before and it had taken me a week or two to finally stop worrying about it.  This just opened up this entire can of worms again.

And then she said that she noticed I’ve had high blood pressure throughout this pregnancy.  Granted, my BP is probably higher than the average persons, but my BP is ALWAYS high at the doctors office.  For as long as I can remember, I would have high BP at appointments.  And I wrote about this during my last pregnancy too, where I had high BP at the beginning of appts and if they’d take it again at the end, it would be much more normal.  I told the midwife this and also how my midwives in IA weren’t concerned about it either and she basically said “Too bad, we’re going to test you for pre-eclampsia anyway.”  *sighs*  At this point I was fighting back tears because I was so frustrated.  I am grateful that they are concerned and just want to be extra cautious and I realize they’re doing this for the sake of our baby and myself.  I get that.  But I didn’t really intend on spending the entire 2 weeks Mark has off at the hospital doing zillions of tests.  We have a TON of stuff to do on the house and his 2 weeks off was when we planned on doing all that.  Me being at the hospital 4 out of 5 days this week and 3 days next week wasn’t in my plan, at all.  But I agreed to the tests and hopefully I’ll pass them all to relieve all of our fears.

The biggest blow was when she said that she’s going to require me to come in twice a week from now until he’s born for NST’s.  (Non-stress tests – where they hook you up to monitors and monitor his heartbeat and movement.)  I DO NOT have time for that.  And naturally she wants me to come in either Monday and Thursday or Tuesday and Friday.  Abbie is at the sitters Tuesday and Thursday, so one day a week I’m going to have to figure out what the heck to do with my 2 year old for 30 mins to 2 hrs while I sit at the hospital.  I think this is being a bit excessive on her part, but she’s not budging on having me do these things.  The first two weeks are fine because Mark is home to stay with Abbie, but after that, I’m not sure what I’m going to do.

Then she measured my belly and was like, “Whoa, we’re going to get you in for a growth scan ultrasound as soon as possible.”  My belly was measuring 35.5 weeks and I am 33 weeks pregnant.  I got in for an ultrasound later that day, and sure enough, baby boy is huge.  His head was measuring 36w1d, his abdomen was measuring 36w and his femur (which is supposedly the most accurate measurement) was measuring 34w4d.  When they averaged all the measurements he took together, baby boy is supposedly measuring 35w5d and is 5lb14oz.  (Normally they are 4.5lbs at 33 weeks gestation.)  This news did freak me out even more than I already was, especially considering all the “info” the nurse gave me on Monday about birth complications.

I really don’t understand how the measurements across your belly during pregnancy can tell them anything about your gestational age.  They use the same thing for people that are 5’0” tall and 5’11” tall and have BMI’s from 20 to 40.  Without taking other factors into consideration, how does just measuring the size of your belly tell them how big your baby is?  I don’t get it.

Apparently I’m just destined to have big babies.  I am glad they’re healthy and growing, or as Mark puts it, “Strong like bull!”, but having to push out 10lb babies is not my idea of fun.  I would be THRILLED if this little guy was 9.5lbs or under, but if the ultrasounds are accurate, he won’t be.  I’m a little jealous of people who have babies that are 6 and 7lbs and actually look like newborns when they arrive, instead of 2 month olds.  Luckily I was smart enough to not buy baby boy newborn sized clothes since I knew he wouldn’t fit into them anyway. 

This week has been a little bit overwhelming for me.  It’s a lot of information to process and take in, especially when I had been thinking I was pretty healthy.  I’m currently at the lab getting a whole bunch of tests done, so I should have some answers later today.  My fingers are crossed for good results!!

He already looks as chubby as a newborn and he has 7 weeks to go!!

28 week appointment

Last week I had my 28 week appointment.  I was nervous about it since it was my glucose test.  I thought that I had to drink the stuff and then sit there for an hour and then have my appointment.  But I drank the stuff and then had my appointment during the hour wait.

So they always weigh you first thing.  I gained 11lbs this month…  ELEVEN?!?!  O.M.G.  I about died…  And then I about cried.  And THEN she took my blood pressure, which naturally was high because I was a tad bit worked up about gaining 11lbs in one month.  I hadn’t wanted to gain 11lbs the rest of my pregnancy and I gained it in one month?  Ugh.  My clothes aren’t fitting any tighter, but my belly is definitely getting bigger.  And I hadn’t been eating the best for the previous week+ since we’d been out of town and eating out every meal.  But 11lbs?  Ugh.  Not good.

