Pregnancy: 15th week

Week 15
January 24 - 30

After having a little discussion with DH about me needing to buy some maternity clothes soon, and him mentioning thrift stores, it got my mind working a bit. Anyone who has been to the thrift stores in my town know for a fact that they are less than awesome. My town is not affluent, so the majority of items that show up there are pretty used & abused, and usually things you can buy at Walmart anyway. So I kinda want to stay away from them if I can. But then I remembered that there is a relatively new consignment shop for baby stuff in town. I looked up the info online, and although their website didn't give a ton of information, it did mention that they carry gently used maternity clothes. So today I went up there to see what they had.

The section wasn't huge, by any means, but most of their clothing was from places like Motherhood Maternity, which is probably where I would have gone first had I left town to go shopping. So I came home with 2 shirts, 2 pairs of jeans and an awesome long jean skirt. And DH is going to love this... I got it all for less than $45. The surprising part for me, was that the jeans were priced less than the shirts were. I wonder why this is? Now I have some basics to get me through the next few months as I can still wear the majority of my shirts still. Then I'll see about working on more warm weather clothes.

Anyway, lately I've been noting that I should start eating more. My tummy grew pretty early, and I was making good progress on a real baby bump, but then I hit that rough patch last week where eating was difficult. I lost a few pounds and I could swear that I'm not as big as I was last week. And I'm probably not eating as much as I should anyway, so this might be part of the problem. But I better get on this gaining weight thing, or I foresee a lecture from my doctor coming soon. Darn. More ice cream.

On the whole for this week though, it's been pretty uneventful. The icky symptoms I had last week are gone for the most part, though I do still get headaches once in a while. I haven't felt the baby move in a while, but I'm not concerned as it's still pretty early for that.

Guilt

I've finally experienced it: the guilt infertile women get when they feel like they're not allowed to complain about their pregnancy. A handful of friends who've dealt with infertility have expressed this while they themselves were pregnant, and I know that they'd say to me exactly what I've told them... that it's okay to complain when things get rough. We're not martyrs. I'd said something along those lines while we were still TTC, so I didn't truly understand what they were going through. But now I know, and I am humbled.

Because when you're in the midst of infertility, with all the pain and jealousy, honestly, it's a little infuriating to hear women complain about their pregnancies. How dare they complain? Don't they realize the awesomeness of what's happening within their bodies and that many would gladly sacrifice a body part to experience it? Yes, it's irrational. But it goes with the territory, and besides, as my DH has pointed out pretty much every other day since we've met, women are irrational anyway. Oddly enough, if I actually knew the pregnant woman in question, it didn't bother me at all to hear them complain. Only if it was someone I didn't know... usually on a message board, or someone I was just an acquaintance with IRL.

But when it comes down to it, no one likes to be hurting or uncomfortable in any way, even if you are a veteran of infertility and you finally get your dream of being pregnant. So I need to cut myself (and others) some slack. We definitely aren't martyrs to the cause, and I'm officially apologizing for wanting to maim unwitting complainers. It probably won't happen again. Probably. :)

Pregnancy: 14th week

Week 14
January 17 - 23

Well, the good news is that my appetite came back a little bit and I didn't even get nauseous! Just for one day though.

Seriously, second trimester sucks so far! I'm nauseous pretty much all the time, I've got lots of random food aversions, I can't do much of anything for longer than 5 minutes before I need to sit down because I get so tired, I'm waking up at least 2x a night and have trouble falling back asleep, and the worst part is that I'm getting a headache almost daily now... which makes my nausea worse. I thankfully haven't thrown up (yet), but I still count nausea as morning sickness.

I really hate complaining about this because it means that I actually am growing a baby inside of me. Before, I always wanted to maim pregnant women who complained about being pregnant, because it felt like they weren't counting their blessings. So I guess that makes me a hypocrite? Feel free to maim me... it might take my mind off my stomach and/or my head. ;)

But man, why couldn't this have happened in the first trimester, you know, when I was expecting it?!? Yes, it will get better. I know that. I'm just throwing a pity party. Don't mind me.

In more exciting news, I think I've felt the baby a few more times. It's always felt like a little thump, and not the butterflies everyone talks about. I hope to feel it more this week!

