6/25/10 :: day 232

Lately this little boy has been getting the hiccups, and Derek and I LOVE it!  Whenever I feel my belly bumping I call Derek over and we get the biggest kick out of feeling him hiccup.  The best way I can explain how his hiccups feel is that they are like feeling your heart beat with your hand on your chest, but just a little bit stronger.

(1:00pm) Note to self: do not eat Bogie’s Deli while pregnant.  It really tears up your stomach.  It causes you to have to do things at work you never wanted to do.  That’s an at home only activity PEOPLE!

(2:04pm) My stomach has the hiccups.  I love it!

Super scooper excited about tomorrow.  Tomorrow I have my second baby shower for Grayson and on Sunday…a third.  We are so lucky to be loved by so many people.

6/29/10 :: day 236

I have decided my most hated part of pregnancy right now is getting in and out of the car.  When I sit in the car it’s more like I just fall or plop into the seat, and trying to get out….that’s….  Trying to get out of the car is worse than getting/plopping in the dang thing.  I have to rock myself and find something to give me leverage like the center console or the steering wheel.  While doing this I have to be careful not to push on anything too hard, too much, or else I’ll end up bending or breaking something.

Over the weekend I had two showers, and although the showers were amazing they wore my butt out!  Seriously, Saturday was the 1st shower and I was pooped that night.  The next morning at church I could barely stay awake.  I had to come home and take a nap before my shower that afternoon.  After the shower on Sunday afternoon, I was wiped.  I haven’t been that pooped since my 1st trimester.  Let’s put it this way…I was still so tired on Monday I called into work.  Functioning was not going to happen that day.

6/30/10 :: day 237

Bending over is becoming a HUGE task for me these days.  I find myself depending on Derek to help me out with simple tasks more and more.  Sometimes I am so pooped when it’s time to get out of the car I have to call him over and have him offer me his hand like Prince Charming helping Cinderella out of the carriage.  And it totally looks just like that except for the fact that Cinderell-i is knocked up.  Maybe that’s why her wicked step mother locked her in the attic.

6/17/10 :: day 224

Over the past week I have noticed that my stomach muscles and skin feel like they are stretched to their limit.  They are not sore, but tired.  It feels like I’ve been keeping my muscles tensed all day and finally relaxing them and feeling worn out in my abdomen, due to the tension I kept on them all day.  The thing is, I haven’t been keeping them flexed.  I wish I could that would actually feel marvelous.  I love being pregnant, but when my stomach muscles feel worn out like this I long for the days of being able to flex my stomach muscles and use them to support my body.

6/18/10 :: day 225

(10:00am) I don’t know if it’s the pants I’m wearing today, but this little guy in my tummy has been wigging all morning.  I felt him wake up on the drive to work.  It was pretty cute.

6/21/10 :: day 228

Why do I have the feeling that the 1st week of having my own child will feel like the craziest most insane babysitting job I ever had?  You know, the job where the baby won’t stop crying and you are afraid that any second the parents are going to walk through the front door and wonder why their sweet little precious baby is crying in arms of what they thought to be a capable teenager.  The 16 year old version of me was quite good with infants, but there were those jobs when the baby just was FUSSY.

(11:18am)  One of my favorite thing these days isn’t feeling my little guy move, don’t get me wrong…I still adore that, but feeling his little body parts under my skin.  Like when he stretches or changes position I can actually FEEL him with my hand.  It’s the closest I can get right now to touching his sweet soft baby skin.

6/22/10 :: day 229

(8:27am) I am already worn out today.  Just getting ready this morning took it out of me.  I walked to the cafeteria with Derek for breakfast and I was mildly sweating once we got to his office. Now I’m at work and just sitting in my chair is wearing me out.  Geez!

6/10/10 :: day 217

This little guy was up early this morning.  He was flipping around in my belly a full hour before his normal 9:30am playtime.

6/11/10 :: day 218

Today I have the pleasure of enjoying some Braxton Hicks contractions.  This is only the second time I have noticed having them.  They really don’t hurt, but they do feel like you are flexing your stomach muscles and they won’t un-flex.  Just a tiny bit uncomfortable.  It feels much better when I get up and walk around.  So, I just took a little stroll around the parking lot here at work.  It seemed to have helped.

I’m totally sure I will regret saying this one day soon, but I kind of like having them.  It’s like a little note from your body saying “it’s almost time, so I’m gonna start practicing.”