My midwife and a student midwife came in for my appointment and I ended up talking with them for a good half hour.  They were mildly concerned about the weight gain and my high blood pressure, but since my bp wasn’t that high and it wasn’t consistently high, they were okay with it.

I talked to them about quite a few different things.  The weight gain, having large babies, his position, giving birth to breech babies, my appointments once I get to Italy, perineal massage, etc.  I feel like I got a bunch of good info from them and they were very reassuring.   They measured my belly again and dug around in there to determine his position, which hurt like HECK.  But he’s still measuring over 2 weeks ahead of schedule and he was head down at the time of my appointment.  We listened to his heartbeat, which was good and strong as usual.

I waited in the lobby for my hour to be up after my appointment with the midwives.  Mark actually called during that time so it was nice to talk to him for a bit.  Then they called me back to do the finger stick to check my glucose and hemoglobin counts.  They said that my glucose had to be 151 or below and the hemoglobin had to be 11 of above.  My glucose ended up being 150, and my hemoglobin was 10.5.  So I BARELY passed the glucose test and I didn’t pass the hemoglobin test.  I’m not 100% sure what that means, but they didn’t really say anything much about it besides to make sure I’m taking my prenatals.

I have another appointment next week and that is my last one while I’m still in the States.  If I’ve gained a bunch more weight, I don’t even know what I’m going to do besides stop eating all together.  I tried to make my appointments in Italy for when I get back, but they won’t let me do that until they have all my records, which I’ll take back with me.  I did find out that they don’t go to bi-weekly appointments in Italy until 36 weeks, so that kind of stinks.  I’m just hoping if I’m still measuring weeks ahead there that they’ll do an ultrasound to see exactly how big he is.

I’m getting to the point in my pregnancy where I like being pregnant.  I’ve been feeling him a lot, which is fun and its a constant reminder that our lives are going to change quite a bit pretty soon.  I can’t wait for Mark to get home so he can feel his baby boy moving around too.  Every once in a while Abbie will come up and ask to feel him.  I’m still not sure if she’s actually felt him move though because she’s never felt my belly when he’s really in there womping around.  But I love it when he’s active and I’m ultra-aware of our second baby. 

My ribs and lungs do feel a little cramped right now and I have a hard time taking a deep breath sometimes.  I have no clue where my stomach is located right now, but when I lay down, I do get pretty bad reflux.  Last night he was in there sideways and kept me up quite a bit of the night because I couldn’t get comfortable.  I could feel his head pushing out the side of my belly and it was weird to lay on my side and feel him right there and then feel him kicking my other side.  But I could breathe a little easier so that was nice.  I like to lay on my back though, but since you’re not supposed to do that when you’re this far along, I’m constantly trying to rearrange my pillows to make sure one side is higher than the other.

I’m interested and nervous to see what OB care will be like at Aviano.  It’s a little scary that I’ll only have a couple appointments there, most likely with different doctors, before we have this little guy.  Doesn’t give you much time to get to know your doctor and there is a possibility that someone I’ve never met will be delivering him.  But that was also a possibility with Abbie’s birth and things turned out fine with her!