And now back to poor me stuff, it feels like I broke my butt during swimming. No, I didn't slip & fall, and no, I doubt I actually broke anything. But on Tuesday, I was being maybe a little too vigorous in my breaststroke kicking, and I pulled some muscles. At first, I thought it was my groin, because that's usually the first muscle you'd pull if you were doing breaststroke. But upon discrete prodding, stretching and further swimming, I've deduced that it's not the groin that I pulled, but a muscle I had no idea existed. It's further up than the groin, and further back towards the butt. Hence me saying I think I broke my butt. From a little search on Google, the closest muscle to where I'm describing is the "Pubococcygeus muscle", though I'm not entirely sure that's right either.

All I know now is that it hurts like a b*tch to do breaststroke, and is somewhat painful when I do freestyle or backstroke kicking. So now I have to take it even easier on the lame 500 meters I've already cut myself down to. Go me!

Sorry... it's been a tough week. I hope next week I'll be perkier. US Nationals for figure skating will be next week, so that'll help.

Pregnancy: 13th week

Week 13
January 10 - 16

Woot! I'm now starting my 2nd trimester! I know there are different opinions on when each trimester starts, and mine just happens to be at the start of the 13th week.

Anyway, people all around me are getting sick. It makes me nervous because if I get sick, there are very few things I can take to make myself feel better, and will mostly just have to tough it out. I'm just glad that college band hasn't started back up yet, because from what I hear, the college is more of a cesspool of germs than it usually is right now. Included in the list of sickies is DH. So far it doesn't seem too bad, so I hope that's all it is and that he doesn't give it to me!

As far as how I'm doing, I honestly feel worse than I did in the first trimester. My appetite is g.o.n.e. and more foods are randomly setting off nausea, though my stomach hasn't actively rebelled yet. My energy level has gone way down, so I find myself on the computer or watching TV a lot more than I usually am, which makes me feel like a severe slacker. And whenever I wake up needing to pee, it takes me at least 30 minutes to get back to sleep... which hurts a lot if you wake up 3 times a night or more. But that part makes me curious... I should keep track of when I tend to wake and then when bubs comes, see if that's when night feeds tend to happen. That would be kinda interesting.

But on the bright side, I ordered my maternity suit and it looks like it'll fit, although it might be a touch too big at the moment. I don't expect that to last too much longer. Should be interesting to use just one suit though. I currently rotate between 3, and the one I wear the day before is always still a little damp when I pack my bag the next morning. I can think of a lot things that would be more fun than putting a cold damp suit on. We'll see how it goes though. If it becomes a nuisance, I'll just buy another suit so I can rotate.

I also started 2 registries, which DH kinda shook his head at, what with it still being pretty early. But I wanted to, so I did, although neither one are complete. I did one on Amazon and one for Target. The Target one will be a little lame though, because I did it for those who don't shop online (aka, my mom). I'm still planning on going to a Target and register some more stuff there, since their online selection for "in-store" items is actually pretty small. But mostly all the fun stuff is on the Amazon one.

Pregnancy: 12th week

Week 12
January 3 - 9

One more week until I'm out of the 1st trimester! Even though 13 weeks is the technical start of the 2nd trimester, I am now breathing a little easier now that I've hit 12 weeks, so it almost feels as though I'm already there.

And I announced the pregnancy on Facebook on Wednesday. I have my 12 week appointment on Friday, and wanted to wait until then, but since pretty much all my close family & friends already knew, I figured it was no big deal to reveal a few days earlier than planned. Now I can start "liking" baby-related FB pages! I've been participating in cloth diaper giveaways, and you get more votes if you "like" their page on FB. Well, when you're supposed to be in the closet, you can't do things like that or people will put 2 & 2 together... especially since FB started that annoying real-time ticker that no one can turn off.

Anyway, I'm starting to have problems with migraines, and it really sucks, as I mentioned in a previous post. But I think I know what the main culprit is... sleeping on my back. I go to sleep on my left side, but I sometimes find myself waking up on my back. And the reason why I think this gives me migraines is because my pillow is a little taller than normal, so my neck is at a weird angle. And since my neck is my Achilles Heel, it almost never misses an opportunity to give me problems. I don't want to, but I think I may have to start sleeping with a pillow between me and DH to help prevent me from rolling on my back. He'll just have to get his cuddles some other time.

12w6d - I *think* I felt the baby. It was just a teeny-tiny thump. Or it was a gas bubble. I think I'll just go with the baby, because that's way cooler than any old gas bubble.

*results of my 12 week appointment*
So I'm *slightly* annoyed, not much, but just a little. When I first went in for confirmation at 4 weeks, the doctor kinda made a big deal about not knowing how to date me since I didn't O on CD14 like every other woman on this planet, and so I'd need an ultrasound to do it. I did it, and measured exactly according to my O date.

