Halfway There!!

I can't believe I have made it to the 20 week mark!! While 20 weeks feels like such an accomplishment, I still can't believe we have to wait 20 MORE weeks to meet this little boy/girl. It is well worth the wait, but I sure can't wait for June to get here!!! I have been feeling great the past couple weeks, which is such a nice change from the first trimester!! People have been asking me for a while now if I have felt the baby move. I would say around 15 weeks I felt bubbles and a few jabs, but I could never tell if it was the baby or not. The day I turned 19 weeks I felt a punch that was like nothing I have ever felt before. I sat there for HOURS waiting for it to happen again and of course it didn't :) But as the week went along, I have felt it more and more. Mostly when I am laying in bed at night. It is the best feeling in the world and I only wish it happened multiple times in a row so Chad could feel it too! I am sure in the coming weeks it will become even more frequent!

This week we got our FIRST baby item!! It is the most beautiful baby stroller I have ever seen!! My absolute favorite part about this stroller is the bassinet it comes with! My dad knew I had been eyeing this stroller, but never in a million years did I think I would actually own one myself! My dad has always been the best gift giver, so I am not surprised that this perfect gift showed up on my doorstep! While a part of me likes to think he bought this gift for me because he knew I loved it, the rest of me knows that he just wants his first grandbaby to have the most stylish ride in town :) We are so grateful to have family that is so generous and thoughtful, I don't know what we would do without all of them!!

Now it's time to focus on more important things...furniture, painting, and emptying out the "guest room," so it can be transformed into the nursery!! Something tells me I will be doing all of the delegating for this task! We will see how my control freak personality handles that one. I tried to tell my dad and Chad that pregnant women are allowed to paint and put things together, but something tells me they didn't buy it and will not allow me to help! It was worth a try!

Here I am 2 days shy of 20 weeks!! Definitely a baby belly, although I don't think it was this big when I woke up this morning, so maybe it is half food and half baby :)

Happy 18 Weeks!

At the very beginning of my pregnancy I felt like the days could not go by any slower. It took FOREVER for a week to roll around! I suppose that is in part due to how miserable I was from weeks 5-13. But now that the holidays are over, and I am finally feeling better, I am finding it hard to believe that I am 18 weeks! Two weeks shy of being half way there! Besides being sick for eight weeks straight, I had a hard time believing this pregnancy was real. Even after hearing the heartbeat at my 13 week appointment, I still didn't believe there was a tiny peanut growing inside of me. Until yesterday...1/11/11. Chad and I got to see this little 9 oz being moving around inside of me. I thought I would cry, but instead every time it moved, I laughed. I think Chad may have blinked twice in a 30 minute period. I don't even think he looked at me once because he was so mesmerized by what was on the screen. When the ultrasound began, the baby had one foot up by it's head as if it were to say "ARE YOU SURE YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW MY GENDER??" We of course couldn't tell, but the ultrasound tech said she "had a pretty good idea." For those of you who don't know, we decided to keep the gender a surprise! We went back and forth for awhile and decided that the sound of "it's a ______" in the delivery room, is well worth waiting 40 weeks! To be totally honest...I thought it would be so hard to not ask or not look for that "third leg," but I don't think I thought about it once in the whole 30 minute ultrasound. I was so fixated on what I was seeing that gender was the last thing to cross my mind. When we were sitting in the room waiting for the doc to come in, Chad, once again, said "now I really think it's a boy." I said "and why is that?" And his reasoning was "I don't know, just the way it was moving it's arms and legs..." Really Chad?? I love you, but that is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. Next to him saying that he thinks that the baby occupies its time in the womb by doing curls with the umbilical cord. Do you think he wants a lacrosse player?? He is nuts!

The doc finally entered the room and that is when my nervous nurse mode kicked in. All I wanted to hear him say is "everything is perfect! See you in four weeks!" He DID say that everything with the baby looked PERFECT! What a relief!!!!! They were unable to see a portion of the baby's spine due to it laying transverse, so he said "unfortunately" with sarcasm in his voice, we will need to get another ultrasound in about eight weeks. The only other thing that he said was a slight concern, was the placement of my placenta. They diagnosed me with a marginal placenta previa. Again, this whole being a nurse and knowing too much thing is not good at times like this!!! All I heard was placental previa and thought about all the deliveries I have been to for babies who were born to mom's with placental previas. SCARY STUFF! A placental previa can be marginal/partial or complete. Complete is obviously the worse of the two. Many women with complete placental previas end up on bed rest at some point during their pregnancy and all deliver via c-section. The concern is that the placenta has implanted too close to the cervix and if it does not move toward the end of pregnancy, the fear is that as you begin to dilate, the placenta will tear away causing both mom and baby to hemorrhage. It turns out that a large percentage of women have a marginal placenta previa in the early part of the second trimester. The hope is that as the uterus grows, the placenta will shift away from the cervix. So they will be monitoring that at our next ultrasound as well. He did say however, that if it does not shift, which he is confident it will, but if it does not, we may be looking at a c-section. I told him that I did not have my heart set on anything but a healthy baby, so whatever has to happen to get this baby here safe at the end of 40 weeks I am more than okay with. The only other instructions he gave were to avoid any "trauma" for the next eight weeks...aka intercourse. Haha. Poor Chad. Although I think the doctor scared him enough that even if we were cleared, he would avoid me until the baby is walking! Haha. So, all in all, a very good appointment! He did tell me that my weight has stayed the same, so the goal for our next appointment in four weeks is...WEIGHT GAIN! You don't have to tell me twice!