Blah

Let me preface this by saying I know that I am very blessed and I know there are many people that have it much worse than I do.  (Those of you that have to endure 12+ month deployments, my heart goes out to you.)  With that being said, I try to keep this blog real and not gloss things over, so I tell it like it is.
For the past few days, I’ve been having a rough time.  I’ve been having to deal with things that I just don’t want to deal with, especially by myself.  I’ve heard many times about how you lose your filter when you’re pregnant, and I find myself having the urge to really tell people exactly what I think, no matter what the consequences are.  And I’m letting things that normally wouldn’t bug me as much, bug me a lot, thanks to my crazy hormones.
On top of that, I’ve been in a LOT of pain lately due to my SPD.  I bought a belt to wear when I’m going to be walking a lot and it has helped, but my SPD is still getting worse, and it will continue to do so until after baby boy is born (3.5 months from now..).  I’ve been going to a chiropractor and my hips/pelvis/lower back are out of alignment.  He said that my pelvic ligaments are so loose, all the surrounding muscles are having to work overtime to try to keep things in place.  He did some deep tissue massage on me and it hurt SO bad.  But he basically said that there’s nothing he can do to fix anything that’s going to last long term.  He can keep getting me back in alignment, but it won’t last more than a week or two.  Since he adjusted me on Monday, I’ve been having a lot of lower back pain, along with my pelvic pain.  Sometimes my pelvic pain is so bad, I have a really hard time getting out of bed and it takes me a good 3-5 minutes just to get to a standing position from laying down in bed.  Not exactly my idea of fun.  And being in pain most of the time is exhausting.
I miss my husband.  It’s been almost 5 months since I’ve seen him and quite honestly, I’m just tired of this.  It’s been great being at home and seeing all my friends and having all the help my parents have given me with Abbie.  But this isn’t my home.  I miss my stuff and my house and my comfort zone and my husband.  I’m just over this whole deployment and I’m ready to get back to my life.  I’m tired of writing my husband 1-6 emails a day (yes, sometimes I do actually email him that much).  I want to be able to talk to him at night before we go to sleep instead of email him.  I want to wake up in the middle of the night and know he’s beside me instead of habitually checking my email from my phone to see if he’s emailed me back yet.  (Yes, I do that multiple times a night too.)  I’m tired of sending him pages long emails telling him everything cute (or not so cute) his daughter did that day so he doesn’t feel like he’s completely out of the loop.  I want him to be able to watch her grow up in person, instead of through the emails, photos and videos I send him daily.  I’m just really ready to have my husband back.
I’ve been struggling with the weight I’m gaining with this baby.  I’ve gained about 17lbs so far, and according to my midwife today, that’s perfectly fine and right on track.  However, I feel huge.  I look back on pictures of when I was 8+ months pregnant with Abbie and I am disgusted by what I see, and I’m terrified I’m going to be looking like that again soon.  It doesn’t at all help that our squadron in Italy is basically full of very athletic, in-shape people who run marathons and work out all the time.  I see the girls talking about buying cute homecoming outfits for when the guys get home and I just feel like I’m going to show up looking like the fat girl.  I am very thankful to be pregnant and I obviously wouldn’t change that for all the cute outfits in the world, but it does bother me.  I’d love to be active, by this stupid SPD prevents me from even walking at times.  And if I do go for a walk, I usually pay for it the next day.
The thing that amazes me, is that even though my husband is 7000 miles away from me, he is still able to 100% provide for me the support I need.  He always seems to know exactly what to say to make me feel better and he makes me feel like I’m not in this completely alone, even though he’s not physically around me.  He listens to me vent, and doesn’t just give the typical guy responses, which usually involve a lot of “uh-huh’s” and “yeah’s”.  He asks questions and helps me sort through my emotions and come up with solutions and I usually feel 95% better just by talking things over with him.  I just can’t wait until I can hug him and forget that the rest of the world even exists.

Baby boy clothes

Since we found out we’re having a boy, I may or may not have gone a little haywire in buying baby boy clothes…  But I am having a TON of fun.  I haven’t bought anything for baby #2 prior to this weeks shopping sprees (except for the onesie I bought him in Vegas) since I was waiting for the anatomy scan before I went crazy with my shopping.  And now I have 2 months and 1 week left in the States to “catch up”. 

I really am not a huge shopper.  I need to be in the mood to shop and I like shopping much better if I have a specific thing in mind that I’m looking for.  And I tend to be somewhat of a “speed shopper”.  I like to get in the store, take a quick walk through, and then get out.  I don’t like to wander around aimlessly, and right now, it hurts too much to walk to not have a purpose in what I’m doing anyway. 

But shopping for baby clothes is completely different.  Besides the fact that I’m getting bigger and I can feel the little guy more now, buying clothes for him and imagining what he’ll look like in them is what’s making this pregnancy seem like it’s moving forward.  In 4-ish months we’ll have a new addition to our family and we’ll get to dress him in these cute clothes.

I have to tell you though, shopping for a baby boy isn’t NEAR as much fun as shopping for a baby girl, because, in my opinion, baby boy clothes just aren’t nearly as cute as baby girl clothes are.  I still find myself gravitating towards the baby girl clothes, even though I’m looking for boy things.  I hate the color brown.  I think it’s just ugly.  Especially the poop colored brown.  I could like deep, rich brown colors, but the majority of boy clothes are the ugly brown color.  Or orange, which I also dislike.  Or even worse, they’re brown and orange combined.  Gross!  I have been SHOCKED at how many baby boy clothes have skulls and bones and aliens and monsters on them.  Who wants to put their tiny little baby boy in those sorts of things?  I find that pretty much weird and I’m shocked that it’s not just a few things here and there that have those characters on them.