Last night in our baby class I ran into an old high school friend who is expecting her 1st baby 11 days before me on August 1st.  She having a little girl.  It was so exciting to see her that when she walked in the door to our classroom I yelled out her name (and pointed). I was a bit red in the face after that one, but during breaks in the class and after we had the chance to catch up.  She is actually a labor and delivery nurse, so she has seen it all before.  It would be great if she were my nurse on the day I deliver, but since she is due before me I doubt that will happen.  Bummer.

(8:05pm) Right now I am laying on the couch trying not to use my stomach muscles, because it feels like I just did a million gazillion sit-ups.  My stomach muscles are soooo freggin’ sore.  They started to feel sore just before I left work.  I don’t know if it’s from the BH contractions earlier today or from my belly constantly running into my desk at work.  Whatever is causing the soreness I hope it goes away soon, because I am useless right now.

6/15/10 :: day 222

(7:43am) Wow!  This little boy is super wiggly this morning. I still believe he is head down most of the time because I feel most of the activity just below my ribs; meaning his little legs are just kicking up a storm.

• nausea
  • I only threw up twice the entire pregnancy (w/ light nausea through out the day)
• fatigue
  • during my 1st trimester (weeks 6-12) I was extremely fatigued.  I was spacey during the day but not sleepy.  Around 6pm each night I would crash.  If I stayed up past 9pm Derek generally would have to help me to bed. I couldn’t do it myself.  Once I hit my second trimester I began to get that second wind they speak about.
• leg cramps
  • a few sporadic leg cramps, typically when I wake in the middle of the night (3rd trimester)
• hip pain
  • towards the end of my 2nd trimester I had a touch of sciatica. This caused me to have hip pain from sleeping on one hip that occasionally lasted into the mid morning.
• back pain
  • My 2nd trimester and the beginning of my 3rd I experience back pain.  Some days were bad enough to stay home from work.  The most sever back pain was located just below/between my shoulder blades.
• dizziness
  • only one issue with dizziness in the middle of my 3rd trimester.  My doc said most likely it had to do with low blood sugar.
• constipation
  • been pretty regular.  Only one or two real issues with this.  Nothing to get worried over.  I’ve been drinking a ton of water.  I think it helps.
• nose bleeds
  • only two nose bleeds….very minor
• trouble breathing
  • began during my second trimester.  This is not too bad, just occasional spurts of shortness of breath due to Grayson pushing on my diaphragm.
• pregnancy dreams
  • only one baby dream (3rd trimester), somewhat frequent “bow chick a wow wow” dreams (all 3 trimesters)
• swelling
  • no swelling of anything so far  (fingers crossed)
• blood pressure
  • during my entire pregnancy I have had wonderful blood pressure.  I am quite proud of myself considering that shortly before I got pregnant it was a tad elevated.  I think I took care of that issue before the pregnancy began.
• heartburn/indigestion
  • none of this nasty stuff so far

6/16/10 :: day 223

(3:57pm) Well, well, well…we have an afternoon wiggler.  Gray moves more often during the morning than the afternoon, but not today.  It must be because I had pizza for lunch.  This kid ALWAYS moves after pizza.  Especially Memphis Pizza Cafe pizza.

6/3/10 :: day 210

Wow….30 weeks!  That’s a lot of pregnant.  It still seems like there is way too much time before I meet my little guy, but not enough time to prepare our lives for his arrival.  Today has been not fun.  I woke up with stomach and shoulder pain, so I stayed home from work….again.  I’m sure they are loving all of my time off.  Sorry dudes…I’m preggo.

Just after I finished lunch, I stood up and jabbed my stomach into the super sharp corner of our kitchen island.  I didn’t think it did much damage until I started feeling a few sharp pains when I moved in that exact spot.  I was lucky and no real damage was done.  If the pain had continued I would have headed on into the doctors, but no bleeding and no pain (never any bleeding) after an hour or so.  One thing that was weird was that I thew up in my mouth (just a tiny bit) twice today.  Gross!!!

We had baby class tonight.  Both Derek and I were super excited about this class, because it was “Baby Basics”.  We learned how to give bathes, how to swaddle, the best ways to administer meds, and many many other useful tips.  They provided everyone in the class with a baby doll to practice on.  Mine really did look like it was the Mail Man’s kid.  Although our baby doll didn’t quite look like us he was super cute and had little tiny beads in his booty.  Which I loved.  It made his fanny so squishy.

