Belly, Week 37

Okay, so I’m lying, this is actually me at 37 and a half weeks. Which means that I have two and a half weeks until my due date, yes, I am awesome at math. I’m pretty sure I’ve never been so concerned about the HALVES since ages four through ten, when the six-month mark of every year was some kind of major milestone in my life, but yet here we are again and I’m regressing back into those juvenile days HALVING it up, HALF HALF HALF HALF HALF.

At my OB appointment today my doctor still wasn’t sure if Avalon was transverse like she was last week or if she had finally made her way into the head down position, so, yay!, I got yet another ultrasound to check her positioning. The good news is that she was indeed head down, and what we thought was her head under my ribs was actually her butt. Her really cute butt. The ultrasound technician also gave me another great profile picture of her while she was yawning. Apparently we were keeping the princess up.

The other good news this week was that I have only gained one pound since last week’s appointment, and considering my newly adopted ’screw the weight gain’ attitude being followed by grilled cheese sandwiches, ice cream sundaes, and burritos, I’m quite pleased. Thank you, confused, whacked-out metabolism.

In these days and weeks leading up to delivery, I have been reading several bloggers’ birth stories and getting anxious to write my own. Just this week dooce wrote about the birth of her second baby here, and GAH, is she an awesome and inspirational writer. I may or may not have read that post five times already with plans to read it five more times before the end of the day. Here is the birth story of her first daughter, and although totally different in both format and content than the second time around, it’s just as awesome. Another favorite of mine is by Alice at finslippy, and her birth story made me howl, it is so hilarious. Anyway, my point is that I’m so stoked to write about my own labor and delivery experience…and then be able to look back and read it 25 years later.

There may even be a point, perhaps sixteen years from now, when I’ll need to have Avalon read it, study it, ENVISION IT, you know…just to make sure she knows she should respect her mama. So not only is the birth story a written memory, we’ll call it A VERY VALUABLE PARENTING TOOL.

Inside my brain

Rob is taking me to get a pedicure tonight. I asked him yesterday if he would since my toes are in total disrepair and 1) it’s physically impossible for me to contort my body enough to reach down and paint my own toes and 2) I don’t exactly trust Rob to do it. However, I’ve realized that me saying that Rob is “taking me to get a pedicure” sounds a lot more glamorous and romantic than it really is, considering all he is doing is dropping me off at the salon while he goes and runs some of his own errands. It’s not like he’s going to sit with me throughout the whole thing or whip out cash to pay for the pedicure when I’m done. So really, scratch that first sentence, Rob has nothing to do with it. 

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Etsy has been a dear friend of mine ever since I found out that we were expecting a girl. Are you aware of the endless treasures that etsy offers for babies? So far I have bought lots of headbands, bows, and baby leg warmers for Avalon and everything is so adorable. It was all moderately priced, too, and I really like buying straight from the artists themselves. Something about it makes me feel like a good samaritan. 

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I’ve turned into a peach fanatic lately. In the past three days I’d estimate that I’ve eaten at least seven peaches. They’re so juicy and good this time of year, it makes me wish that summer lasted all year long so we could enjoy the fresh produce. I thought about whipping up some peach cobbler or peach pie or peachy something-or-other, but I just can’t bring myself to do it. I think I must unconsciously love the unadulterated peaches too much to let them mingle with flour and sugar. And if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. 

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Yesterday I got to meet the Head Honcho of labor nurses at the hospital where I will be delivering Avalon (she is a client of my mom’s). She was really, really nice and made me feel very comfortable and at ease about labor and delivery. Her biggest piece of advice for me was to STAY OUT OF BED when in labor. Stay on my feet, move around, use the tub, do the hokey-pokey, whatever it takes. Which is all good, but you know what all those things mean? No epidural. Epidurals essentially glue your butt to the bed and you forfeit the opportunity of getting out of it until after the whole thing is done and over with. So! I think I’m going to try and remain mobile and epidural-free for as long as my body can handle it. This could be six minutes or six hours. What a fun gamble. Anybody want to place any bets? 

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You know when your split ends are screaming at you to get a haircut but you ignore all the commotion and let it just keep on growing, dry, split ends and all? That’s where I am right now, as I’m on a quest to grow my hair long again. My hair has been every length and color in the past twelve years, from pixie cut to way down my back, and here is some more recent evidence:

This was right before our wedding, and was the longest my hair had ever been. I had grown my hair out for a couple of years knowing that I wanted it really long for my wedding. Then I got married and this happened:

I hacked it off, a la Posh Spice, and donated the remains to Locks of Love figuring that, hey, my wedding was over, I didn’t need all that hair anymore.