So far I’ve been to Target, Kohl’s, Old Navy and Younkers.  (For those not from the mid-west, Younkers is kind of like a JC Penney’s except a little more expensive.)  All these pictures are of my purchases from Target, Kohl’s and Old Navy.  I went to Younkers yesterday and hit the jackpot, but I haven’t taken bunches of pictures of those clothes yet.  They were having a yellow dot sale so I got lots of clothes at 75% off and all of the clothes I bought were at least 30% off because they were all on sale some and then I had a 20% coupon that could be applied to some of the sale items.

 

I still have a ways to go with my shopping, but I’m getting there, slowly but surely.  It’s MUCH more fun to shop in person than it is online, especially since baby clothes seem to vary so much in their sizes.  I’m going to try to get most of his wardrobe through at least 18 or 24 months since we don’t plan on coming back to the States again before we move, which should be in Spring of 2013.  Since he’s already measuring long, I’m trying to keep that in mind when deciding what sizes to get him for different seasons, and it’s definitely not been easy.  It hasn’t been easy, but it has been fun and I’m excited to check out stores during our upcoming trips to Colorado, Kansas City and Branson.  I have a little notebook dedicated to inventorying his clothes and I’ve written down everything I have for him so far and I’m making lists of what I need for him so I don’t end up buying him the same things in the same sizes.

Where do you buy most of the clothes for your kids?  I got at least 60% of Abbie’s first year wardrobe from Ross (like TJ Maxx or Marshall’s) but they don’t have Ross around here and I miss it!  What brands do you like best for baby clothes?  And what would I need for a boy that I didn’t need for a girl??  (Like those pee pee tee pee things.)  I’m open to any and all suggestions!!

(Mark’s call sign is “Moose” so I thought this shirt was especially cute!)

It’s a ….

BOY!!!

I’m not exactly sure why, but for some reason, I knew this baby was a boy, so I wasn’t at all surprised when the ultrasound revealed his gender.  And even though I’d said if I could choose, I would choose a girl, I am MORE than excited that this little one is a boy.  I asked Abbie a few weeks ago if she thought we would have a baby boy or a baby girl and she said “Ummm…  … …  a baby boy.”  So apparently she knew too, even though it took her a bit to come to that conclusion.

I was going to have the ultrasound tech just write the gender on a piece of paper so I could just open it when Mark called and we could find out together, but this little guy isn’t shy at all so it was very obvious even to my completely untrained eye that he was a boy.  Mark was supposed to call at 11am, shortly after my appointment, but naturally he was delayed due to flying and didn’t end up calling until almost 2pm.  I was able to keep my mouth shut though for those hours, despite my parents really wanting to know and other friends/family texting me, so Mark was the 2nd person to know for sure what we are having.  And that’s the way I wanted it.

Mark seems to be much more excited about this pregnancy now that we know the gender.  I think it is hard for him to connect to the situation being so far away and fighting a war, but now that we know we’re having a boy, he’s very excited about it.  He would have been excited for another girl too, I think just knowing what we’re having makes it more real for him.

I am more excited about this pregnancy now that it’s confirmed I’m having a little boy too.  I’ve heard NUMEROUS mom’s of boys tell me that boys love their momma’s best.  I’m excited about that since Abbie is definitely a daddy’s girl.  Not that she doesn’t prefer me most of the time, but she definitely has a special relationship with Mark.  I’ve been feeling this little guy move and kick some in the past week or two, so that also makes it feel more real also.  I can’t wait until Abbie can feel him kicking, but I might wait until Mark is home before I try to get her to feel that so he can be here for her reaction too.

My midwife freaked me out a bit by saying that a doctor was going to review the ultrasound results and that she wouldn’t be surprised if they wanted a follow up ultrasound done sometime in September.  She was really vague about why she thought that when I questioned her on it and said something about not getting good readings on things in the ultrasound.  I decided to call the office the next day just to see why exactly she thought that since I didn’t want to worry about it for the next month.  The doctor did review the ultrasounds and said that there was no further need for evaluation and the baby was registering normal in all categories.  I guess they didn’t get clear pictures of the hands because he’s so wiggly, but that doesn’t call for a repeat ultrasound.  He is already measuring a week and a half ahead of schedule in many of his length measurements, but that’s not too surprising since Mark and I seem to create tall babies.  (Which stands to reason since Mark is 6’3 and I’m 5’9.)