I don't have a belly pic for this week yet, but these are even better...our little alien baby :) The last one is my favorite, Chad loves the foot prints, and well the first one...is a little scary looking!!

16.5 Week Baby Bump!

None of my friends believe that this is a real baby bump! Ever since I can remember I have been able to blow out my belly to look like I was 9 months pregnant. My mom said when I was a kid, I looked malnourished because I had this scrawny body and this giant belly. Well through the years, especially when I had one too many to drink, I liked to show off this special talent of mine. So now no one believes that this is a real baby bump! They all think I am just pushing my belly out! While this might be partially true, I have to say that my "fake pregnant belly" is WAY bigger than my REAL pregnant belly! :)

13 Weeks!

At 13 weeks we had our second OB appointment. I was told that I am supposed to see every doctor in the practice so when it comes time for me to deliver, I have seen every doctor at least once. I am not a huge fan of this, as I would like to see the same doctor every time and have that same doctor be the one to deliver me, but I know that is not how most offices work these days. I was supposed to see the nurse midwife this appointment, but it turns out she had an appointment herself, so I ended up seeing the same doctor I saw at nine weeks. He is very nice, but he resembles someone I know all to well, so that really kind of creeps me out! Anyways, we started this appointment by getting weighed and peeing in a cup. At this point I had not gained any weight, but thankfully I had not lost a lot which is what I worried about due to my all-day-sickness! When the doctor came into the room, one of the first things he asked me was if we were planning on doing the genetic testing. This testing has to be completed prior to 14 weeks, so he needed to know that day whether or not we had decided to go forth with the testing. While I would have LOVED to have another ultrasound, we opted out of the genetic testing. We have no known risk factors and we did not want to put ourselves through all of the worry since many of these tests have false positives. I am a NICU nurse, so I think I worry enough! Extra tests and false positives would send my hypocondriacism (if that is even a word!) to a whole new level!! After asking 100 more questions he finally pulled out the doppler! He found the heartbeat right away and the baby's heart was beating at a fast 168 beat per min! For those of you that don't know, at about 10 weeks, I purchased my own doppler online because I wanted to hear the heartbeat all the time with this baby and all future babies! Some people laughed and thought I was crazy for buying it, but it really is the best thing ever! At first I had a hard time finding the heartbeat because it was so low and the baby was so squirmy, but starting at about 12 weeks I was able to find it without any problems. The heart rate started out in the high 160's and as the weeks have gone on it has drifted into the high 140's and 150's. I definitely used the doppler more often when I first bought it, but I would say I use it about once a week now.

At the end of this appointment, I assumed I would be scheduling my next appointment for 17 weeks and then 21 weeks. I figured they would do our 20 week ultrasound at 21 weeks. Apparently this doctor likes to do the 20 week ultrasound earlier rather than later, so he had me schedule my next appointment for 18 weeks and he said he would do the ultrasound then! I can't believe that we have only had two OB appointments and our next one is the BIG ULTRASOUND! So on January 11th we get to see how much our peanut has changed since six weeks!! I am pretty sure we will see more than a flickering black blob this time :) Another thing I forgot to mention...we will NOT be finding out the sex of the baby! I have people calling me daily trying to change my mind, but I am sticking to it! I have been told by quite a few people that my doctor should be expecting many phone calls on Jan 11th. Haha.

I will be sure to post pictures as soon as we get the ultrasound!

First Real Belly Picture!

12.5 weeks! While I wish I could say this is a baby bump, I think it is bloating more than anything!

All Day Sickness!

I just have to say that I am SO JEALOUS of the women that do not experience all-day-sickness!! Starting at about five and a half weeks I was so nauseous I could hardly do anything! As if the 24-7 nausea wasn't bad enough, the vomiting that started at 8 weeks was a nice cherry on top! I could not eat or drink anything! I couldn't even take my vitamin! Poor Chad had to cook and do the grocery shopping from 5-12 weeks! Almost everyday I would go from my bed to the couch and I dreaded going into work. "Hi my name is Emily and I will be taking care of your baby...please excuse me while I throw up in this trash can!" Yea, I knew that wasn't going to go over so well. It finally got to the point where I had to ask my doctor for medicine because I could not call into work sick. He started off giving me phenergan which made me too sleepy! I couldn't afford to work in an ICU while being nauseous and drowsy, so he finally gave in and gave me the miracle drug...ZOFRAN! I love this drug and I don't think I could have made it through without it! It worked within two minutes of taking it and it did not make me feel like a zombie!

