Dear Santa.

Dear Santa,

Remember last year?

Well, I just wanted to thank you for the iPod touch you sent me.

It's sure come in handy since the other gift I asked for arrived. (I forgot to mention last year that one of the perks of the iPod is that you only need one hand to use it. Same with my Kindle, even though Shallow Man, rather than you, gave that to me for our anniversary/law school graduation/Mother's Day.)

So, since I got everything on my list, I really don't have anything I want to ask you for this Christmas (at least not for myself. But I trust you'll bring something special for the Little Guy).

But don't worry, I'll still leave out milk and cookies for you. The way I figure it, the way you came through this year, you've definitely earned them.

Respectfully and very gratefully yours, & cetera.



P.S. Oh, also? Remember how I mentioned how a firstborn child was a great gift idea because you could use it for bartering?

Well, after careful consideration of the firstborn son now sleeping on my lap, I take it back.

I wouldn't trade him for anything.

Checking in.

I haven't forgotten this blog, I promise. I've just been, well, busy. And being busy with a newborn, while it is lots of fun and provides cool things to blog about, isn't something I want to continually post about on this particular blog. I know that there were times before I had a child when other people had new babies and were so in love with them and didn't want to talk about anything else and while I was happy for them, it also hurt. I don't want to rub it in anyone's face, as it were.

But I will try to post on here more often in the future.

Not right now, because it's already late and I need to head to bed. But soon.

Surprise, surprise; or, he's here!

I don't have time (or energy) for a full post right now, but just wanted to let you all know that our little guy decided to make an early entrance (or it was decided for him after my blood pressure was dangerously high at my 36-week checkup). He arrived at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday night via c-section and is, quite simply, perfect. No complications for baby or for me so far. I'll share the full story later, but for now, here are my 1000 words:


Yeah, you just WISH your toes were that cute. :)

Checking in.

So it was pointed out to me that I haven't updated in a while. So I'm checking in.

We're at 33.5 weeks now and I am getting progressively more excited and panicky as the date approaches. I'm really looking forward to meeting our little guy, but still feel extremely unprepared. We're slowly but surely making progress on getting what wil be the nursery cleared out and ready for him, but it still has a way to go. Part of the problem is that while my nesting instincts are really kicking in, my energy levels are still pretty low (maybe it has something to do with the anemia? Or the fact that I'm just so cumbersome?) so it's harder to tackle big projects.

Speaking of cumbersome, I feel very big. (My daddy has started greeting me with the title "Great and Spacious One." If anyone else tries to call me that, though, there will be serious consequences.) I haven't gained too much weight this pregnancy (thanks to the brand-new weight loss program I discovered called "First Trimester") but the little guy is carrying really far forward so I stick out. A lot. I have to wash dishes standing sideways because my arms aren't long enough to really reach past my big tummy.

Sleeping is not working out so well. We're about to the point where I can sleep either in a comfortable position or in a position where I can breathe. I'm sleeping in 1.5-2 hour cycles and then have to get up several times during the night. My doctor says I can take Tylenol PM about three times a week to help out, but even then it mostly lengthens the cycles to 4 or 5 hours. I had one night this week where I was able to sleep straight through for 6.5 hours and it was amazing, but it hasn't happened again. The Tylenol does help ease the aches and pains so I don't wake up as stiff in the morning, though, which is also good.

It turned out that I do NOT have preeclampsia (big sigh of relief); just anemia and gestational diabetes (grumble). It hasn't been too much of a problem; it's more of an annoyance than anything else. My levels during the day were staying where they needed to be with diet and exercise but overnight my body always convinced itself that I was starving so my first-thing-in-the-morning levels were always pretty high, which means I have to take a pill to control it (no insulin shots, thank goodness). Unfortunately, because I'm on medication that means they have to monitor me more closely, so I have to go in twice a week to do non-stress tests. Other than the time commitment, though, I don't really mind this because it's a chance to briefly see the kid when they do the pre-test ultrasound to check my amniotic fluid levels, and getting to sit in those incredibly comfortable chairs which miraculously let me breathe AND be comfortable for 30-45 minutes in a semi-darkened room where I can just read and listen to baby's heartbeat is okay by me. It's seriously one of the most relaxing times of my day. (Baby doesn't particularly enjoy it when they have to wake him up with the buzzer to measure his elevated heart rates, though. He's definitely not going to be a morning person; his first experience with the buzzer brought on a tantrum that more than fulfilled the requirement for baby movement during the test and left me giggling because it is kind of hilarious to see my tummy moving like that.)