We are so excited to be adding a little boy to our family and I am glad that we’ll have one of each now.  I think raising a little boy will be a different experience for us, but we welcome that challenge.  I’m interested in seeing the similarities and differences in raising boys verses girls.  We’re definitely counting down the days to December!

(If you haven’t guessed already, join our guessing game linked at the bottom of the page!)

Another halfway point

I am almost 20 weeks pregnant.  This week I have my big ultrasound where we’ll hopefully find out the sex of this baby.  I am VERY excited to find out what we’re having, but I’m kind of nervous to.

If I had my choice, I would want to have another girl.  As I’ve said before, ideally I would love to have 2-3 girls and then a boy.  But I’m not going to be disappointed if this baby is a boy.  I’ll still be super excited, I’ll just also be scared.

I feel like I know nothing about having a baby boy.  I didn’t grow up with brothers or with any cousins my age really (boy or girl), so I pretty much know nothing about raising a boy.  And I worry about the differences in raising boys vs girls.  I wonder if people treat young boys differently because they are boys and they are expected to be tougher than little girls are.  I’m not sure how I’d do with that.  But I’ve come to the conclusion that if we can raise a boy and have him turn out like Mark, then I’ll be happy.

With that being said, I think I’m having a boy.  This pregnancy has just been so different from my last.  I didn’t get migraines at all, just headaches, and I’ve been a lot more tired this time than I was with my last one.  And most of the time I don’t even feel pregnant.  I think a lot of it has to do with Mark not being around.  It’s definitely not as fun to be pregnant when you don’t really have anyone to share your excitement with.  He’s not around to take pictures of me, so I haven’t really been documenting my progress as far as how big I am now which is disappointing to me.  I think Mark feels pretty disconnected from this pregnancy too, which stinks.  I’m hoping things will be different once we’re all together again, but we’ll have less than 2 months before I’m due by the time he gets back.

Either way, we find out Thursday and I am SO excited to finally know what I’m having.  By this time in my pregnancy with Abbie, we’d already had 3-4 ultrasounds, so I feel like I was more connected with her since I had lots of pictures of her.  I’m excited to get to see baby #2 for the second time, I just wish Mark was here to go with me.

(20 weeks pregnant)

(A few out-takes.)

Chicago and Vegas Bound

Abbie and I are heading to Chicago today.  Abbie is staying with Mark’s family, while I head to Vegas to meet up with some of my friends from Italy.  I’m excited to see my friends from the squadron, but I am SO nervous about leaving Abbie for a few days.

I’ll be gone Thursday afternoon through Sunday evening, which will be the longest time and the furthest distance I’ve every been away from Abbie.  I’m not at all worried about Mark’s family not taking good care of Abbie, because I know they will and all 4 of them pay attention to pretty much nothing but her the entire time she’s around.  So I know she’ll be in good hands.  But I’m so nervous about something out of their control happening to her – a car accident, a fire, etc.  I can’t just hurry up and drive back to their house since I’ll be several states away.

I know she’ll be okay, but I’m still worried.  And I’ll admit, I shed a few tears when I think about having to say goodbye to her.  I’m blaming that on my pregnancy hormones.  =)

I’m also worried about Vegas.  I’m meeting up with 4 other girls, and I’ll be the only pregnant one, which is fine.  But in the past week or so, my SPD has gotten pretty darn bad.  My pelvic area hurts a LOT.  If I put too much weight on one foot, I get shooting pains down the insides of my legs and up my back, and sometimes it’s so sharp it makes me gasp for breath.  So obviously walking is pretty painful, any kind of stairs hurts whether I go up or down and even rolling over in bed takes effort.  I walk around like I’m 80 years old and I waddle pretty bad since it hurts to walk.  Standing just makes things worse.  So I’m concerned about keeping up with the other girls or even worse, slowing them down.  I’m going to have to take it easier than they might want to, so I might end up spending the majority of my time there alone.  But that’ll be okay as long as I can keep my mind off of Abbie.

I might not do much blogging in the next week, or I might do a ton.  I’m not sure.  But I just wanted to forewarn you!

