At 10 weeks and 1 day (by my reckoning)

I have hit two milestones. The first is that, though my morning sickness seems to have returned with a greater propensity to make me eye up the nearest toilet, I can go back to work now and make it through the better part of a full day. The second is that baby bloat and queasiness have finally combined to make it impossible to fully zip and button my jeans. It's like that tiny button has become the arch enemy of comfort. It seethes in frustration at not being allowed to perform its proper function of keeping my trousers up. Not to mention ensuring general decency in public places. It's as if the zipper comes up halfway and then my baby belly quotes it the scripture from Job: "Hitherto shalt thou go, but no further." Sorry, buddy: that's as far as you can go. It's baby-zone up here and we don't appreciate pesky form-fitting clothing encroaching on the space designated for the growing fetus, so if you can just keep behind the caution tape we'll all be fine. Thanks for the cooperation.

As I've said before, since baby shares my body, baby gets to make the rules now, so my seething angry jeans button will just have to suck up its angst and be a team player for the coming months. The next team player will be a new season draft of a belly band, so that I can keep from flashing the world my underwear in public without risking a zipper/button malfunction, a public spectacle of vomit, or angry lines across my abdomen from too-tight trousers. I'm not quite at the stage where going out in pyjamas has become socially acceptable. More's the pity.

Counting your chickens...

Alas, in my joy to be feeling normal again, I spoke too soon. Over the past few days, the piggly wiggly has taken its chance to remind me that *it* is the one in charge. When it wants more energy to use on growing and swishing around in its tiny sack of amniotic fluid, it gets that energy...and I get to cry until I'm allowed to go to sleep. When it demands a higher caloric intake to facilitate further growth (and I demand it to stave off feelings of queasiness), it gets more food. I even try to oblige when it demands a foot-long sandwich from Subway with lettuce, mayonnaise, honey mustard, and three types of meat. The tyranny has begun...the baby is officially in charge of me. Resistance, as they say, is futile.

At least, though, the first appointment with the midwife went well. She's quite nice, and easy to talk to, which helps tremendously. Mostly it was just paperwork and a few blood tests for screening. Of course, when she stuck the needle in my vein and started wiggling it around to get the blood to start flowing, the husband sat watching and squirming in the corner. He hates needles. When I remind him of the size of the needle they use when you donate blood (just to keep perspective) he cringes and shivers in something I suspect is a combination of fear and disgust.

However, though I may have spoken too soon about escaping from under the cruel thumb of exhaustion and morning sickness, I am, at least, about to turn a nice corner. Come Wednesday I should be 10 weeks pregnant, which means that I've finished 1/4 of my time. That makes it sound like prison. Anyway, only 30 weeks to go from here...at least as an estimate. Of course, with the new-found discovery of lots of multiples being conceived in this family, I still have the possibility to knock 4 weeks off that time if it's twins. (I'm still waiting on that synchronised swimmer routine as a sign...baby(ies) have not yet obliged me.) Either way, we'll know on 6 April: our first look at the piggly wiggly! (Who is now the size of a prune, apparently. It should be the size of a lime when we see it.)

Food, Glorious Food

For someone who hasn't felt terribly keen on eating for the past few weeks, I've had quite a few urgent needs for specific foods. There was the day I desperately craved a burger and fries, the day I could have murdered a Chipotle burrito or two, a sudden desire for pb&j sandwiches, a nostalgic yearning for a Chick-fil-a salad, and today an irrepressible hankering for a pepperoni and pineapple pizza from Papa John's.

I know people talk a lot about pregnancy cravings, but holy cow! It's not one thing all the time, it's random very specific things at odd and unpredictable intervals. The sad part is that I devoured the entire pizza on my own...in less than an hour...after finally getting back to the gym after 4 weeks off staying in bed to nurse my morning sickness. I felt like such a champ soldiering through a session at the gym. Okay, not so much soldiering as taking a leisurely step back towards my former fitness...and feeling my knees creak on the squat machine. Thanks, pregnancy, for making me feel old. I'm not even 24 yet!