6/5/10 :: day 212

I am dizzy as dizzy can be today.  I can’t sit on the couch without feeling the world spin.  I read that pregnant people get dizzy spells, but come on!  This has been going on for the past hour.  I feel totally fine otherwise.  If the dizzies continue much longer I think I may call the doctor just to be sure it’s not a sign of anything bad.

This little boy has been all up in my rib cage today.  I was driving to the store this morning and I had to put pressure on the top of my belly just to keep him out of my ribs and off of my diaphragm.  It’s not a jungle gym kiddo…lay off!

6/7/10 :: day 214

I went to the doctor today and told him about my dizzy spell on Saturday.  He said it is most likely a drop in my blood sugar.  He told me to watch out for another one of those and if I do have one that cannot be fixed by a Coke or a piece of candy to give him a call.  I haven’t had one yet.  I’ll keep my fingers crossed.

Grayson is loving this rib cage playground he discovered on Saturday.  Mommy is not liking it so much.  I have to recline back quite far to keep myself comfortable when crams himself in there.

6/8/10 :: day 215

Last night was just horrible; at 4am I awoke due to discomfort.  I thought I would give sleeping a go without the pillow between my legs.  I grabbed the pillow that was nestled under the my legs and tied up in 10,000 blankets, or so it seemed, and pulled.  I pulled so hard that my hand, and the pillow, flew way back and hit my nightstand and knocked EVERYTHING over….including my almost full cup of water.  You see on most nights I would have already finished that cup of water sitting on my nightstand, but oh no not this night.  This night it was just about full, and I whacked it!  Water went everywhere….  All over our wedding picture I have sitting on my nightstand, all over the outlet and other electrics, and all over the book that Derek and I read to Grayson to get him use to our voices.

Having the water all over the electrics and the carpet didn’t bother me, but the second I noticed it on Grayson’s book…I lost it.  I started sobbing!  I cried the entire time I was cleaning.  Yes, at 4am.  Boo!

Once I got back in bed I realized that I still wasn’t comfortable so I moved my butt to the couch.  I have found that I sleep like a baby on our new super comfy couch.  It is amazing!  I racked out for another 5 hours.  I would sleep on the couch every night until I deliver, but I prefer to sleep next to Derek.  It’s that sense of comfort and protection thing.  Plus, his back is super comfy too.

6/9/10 :: day 216

Last night this little guy had the hiccups for about 10 minutes.  It was pretty funny.

5/27/10 :: day 203

Last night we had one of Derek’s old friends over. Dane now lives in Washington state with his wife and two kids, and every so often comes back to Memphis to visit friends and family. Unfortunately, this trip it was just Dane and the kids, because his wife had to stay at home because she is in school and they haven’t let out yet.  On the bright side Derek got the chance to catch up with an old buddy and I got the chance to play with two of the cutest kids you will ever meet, Taya and Paxton.  Taya is 3 and Paxton turns 1 TODAY!  Having these two over helped Derek and I realize how many items in our house will need to be moved from low lying book shelves or the floor.  Thankfully, Taya and Paxton were very well behaved when it came to not touching things, but when you are keeping an eye out for little ones you start paying attention to the things they might get their hands on.

I’m not quite certain what is happening, but the past few lunchtimes I have had an aversion to dairy.  It’s not that I can’t eat it at all.  It’s just that if I have cheese or too much milk the night before my stomach gets queasy at just the thought of a dairy item around lunch the next day.  Maybe this is some weird version of lactose intolerance.

6/1/10 :: day 208

I must say I am still thrilled to be pregnant.  I still look back at my pregnancy in awe.  I enjoy the attention.  Don’t get me wrong that is NOT why I got pregnant, but the attention coated with sweet and loving comments truly is nice.

6/2/10 :: day 209

My back is beginning to hurt again.  I must admit I did have a tiny panic attack last night when I realized that there is the chance that my stomach may never look the same again.  I had forgotten about that little detail.  I was so focused on the tremendous amount of pain I will so be going through that I totally forgot about the mutilation that pregnancy can bring to your mid region.  I understand that it doesn’t mess everyone’s stomach up, but it could.  I am doing my best to control my weight and to apply my stretch mark lotion everyday, but the doc said if I’m going to get them (stretchmarks) then there really isn’t much I can do about it.  I haven’t seen any marks on my tum tum yet, but I still have 2.5 months to go.  The wait is torturous.

