Thursday, November 09, 2006

Ack! The Dentist

I had my 6 month dentist appointment this morning. I only got to see the hygienist as my body started to lose it as the cleaning and curretage progressed. First things felt like they were getting dark, then I felt like I was getting nauseous, then I felt like I was going to pass out and throw up and I had to sit up twice to try to settle my body down. Finally I said that my body had enough and that was it, so I didn't even get to see my dentist. It was rather upsetting -- though my teeth and gums look great she said. I even got teary about it, and would have cried if I had let myself.

My acupuncturist's office is down the hall so I went there for a while to sit in their reception. I checked in with one of the acus I see and asked her about the blood sugar/adrenaline sensativity that I've been feeling (a little stress and I feel sick for hours, plus that's what's been waking me up at night). She said that it sounded like my kidney energy was needing adjusting so I set up a couple appointments and hopefully that will help make a difference.

Then I bought a hot chocolate on my way to the office, figuring the sugar/chocolate plus the comfort factor would make me feel better.

Sunday, November 05, 2006

Belly at 25 weeks

Here's the latest and greatest. I'm starting to feel pretty big and having to use some moisturizer on my belly as the skin definately feels stretched out now.



And my belly button? It's been turned inside out for the most part and it's about one quarter the size it normally is. I still count as an inny but who knows what's going to happen to it in the long run.

Just over three months to go now.

snippets from my online posts

(over the past two weeks)

I didn't tell you that I hung out with my sis on Sunday for lunch and a little shopping. When I drove over to pick her up she got in the car, pushed aside my coat, pulled up my sweater and t-shirt to expose my belly and said "hi baby!" She's very excited. She said with her doctoral research she's been around lots of pregnant women but it's different when it's family.

...

My body has decided [last] week that it won't sleep straight for more than 6 hours so I go to bed and wake up in the middle of the night and then I'm up for hours before I'm able to go back to bed. Makes for an interesting work day as I'm a bit tired out by late afternoon as it is.

...

I can't believe I'm almost 6 months now I don't feel that big but when I look at myself in the mirror I'm amazed. Let's see what else... we bought a new car on Thursday night after work. We got a Toyota Prius and it's really quite cool. It starts with the push of a button! I spent today tidying up my old car so I can sell it.

Not too much baby things going on here. Just cooking, eating, resting -- but I did do some stretching, push-ups and leg lifts this morning (dance warm-up). Yesterday I made chicken soup and banana bread in the morning and then garlic herb breadcrumb topped snapper with mashed potatoes and black kale for dinner. This kid is eating well.

I swear I need some more pg jeans though and a new bra. My belly has gotten so big that it is pushing the demi band down all the time on my Gap jeans. My bra is just getting a bit tight all over, not sure if I need to go up a cup or a band or both

Oh, and we bought our plane tickets for Thanksgiving. Flights weren't giving us much in the way of aisle seats so we splurged and bought first class. It's the only time I've bought first class (I did manage to get bumped to business class once though) but I told my partner, if ever there were a time to get first class it was now. And, the tickets are fully refundable too, just in case.

...

My partner put his ear to my belly the other night to see if he could hear anything and the baby kicked him in the side of the head We both started laughing. My partner has spent more time with his hands on my belly feeling the baby move, while we watch TV or read in bed. He even noticed this morning when the baby was sleeping as there were no wiggles. I like that he's got a little bit more of a relationship going on with the baby now. He went out with his buddy and they were talking baby stuff the other night, and then talked with our massage therapist and one of his clients about the baby -- they were asking. He said it was the most he had talked about the kid out of the blue so far.

His brother's having his 40th birthday this weekend and so I have to contend with my SIL and MIL. Thankfully there will be others around to help soften the tension. I'm still not feeling very open with my SIL at all and she's not even talking to me either. I'm left feeling like if she wanted to be nice to me she just could have done, but by attacking me she showed her complete and total lack of understanding of where I'm coming from and what I've been through. I feel she owes me an apology at the least. I'm so not into confrontation that its not funny. I imagine (and probably rightly so) that my SIL is spending all today bitching about me to my MIL. Fun, fun, fun.

I also found out last week that one of our former employees, someone who worked with us for 5 years and was generously compensated, continues to talk sh*t about me and my m/c. She only knows of the one as well. What a heartless person, all I can think of is that since she's never going to have children that she really can't fathom what I've been through. Still, her mother died of cancer about 10 years ago so it's surprising that she learned such little compassion about other people's grieving experiences. I only hope that her badmouthing me and my misfortune reflects badly on her in other people's eyes.

Go figure that pg loss can have such a lasting impact in so many ways on so many relationships.

...

I know that feeling as well. My losses were discovered so early that the really scary "is this going to fail for me again right now" passed sort of quickly. Still, the wavering of symptoms is really common, particularly around 8/10 weeks as the placenta starts to take over more from your ovaries/corpus luteum. I'd go from feeling absolutely lousy for a few days to feeling okay for a few days -- which would just make me worry. Also, each OB appt would bring the prospect of bad news so I would start to get anxious before each one that some pronouncement about the health of the baby would come crashing down on me. But it didn't. All I got was good news, good test results, things growing right on track.

Try making a list of all the positive signs of your baby's vitality and your body's comittement to the process. HCG levels, heartbeat showing up on time, dates measuring on time, baby measuring perfectly on size. Your nausea, increased metabolism, fatigue, food cravings/aversions, little ovarian twinges, breast pain, let them help provide you with a little confidence that things are proceeding as best as they can. One day at a time. And look how far you have made it already.

...

For some reason as I was falling asleep last night I was starting to freak out about the glucose tolerance test. I'm not tolerating glucose well right now at all so the thought of drinking some sugar syrup and making myself feel all woozy doesn't sound like fun at all. Do you think that the fact that I'm having blood sugar issues (crashing levels and feeling woozy) is a bad sign or is it common in pg?

---

I did bring up the jelly beans alternative with my OB but he resisted. I could push for it if I want to. He said we could do the test later in the day which should help, so not total fasting. I can eat breakfast but have to hold off on simple carbs, juices and sugary fruit. I have to drink the stuff about 45 minutes before I go in for the blood draw and I can have something to eat right after. I just don't like that much sweet stuff, particularly after cutting back on it over the past 5 years due to the advice of my naturopath and acus.

Did I mention that I passed the 24 week mark yesterday? Only 16 weeks to go. Let's see, so if there are 4 weeks in a month then 24 weeks equals 6 months and 16 weeks is divided by 4 into 4 months then that equals 10 months -- don't you just love pg math.