15 week and 3 day appt

Today I had my shortest OB appointment yet (from either pregnancy).  It took a grand total of 15 mins from the time I walked into the dr’s office, until the time I walked out.  I’ve gained 1 lb in the past month, and my blood pressure was 140/80, which is kind of high, but I was a tad worried about the appointment.  The midwife measured me and we listened to the baby’s heartbeat, which was nice and strong, so I had nothing to worry about after all.

This pregnancy has been kind of odd for me.  I would say at least 9/10’s of the time, I don’t even feel pregnant at all.  I completely forget I’m pregnant half the time.  My hips/ pelvis area does this weird “clunky” thing when I get up from laying down, and I’m still more tired than normal, but other than that, I really don’t have any pregnancy symptoms at all.  And when you add my husband not being around to share the excitement of the pregnancy to the mix, I don’t know.  It’s just weird.  It just seems as though this pregnancy is SO different from when I was pregnant with Abbie and it really makes me think I’m having a boy this time around.  If I’m completely honest though, I really want another girl, and the thought of having a boy pretty much completely terrifies me.  I know NOTHING about raising a boy.  I didn’t have brothers, or any younger male relatives that I spent much time with growing up, so having a boy would be completely foreign to me.  I was talking to one of my best friends tonight (who has 1 girl and 2 boys) and I told her about my fears and she pretty much laughed and said, yeah, I don’t blame you for being scared.  Haha!  I’m glad she was honest though.  I was at the grocery store today and saw a mom with 3 girls and a boy with the boy being the youngest, and that would be my idea of perfect.  I told Mark about that today when I talked to him and he was like, “Whoa, we need to discuss this a little more.  You really want 4 kids??”.  =)  Yeah, maybe?  Depends on how this next one is, I suppose.  So anyway, my next appointment (when we’ll find out the sex) is July 28th.  Too bad that seems like FOREVER away!!

(I absolutely LOVE this little dress on her!  Mark bought it for her and I just think it’s the cutest.  I just bought a pattern and fabric so I could make her another one.)

So we’re in the “picking out names” phase right now and we’re still seeking ideas.  Do you have any names you really like for boys or girls?

12 weeks and 2 years

Abbie and I had doctors appointments this week.  I had my 12 week OB appointment, which included my first ultrasound with this baby, and she had her 2 year well baby check up.

(10 weeks)

I was a nervous wreck for a week or two leading up to my appointment.  I’d had at least 2 ultrasounds by 12 weeks with Abbie’s pregnancy since that’s the way my OB in Oklahoma did things.  I didn’t really like waiting until 12 weeks to see if everything was okay with the PP (nickname for baby #2).  I felt really pregnant until about 10 weeks.  I was already showing a bunch, I had a bunch of “stretching” feelings, and my stomach was rock hard.  Around 11 weeks, I’d stopped feeling those little pregnancy twinges, I could completely suck my stomach in and I just didn’t feel pregnant.  So I was beyond nervous that this u/s was going to bring bad news.  Thank God, it didn’t.

As soon as she turned the camera on, the PP started bucking around in there, kicking its legs and flailing it’s arms, so I was immediately relieved.  She printed out bunches of pictures for us, and even printed out duplicates so I could send Mark copies of them.  She gave me 3 of one of them, so I gave Abbie a copy of one, and she’s been hauling it around pointing to the baby saying “baby in mommy’s belly”.  Today she lifted up my shirt because she wanted to see the baby in my belly.  Haha!  She’s pretty cute.  She’s also saying “baby in Abbie’s belly”.  Let’s hope not!

Anyway, everything looked fine.  It’s heart rate was 171bpm, which she said was good.  My next appointment is in 4 weeks, and my next ultrasound is at 20 weeks.
Today Abbie had her 2 year appointment.  She’s 29.6lbs (80%), just over 36” long (over 90%) and her head circumference was 45cm (75%).  So she’s rather large for her age, but she always has been.  They asked if she was still using a bottle and I told them she was and they didn’t even say anything about it, which surprised me.  I’m not concerned about her using a bottle, because I know it’s her comfort item, but I thought they might be.  She uses a normal cup just fine, but she still likes her bottles of milk at times.  One of the questions I had to answer was if she was saying at least 50 words.  I had to laugh a little because my little motor mouth says at least 500 words.  Her favorite sentence right now is “I want just a little bit more.”
Now that our appointments are over, I know I’m a little more relaxed.  I definitely slept better last night than I have in a long time, but that might have been attributed to the fact that it was actually cool, so I wasn’t roasting to death.  =)

Appointments

On May 6th, I had my first appointment with this pregnancy.  It was more of just an interview than a doctors appointment.  We sat in the midwife’s office and just talked about our family histories and Abbie’s birth.  I got to brag about Mark quite a bit and I showed her his picture on my iPhone and she said “Oh!  And he’s really good looking too.”  Haha!  Yeah, he’s hot.  I’m lucky.  That was the best part of the appointment.