5/20/10 :: day 196

Yesterday, Derek and I took the dogs on a walk and during that walk I had the pleasure of experiencing my 1st true set of Braxton Hicks contractions.  They weren’t bad, but I could totally tell what was going on.  My stomach turned into a rock, and it felt like an expanding balloon was about to burst out of my abdomen.  I made Derek feel my belly when it was contracting, because I love sharing these unique moments with him since being a man he will never get to personally experience something like that himself.

We are going to baby class again tonight.  Tonight is the big hospital tour.  I’m pretty excited about it.  Although, I have already been in the hospital’s brand spanking new maternity ward 3 times now visiting friends that recently popped one out.  The reason I am still very excited is that I will, this time, get to see the delivery portion of the maternity ward.  Each time I have been up there I have only been able to visit the postpartum rooms, since my friends had already given birth.  They are going to show us where to check in and where to go tonight.  Yipee!

5/25/10 :: day 201

Well, we had Friday off work so Derek and I spent a little time getting some much needed projects done around the house. Later that night we had some close friends over to grill out, and we had a blast.  I think the boys had a little too much fun. Sarah and I were heavily involved in baby chatter.  Sunday I had to go into work for a few hours and then to a bridal shower.  I had a blast at the shower, but work was not so much fun.  Seriously…on a Sunday?!?  It really wasn’t too bad.  We were just testing a system upgrade, so at least it wasn’t a typical work day.  The thing that angers me the most though about going into work was that for some reason it caused my back to start hurting.  By the time I made it home that evening all I could do was lay on the couch.

My back was still killing me Monday morning when I woke up so I took the day off work.  I know it sounds wimpy, but my work chair only makes the pain worse.  So, as horrible as it sounds I spent the day on my back. (resting…only resting)  The day came and went with no pain relief.  I sucked it up today and headed into work.

5/26/10 :: day 202

Yesterday was a day from hell.  I kid you not.  Just like Sunday and Monday my back was killing me on Tuesday.  Sitting in my work chair all day did not help one bit.  I took a few walks around my building’s parking lot to ease the pain.  There are only 2 positions that don’t cause my back to ache, standing and laying down on my back.  Since laying down on my back isn’t an option at work I opted for laps around the parking lot.  To be honest, laying flat on my back helps, but the weight of my ever growing child makes it extremely hard to breathe.  If I have enough pillows behind my back I can prop myself up and counter act this fat baby in my belly, but that only works on the couch.  In bed he still feels like a bowling ball sitting on my chest.

Lucky me, Wrigley decided to start barking @ 4:30am yesterday morning and woke my sleeping beauty butt up.  I couldn’t go back to sleep.  No wait…that’s incorrect.  I fell back asleep about 15 minutes before the alarm went off at 6:00am.

So here was my yesterday.  Awake @ 4:30am, up at 6:00am, dreadfully tired, off to work, in a meeting for an hour where I got to sit in the only plastic chair in the room, (because no one offered to let the pregnant lady sit in their big comfy leather chairs…RUDE!), sweated through the entire hour long meeting because someone closed the door and it was terribly hot in the room, cried twice before lunch, ate lunch at my desk because Derek went to lunch with his co-workers, still dealing with back pain, went to another meeting and my key chain broke, got back to my desk and the strap on my brand new dress snapped and I had to leave work early do to a wardrobe malfunction.  What a day.  I think God broke the strap on my dress on purpose so I could go home and get away from this dreadful day.

After making dinner I plopped down on the couch around 7:00pm and zonked out until 9:30pm.  I never take naps during the day….even now that I’m pregnant.  So, I must have had a humdinger of a day to have crashed for 2.5 hours.  Then, I got ready for bed and crashed hard around 10:00pm.  I only woke up once to pee.  That shows me that I was still really, really tired, because I ALWAYS have to pee at least twice during the night these days.  Almost forgot, I was so out of it when I did finally wake up for my potty break that I accidentally kicked one of the dogs in the head and then ran face first into the closed bedroom door. N-I-C-E!

I just remembered something else about yesterday, while walking to the restroom at work my back felt heavy.  That’s the only way I can describe the sensation…heavy.  I don’t know what that was all about.

Oh man!  I just had about a minute of on and off tiny stabbing pains in my lower abdomen on the right side.  I had to get up and walk that one off.  It was like someone kept jabbing me with a thick sewing needle over and over.  I had to cover my mouth since I am still at work so I wouldn’t shout any words that might get me in trouble.