Now I’m in the BLAHHHH middle/boring length trying to get it back to where it was pre-wedding. I don’t know why, I guess I just liked it. And also (THIS IS GOING TO SOUND SO SHALLOW, CAN’T BELIEVE I AM EVEN SAYING THIS), I want to be a ‘cute mom’. And I picture myself as a ‘cute mom’ with long hair. Also: I love throwing my hair up into a quick ponytail.

Ugh, I am ridiculous. Somebody slug me. 

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Another baby shower

In my bird post last week I mentioned that my sister and My Bff Mo had given me a baby shower. Although it was almost a month ago, I wanted to wait to blog about it until I had pictures. And now I do! Because my other friend, Shannon, used her mad skillz and took some awesome photos throughout the day. (She’s really good.) I’m so grateful that she was there and offered to take pictures because I have this problem where I never remember to bring my camera ANYWHERE. This has got to stop after Avalon gets here. I think I’m going to need to super glue my camera to my hand.

They had lots of good food. And made a cute little bird nest-thing around the chip bowl.

The gifts. Isn’t that Moses Basket cool?

This is, of course, where the birds came from that are now framed in Avalon’s room. Such a cute idea at the shower.

Action shot! Although some couldn’t make it, I loved having my close friends with me that day.

Getting ready to open gifts. I must have been excited. Sorry Avalon, your mama is a dork. But I’m sure you’ll figure that out yourself in about thirteen years.

Cute shtuff. I got lots of cute shtuff.

My proud and excited mom, soon to be Mamie. She has already spoiled Avalon a lot. This could be dangerous.

The breast pump that my mom bought for me. Do you ever think my mom thought about the day when she would buy her daughter a breast pump? I’m guessing no, just like I’m choosing to not think about me ever buying Avalon a breast pump. LA LA LA, SHE’S NEVER GOING TO GROW UP, LA LA LA.

Thanks for a great baby shower, guys!

Belly, Weeks 33-36

I’m now into what I lovingly refer to as the OH SHIT phase of pregnancy. As in, OH SHIT, we’re really going to have a baby. Soon. And OMG what did we do to ourselves? And OMG life will never be the same! And OMG THIS IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING, WE’RE HAVING A BABY, WHAT IF WE’RE NOT READY, WHAT WERE WE EVER THINKING GIVING UP ON THE YAZ?

I’m having a reality shock that it’s possible for the baby come at any point now. (And shall we just make it official that since I just made that statement Avalon will decide to free-ride in my womb approximately two weeks past my due date?) The couple of contractions I have had in the past few nights only make this realization even more crystal clear, as has the rapid third trimester weight gain, horrendous heart burn, and multiple nighttime trips to the bathroom. Seems to me that when added up all of these symptoms say, Pack Your Bags, The End Is Near.

Which, I haven’t even done yet. Pack my bags, I mean. I have been intending to start collecting things to take to the hospital and throwing them in a bag, but have yet to actually put those thoughts into motion. And really, it’s been hard for me to put much of anything into motion because I feel so heavy and round and huge that I have almost lost control of my entire body and if I get going too fast and pick up too much inertia there’s a chance that I’ll either never be able to stop moving or that I’ll just give in to my bulbous physique, make my way to the floor, and roll myself everywhere I need to go like a stubby little oompa loompa.

At my doctor’s appointment today we realized that Avalon’s not quite ready to make her way out of her cozy home yet anyway, as she has yet to drop head-down into the swan dive position. Instead she typically prefers to be ‘transverse’, basically wrapping herself around my entire midsection like my own little equator. It’s always really obvious when she is in this position because I have two large lumps on either side of my stomach with a valley in the middle, and if someone didn’t know better they might assume just by looking at my belly (yeah, it’s that obvious) that there’s two in there. However, we all know that she’s the only tenant, although after stepping on the scale today I may have wished that there was more going on in there, as I’ve packed on a solid 30 pounds already. What’s really unfortunate is that I can assure you not all of the weight is in my belly. And that’s all I want to say about that.

So here we are, with four weeks left. Four weeks of heart burn, maternity pants, and the inability to give myself a pedicure. Four weeks left of selfish freedom*. Four weeks left of just the two of us*. Four weeks until I have my baby girl in my arms*. It’s coming so soon!

*Refer to first sentence of this post.

I will call this “art.”