My first “real” appointment is May 25th, when I get to have an ultrasound.  I’m excited, but very nervous about that.  If something isn’t right, that’s when I’ll find out and I’ve had too many friends have miscarriages to be completely confident that everything will be fine.  My mom wants to go with me for the ultrasound, but honestly, I don’t want her, or anyone else, there.  I feel like this is Mark’s and my baby, and if he can’t be there with me, then I don’t want to share it with anyone else.  Maybe that’s selfish of me, but that’s just how I feel right now.

I’m 9 weeks pregnant now, and for the last 3 weeks I’ve felt pretty nauseous at times.  Usually from about 4pm-7pm I just feel kinda icky.  I’ve never come close to throwing up or anything, I just feel gross.  Usually I could eat something and I’d feel better, and I’ve noticed in the last week I’ve not been having any nausea.  I’ve been REALLY tired for the past month and I often take a nap when Abbie takes her naps.  I’ve gotten a few minor headaches, but NOTHING like the terrible migraines I got for weeks when I was pregnant with Abbie.  I’m already starting to show and the top of my stomach gets really hard at times.  I’ve been kinda crampy and achy, but nothing too terrible.

At times it doesn’t seem like I’m pregnant.  Most of the time it doesn’t seem like I’m pregnant.  Mainly because my husband isn’t around to share the excitement with.  I’m sure as I get bigger, and we get closer to him getting home, things will start to feel different but for now, it’s all pretty surreal.

Written 5/12/11

The beginning of pregnancy #2

Mark and I debated for quite a while as to when we wanted to start trying for baby #2. (Which, by the way, we are calling PP for now, which stands for potential pips.) Originally I wanted our kids to be close together, as in under 2 years apart, until Abbie came out and didn’t sleep for the first 7 months of her life unless I was holding her.  Then we talked about maybe having them 4 years apart, but decided that might be a little too far apart.  Then with as busy as he’s been here with work it turned more into a ‘well when are we even going to have to opportunity to try’ situation.  It eventually came down to us wanting to try either before or after his deployment.  We finally decided to try before he left.  However, since he was gone for 6-7 weeks before his deployment, that left us with two cycles to try before he left.  We were hopeful, but not holding our breath.  (It took us 7 months of actively charting and taking my temperature to get pregnant with Abbie.)
So Mark left on a Monday.  I took tests on Sunday and Monday morning, which was a few days early, but I was hoping to have an answer for us before he left.  I knew since I was testing a couple days early there was a possibility that I could be pregnant even if they were negative, but when we saw both negatives on those tests, we just assumed I wasn’t.  I was letting the fact that I wasn’t pregnant sink in and I was kind of excited about not being pregnant during my six months at home.  I was looking at all the positives of it, being able to buy a new wardrobe, having energy, getting into better shape, losing weight, riding horses with friends, etc, even though I was a little disappointed we weren’t pregnant.  For some reason on Wednesday, I decided to take another test at 3pm.  I was just feeling a little off, so I wanted to make sure I wasn’t pregnant.  The problem was I only had 2 old pregnancy tests left from when I was testing with Abbie and they’d expired in June of 2010.  But it was all I had so I used one of them, and after looking at it after a couple minutes, it was negative so, again, I thought I wasn’t pregnant.  However, when I looked at it before I went to bed, around 9pm, there was a slight positive line on it. 
So Thursday morning, I took the last expired test I had, just to see what it said, and it immediately was positive also.  I dropped Abbie off at her sitter’s, and headed to the hospital on base to do the pee test.  I waited an hour for those results, and it came back negative, so I had to call flight med and get a referral for a blood test.  I went back a few hours later and got the blood drawn and was told it’d take an hour to get the results.  Since I had to pick Abbie up at the sitter’s, I called flight med after we got home to find out the results.  I told whoever answered the phone that I was calling for results, she asked my name, and then told me they were negative.  I confirmed with her TWICE that she was talking about my blood test and not the pee test results and she acknowledged TWICE that yes, she was talking about the blood test.  So I got off the phone and was kind of disappointed.  Over the course of the night I was adjusting to the thought of being pregnant and had gotten kind of excited about it, and now I started switching gears again, which was frustrating and exhausting.  (And that was an emotionally exhausting week already with Mark having just left.) I just had some weird feeling that she was wrong, so I called our flight doc (the squadron is assigned a doctor and we all have his personal cell phone number) about 5 minutes after I’d gotten off the phone with the lady.  The flight doc looked in the computer and told me the blood test results were still pending and that he’d called me in an hour.  He called me almost exactly an hour later and told me I was indeed pregnant.
I am sort of emotionally exhausted after this rollercoaster of a week with Mark leaving and thinking I wasn’t pregnant and then I was pregnant and then I wasn’t pregnant and now I am pregnant.  I feel like I’ve been too busy to even process it at this point and I still have SO much to do before we leave in a few days that I probably won’t have time to process it for a while.  The flight doc was a little worried about it sticking since when I was tested I was BARELY pregnant, as in, probably not even 2 weeks pregnant by that point.  So hopefully this baby sticks and we’ll have another potential pips (our nickname for Abbie) due December 13.
Mark was really excited when I told him I was pregnant.  He was disappointed when we thought we weren’t pregnant, more so than I was, so he’s very happy that we are.  It was weird telling my husband over the phone that we’re pregnant, but oh well.  I’m bummed he’s not going to be here for the majority of it, but at least he was around for all of my pregnancy with Abbie.  And he’ll be back just in time for me to be really miserably pregnant.  =)
Written 4/8/11

