Thursday, June 25, 2009

Whoosh whoosh whoosh

Zippy has a heartbeat! It's somewhere in the 170's, which is pretty much where Emily's was at this point too, but apparently that's pretty standard. My OB also assured me that it doesn't feel like I'm carrying twins, PLUS I still haven't gained any weight (sweet!), PLUS they'll now draw my blood for me AT the office instead of sending me to the creepy lab across the street that is always crowded and just skeezy. So I am feeling pretty jazzed. Once we got past the confusion of me having to convince the secretary that I was pregnant (they had me down for a well-woman check, and I had to tell her that I WAS well, but I was also pregnant) and once I managed to produce my second urine sample since they got all excited and threw away my first one, everything went very well.

The thing that got me most excited though, is that I get to have an ultrasound in 2 weeks! Squeeee!

Apparently in the time since I was pregnant with Emily, they have started to offer early screenings for genetic abnormalities. I don't have any risk factors, but it includes an ultrasound so hells yes I want to do it! I had my appointment today in a room with a sign over it that said "Sonogram". I asked the nurse if that meant I got a sonogram, and she hemmed and hawed and basically said "Maybe". I sat there waiting for the doctor, staring at the sonogram machine (and Will sat there giggling at the pile of condoms that they use on the sonogram probes) hoping for a sonogram but also not.

The rule, it seems, is that if the doctor can find the heartbeat with the doppler, that's proof enough that you're pregnant and the baby is doing well so they don't do a sonogram, but if they can't find the heartbeat, they go looking for the baby. This rule makes me feel so torn. While she's pushing the doppler around in the goo on my belly, and I'm laying there listening to the static, part of me thinks "Please let there be a nice strong heartbeat" while another part of me that I keep telling to shut up thinks "Please don't let her find the heartbeat so that we can have a sonogram and see the baby!". SOMETHING is making me exhausted and making my stomach pop out, so I am pretty sure things are progressing as they should, but even still I can't quite bring myself to wish not to hear a heartbeat.

But hear a heartbeat we did, so Zippy is in there presumably growing away and doing what he/she should, AND we get to see him/her in 2 weeks! Now that we have a heartbeat and I'm not having any concerning symptoms, my odds of miscarriage are down to about 4%, and I am at the point where I would already know if my pregnancy was ectopic, or molar, or if I had a blighted ovum, or any of the other strange and terrifying things that can go wrong but still mimic a healthy pregnancy.

But even with many of my concerns eliminated, I still can't wait to see those arms and legs on an appropriately-sized, properly attached baby waving at me in 2 weeks :-)

Saturday, June 20, 2009

Vacation Schmacation

We have returned from Ocean City. It was beautiful, sunny, warm, perfect beach weather. That is, on Friday, the day we left. The rest of the week was freezing cold, gray, rainy, bleh. Every day someone would venture out onto the porch, peek hopefully at the sky and remark "I think it's clearing! I see some blue!" only to be blasted with an icy, misty, sandy ocean wind and come scurrying back inside.

I didn't mind so much. Emily is apparently stoically frightened of the ocean and of bodies of water larger than a bathtub in general, so she wasn't disappointed that it was too cold to swim. I say "stoically" frightened because there was no shrieking or crying or running away from the waves, there was just zero interest in getting any closer to the ocean than was necessary to access the beach sand, and flat-out refusal to be coaxed any closer to the water. She did love going to the pool even though she would only go in the first two steps, and any time we were not wrapped in towels shivering by the pool, she was asking to go to the pool.

