News

Something big to share today. It is something I've been trying to tell "personally" to everyone who I know reads the blog. There are friends from college that I haven't told yet - not because I don't want to tell them but because I'm not a huge fan of the phone and my current state of busy-ness has kept me from making many calls. So I have been sure to tell the people that I know read the blog (because they post comments). If you read the blog, but never comment, and I haven't shared the news with you personally...well, let this be a lesson to you. :-)

You may have noticed that my thoughts have been somewhat scattered over the past few months. Much of this is because there is something rather big and life changing that I haven't been writing about. I'm pregnant. :-) 20 weeks and 2 days to be exact. We had the big ultrasound last week, and our daughter looks healthy and is still on course for a mid-February arrival. The due date is the 18th, but since only 5% of babies arrive on their actual due date, I prefer to say mid-February.

I briefly considered keeping a journal of the experience of pregnancy, but I don't know that there is really enough to say, and some of it is not pleasant enough to want to write. ;-) I will recap here a little bit some of the highlights:

The day we found out was a shocker. Not because we hadn't been trying, but because I was fairly convinced that we hadn't timed our attempts very well. And also because even though this was something we wanted and were purposefully trying to achieve, there is something very startling about actually getting a positive test. (And they were both VERY CLEARLY positive, no "is that a line? do you think you see a line?" for us - we got A LINE and pretty quickly, too).

Then there was a few days of - when do we tell people? who do we tell first? what do we do now? And there is the constant back and forth emotion of being really excited and at the same time not wanting to get your hopes up too much because it was so early. We've known a number of couples who've had issues both getting and staying pregnant, and we're both too practical to take anything for granted.

A week after we found out, we had the chance to tell both sets of future grandparents together and in person. So we took the opportunity to tell them (as well as R's sister, brother and niece, and a couple of friends who had stuck around to the bitter end of our party), and then simultaneously swear them to secrecy. :-) We did give them "permission" to tell a few of their friends so they wouldn't explode with the secret, but we didn't want to start telling more family but have to tell them to keep a secret, too. With a few exceptions, we didn't spread the news to family and friends until the second week of August. The following week I told work, and we've been slowly telling people as we talk to them ever since.

On the symptom front, I was nauseous on and off for the first three weeks. Thankfully, I felt fine in the morning (generally) so getting myself to work wasn't a hurdle. Once the nausea wore off, I was REALLY tired. Like I couldn't bring myself to do much of anything but sit on the couch after work tired. There wasn't much that I *needed* to do, but I hate feeling like such a lump. And as soon as the exhaustion wore off life got a little busier, so a good night's sleep has continued to be extremely important.

What else? Well, the whole thing didn't really seem very real until the 12 week appointment when we heard the heartbeat. Even after the 8 week appointment, I wasn't totally convinced that this was all real. Sure, I had had some morning sickness, and the doctor verified that my uterus was bigger and no one laughed at me for thinking I was pregnant. But until we heard that little heart beating 154 times a minute I didn't really believe that there was something in there. And when we started telling people it became that much more real.

I'm still not really showing. Yes, my belly is bigger, but it is much more noticeable to me and it is still pretty easy to hide. The only clothing that does not fit are my jeans and a few shirts that were on the tight side before I gained 12 pounds. :-) My work pants still fit, though I can tell that they won't last a lot longer. I've started wearing some maternity jeans and pants, mostly for the comfort factor, even though they are still a little big.

Part of me is impatient for my belly to "pop" and to really look pregnant (and not just like I've gained weight), but I also know that once I start to look pregnant it will be just that much sooner until I start hearing "haven't you had that baby yet?" So I'll count my blessings that the baby is healthy and try to let go of what I can't control.

I also wouldn't mind feeling the baby move now and then. It makes me impatient for the next time we hear the heartbeat to make sure that everything is still okay.