This summer’s bucket list (REVISED)

I find it interesting that my blog post about my summer's bucket list has already shot to being my #1 read blog.  People seem to be very interested in other's summer plans, but I can't really blame them.  I like to know what people are doing too!

With that being said, due to an unforeseen circumstance, I had to revise ONE thing on my bucket list for this summer.  I guess I shouldn’t say “unforeseen” because this was very much planned.  Here’s the new list.

• Spend LOTS of time with friends and family that I haven’t gotten to spend quality time with at all in the past 5 years.
• Shop
• Get my hair cut and colored by Rachel 3 times.  (Rachel, expect me to be in your chair the first week I am home!)
• Take Abbie to the pool a few times, preferably with friends.
• Eat at a hibachi grill.
• Go boating with my family and introduce Abbie to the fun that can be had on the river.
• Shop
• Grow a baby. 
• Take a trip out to CO to see family and friends and to spend some time in the Rockies.
• Enhance my photography skills by taking pictures of friends’ families and animals and anything else they want me to shoot.
• Shop
• Learn how to use Photoshop and practice using the photos I take for my friends.
• Read a lot of books.
• Take violin lessons.
• Do a “mommy and me” class with Abbie.
• Shop
• Learn more quilting techniques from people who’ve been doing it for a long time.
• Go out to eat at least twice a week with friends. 
• Do a girls weekend, maybe to Chicago.
• Take Abbie to the zoo a few times - Madison, Lincoln Park, Omaha, etc.
• Shop
• Write to Mark at least 2 times a week.
• Take Abbie to story time at the local library weekly.
• Visit my friends in OK and maybe NM if I can make it that far.
• Watch TLC, HGTV, and The Food Network as much as possible.
• Potty-train Abbie.  (I’ll let her pee all over someone else’s house.  HAHA!  (Just kidding, mom…)
• Play my piano regularly.  (Need to remember to take my music back with me!)
• Shop
• Take some great photos of my hometown.  (Shouldn’t be hard.  It’s very picturesque!)
• Throw Abbie a huge 2nd birthday party.
• Keep in touch with my friends back in Italy and the ones that are going back to the States too.
• Shop
• Plan a fun vacation for when Mark returns.
• Spend a lot of time with my 95 year old grandma.
• Send care packages to my husband at least every other week.
• Buy a new suitcase to take all of my new clothes back with me.
• See an off-Broadway show, maybe in Chicago.
• Do day-trips with Abbie

Did you catch that?  If not, let Abbie help you out.


Yep, we're pregnant!  Baby #2 is due mid-December and I am 9 weeks along.  We are VERY excited!