At my nine week appointment, I told my doc I was worried that my lack of food/liquid intake was causing harm to the baby. He reassured me that I would have to be at the point of starvation to cause harm to the baby. He told me that anything the baby needs, he/she is going to take from me before I can use it. He said to try and stay hydrated since the vomiting can cause severe dehydration and to not worry about what I eat and just eat when I feel like I can.

Everyone kept telling me that I will feel like a new person once I hit the 12 week mark, so I counted down the days. I would say I started feeling a little better at 13 weeks. I still have my moments of nausea, but they are few and far between...THANK GOD! While "morning sickness" is quite dreadful, I would go through a heck of a lot worse for this tiny little peanut I am carrying!! One trimester down, two to go!!

Beta-HCG Levels

For those of you who don't know, some doctors do a blood test to confirm your pregnancy. The blood test measures the amount of "pregnancy hormone" aka human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG) that is in your system. From my understanding, anything over five is considered a "positive." As the embryo grows, the level of HCG rises and the beta numbers should double every two to three days. I called my doctor on Monday October 11th to let them know that I had been taking positive pregnancy tests. They brought me in that day to draw my blood and see what my HCG levels were. They called me later that afternoon to tell me my first beta was a big fat 1842!! While I knew that number was high, I didn't say anything I just asked what they wanted me to do next. They said they wanted to bring me in two days later to check it again to make sure it was doubling like it was supposed to. Well, 46 hours later not only did my numbers double, but they tripled. That is when the nurse says to me..."how do you feel about multiples??" I about fell out of my chair! Of course I said we would be happy with whatever we were blessed with, but inside I was TERRIFIED! I see SO many multiples come through the NICU and I couldn't help but be scared that my five-foot three-inch frame could not carry two or MORE babies to term! Since my numbers were so high, my doctor wanted to bring me in for an early ultrasound. So at five weeks and three days pregnant we had our very first ultrasound. As the doctor was performing the ultrasound, I burst into tears because I was so scared he was going to tell me I'm going to be the next octo-mom! He handed me a tissue and said congratulations we have ONE baby! It was too early to see the heartbeat, so he brought us in the following Friday at six weeks and three days pregnant and did another ultrasound. This was the first time we heard the most amazing sound anyone could ever hear...our baby's fast and STRONG heartbeat :) Oh yea...and he still only saw one baby!!! Six and a half weeks down...and a lot more to go!!

October 7th, 2010

October 7th was a special day that will go down in the book as one of the best days of my life! Even though I had a week's worth of positive pregnancy tests hidden in my underwear drawer, I was still not convinced it was true, hence why I had not said anything to my husband! I did not want to get both of our hopes up if I was not 100% sure there were TWO lines on that pee stick! So on Oct. 7th I decided to go to target and buy something that said "I LOVE DADDY!" We were packing for my best friend Kelly's wedding that day and since Chad was not home from work yet, I decided to put the I LOVE DADDY towel and onesies, plus all 10 positive pregnancy tests in the suitcase, so when he opened it to pack, he would get a nice little surprise! When Chad got home from work, I was sitting on the couch patiently waiting for him to go upstairs and pack! He goes upstairs and my heart begins to race! After about 10 minutes, he comes back downstairs and sits on the couch next to me. He doesn't say anything, so I ask him if he finished packing. He said yes. So I said "AND???" He just looks at me like I am crazy! I said "are you not going to say anything about what was in the suitcase?" and he said "what are you talking about?" At this point I was ready to KILL HIM! Annoyed with me, he goes back upstairs to see what I was making such a fuss about. It turns out that my genius husband packed all of his stuff ON TOP of the baby stuff and positive pregnancy tests and did not even see them! When he went back upstairs he finally came downstairs with a big smile on his face. I just could not believe he packed all of his stuff without noticing anything!! After about 5 minutes of being annoyed with him for ruining my surprise I finally forgave him and told him that I had been taking positives tests all week long!!

The next day we flew to NJ to see my best friend get married! It was a perfect weekend and she was a stunning bride! I knew it was going to be SO HARD to keep this secret from all of my best girlfriends, but Chad and I pulled it off quite well! He kept going to the bar and getting me cranberry & orange juice drinks that looked like cocktails! 12 weeks later everyone was like "but Em you were drinking at Kel's wedding..." They couldn't believe that I had managed to pull that one off!

So October 7th is the day I like to think of as the beginning of the best journey of our life!