The main annoyance I have with the GD situation is the weariness of testing 5-6 times a day and having to eat at those regularly scheduled times with all the new dietary restrictions. Carbs and I have always been BFFs and now that I have to carefully monitor how many I'm getting I keep getting confronted (bombarded, really) with ads for donuts or bread or cupcakes or potatoes or whatnot. Also, my main craving during this pregnancy and one of the only things I could reliably count on to keep nausea at bay has been juice. And juice has so many carbs that it's not even worth it now. Also I have to be careful on my fruit levels because of all those natural sugars. So my diet options have become limited and frustrating even though my stomach's nausea-induced picky eating hasn't really subsided. So it's a bit frustrating and I have been spending the last few weeks telling Shallow Man "When the baby comes and I can eat again, we're going to get milkshakes/have an eclair/eat more waffles than you can shake a stick at/get drunk on orange juice/etc."

With all of that, though, I really do love being pregnant, even if I'm not overly fond of the side effects of pregnancy. I love feeling baby kick and wiggle and move around (as long as he doesn't try to dislodge my spleen or start tickling me while I'm driving). I love seeing him move. I love cuddling up next to Shallow Man and having him feel baby go crazy-go-nuts. I love registering for tiny socks (and big hats because our child has a large noggin. The doctor at the first post-diabetes ultrasound was a little worried about his head measurement until she saw Shallow Man's head and heard that we both have a hard time finding hats that fit) and looking at cribs and strollers. I love the sudden realizations that come over me at various times during the day, like "Oh, I'm going to need to get him a stocking for Christmas" or "I will have a TINY BABY to dress up for Halloween this year! Score!" or "If I want to go see that play that's coming in December I will need to arrange for a babysitter then." It's a wonderful feeling to know that our family is growing and that we've made it farther than I thought we would this time last year.

Of course there are feelings of nervousness, too, when I remember what has to happen to actually get the little guy out in public. But I'm finding it's easier to be calm when I focus on the fact that the end result will be, quite frankly, the most awesome baby the world has seen, at least in the last couple of millenia. We can hardly wait to meet our son!


(And I have to admit I'm looking forward to re-discovering what it's like to stand up without having to wait for gravity to finish re-arranging my internal organs and occupant, which inevitably results in my bladder getting squished, followed by a rapid waddle towards the bathroom.)

Mixed bag; or, Potpourri.

So up until this point my pregnancy has been progressing pretty normally, except with more nausea and vomiting than I personally would care for. (Yeah, remember when I thought I liked the second trimester? Second trimester LIED. That was NOT a beautiful relationship.)

Apparently my body was just saving up the real drama, because after a ridiculous amount of poking and prodding and blood-drawing and other totally fun stuff (my poor arms have bruises inside both elbows from the six times they had to draw blood last week) it has been determined that I am anemic. And have gestational diabetes. And we're waiting to hear back on the preeclampsia thing.

Yeah. And yee-haw.

I'm not too worried at the moment—saving that for when there's actually a need to be worried—but I am annoyed. Wouldn't you know that the minute my time frees up to do some of that baking I've been wanting to do during the months of bar study that I'm suddenly not allowed to eat cookies and such anymore? Good grief.

But that anemia thing does explain the absolutely dead-beat, bone-tired, no energy thing. And the iron supplements have helped a lot with that. So that's something.

