You Okay In There Little Bean?

Ironic that my last real post was about the size of my belly because shortly after writing about others commenting on the smallness of it, we had an OB appointment where I was measuring the same as I had 3 weeks before... If you haven't ever gone through a pregnancy before then maybe you don't know this but basically very little happens at your frequent check-ups. You pee on a stick (yes, pregnancy involves lots of stick peeing...actually lots of peeing in general), you get weighed, blood pressure checked, your ankles and feet are glanced at, you're asked very generally "how are you feeling," your belly is measured, and out the door you go until your back to do it all again three weeks later.

That is, until one of those things is off. Which for us, was my belly measurement. There I was busy laughing in my head about how absurdly easy it all seems when my thoughts were interrupted by my OB saying, "you're measuring the same as you did last time you were here."
..."is that bad?!" I asked.
"It warrants an ultrasound" is all I could really focus on her saying.

 I mean, she definitely said other things like, "I'm not worried" and "there are a million reasons why this could not be an exact measurement" and she explained that given my height and Sean's height, we were unlikely to have made anything but a small baby (sorry in advance, kid), but all of that didn't really help. Luckily Sean was there so he could remind me of these things as I perseverated on it for the next week and truthfully that is what kept me from completely spiraling into an anxiety worm hole. It also, once again, helped immensely that I am blessed with doctors for siblings who put up with my extremely frequent texts that I send off at random whenever a concern arises, which is often. They are so patient and alway informative and calming, I am so grateful. But despite all of the very logical rationales I was given from various sources, I just could not be convinced that everything was okay.

Yesterday, I finally went for my ultrasound to check on the matter. As the appointment got closer and closer I got crazier and crazier. Theres a lot going on right now so really it could have been that I was anxious about a variety of things but I knew deep down that all of it was stemming from one source only: my worry about the baby. The slightest thing would set me off and I found that I couldn't stop crying. To be fair, I do think that my third trimester has kicked in and that I'm starting to be a hormonal mess again so that definitely contributed to the crying situation. Either way, I was a disaster and I think my mom and Sean had just about enough of me and my insanity by the time Wednesday morning rolled around (sorry mom, in retrospect it was probably a bad time to suddenly be staying with you for several nights in a row!).

Although the technician isn't allowed to give us any results, the doctor told me that unless they make us stay and wait until she can come over and talk to us, we should assume everything was fine. And that is exactly what happened.

So, I feel a bit better but to be honest, now I just have different concerns than I did prior to yesterday. For example, I asked the technician to verify it was a girl and she said "her legs are closed pretty tight but theres nothing that I see that suggests it could be a boy." Now you might have heard that and thought, sounds good - its definitely a girl. Me on the other hand, I start thinking "Are you trying to tell me I'm having a hermaphrodite baby?!" Even just now I said to Sean, "Do you think we should have some boys names ready just in case?" Obviously Sean just shook his head in disbelief that I'm STILL on this and kept his thoughts to himself. Other concerns that I have involve how absolutely squished the baby looked in there. Her feet are jammed into my upper right side, her hands are around the left side of my stomach, and her head is very low down, almost at the top of my right leg (it felt like the technician was doing an ultrasound of my leg when she was trying to get a look at the baby's head). So pretty much she is squished up in a boomerang shape which just cannot be comfortable! Add that to the list of concerns - is my belly squishing the baby??! Do her feet have enough room? Can her brain grow properly if she's jammed into my leg?!

I really have gotten better about handling other stress in my life. Its been three of the most insane weeks and I haven't completely fallen apart but instead have been excited to see where life is taking us - definite progress! Now I'd really like to apply this attitude to growing this baby too. I know that stress is absolutely not good for her so I try to keep that in mind but when has telling yourself how to feel ever helped anyone? If it were that easy, I wouldn't have a job.

What I find does help me is thinking about what I do know about my baby girl and this pregnancy so far and tracking how things have changed week by week. So I thought it would be a good exercise to write it out in a list here, which will also help with the documentation process - its been so nice to have this blog and emails to family before that to look back on and see just how much things have changed along the way.

So here is the 30 week/7.5 month summary:

- I am now so pregnant that people offer me their seat on the subway. I have decided to milk this thing for all its worth which has led to a false sense of entitlement in general. For example, where there is a line to get into the exiting stairwell of the subway, I push out my belly and push my way through with total disregard for how many people I am cutting in front of. Out of my way people, I'm growing a child, I clearly deserve to get down these stairs before you!

- As I mentioned, I am back to being moody and emotional again. Its a real treat for anyone who gets to spend any amount of time with me. I really, really hate feeling so out of control of my emotions but am trying to use it as an opportunity to gain empathy and understanding for those with mood disorders. Its comforting to know that my instability is (mostly) based on pregnancy hormones, I can't imagine what it would be like if I didn't have that to logically make sense of my craziness.

- I'm slowing down significantly. It took me a good extra 4 minutes to walk home from the subway today (when you're a fast-walker like me - a quality I inherited from my dad - thats a significant amount of time to add to a walk!). But its not just that I'm slowing down in speed, its other things too. I can't do as much as I was doing before, I just get far too exhausted. I need a lot of down time and a lot of sleep. Or maybe I just haven't been able to get either lately and its just the lack of it thats bringing me down. We'll see.

- Baby girl is getting stronger than ever. Sometimes I can feel her little feet and know from touch they are indeed her little feet. It kind of freaks Sean out when I tell him to feel and he touches a legit body part of the baby. Its so very alien-like but I love it anyway. The other day I'm pretty sure she shoved her bum right up to the surface of my belly, it was so cute. She's getting pretty strong so that sometimes when she kicks it actually hurts! The other day I was being assaulted from within while doing an assessment. I must have looked like a crazy person as I kept twitching and getting startled out of nowhere.

- I have Braxton-Hicks contractions all the time and they are getting stronger and more uncomfortable...though I still think they are kind of cool.

- Baby used to move all the time around 10am but now she tends to be quiet in the mornings and pretty active at night. Sometimes its hard to get to sleep because she's fluttering around so much. She's like her mamma, it takes her awhile to settle down but once she's asleep, she likes to sleep in :)

- I can't believe it was only three weeks ago that I was able to sleep on my stomach and didn't require a pillow between my knees and under my belly. Oh how things have changed!

- I need to pee at least hourly. Sigh.

Speaking of which, its time to go do the things I do the most lately: pee and sleep. G'nite!