Will and I were forcibly reminded though of why Emily has slept in her own room since the day we brought her home. This child thrashes, whines, cries, talks etc. in her sleep, then if she spots someone in the room with her, is awake and ready to go by 7AM, even though she reliably sleeps until 8:30-9 when we're at home. We were awakened many times over the course of the night by pitiful sleep-spoken sentences coming from the pack and play, like "mommy help blanket" and "watch a show", then at 7 (IF we were lucky), we'd hear giggling and "Mommy wake up!" and that was it. Emily doesn't have a sleep button. She actually woke up at 7 on Monday, 6:30 on Tuesday, 4:50 on Wednesday etc. We were DESPERATE for sleep, and once again, we could not take part in any fun activities like going out to bars with my sisters or playing games or watching movies because the minute Emily fell asleep, we had to go to sleep. This sleep deprivation was particularly difficult, considering I am exhausted already by the growing of another little kiddo to wake us up on vacation. We had kind of thought this crazy early waking up business that she did when we were in Bar Harbor was because she was sick, but apparently healthy Emily wakes up incredibly early on vacations too. This time though, it was too cold to go walking around with her outside, nothing was open for us to drive to, so we were forced to wrangle a toddler in a condo full of sleeping people for hours until it was a reasonable time to release her, thereby waking everyone up.

We did have some fun times though. Emily enjoyed the Kite Loft, playing on the beach (wearing a sweatshirt and pants), and she had her first carousel ride. When we finished, she pointed at the roller coaster next to the carousel and said "Ride that". I may finally have a roller coaster buddy! But maybe not, because once again, as soon as we got Emily out of the car after driving home from Ocean City, she barfed. Every time we have ever driven that girl in a car for longer than an hour or two, she barfs. EVERY TIME. So I'm thinking she gets motion sick in the car.

I guess family vacations from here on out are more for providing our children with experiences than they are for mommy and daddy to relax. Perhaps I am stupid for not having realized this already. But I guess I will have to work on not missing Emily so much when we go away, because it appears leaving her at home is the only way to get in an actual vacation.

So now I turn my attention to the trip we have planned in the end of August. If I don't let myself think about the details, I'm excited about it. We're going to Camp Gorham, up in the Adirondacks, which is the place Will went in the summer every year growing up. I've never been, and he's very excited to show me around his old stomping grounds and introduce me to people he grew up with. I am excited to finally see the Adirondacks, about which everyone I know speaks with breathless awe.

But now, we look at the details. It is an 8 hour drive up there, which is over twice as long as Emily's barf threshold. We will be staying in a cabin with a large portion of Will's mom's family, so we'll once again be desperate for sleep and desperately trying to keep her quiet every morning in a cabin full of people. There are apparently toilets in the cabins, but no showers. For those you have to walk a ways and share with the other campers, which sounds delightful considering the temperature is usually in the 40's at night. Probably the MOST annoying thing is that meals are served in a bit mess hall. Now this sounds wonderful to me...a whole week of having someone else making breakfast lunch and dinner for us! I like to eat as healthy as the next person, but when offered a prospect like that, I will gladly eat white-flour pancakes and hamburgers made with ground beef containing more than 8% fat.

Will, however, will not.

"We'll just take our own food", he says offhandedly. No big deal.

Right. We'll drive 3 people, all our stuff, AND enough food to feed a growing toddler (a lot), a pregnant me (a whole lot) and a healthy Will (you can't even imagine) 8 hours, to a place where there is no refrigerator? And then we will somehow doggedly prepare all our own meals in a cabin with no microwave or oven or stove while everyone else trots gaily off to the mess hall to have food prepared FOR them? All while making sure Emily doesn't wander off and get eaten by a bear or fall into the lake? Sounds wonderful.

And today, I find out that we're supposed to sleep in bunk beds in the same room as my mother and father-in-law. I have shared a room with my mother-in-law once before. I do not speak of this occasion, at least not on the internet. And that was when I was NOT a pregnant grouch and I did NOT have a toddler waking me up at 5 every morning.

I want to go. Just like I wanted to go to Alaska last year. But every time a trip is planned on that side of the family, things seem to get more and more complicated and stressful to think about as we approach go time. The 6 hour flight to Vancouver to get on the cruise ship (probably miserable with a 12 month old, but still in the realm of possibility) turned out to actually be a gazillion hour flight to Juneau with several layovers (I get hives thinking about trying to pull that off). A nice family vacation in the woods turns into "Oh yeah, and you have to sleep in a room with 4 other people, 2 of whom you are NOT comfortable sharing a room with. And you can't sleep in the same bed as your husband for a week. And there is no alcohol allowed". Not that I can drink, but it's the PRINCIPLE! I feel like I'm in high school again, but without the freedom because I also have a 2 year old to take care of.