But the good news is that 1) we have a name for the kid. Which I will NOT be sharing on the internet. Which means I need to figure out an appropriate alias for him. Drat. More naming. Hm. 2) We've got a battle plan for the nursery and are actually getting some work done on it (still trying to decide if this plan will involve painting or not) and 3) the kid is getting big enough that I can feel all sorts of fun movement.

Luckily he hasn't figured out where my ribs are yet, and has turned around so he's not kicking any nerves anymore, so most of the movement is of the "whoa, cool" or "ARGH! That tickles!" variety. I admit that I have certain visuals for certain types of movement. Besides the Jackie Chan/ninja kicks and the punching bag moves, we also have the "squirrelly squirrel!" genre (mostly the first 15 seconds or so):



And what I like to refer to as his "stoutness exercises":



He also, today, did something that I swear felt like he sneezed. I guess he's doing his job to help me fight off the nasty cold that Shallow Man gave me. Thanks for the support, kiddo! (Also, it was just so dang cute. Love that little guy.)

Another brief restrospective; or, PICTURES!

Again, a wonderful comparison of then and now:

This time last year I was almost done with the week of limbo between finding out there was no heartbeat and actually miscarrying.

Today we went in for our follow-up ultrasound. It's still a boy, he's still healthy (and they could see everything they needed to; this time he was much more cooperative), and we are still thrilled.

But because my time is limited these days and I need to get back to studying, I won't take the time now to write down all my happy thoughts. Instead, I'll leave you with these. Consider this your 2,000 word post. :)

Profile (love the lips!):


Face (he has British cheeks):

Come a long way.

A year ago today, we sat in an unwelcoming room waiting to hear the news, knowing what was coming but somehow praying that the outcome would be different, that somehow the little heartbeat they hadn't found was really there after all.

This morning, I woke up stiff and sore because there's no way to sleep comfortably right now, and felt the little guy start his morning kickboxing routine.

A year ago, I could never have envisioned that we'd be where we are now.

We've come a long way.


There are a lot of things I want to post about, but we're both studying for the bar exam this month and so they'll mostly have to wait. Sorry in advance for any perceived or real neglect, and I'll see you in August.

It's a . . .

Baby was curled up, face down, just like a potato bug, and we weren't sure we were going to be able to find out the flavor at first. (In fact, we're going to need to get a second ultrasound in a few more weeks since that position meant the technician couldn't get as detailed a view of the heart as she wanted. She said not to worry, because everything she could see looked great and healthy, but they're interested in more detail right now. So we're going to have to go in and see our little one again. Oh, darn. :) How will we ever handle that?)

So we took a little break so I could poke around and see if we could get baby to wake up or shift position a bit. Mostly what I got for my pains was a half-hearted little kick to the bladder ("Leave me alone, Mom! Five more minutes.") But then baby rolled to the side for a moment or two, just long enough to get a little peek at . . .

Technician: And see there? That's between the legs.

Me: (thinking: But that's a . . .)

*pause*

Me: We're having a boy?

Yep, that's right -- it's a boy! This actually came as a pretty big surprise to us, since we've both felt pretty strongly from the beginning, and even before that, that this baby was a girl. We had even had a prompting about what her name was supposed to be. This meant that we hadn't really seriously thought about boys' names this time around.

We're very excited to be getting a little boy (I have three adorable nephews and love them all to bits. Although this does mean that my one little niece is going to be even more outnumbered now). But I am panicking just a bit because I have no idea what we're going to call him. And if we can't come up with a more viable option soon, he may just end up being Axel Danger or Commander Awesome. And while that's a name that, once you're an adult, means nobody will mess with you, EVER, you still have to survive to adulthood with that name.

So, welcome to our family, little guy. We love you more than you can imagine, and we can't wait to meet you. And I promise we'll figure out a better moniker than just "hey, you there, boy" by the time you make your grand appearance.


