Ok - People are starting to know

We told my sisters & brother this weekend. So, now I am just telling people as it comes up. No more keeping it a secret. Plus, I've got the telltale baby bump started. It really does come out faster with the second child than with the first.

I went through my maternity clothes to see just what I have for summer. I have a friend who offered to borrow me some, so hopefully I am covered. Since Isabel was an end of May baby, I only had a couple pairs of shorts & tank tops and a couple of capris. So, hopefully my friend will have a few more of each for me and I will fill in with some t-shirts. And I am hoping to borrow another swimsuit from someone. I have one, but we are getting a membership to the pool this summer and it's only 4 blocks away, so we hope to be there often and my one suit may not dry in between visits.

Still feeling sick & puking. Bah! I'm 12 weeks tomorrow. I am hoping that things settle more by the end of the month when I fly to Philly to visit a friend, but I have to be honest, I am nervous about still having all-day sickness and being in an airport & on a plane. Guess I'll figure it out.

10 Weeks

Well, I guess tomorrow I am officially 10 weeks. They did an ultrasound today to confirm due date and to check how many babies there were. The ultrasound said November 1 as a due date based on that tiny, tiny little peanut up there. The doctor said we are still going with October 28 since my period was regular. So, the baby is growing just as they are supposed to and there is only ONE baby in there. It would have quite a shock to hear there was more than one.

We will listen to the heartbeat at the next appointment in a month. The doc said they like to wait until at least 12 weeks to listen to the heartbeat because whereas we might be able to hear it now it would be hard to pick up on the in-room heart monitor. But she said she could see a little flicker of the heart beating on the ultrasound.

So, if you are looking at this picture and trying to figure out exactly where this baby is, look about 1/3 the way down and you see some black (that's my uterus) and then you can kinda see a little peanut there. You can see where the head on the left) is formed and where the rest of the body curls around as it lays on it's back.

So, the next appointment we will hear the heartbeat and probably the one after that we will have a 2nd ultrasound, at which point we can find out gender (which we do plan to do again).

As for me, I am down about 2 1/2 pounds since my first visit with the pee test. I was down 2.5 pounds at 12 weeks with Isabel. So far this pregnancy is shaping up to be quite similar.

Isabel was with me at the appointment and she was so great. I talked to her beforehand about the things the doctor & nurses would be doing and she didn't seem the least surprised when she saw it all. The cutest part was while I was getting my pap smear, she was standing on a chair by my shoulders and was rubbing my arm saying "It's ok mommy. It's ok." When the doctor asked her where the baby was, she patted her stomach and said "In my belly". Isabel knows that mommy has a baby in her belly, but she seems to think she has a baby in her belly as well. The doctor said it's very common for kids her age to internalize everything and think they have a baby too and call it "my baby".

Isabel sat & ate her snack during the ultrasound, so she didn't see the baby on the screen and wasn't interested in a seeing the picture, which is just as well because at this point it looks nothing like a baby and it might just be confusing.

To real change in the nausea & vomiting. I still have some nausea on the meds, but not as bad. And still constipated, but am making an effort to eat more foods (like apple stuff) that help with that. And vomiting still happens 1-2x a day. I am still exhuasted and still have to eat about every hour to keep the nausea from getting too severe.

Ok - it's NOT better.

So, I may not feel like puking all day, but I am still puking every day. Yes, it is now EVERY day and has been twice a day the past few days, generally in the evenings (just like Isabel). But with Isabel I could come home from work, vomit, and go to sleep. Now, I am home with an almost 3-year old all day, puke in the early evening, make supper & resume watching MORE tivo'ed kids' programs, wait for daddy to get home and vomit again whilehe does the bedtime routine (if he isn't home for that, I just take a break from kids' progams to go vomit before I put her to bed.)

Oh - and the apple-cranberry juice is NOT a good idea. It burns the second time around. And remember to ALWAYS drink lots of fluids when you eat (chew thoroughly, which that I remember). It would be a shame to choke on your vomit because it's too thick.

Constipation & Other Maladies

So, my drugs which are helping keep my nausea at bay are making me constipated. The drugs are not completly getting rid of my nausea & vomiting, but instead of feeling 75-100% nauseaous all the time, I usually feel 10-25%. So, much improvement. Although, the meds effects wear off as the day goes on and I have been taking a 2nd pill every other day.

I am still vomiting about every other day (there is no correlation to the amount of med I take.)

And fatigue is still a huge issue. I would say I am at 50-75% fatigue level at any given moment.

Now, I have constipation to contend with. I called the doc to ask what "non-medicine things I can take to help with that." Her nurse called back to tell me the doc recommended 400 mg of Colace, which is a stool softener & considered "medicine" in my book. I was looking for food or beverage recommendations, like eat prunes or drink apple juice, etc. It annoys me that doctors have to go to medicine right away. But I want to be delivered by a doctor in a hospital in case something does happen. And I didn't see any midwives on staff at this clinic we have to go to.

