S.O.B.s February 19, 2007

WARNING: if you are squeamish about vomiting, read no further!

For about six weeks, I was queasy all of the time, but only actually tossed my cookies once (I’m not counting the three-barf migrane here). It was icky and I felt awful, but I didn’t have to maintain and up-close-and-personal relationship with my toilet, so I was grateful. I felt better wearing seasickness bands on my wrists, and for that I was also grateful.

Then I hit the 12-week mark and started to feel a bit better. Hallelujah! I’m in the second trimester! I’ll have energy! Vim! Vigor! And no more vomity feelings!

Well, that was then, and this is a whole new ballgame. I’m feeling pretty good, actually. HOWEVER. The days of queasy-but-no-vomit have been replaced with the S.O.B.s: Sudden Onset Barfing Syndrome. The S.O.B.s can overtake you at any time, and give you about 20 seconds of warning to run to the bathroom and shoved your significant other out of the way before turning you into a heaving mess. I don’t recommend the S.O.B.s, but if you *do* have to have them, I especially don’t recommend having them while you are in the middle of what should have been a delicious breakfast, complete with sliced fresh strawberries on top. Half of which are now in the plumbing system, and the other half in the trash.

Most of my barfing experience lo, these past 15 year or so, have been hangover or migrane related. Many more related to hangovers than migranes, particularly in the college and post-college years. Those typically manifested with a splitting headache upon waking up in the morning and an urgent need to void the (mostly empty) contents of my stomach upon any movement, sudden or otherwise. It would last pretty much all day, but never was I able to eat much of anything before it came back up again. So the barfing, while awful and upsetting, was relatively limited in its volume.

That’s not the case when you’re in the middle of eating breakfast and you suddenly realize that you’re going to see it again. There’s more volume. And less fluid, simply because you haven’t been up that long, and your tea has just cooled enough to start drinking it. And for the rest of the day, I’ve thought about how that felt, and that has NOT helped to keep subsequent icky feelings at bay.

My dear husband is downstairs right now, fixing some dinner for himself while I stay away from any food smells. If I’m feeling brave later, I may have a mango.

Favorite thoughts & wishes – so far February 17, 2007

As I’ve mentioned before, it is SO MUCH fun to tell people our happy news. I haven’t yet been able to respond to all of the happy notes that we’ve gotten recently from our friends and family, but I promise that I’m working on it! So many people have said such kind things – many that have brought tears to my eyes. Thanks y’all. We hope we’ll do an ok job of this – it’s kind of important that we do. We’re both fortunate to have good examples set for us already and we’re looking forward to following them, as well as making this whole thing up as we go.

Below is a compilation of some of the funny comments and advice that we got as we’ve told people. Hope you enjoy these as much as we did…

WHAT?!?!

Congratulations and to be sure to name the kid after [me]!

I think the stomach and hips became permanent features after the birth also. You will not have any problem losing the weight afterwards because you run.

Dave, you are going to be the greatest father. You seem to have the patience of Job.

These will be the last times you and Dave will be just the two of you. A third person will be with you forever. You will always have a child no matter how old you and Dave are.

You look at the bikini with your summer clothes and know that you will get used to the one-piece bathing suit. You will look and feel like a blimp and kill Dave if he even blinks at you. But all in all pregnancy is a unique experience that messes with your cerebral cortex so that you want to do it more than once!

As a nurse, the best advice I can give “Hold your nose and dive right in.” Make sure the small stuff, remains small stuff. Always kiss your child goodnight and say “I love you, because you’re God’s gift to me!”

Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Dave’s boys can swim!!!!!!!!!!

This is going to be an excellent year for babies, sort of like a good vintage year for wine.

Congratulations!!! You’re the 4th person who has, in the past month or two, told me she is having a baby in August. I guess it was a cold, sexy winter.

Get a nursing bra soon. I went out and got a nursing bra today, and it kicks ass. Seriously, I should have gotten a bra like this long ago. Really, nursing bras are the bra version of crotchless panties, so they are appropriate for all seasons, during nursing and beyond.

You’re not going to have a critter, you’re going to have a MONKEY!

I took my first prenatal yoga class last night. A new studio opened up in my neighborhood and all classes the first week were free. I also stayed afterwards for the Yoga/Dance Fusion class and had a lot of fun. I’ll have to check the $$$ to see if I can swing it to go to both every week, but if I had to choose, I’d stick with the prenatal class. I’ve got a lot to learn, and anything that is supposed to ease labor and delivery is worth checking out!

12 weeks! February 8, 2007

The lil’ critter is now 12 weeks along and everything seems to be fine! At yesterday’s checkup, I *finally* found out my blood type (which I’ve always requested every time I donated blood): A plus! Everyone says that it’s actually A positive, but I prefer to think of it as A PLUS. I think I actually would have been disappointed to find out that I was B-. Heh.

That’s the silly part of this post, of course. The exciting part is that we heard the heartbeat! It’s somewhere between swish-swish-swish-swish and wcheeo-wcheeoo-wcheoo-wcheoo. Maybe closer to the latter. It really was a beautiful, amazing thing and I was so happy to have CritterPaPa there with me to hold my hand and give me a hug when I got all teary. Wow.

We’ve now told a number of friends, but I’m still holding off on telling my organization’s Steering Committee. They’ve got a lot of decisions to make in the coming weeks, and I’m just not sure that I’m ready for them all to know. I’ll tell a couple of them, but if you happen to know any of them (or if you happen to BE any of them), please keep this on the down-low for just a little longer. Merci.

Finally, sister Alia sent me a wonderful, hilarious care package the other day! I’ll try to post pictures as soon as I figure out how…

11 weeks, 5 days, 22 hours February 6, 2007

Howdy friends. We’re just shy of 12 weeks, and we’re about to let a whole lot more people in on the secret. I’ve got my 12-week checkup tomorrow, and Thursday will be 12 weeks officially. As of Thursday, the critter will be about 2 inches long, about the size of a lime (I love limes!). That’s an actual *thing*!

I’m feeling a lot better these days, with a much more robust stomach. Yay. Now if I could just kick this head cold, I’d be set. I’m still tired, but as the cold begins to subside, I’m feeling more energetic. I *really* need to start running again – it’s been about 10 days since my last run. Wow – that sounds like I’m in AA and I’m counting the days since my last fix. Well, if the shoe fits…

I had lunch today with E.P.A., a good friend that I haven’t seen in ages, and she’s about 7 months along with her second child now. She was wonderful, as always, and full of good and supportive advice for me. Including this: we don’t have to tell anyone that we don’t want to tell!

One thing that CritterPa and I are talking about right now is the possibility of a “baby moon” (stupid name, good idea). We also have to figure out how to attend three weddings, one reunion of the college girls, and a visit to see sister Alia and her Alaskan mooselet that is scheduled to arrive in early May. We’ll go visit them while they’re in Georgia – ain’t no way CritterPa is getting on one o’ them itty bitty planes to see them in the fishing village! With things uncertain with my job, we can’t possibly do everything. Heck, we may not be able to do anything but visit the mooselet! We shall see…

Ok, that’s it for now. Will write a report of tomorrow’s doctor’s visit soon.