Baby boy celebrated the big reveal by doing a lengthy Rockettes impression last night, so Shallow Man got to feel a lot of real kicking, which he hasn't really been able to do up till now. So much fun!

The big day; or, A Poll.

So folks, today's the big day. We're getting our ultrasound this afternoon and get to find out what flavor of baby we're having. So place your bets! I'll let you all know when we find out.

Super-quick thought

So I've reached 19 weeks now and am almost at the halfway point and am completely freaked out by this picture here.

Really, do they have to make my baby look quite that, well, claustrophobic?

Honestly.

At any rate, my hopelessly squished baby and I are off to bed. With any luck I can sleep through until next week when baby starts looking much less desperately uncomfortable.

Really, now, illustrators, who thought that was a good plan?

Quick thought: Mother's Day.

This year will be the first time I have been pregnant on Mother's Day. But I still remember all the other years and want to take this moment to say that I am thinking of and praying for all of my friends who are struggling with miscarriage or infertility. For many years I couldn't go to church on Mother's Day because it was too much. I know it's hard, and I know there's not always much you can do about it. But I want to assure you all that you are loved, and wish you a happy (if bittersweet) day just the same. Peace be with you.

Finally.

I've got a lot of blog posts that have been brewing for the last month but haven't been written yet because of finals and projects and sickness and such. And I'm not writing them tonight, either, because I'm reveling in the fact that I don't have anything I have to do right now (WAHOO for graduation!).

But I did want to make an important announcement here:

Today I did not have to take any anti-nausea medication.

Yes.

Second trimester appears to be here and loving life. And I am loving the second trimester so far. Never been this far before, but I think it may be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Update

They found the heartbeat right off. I mean RIGHT off. (Baby is definitely a show-off.)

If you felt a large gust of near-gale force wind this morning around 9:30, that was us breathing a huge sigh of relief.

Thank you for the prayers! It means a lot.

Insomnia; or, Flashbacks.

Tomorrow morning I go in for my 12 week appointment. I'll be hearing Baby's heartbeat on a Doppler.

Tonight I can't sleep.

Never mind that we've already seen Baby's strong little heartbeat, severely lessening chances of miscarriage. Never mind that I've been consistently sick for the past seven and a half weeks. Never mind that I haven't had any symptoms of anything other than normally progressing pregnancy. Never mind that my pregnancy symptoms are pretty much textbook pregnancy symptoms so far, something that never happened the other two times.

All I can think about, as I pray over and over again, "Please let them find the heartbeat right off," is that exactly 39 weeks ago, the exact same prayer was going through my mind the night before my last 12 week appointment. I was pretty confident that everything was fine, but I really didn't want to have to deal with the suspense and false panic if they couldn't find it right off.

And then the next morning they couldn't find the heartbeat with the Doppler. No big deal, I thought, plenty of people say they couldn't find the heartbeat right off. They took me downstairs just to check with the ancient sonogram machine. Couldn't find a heartbeat. But no big deal, because really, when I say ancient I mean you could barely even tell there was a uterus in that image. So they sent me to the hospital to check on the fancy new machine. No big deal, because I get to see my baby.

And then they couldn't find a heartbeat there.

And then it was a very big deal.

Both Shallow Man and I have a very good feeling about this pregnancy. We're confident that it's going to work out. But that isn't making the flashbacks go away so I can sleep yet.

Tonight, 39 weeks later, I'm praying the same prayer and just hoping that tomorrow will be a good day, with no further sense of deja vu.

Please, PLEASE, let them find the heartbeat right off this time.

Dear, sweet child . . .

I know I always jokingly say that doing homework makes me sick to my stomach.

But I really need to get this done today.

So please, let's establish some boundaries right now:

Stop taking me so literally!

Or at the very least hold off on the sickness until after my major project is finished.

Thank you.

And now for something best of all; or, "!!!!!"

So I don't have the energy at this point to write a long post.

But if a picture is worth a thousand words, I think a

one . . .



two . . .



or three . . .



thousand word post would definitely be long enough, right?