I'd like to think I'm not a high-maintenance person. Sure, I love staying at an all-inclusive luxury resort as much as the next person, but camping and adventure travel can be lots of fun too. Anyone will tell you though, that taking care of a toddler, even in your own home on your own schedule with everything you need within arm's reach can be trying at times, and taking care of a toddler in the wilderness when many of the arrangements are out of your control can make you weep.

And call me crazy, but I like to sleep with my husband :-)

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Downtime and Dreamtime

Ahhh. Just got back from my little vacation from real life, and it was quite nice. While Will was in Orlando for 2 days I kind of moved in with my parents and sisters for a bit. They were thrilled to have Emily and I there for a couple days, and I was thrilled to be able to take naps and not have to clean my house and make food. I felt a bit guilty about being such a slug, and I did help out when I could, but they really did spoil me and it would've been a waste of their effort if I didn't enjoy it, right? :-)

So now I'm back at home, vacuuming up clumps of dog fur and trying to think of what to make for dinner. Breakfast-for-dinner (Brinner) has been popular recently, due to the inherently high carb content of most breakfast foods and my almost complete preference for carbs these days.

But don't feel too bad for me, on Sunday we leave for Ocean City! And since poor Will hasn't taken any vacation days yet this year (only sick days :-() he can stay the whole time. Emily asks every day to put on her bathing suit and go to Ocean City, and I'm excited to see what she thinks of the ocean this year. I also want to take her on the carousel at the boardwalk, bike riding, swimming in the pool, all sorts of fun stuff. Oh, and I want to relax and sleep too :-)

But before we leave for OC, I have a couple of crazy days of getting ready and packing, plus a 10-year high school reunion to attend on Saturday. A slight wrench has been thrown into the works by the fact that my belly has genuinely popped, and I look 20 weeks pregnant (or at least how I looked when I was 20 weeks last time). The outfit I got for the reunion will definitely not fit, or if I CAN squeeze my freakishly large belly into it it definitely won't look GOOD, so I have to pull something out of my maternity clothes box. Luckily I like most of my maternity clothes a lot. I have, in fact, started wearing my maternity clothes already because it's so uncomfortable to wear regular pants, and I might as well be comfy, since I have the clothes sitting there already.

I am actually quite grateful that I have a belly. I don't know what it IS, because it's definitely not baby yet, but it's in the shape of a pregnancy belly, so I'm going with it. I am grateful because now I will look pregnant and not just fat at the reunion and OC. It appears that I'll be lucky enough to skip the several month long "Ugh, I just look chubby" phase this time around.

And it may be too early to say, but I haven't been nauseous or gagging for a couple days in a row now, so I am heartened that I might be through the worst of the morning sickness. Which really wasn't TOO terrible, but I'm just a whiney wimp. In fact, aside from the lingering tiredness and the food aversions, I'm starting to really enjoy this pregnancy. The boob fairy finally showed up, although it seems she's been less generous this time. I'll take whatever I can get though. My nails are awesome, my belly is present, it feels like I'm already in the second trimester, even though I'm barely 9 weeks.

My dreams are dreadfully boring though. Pregnant ladies are known for having very vivid and often explicit dreams, and I'm wondering where my piece of that action is. In the past week, I have dreamed about scrubbing a bathtub (for a LONG time), putting all my school supplies back into my backpack at the end of a class (for a LONG time...I seriously must've dreamed about putting things in my backpack for about 20 minutes), and waiting in various lines at the grocery store (for...you guessed it, a long time). I even dreamed last night that I poured myself a glass of wine, but then thought I shouldn't drink it for some reason and dumped it out. I can't even drink wine and have fun in my dreams! My dream life is just like my normal life, just way more boring.

I guess I could be having BAD dreams, and I guess boring is better than bad, but geez. If I weren't already asleep, my dreams would PUT me to sleep.