A couple of weeks ago My Bff Mo and my sister, Courtney, gave me another baby shower. It was fun, with all of my close friends, and had a little bit of a bird theme going on. (Important to note for the record: none of us are really theme-y people, but this was pulled off really nicely without being too over-the-top, grody theme-y. Thank you and good bye.) One of the cute things they did was cut silhouettes of birds out of really cool, patterned paper then hung them all around. Once the shower was over they decided to keep the paper birds for me in case I had a light bulb moment and thought of something interesting to do with them.

Unfortunately, I don’t have many of those so-called light bulb moments and am not typically very creative. However, Courtney sort of led me to think about mounting the birds on white paper then framing them and hanging them in the nursery. While doing some shopping on Sunday I found some picture frames that were 40% off, and not being able to deny myself of a good deal I bought four of them thinking I would try the bird-framing idea.

Again, not necessarily a fan of birds, per se, and without doing a major bird theme in the nursery, I think I really like how the whole thing turned out.

Not only do I really dig the patterns and colors that are going on, but what’s better than an art project that takes less than fifteen minutes?

Nothing, that’s what.

Confessional: Out of Control

I never thought that when I stepped onto the scale I would see the numbers that I saw yesterday. As every day passes the numbers creep higher and higher, as does my blood pressure upon seeing how far away from my pre-pregnancy weight I am straying.

What kills me the most is knowing that I have little to no control over the weight gain. Before getting pregnant I liked and took advantage of the control I had over my weight. I was somewhat careful with what I ate, and I enjoyed working out on a fairly consistent basis. If I did splurge on crappy food I knew that all I had to do to make up for it was take an extra kickboxing class or cycle a few extra miles. This happened all the time, truth be told, because my willpower when it comes to food is horrible. I’d rather exercise like a gerbil on a wheel for hours on end than deprive myself of some delicious grub. 

All that being said, I was still far from having the perfect physique or weight, yet I was in a place where I was comfortable and happy.

Also: CONTROL. 

At almost nine months pregnant, the control thing is obviously on hiatus. If I eat like crap, I’m physically unable to just ‘work it off’ like I used to. And even if I don’t eat like crap, the numbers on the scale are still going to keep getting higher. 

It’s challenging to break through my old mindset and accept the fact that, at this point, my weight is (mostly) out of my control. It’s not something I dwell on all the time, and luckily I haven’t really had to up until my third trimester when I quit kickboxing and all of a sudden the pounds just begin piling on.

I’m looking forward to the days where I can exercise again and achieve some new physical goals. I’m thinking of maybe even running another half marathon, which means something serious because did you know? I HATE RUNNING. I even told my kettlebell trainer that she has full permission to kick my butt like she never has before, which is something I will probably regret ever saying as soon as I step back into the gym.

All I know is that I am more motivated than I ever have been before.

I am woman, hear me roar. Maybe.

Ever since Saturday I have been meaning to sit down and unload all of the thoughts and information that have been swirling around inside my head since the childbirth class Rob and I attended. Unfortunately, daily life has a tendency of getting in the way of blogging sometimes so I’m a bit behind, but if I may, I’d like to blame part of my absence in blogland on Jillian for stealing away two precious hours of my Monday evening. And as if that isn’t bad enough, she had to make the unfortunate decision to send Reid home, which is something I will never understand because Reid is a Hottie Two-Shoes.

(P.S., Jill, I have no words for you and will never figure out why you prefer men in hot pants over men in sexy spectacles. Is that a Canadian thing? Thank you and goodbye forever.)

Anyway, walking into the classroom Saturday morning at the hospital, Rob and I had no idea what to expect from the childbirth class. All we knew was that it was going to take up an entire day of our precious weekend, albeit a gorgeous, sunny day which we could have spent out by the pool soaking up summer’s precious rays. And when our instructor – a hunch-backed, gray-haired, eighty year-old lady – came walking into the room we really questioned whether this was going to be worth our time or not. I didn’t need some old hag barking breathing techniques at me all day.

But when she introduced herself and started talking to the class she immediately charmed us. She may have been old, but she had a spunky personality and over forty years of experience as a labor nurse. She knew what she was talking about and had seen a lot of births in her day. She even had a really cute way of pronouncing ‘baby’ so that it sounded more like ‘baybay’, which made the day a little extra entertaining.

Throughout the class she hit on a whole slew of topics: female anatomy and why we feel the way we do when we’re pregnant; labor “stations” and dialation; pain management; relaxation techniques; c-sections; contractions. We got the lowdown on the whole shootin’ match and she held nothing back.