Short story: Our surprise little miracle Baby Nib or Shallow Jr. is scheduled to arrive in October. We got the sonogram this morning and saw our little one and heard the heartbeat for the first time ever and I have to say it's kind of addicting and completely over-the-top amazing and we couldn't be more thrilled. We are thanking our Heavenly Father daily, hourly, and more for this blessing.


The other good news is that the crippling morning sickness I've been suffering with for the last month or so (I may or may not have lost about 10 pounds in that time) is responding VERY well to the new prescription they gave me (after the last prescription made it about ten times worse). I may even make it back to class for the last few weeks of my last semester!

Now for something more light-hearted.

So I read blogs.

Lots of blogs.

Blogs of friends and family, yeah.

But mostly blogs of people I do not know and will never meet.

And I'm okay with that.

Because many of these people are hilarious.

And sometimes they have posts like this.

And then I just have to share.

(And I also wonder why I never thought of that.)


Hmmm.

Maybe it's time to find some cabbage. . . .

Heavy heart

I don't think I ever truly understood what it felt like to mourn with those that mourned until I had my miscarriages. I always felt deeply for people when they had trials or tragedies and would sympathize with them, talk with them and even, I hope, help make their way a little easier to bear. But it was sympathy and not empathy.

Since I have begun blogging, albeit irregularly, about our infertility struggles and the heartache of the miscarriages, I have come across the amazing network of blogs and communities of women and couples who are struggling, too. I am not a central player in any of this; I tend to lurk and read blogs without commenting most of the time. One of these days when I'm more organized I will get around to putting up a list of some of these blogs that have inspired and helped me.

When I hear about any of these wonderful people getting that positive test, or getting chosen for adoption, I cheer for them. When they find out the flavor of their baby, I start thinking thoughts of pink or blue. When they post pictures of their miracles, I coo and sigh and melt and post comments with wayyy too many exclamation points.

And then there are those other days. Days when someone gets one more negative test. Days when suddenly it's too hard for someone to put on a hopeful face and they need to vent or cry or scream in frustration. Days when the Clomid didn't work, or a new round of shots failed, or the doctors just don't know what to try next.

Or days of loss, like today. Days when I find out that one of these amazing couples has been unchosen for adoption. And then the loss seems as unbearable to me as if it had been my own. I'm weeping as I type this, because my heart aches for this couple (who most likely had no idea I was even reading their blog). I can't lift the burden for them. I can't make it better. All I can do for them is mourn as they mourn.

Please, keep Josh and Savannah in your prayers.

I suppose you're wondering why I've gathered you all together today.

So I think we've figured out the answer to the mystery:

Barb @ getupandplay said...
Weird! Strange coincidence, my baby boy Charlie is one of the babies in that issue. I can't think how it got to your inbox though! What a bizarre thing!

Not so bizarre, Barb. No so bizarre at all.

I remember a few months back, Barb mentioned that baby Charlie (who is pretty freaking adorable if pictures are to be believed) was a finalist in some baby contest and urged us all to go vote for him. Being the supportive friend and sucker for cute baby pictures that I am, I obliged. Apparently it was a good thing I did, too, because this cute boy did win second place in his category. Yes, after seeing Barb's comment, I checked my free issue and found the exact picture for which I had voted published right there for all those with free subscriptions to see (my votes for the other two age categories also ended up winning prizes. Do I have great taste in babies or what? And you're welcome, Barb!).

What sealed the deal: as I remembered voting for these kids, I had a vivid flashback to the voting process. Rather than having little radio buttons you could toggle and submit, all of the photos were numbered. In order to vote you had to submit your three choices . . .

BY EMAIL.

(dun dun DUH!)

So I guess I won a prize, too, just for voting. Kind of like this:



So the moral of the day is: if you vote, mysterious things happen to you, culminating in free magazine subscriptions.

Or you might just get a sticker. Whichever.

In any event, I this it's now safe to say . . .

Case closed.