I'm not sure what will be on the menu for dinner. At least, I ought to make something decent for the husband. He's been saddled with most of the cooking lately, and though he doesn't seem to mind, I do feel bad letting it carry on for too long. Thankfully, now that the baby seems content to keep growing without sapping my will to live, I can have something like my life back! It's a relief to experience and not just take people's word for it that the rest of pregnancy isn't a bar of evil wrapped in misery and sprinkled with tears.

Over the Hill

This has nothing to do with being old and everything to do with the hope that the worst of the mind-numbing, gut-wrenching, soul-destroying horror that is morning sickness is now over and gone. (I have a feeling that over the next 7 months my talents for both hyperbole and brutal honesty will get constant exercise.) This past week I've been feeling much closer to normal than I have in a long time. I've eaten more than frozen pepperoni pizza, cinnamon raisin bagels, and yoghurts. Sweet things are no longer vile to think about, though cheesy crackers are still something I'd emphatically give a miss on. I can even put real clothes on and drive to the store!

However, this does not mean that from here on out, baby-growing is all roses and sunshine. My eyes like to do funny things if I move my head too quickly - like when you stand up too fast in a really hot bath or rub your eyes really hard. I'm desperately thirsty most of the time, but I have a very tiny tummy since my uterus is apparently playing (and winning) a very aggressive game of King of the Mountain in my abdomen right now. This means that I feel ridiculously full after very little real food. The dizziness and headaches come and go as they please, and I am a veritable fountain of tears on most days. I think the one show I can watch without crying is Midsomer Murders. Seriously. I cried during Glee, during Private Practise, during Grey's Anatomy, watching No Reservations...I'm surprised I didn't cry when Aragorn fell off the cliff in The Two Towers last night! I apparently cried in my sleep the other morning when Sebastian tried to sneak out of bed to go to work. Crazy crazy hormones.

On the bright side, my first appointment with our midwife is next week on Wednesday, so I'm really excited to feel a bit more like I'm not just making up this desperate need to sleep and my overly-finicky stomach. Oh, and the absolutely bizarre and highly vivid dreams. Some of which are quite hilarious!

My Apparent Words of Wisdom

I do love it when friends find my pithy one-liners and amusing observations entertaining enough to re-post. It makes me unsuitably pleased with my own wit. Take for example today's gem:

From a wise friend, "Don't get me wrong, I'm sure they're amazing and wonderful and you spend a lot of time and effort making sure they don't turn into the Unibomber or Snooki or something else equally horrid, but women should remember that they're more than their kids"

See? There's a good lesson in that. Words to ponder. ;-)

Rumbled

We've been found out. Our ward has seen too many babies born in the past few years not to figure out quite quickly that we're expecting. Even my young women that I teach on Sundays have been keeping tabs on me, and when I left church early the other day to go home for a suddenly much-needed nap, I confirmed their suspicions and they harassed the other youth leaders to find out if I was pregnant. Of course, we hadn't admitted to anything at this point, so they were left with no definite answers to their questions. Alas, that won't last long.

Even my friend's daughter decided yesterday that I'm having a baby! When she pointed at me and said, "You have a baby!" I thought I'd get smart with her and asked, "oh yeah? Well, where is it?" She didn't skip a beat and pointed to my rapidly expanding waistline. So I asked her how big the baby was if it was hiding in there. Her answer: tiny. So will it be a quiet baby or a loud baby? A quiet one. And is it a baby boy or a baby girl? A baby boy. To be honest, I sort of hope it's a girl so I can name her after my nana who just passed away. I think Elva is a lovely name for a baby girl. And besides, my nana was a pretty classy lady.

I suppose there's a bit of relief now that so many people know. If only that relief came in the form of not feeling sick any more. There may be light at the end of the tunnel, but it still seems so far away...

Dear Ridiculous Facebook Apps...

