This little blurred thing was 10 weeks when we took his/her picture back at the end of February. Should be making his/her debut around August 29th.
I knew I was pregnant about a week before I decided to take the test (and it was the designated time to take the test). That week, I hadn't felt like eating dinner with everyone else one night (just wasn't feeling it), but later I ate a jar of pickles that I'd canned and had a small bag of Panera chips. I think I was craving the salt so I'd increase my water intake and help my body increase the blood flow (I think the amount of blood doubles in the first month or so?). Then I started to notice strong smells. Poor Brian took the brunt of my smell aversion and we had to get him a new deodorant. So, I took the test right before we left for Christmas vacation and wasn't surprised when it was positive:
At week 6, pretty much on the dot, the nausea started. There are a few subtle differences from my pregnancy with Juliana. First, I feel MORE nauseous than I did with her because I'm nauseous all the time. With her, I got a reprieve at night, but with a toddler who sometimes cries out at night, I wake up instantly and then take forever to fall back asleep again. But, I haven't lost the contents of my stomach with this one, and I did a handful of times with Juliana. I think this is because I recognize a lot of the signs that I either need to eat or stop eating so I'm a little better at managing it than I was with her. I'm now 17 weeks, and the nausea has definitely subsided, but sometimes comes back for a little bit.
To manage nausea, mostly I've been making sure my stomach is never empty, which lead to a 7 lb weight gain by my first appointment at 10 weeks. I have taken Zofran (anti-nausea med) a handful of times, mostly at night when I lay down and the room is spinning and I can't settle everything down. I take Unisom (sleep aid), either 1/2-1 pill every night (I took this the entire pregnancy with Juliana), and I'm taking a handful of supplements that are supposed to help my immune system stay in shape, help with digestion, help prevent miscarriage, and boost general health. In addition, I try to get enough (if not extra) sleep. I've been lucky in that I'm able to set my own schedule for work, so there was a lot of napping in January and February. A few weeks ago, I could tell my energy was starting to come back because the naps weren't quite as long as they were before.
I was determined to keep exercising through this pregnancy (I never did anything formal with Juliana, but I was walking around campus a lot), and did pretty well in the beginning but then nausea and fatigue reared it's ugly head, and the best thing for me to combat it was to sleep. Plus with the impending move, I've been prioritizing other things, but I anticipate once we get settled in NC, I'll be able to jump back into moderate activity.
I've been having problems with headaches in the recent weeks, and I'm sure it's stress related, but I also noticed it with my previous pregnancy and the only thing that helped then was seeing a chiropractor on a regular basis. Again, with everything going on, those appointments have been put on the back burner, but we will get back into it once we move. It could also be related to the stresses of the move...
As to whether it's a boy or a girl, I really have no clue. I've been offered thoughts on people who had starkly different pregnancies with boy versus girl, but I feel like this is pretty run of the mill. Some weeks I'm adamant that it's a girl, others I think it's a boy. Juliana sometimes says her nighttime prayers for a baby sister and sometimes for a baby brother. Sometimes it's baby Aurora... I think she's excited, we've definitely talked about it a lot, but she has no concept for what it means, and more pressing on her mind is the upcoming move (more on that in a later post).
I think I started feeling him/her moving around starting at week 10 (the "book", aka What to Expect When You're Expecting says you should start feeling movement around week 18). Part of this comes from the fact that I had a quick 10 week ultrasound done because the doctor hadn't heard a heartbeat on the Doppler, and, bless her, she offered the ultrasound instead of making me wait for 2 more weeks to come back into the office to check for a heartbeat. The ultrasound tech commented on how much the baby was moving, and it was amazing to see it flipping all over the place in the blink of an eye! I started wishing we had done a 10 week ultrasound for Juliana so I could compare if this child is moving as much as she did in utero, but I think so.
Around week 12, after waking up in the middle of the night to soothe Juliana or just listen to her cry out, I felt this weird cramping/thudding at the front wall and told Brian the next morning that he/she was body slamming into the walls for a bit last night.
Last week (week 16), Brian felt him/her for the first time. I was feeling lots of fluttering movements, and when he applied a little bit of pressure he got a couple of reactionary kicks or head butts. I only feel him/her when I'm still, sitting down or laying down. And if the movements that occur in the middle of the night are indicative of awake periods of time, it appears we have another non-sleeper on our hands (oh boy....), but there's time to worry about that and deal with it later. The plus side to having another active little one is that he/she will be more than capable of keeping up with his/her big sister and for standing up and not being overshadowed by such a bubbly, outgoing personality. I don't remember exactly when I felt Juliana move for the first time, but I'm guessing it was around the 16-18week mark.
I can tell I'm pregnant, sometimes it feels like a small basketball sitting between my hips, but I don't look it. I've had a few family members touch my stomach to ask how the baby is, but in reality they're touching my stomach. All of the organs that were sitting some comfy down in my pelvis have pushed up and out making my normal jeans difficult to wear comfortably, and yet there's not enough of a "bump" or "pooch" to justify maternity jeans quite yet. Thankfully, one of the moms in the club I'm involved in was giving away spring/summer maternity clothes a month ago, so I don't think I'll need to buy anything since all of my maternity from Juliana is winter.
My new boss seems excited and encouraging (he has 3 kids) about this new life event impending, and I'm anxious to get started on location on the project before the maternity leave would start.
So, we're excited, but also pushing off worries or thoughts about it until we address the move, probably moving again, and the adjustments to a new location, new jobs, etc! But thoughts and prayers for continued health are greatly appreciated!
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