Well, today, I was listening to the nurses talk (one was training) and heard the senior one say "we go by LMP, so she is 13w1d". What? No, I am 12w3d! I thought we'd established that when you O late, you shouldn't go by LMP (last menstrual period). So when the doctor came in, I asked her, and she said that usually until the 20w ultrasound, they go by LMP, even if there was a dating ultrasound. And she's considering my EDD to be July 12th, instead of the 17th. Grrr. I know it's only 5 days, but still! While I will never regret getting the dating scan and seeing my baby, I'm annoyed that she made a big deal about something she really wouldn't use anyway. So while it's cooler to say I'm in my 13th week, I'm just going to keep using my O date EDD, because I know it's right. I'll say it again... I could totally be a doctor!

Anyway, I got to hear the heartbeat! It took her a while to find, which kinda made me have a heart attack, but she finally got it. The baby is low on my right side, and the HB is measuring about 170 BPM, which is good.

Pregnancy: 11th week

Week 11
December 27 - January 2

I'm getting more excited now that family knows, and I feel a little more secure in buying things now. While on vacation in my hometown, we went to the mall and I will admit, I wandered into the baby sections in most of the department stores, looking for things that could be suitable for gender neutral (not much, BTW). It was slightly disappointing though, because all the baby sections in Dillard's, JCPenney, Herbergers & Sears carry Carter's. There's nothing wrong with Carter's, their clothing is cute and good quality. But when you walk into 4 different stores, you kind of expect different clothing at each of them. Not the case. I did buy a cute brown fleece jacket at Old Navy though. It's got bear ears on the hood! And it was on sale, since it was end-of-season. Score! And before we left town, we stopped at Target because I wanted to take a gander at their maternity section, but we of course went through the baby section. I found the CUTEST sleep & play with characters from Monsters, Inc. on it, and I just had to buy it. They only had 2 though... newborn & 9m. I'm leery of buying a lot of NB clothing because there's no guarantee my baby will even fit into it right after birth. So I bought the 9m, figuring it'll get more wear than the NB size would.

But I was severely disappointed by Target's maternity section. It was super small. I was excited, because no place where I live carries maternity clothing, and I knew Target did. I'd walked into Motherhood Maternity in the mall, but I was a little overwhelmed, so I walked back out and I figured Target would be more manageable. With only 4 racks, it was. But I did buy my first 2 pieces... a plain white long sleeve t-shirt and a dark purple thermal shirt.

I think DH will get a little aggravated at me though, for buying maternity & baby clothes. He knows that our friends will pass around both, so he kinda feels that there's no need to buy more, even though I won't know until I see what I can actually use. But what fun is having a baby when you can't buy your own clothing for both you and the baby? I mean, whatever is lent will be worn, so that's not the issue. He's just being weird I guess because I really haven't bought all that much of either. He should be glad that I don't plan on finding out what it is... gender neutral clothing is really lame, so there's not as much incentive to buy a lot of baby clothing as there would be if we found out. Besides, if we borrowed everything from our friends, it would make me feel like a cheapskate. It'd be one thing if we couldn't afford it, but we can manage to get some stuff, so why not add to the collection to be passed around?

On a brighter note, I'm starting to really show now! It's mostly my organs moving up & out of the way of the uterus, but it's progress!

Not fun, pt. 2

The search for new bras continues. This time, I headed to JC Penney. Right away I found some 34D's and just for kicks, I grabbed a 34C to try on.

I first tried on the C to see if the C at Walmart was just sized small. Nope. The C at JC Penney was too small, too. Okay, so I really am a D. So I tried on the D's. Way too big. So I'm not a D. What the heck is going on? Is there such a thing as a C 1/2? Because that's what I think I am. This is giving me a headache because it's just like trying on jeans.

I don't think my size 34 is wrong either, because I have a 36C bra I'd accidentally bought from Victoria's Secret a while ago (tag said 34C, actual bra said 36C), and on the tightest setting, it's still really lose around the middle after a few hours of wear.

I didn't have too much time to try on more bras, so I didn't go out and try different sizes, and left without a new bra. I'll probably go back when my need is dire and see if the D's will fit then.

But my main bras, which are the same kind, but different colors, are working really well even though the size is a 34B. So I wondered if a 34C would work. When I got back home, I looked online to see if they still make this particular bra. Of course not. I tried eBay, and while they have listings for this bra, none of them are for a 34C. Bummer. I'll have to keep an eye out. But something tells me I won't find one.