I don't know what fake algorithm you use to compute this "my biggest stalkers" list, but I hereby denounce it as absolute BS. Considering I've been sick in bed for most of the past fortnight, I have better things to do than get on Facebook for hours. And better things to do when I am on Facebook than to check out the page of some 16-year-old hundreds of times. Seriously? As if teenagers are ever that interesting? Not even when I was a teenager did I find teenagers that interesting. Such misguided and overinflated ideas of self-importance should be squashed, not fostered. 


I disapprove.

Around 7 Weeks...

And still no sign of a normal life in sight. I'm sure I'm not the most impartial judge of just how sick I am, but I feel absolutely evil. As much as I love the leisure to stay asleep in bed until 11:30 in the morning, I do hate lacking the energy to do much more than stay in that bed, reading, napping, and eating all day. I miss fresh air and sunshine. I miss the gym. I miss feeling like I could actually sit through a whole day at work and be fine. I miss not having to eat every hour and being able to eat more than bagels and yoghurt. On the bright side, at least I'm growing a baby. Somewhere there is light at the end of the tunnel. If only it didn't feel like such a long tunnel.

My mother-in-law informs me that morning sickness is a result of the hormones that are released while the placenta grows so the baby stays alive and healthy and fed and all that sort of thing. I'd love for this stupid placenta to finish its growing, but that point is still another 5-7 weeks away. When I meet with the midwife for the first time, I'm definitely telling her that I need *something* to make the nausea go away so that I can function like a normal person again. I can't wait for another month and a half to get my life back.

Dear Finicky Baby...

Mommy apologises sincerely that it's not an option to just pull off the side of the road into that pub. I know we pass it coming home from work, but it's not as simple as that. Believe me, little piggly wiggly, Mommy realises with astounding clarity just how much you want that huge hamburger on a white floured bun with mayonnaise and mustard and ketchup with a tiny serving of peas and a huge serving of perfectly golden-brown, crispy-fried, sublimely salted chips. The thick kind of chips that you get in a pub. Trust me, baby: I want it, too. And I'd love to just pull over and buy it and eat it for you, but alas, there's a budget to remember, and we have to get home so I can cook dinner for Daddy and Uncle Angus. And besides, you really have to choose which is more important: tasty tasty food, or ordering Mommy to sleep so you can steal all her energy to make yourself grow faster. Once we've settled on priorities, we might try having this discussion again.

Love,

your mommy.

PS - I'm getting distinctly worried there are two of you in there. If there are, please manifest by two rapid tugs on your umbilical cord...if you have one of those yet. Alternately, you can swish around like synchronised swimmers until I notice.

Oh Baby, My Baby

Yup, we've heard that right: I'm growing a tiny human inside my uterus. Crazy thought! Not as crazy as the fact that it makes me tired all the time and various degrees of sick all the time. Vicious. It becomes a self-perpetuating cycle where I feel sick so I don't want to eat, but not eating makes the sick feeling worse, which means everything sounds evil, so I don't want to eat, and the sneaky hate spiral of morning sickness continues.

The piggly wiggly and I aren't very far along at the moment: only about 5 1/2 weeks...at least, that's my estimate. And yes, it is called the piggly wiggly. Despite the fact that it's the name of a chain of grocery stores in the South, when I told Sebastian he decided it was the perfect name for our little fetus while it grows inside of me.

Of course the tired and the sick means that work today, a job interview in Portsmouth tomorrow, and more work on Thursday are going to be interesting (read: painfully protracted and agonizingly slow). Ah well; help is there if I need it, and that's what counts. The only other thing that is agonizingly slow is the way time is elapsing until my first appointment with the midwife at the end of March. The weeks sure could stand to speed up a bit so that I can come out from under the worst of the morning sickness and get to hear from a medical professional that our little blueberry is growing well and looks perfect and beautiful in the way that only an indistinct ball of human cells in a uterus can do. Grow, Baby, grow!