But best of all she had some sweet visual aids to accompany her lectures. The prop she used most often was a baby doll named “Penelope” that was able to fold up all fetus-like and represented a seven pound baybay. She then used Penelope, along with a very graphic spandex contraption meant to represent a woman’s pelvis and nether regions, to demonstrate the the way contractions contribute to a baby’s birth, and what I really mean is HOW THE BAYBAYS MANAGE TO SQUEEZE THEMSELVES OUT OF THE HOO-HA.

Can you please picture an eighty-year-old woman pushing a baby doll through a spandex vagina right now? Lord have mercy. It’s just about fifty-four kinds of wrong, isn’t it?

I’m not really sure why she felt she needed to use props for that, as I think we can all imagine that sight vividly enough on our own internal movie screens, but as if that wasn’t enough she then threw a video tape into a VCR and made us watch two couples from the seventies give birth. I have to say, those videos were probably easier on the eyes than Penelope and the spandex, believe it or not.

As it turned out, the class was really great and changed my whole mindset on labor and delivery. Prior to the class I had my birth plan all figured out, and to sum it up in one word, DRUGS. I planned on having the epidural jabbed into my back before I even changed into my hospital gown so that I could then spend the rest of my labor lollygagging and watching the Food Network until it was time to push.

Because I was scared of natural labor, scared of contractions, and scared of the physical pain.

Now I’m not so scared, but rather anxious, with a newfound sense of empowerment. All our instructor did was explain to us how our bodies were made for labor, and how contractions are not meant to hurt us but to help us. That the more we worked with our body – rather than fight it – the better and faster our labor would be. She didn’t try push us (PUN!) to have natural labors, she just simply gave us the facts.

I left the class instantly encouraged.

I’m not delusional or naive enough to assume that I’m going to have a drug-free, natural labor. I am, however, more inclined to give myself a chance. I want to see how strong I am and how much I can handle. I like giving myself a challenge, and I’d assume that this is The Mother Of All Physical Challenges, Ever, even more than snatching a 35-pound kettlebell over my head. But if the pain gets bad enough that I want to have an epidural, I’m not going to feel disappointed in myself or chastise myself for ‘giving in’. 

Now won’t it be fun to come back and read this post again after I go through the whole birth experience and compare it to my pre-conceived notions? That should be a blast.

A Random Cocktail

Rob is going to be out of town next weekend over my birthday, so for the past couple of days he has been bugging me to open my present. He was so anxious for me to open my gift that you would have thought there was bomb in there ready to explode if I didn’t HURRY UP AND OPEN IT, OMG. So Wednesday night, a whole week and a half before my actual birthday, I finally gave in and opened it. 

And he totally surprised me…

… with a new MacBook Pro! I had no clue this was coming at all. I had been using his old laptop, which worked fine, but apparently I deserved a sweet upgrade. Since then, my live-in computer nerd has transferred everything from my old Mac to the new one. He has probably spent more time playing with it than I have, which makes me wonder if this gift was partly for him…but it doesn’t matter. He’s too good to me. 

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My mom started a blog! She’s funny and sentimental and cute all at the same time. Make sure to go over and check her out HERE. 

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This morning while Rob and I were eating breakfast we saw the national weather forecast and Rob commented, “Wow, look it’s like 115 degrees in Las Vegas.” For some reason, maybe because I was still asleep, I chose to respond with, “Yeah. Hey, isn’t Vegas in New Mexico?” And everyone, it’s not. It’s in Nevada. I wouldn’t have been surprised if Rob had rolled his eyes at me when I said that, or busted out laughing so hard that his granola went flying out of his mouth and across the kitchen. But instead he just looked at me straight-faced and told me it’s in Nevada. 

The point of this story? I am dumb. And I have recently determined that I am especially dumb when it comes to anything geography, math, history, and/or science-related. Seriously, sometimes when we’re bored my sister and her fiance will fire off trivia questions for me to answer. The only reason this is fun is because my answers are so off the wall and downright wrong that it’s hilarious.

Also, embarrassing.

I think when my children are in fourth grade learning state capitals I will try to dodge their geography homework by instead educating them on more practical things, like some accounting debit and credit lessons. Or the difference between there, their, and they’re. After that, I’m pretty much done and they better scoot along to their Daddy.

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The third trimester is totally starting to finally kick in and make me feel all wonky and tired and zombie-like. It’s like I regressed back into the First Trimester Lazy Haze.