Thanks, Barb, for providing the clue that cracked this case wide open. Give that cute baby of yours a squeeze for me!

Puzzled.

So I have a mystery on my hands.

Yesterday, at 8:04 p.m., I received in my email inbox the following:

We hope you enjoy your free subscription to the Utah Baby Guide.

That was it.

No preamble, no explanation of why I have received a free subscription to the Utah Baby Guide. No indication of how they got my contact information. Not even really an official announcement of my having received a free subscription. An implied announcement, yes, but not an explicit one. No clue as to where this is coming from. Just a free subscription, just like that, and I was left scratching my head trying to figure out why this email was sent to me.

And I must confess that I'm stymied.

I haven't signed up for any mailing lists or free drawings or anything. The email address it was sent to was my personal address, rather than the junk one I give out when I sign up for free things anyway. I haven't been frequenting any baby sites or anything that would have given me this hookup. Back when the second miscarriage happened in July, I unsubscribed from the baby sites so I wouldn't keep getting the weekly emails because it was just too painful at the time. Come to think of it, even those emails went to a different account than this one. (Yeah, yeah, I have more email accounts than a normal person needs or ought to have. Whatcha gonna do?) And nobody has mentioned to me, "Oh, hey, I signed you up for a free subscription to the Utah Baby Guide." (That a friend signed me up is the most likely scenario since after the graphic the email does say that if I have a friend I'd like to give a subscription to I just need to click this link, yadda yadda, but still, if someone did sign me up they didn't mention anything about it.)

I should probably have made it clear from the get-go that I'm not upset about this, just mightily puzzled.

Where did the mystery subscription come from? Are there more on the way? Was this a completely random spam-like thing, and if so, why did my spam filter let this one through but block all the Viagara and discount Rolex ones?

Ah, life's eternal questions have risen once again.

And in the meantime, I guess I'll just wonder about the mystery and read the story about the triplets with the cute photo where they're all wearing ties and crying their eyes out.



And if any of you have any light to shed on this puzzle, please let me know. I love mystery stories, but my favorite part is always at the end when Poirot or Miss Marple or Nick and Nora call everyone in for a dinner party and reveal the solution, beginning with the speech about "I suppose you're wondering why I've gathered you all together today." Love that part! So yeah . . . let me know.

Moment of Silence

Today was my due date.

My day started out bright and early with an 8:00 class. Well, early for me, anyway. And actually not bright at all because it was snowing -- the light, slushy kind that's more like rain that's just trying a little too hard but is still no fun to walk or drive in -- and dark. Dark enough that I almost didn't wake up on time because, obviously, if it's still that dark it's not early enough to be getting out of bed. At least it cleared up the nasty, nasty, NASTY smog we've been breathing for the last few weeks.

And I thought to myself, Well, at least Shallow Man doesn't have to drive me to the hospital in the snow.

Because I do try to look on the bright side when possible. And I really didn't want to have any kind of breakdown today.

So I went one further: I am grateful that I did not have to ride to the hospital in the snow with Shallow Man (a native Floridian; remind me to tell you about the first Christmas he spent with my family when it snowed nearly 16" in 24 hours) behind the wheel.

And one more: I'm glad that said ride did not happen while I was looking down the barrel of giving birth to a child for the first time. Because I can't imagine that particular set of circumstances would be terribly zen-inducing.

But I had to stop there. Because I really would rather have gone through all of that if it meant I'd be holding my baby in my arms tonight.

And I did make it through the day without a breakdown. Which is pretty amazing considering the far-above-average number of detailed delivery stories that were told to me today. Purely by chance. Because I'm lucky like that.

Realistically, of course, I know that I would probably still have been pregnant at this point anyway, because, hey, I'm always running late and any child of mine would obviously have several of my genes. But I'd rather think about my baby than about waiting, because, well, I do a lot of waiting as it is.

And then I need to think of the bright side again.

So.

At least I didn't have to ride to the hospital in the snow today.