5/13/10 :: day 189

Today is the beginning of my 3rd trimester….the beginning of the end.

5/14/10 :: day 190

Today is the 1st time it has been really hard to breathe.  This kid is pushing on my diaphragm HARD!  I tried going outside, but it is so humid out there that being outside was doing no good.  It was just as difficult to breathe.  So, I came back in the office where the air is a bit less saturated and stood in a co-worker’s cubicle.  I was running out of breath just talking to her.  I started getting weak and a bit light-headed, so I sat on the ground.  This particular co-worker had the same issue last year while she was pregnant, and had to be rushed to the hospital, because she (at the time) had no clue what was going on.

Oh, did I mention that this child has not stopped moving since about 7pm last night.  Is that bad?  I’m now freaked out that he is going to wrap his cord around his neck.  Cue panic attack.

I totally forgot to mention that I finally started getting leg cramps.  They are not bad and only last a few seconds, but I am getting them.  Yea me!

It’s now 10:47am and this baby boy is STILL kicking me.  I read something today that said his activity would increase, and boy were they right.

5/18/10 :: day 194

I’ve been experiencing some light cramping all morning in my lower abdomen.  It’s not anything to worry about, I don’t think, it’s just a bit annoying.

Wanna hear something funny?  Last night I was in the nursery cleaning blinds (so they wouldn’t be dusty for the little guy) and the dust caused me to cough and the cough caused me to pee.  Just a bit.  GREAT!  Next thing you know I was off to get a dry pair of pants.

Grayson gets active anywhere between 9:30am and 10:00am every morning.  If it’s a Saturday and I’m not out of bed yet he starts kicking me to make sure I feed him.  I’ve read that babies develop a schedule in the womb, I wonder if this will be his awake time in the AM once he arrives?  That will be interesting to see.

Dude, my back is killing me today.  The middle, the lower portion, pretty much all of it hurts.  It’s absurd how much my lower back is beginning to bend due to the pregnancy.  I had a sway back before and now it seems to be close to a 90 degree angle.  After sitting for around and hour or so I typically have to get in what i like to refer to as the “oh crap! the plane is going down” position.  You know it.  It’s the position the airline tells you to assume if your plane decides it doesn’t want to fly anymore.  **Wrap your arms around your knees and pray.**  I TRY to bend over and wrap my arms around my knees and pray that the pain ends soon.  Bending like that seems to stretch out those aching muscles and let them rest for a total of 15 seconds or so, or until I can no longer breathe.

5/19/10 :: day 195

Yesterday was rough.  My back and belly were sore all day.  When I got home I pulled out the Wii and played some Wii Fit to try and work out the kinks in my body.  It seemed to help a bit, but it’s getting a bit harder to do some of the exercises with a big ole belly in the way.  We had BLT’s for dinner and I enjoyed a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch with a side of chocolate milk for dessert. Yummy.

When I got in bed my stomach felt as if it had too much liquid in it.  Every time I would attempt to lay down I would have to sit right back up so I didn’t barf. (Which I did the night before)  Let me explain what i think the situation is here.  The past two nights I drank decent sized glasses of milk within 30-45 minutes before bed.  My stomach doesn’t hurt or anything, but I do tend to get the sensation of needing to blow chunks.  As a matter of fact the night before last (Monday) I threw-up in my mouth…juuust a little bit.  That was NASTY.  Last night I also was given the gift of not being able to breathe by my lovely son.  For about 10 minutes he was all up in my Kool-Aid (a.k.a. – my rib cage/diaphragm)

With all of this chaos going on in my body my attempt at a 9:30pm bedtime turned into a 10:30pm bedtime. Bummer.

Today, my back was already hurting before I even walked out the door.  I mean like 30 minutes after I woke up.  I had to recline my seat in the car on the way to work, while Derek drove, just to give my aching back a break.  And my stomach, my stomach is having a field day being all sore and stuff.  Every now and then I will get a tiny stabbing pain in my lower abdomen.  And for the past two days there has been a constant weight or heaviness to my entire stomach.  I have a feeling since I am now in my last trimester that my little one has either flipped upside down or found a new position that he loves, but mommy doesn’t.

There he is, 9:30am on the nose, wiggling around in my belly.

I almost had a lovely little pregnancy hormone break down in front of my boss today.  I am frustrated with a project right now and due to these blessed hormones the strangest things bring tears to my eyes.  I try to avoid all confrontation and sappy movies to prevent the water works from turning on.