Also, sleeping sucks lately as it’s impossible to get comfortable without my back, my ribs, or my stomach aching. Next thing you know, my eyebrows will be uncomfortable and keeping me up all night.

However, last night  I was so tired that my body finally allowed me to sleep soundly all night long. These are the nights I am cherishing, as I know they’ll be long gone after August 25th(ish). 

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Tomorrow we are going to our day-long birthing class at the hospital. I have some deeply mixed emotions about this.

Part of me is really excited to go and learn about what exactly is going to happen when I finally go into labor. The other part of me is absolutely TERRIFIED to know all the details (ie: episiotomy). 

(Note to self: never again google the word “episiotomy” to find the correct spelling.)

I mentioned on my Facebook status the other day that I was banning myself from watching TLC’s A Baby Story until after I had given birth, though honestly? I think that show is more addicting than cocaine. The harder I try to keep from stopping on that show while flipping through channels, THE MORE I NEED IT. I can barely help myself.

Anyway, I am pretty sure I can blame that show for all the terror I’m feeling.

Well, that, and now also googling the word “episiotomy.” 

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A Pretty Face

Who would have thought that there would come a day when you could sneak a peek into the womb and actually see the facial features of a fetus (say that three times fast for me, will you?)? Excuse me while I sound like an old-timer for a second, but seriously, the advances in technology continue to astound me, just as it did a couple of days ago when we were able to get a 3D ultrasound of our baby girl. 

Because she is, indeed, a girl. We saw, with our own eyes, all of the female-ness in a very blatant three-dimensional view. And now I can sleep soundly at night knowing that the nursery is very pink and thank goodness a female will inhabit that room, amen.

So, want to see how awesome this 3D ultrasound stuff is? It’s a little hard to decipher what’s in the photos at first, so I’ll do my best at describing each one. 

Shown here is a picture of her adorable little face, and she’s facing down like she’s looking at the lower left corner of the picture. It sort of looks like she is all bundled up in a blanket, though she’s really just squished in there with the placenta and all the other weird things within the womb that I am so naive about.

(Seriously, I think I must have skipped seventh grade sex ed because even as a women, myself, I am totally clueless about female anatomy. Duh.)

Anyway. Can you see her cute little button nose? And her eyes and her furrowed brow? And her little lips? 

Here’s another one:

This one is more of a profile of her face, again looking down at the bottom left corner of the photo. Do you see that nose again? That is the nose that I will gobble up every single day while I squish her cheeks and tickle her tummy and repeatedly chant NOM NOM, SQUISHY BABY, ME EAT YOU UP. 

Then we got to see another view of her:

Her feet! I cannot even describe to you how joyous yet stupid I felt when I saw these cute little things pop up on the screen. I was so caught up in the rest of her that when I saw these it was like I totally forgot that babies had feet and didn’t just learn to walk around on nubby little cankles. In the photo it’s hard to tell what all is going on in there, but you can for sure see a foot and toes on the left side of the picture.

Believe me, no one hates feet more than me (can you imagine my disgust of the The Bachelorette’s Tanner P.?), but my little girl has the cutest baby toes I have ever seen. They’re really long, too. Unfortunately I have to claim responsibility for that one.

We also discovered in some of the 2D photos that this girl has lots of hair! While this may or may not explain all of the heartburn I have experienced, it definitely means BOWS! HEADBANDS! and all other sorts of girlish hair paraphernalia.

It’s going to get a little out of hand. I’m just saying.

Belly, Weeks 29-32

Guys, I am getting big, round, and pointy all at the same time, which would normally sound like an oxymoron, but dude, pregnancy is a wild and crazy beast that has no oxymoronic bounds. Ava must be growing a lot, because look at how much I pushed out from week 29 to week 32.

Knowing that I still have eight weeks to go makes me really nervous, as I’m afraid my belly is going to stick straight out so far that people will have to take cover when in close proximity to me so my gut doesn’t poke out any eyeballs. As a service to the general public I should probably buy myself some yellow CAUTION tape to wrap around my midsection.

I also fear that in these last few weeks when Rob wants to hug me we’ll have to assume the awkward eighth-grade dance position; facing each other with arms straight out like a mummy with hands resting on the other person’s shoulders because there’ll be no other way we could possibly get any closer. Or maybe we’ll have to just stick with the ol’ side hug. How romantic.

I thought it’d be interesting to see my progress from early on in the pregnancy to now, so I worked some voodoo and created this just for your viewing entertainment:

I’ll call it, “Weeks 11 and 32.”

I clearly have a serious lack of shame.