Anyways, I searched online about zofran & constipation and is if VERY common. I don't like prune juice and know there is no eay I could stomach it now at all. So, I am going to try an apple-cranberry blend of 100% juice. A mom (online) who had the same issue solved it by drinking a couple glasses of 100% cranberry juice, which I don't think I would like. Cranberry juice by itself is very bitter. But apple juice is notorius for causing diarrhea. You see it all the time in kids who drink too much of it. So, that is what I am going to try.

Also, can't stand any pressure on my stomach. Pants have to be pretty much falling off of me. And I realy don't like anything thta goes over my stomach. I will have to look when this went away with Isabel. I think it was around the same time the nausea went away and I was really starting to pop out.

And I get completly annoyed by excess noises, like the exhause fan in the bathroom or the vent fan in the kitchen. I keep the radio turned off in the car.

And smells really bother me. I am afraid to go to the supermarket sometimes because of all the smells. And I swore Wal-Mart smelled like dirty sweat socks when I picked up my meds last week. I tried really hard to breathe through my mouth only. And I have been avoiding the weekly playgroup at McD's because I am afraid of the over abundance of powerful smells. But the worst is helping Isabel in the bathroom. She does NOT smell like roses. And a 2 1/2 year old doesn't have the motor skills to wipe their butt properly after a bm and then there are times that she just doesn't want you to leave the bathroom. When daddy is home, I am lucky enough to get out of bm bathroom duty (he is not so lucky), but that only seems to happen about half the time.

I keep telling daddy that this is the last kid. He thinks he's funny& tells me I have to have 3 more, that he wants five. In reality, he would probably leave me if I had five (so there better not be 4 kids in there.)

Meds

Well, I couldn't take the nausea anymore. I called the clinic last night and they called me back this morning and got me in the afternoon. I got a prescription for Zofran, 4mg. So far they seem to work, but they are not to be used unnecessarily as they cost me $1 a pill and I can take up to 3 a day. Insurance pays about $36 for their share of the 12 pills, so really the pills are $4 a piece and I pay 25%. The good thing is that they don't make me sleepy, which is what the meds from wen I was pregnant with Isabel did. I didn't take too many of those because I needed to be a functioning, working member of society and couldn't sleep ALL the time. So, hopefully this will work out better. I see the doc for a regular appointment in a week and a half. So, maybe I will see if there is something cheaper that works the same, or maybe I won't need too many a day to keep the nausea at bay. Oh, and I do have the generic for Zofran. I wonder how much the actual Zofran would cost. Is generic for meds like generic in the grocery store?

All-Day Sickness Sucks!

I am pretty sure I never want to go through this all-day sickness ever again. Is his going to last 20 weeks like it did with Isabel. I had about 8 weeks after that where I felt good, before I started getting really big and she was kicking my lungs and bladder and pinching a nerve. Being pregnant was not all that fun and it's all coming back to me.

I am trying to do stuff with Isabel as much as I can, but this just keep getting worse everyday. To take a quote from one of my favorite movies (Office Space) "Every single day of my life has been worse than the day before it. So that means that every single day that you see me, that's on the worst day of my life." This only apply to my all-day sickness, I don't feel that way about life in general. But every single day it is the worse sickness ever. "Wow, that's messed up."

Seriously, how do people going through chemo find the strength to deal with the nausea? I know at the end of this I get a new little baby and I know that even if it last the full 40 weeks, it will be done it 40 weeks at the most.

I bought some pregnancy tea & peppermint tea & ginger capsules (which I couldn't take the smell of the ginger from the bottle made me dry heave and then I couldn't swallow them, that was awaste of $7.50) at the grocery store today. Actually, what made me feel betterwas a Wild Berry Smoothie from Caribou Coffee, which I got for my birthday from them. Too bad it costs $4.50 for a large one. That's an expensive nausea remedy.

I was reading today that it usually peaks about 4 weeks after it starts. Shit! I have 2 more weeks of it getting worse. Or who even knows since I had it for so long with Isabel.

The natural food sections also had homeopathic remedies, so I have been researching those a bit. I may go waste more money and see if that helps. I also might go try acupuncture, since I have that gift certificate I won at that silent auction a couple months ago. I just need to line up someone to watch Isabel so I can go.

And I am not above trying meds again. I don't really want to, but seriously, this really sucks.

Mums the Word

If you have been given this blog address it's because we told you. We are waiting longer to tell people this time, at least until we hear a heartbeat. So, please keep this to yourself. At this point we have only told the grandparents (or at least you are finding out because I gave you this) and daddy really wanted to tell one of his brothers. So, please let us tell people when we are ready and don't post anything on FB about it.

On another note - even though I planned ahead for MakesFour...I did not plan ahead for MakesFive and if you go to that it is someone else's blog.