Our Shower

So, our shower was two weeks ago at this point. And I never got around to posting about it. This is in part because my father was the one taking pictures, which means I will probably never actually see the pictures (or, if I do, it will be at this child's wedding), and I wanted to post said pictures with the post. Not wanting to wait any longer, I'm just going to post with pictures taken after the fact at home, such as the one on the right, which is the contents of the toy box. We didn't get all those things at the shower (we got some at my work shower and some at a yard sale and the stuffed animals were already ours), but we did get quite a few.

Needless to say, the shower was lovely -- not at all a disaster, as I had feared. (The one thing that bothered others but just struck me as par for the course related to the food. My mother and stepmother were put in charge of bringing some of the food -- namely the sandwiches. The only sandwiches they brought were crabmeat. I don't eat seafood. They are well aware of this. So I couldn't eat any sandwiches. But this was very unsurprising to me. I thought my brother was going to blow a gasket, though. Oh, and they just bought the bread and crabmeat and mayo and arrived right before the party started and then complained that they had to spend time in the kitchen putting sandwiches together while guests were there.)

As I think I mentioned before, my brother is an event planner and florist (to those who commented on our wedding photos, he did the flowers -- he's quite talented), so it should have occurred to me that he would end up doing the bulk of the work for this affair.

He apparently asked P to find the Paddington at the Seaside book that I loved as a child and that he thought was at my dad's house but was in fact at ours. Unbeknownst to me, P brought it on vacation and gave it to him. The book became the theme of the shower. I really wish I had pictures. It was very sweet. When/if my dad ever gets them to me, I'll post them.

The shower was a decidedly unstructured affair, which worked well for me and especially for P (it was coed). No ridiculous games. We mingled, we ate, we opened presents, we went home. A ton of people came (about 50) -- it's amazing to know that our baby is so well-loved already. There were also a bunch of kids there, which I thought was great. Our friends' 19-month old daughter kept bringing P goldfish while we were opening presents :)

I'm not sure if this is everyone's experience, but every shower I've ever been to (and many weddings) has ended up with a gift-of-the-shower -- the thing that the bride/parent-to-be ends up getting a ton of, as if every attendee was on the same wavelength. For my wedding shower, it was placemat/napkin sets. All in sets of 4. Evidently we are only allowed to have two other people over at a time. For our wedding, it was salad tongs. Who needs 4 sets of salad tongs? We didn't register for any, since we didn't need any, but we got 4 sets anyway. A good friend received 5 pie plates at her shower. It just seems to happen. Well, for our baby shower, the gift-of-the-shower was blankets. I was amazed by how many we received. To give a sense, here is a photo of eleven of them:

And that's not all of them. I forgot one was in the basement for washing (and this doesn't include the ones we already had). Our child will never be cold.

Oh, and new belly shots too -- I posted one last week but forgot to mention it, and I figure I'll do them weekly now. I'm not sure if this one is just closer up or what but I look much, much bigger than last week.

Back from Vacation

I feel like I have a lot to say, but I don't have a ton of time to say much of anything right now. So I'll keep it brief.

1. New belly shot, from this morning (34w1d). I have definitely gotten much bigger. Eek.
2. We got back from vacation last night. The weather wasn't the best we've ever had. This was especially frustrating since we were away for two weeks, in two different places, and had cloudy and/or rainy weather for chunks of each week. That said, we also had sunny, nice days each week, which was great. I sailed, swam, read a lot, ate too much. All in all, a fantastic two weeks off.
3. While away, the swelling in my feet went way down. My hands started to swell again over the last couple of days of the trip, but my feet stayed normally proportioned until today. Apparently it's work that's doing it. I feel very swollen again already, which sucks.
4. Baby shower is this weekend. I hope people come. And I hope it doesn't suck. Not much has been bought off our registries (yes, we have two -- BRU and a cloth diaper one), which makes me a little nervous that maybe no one is coming.
5. I failed to mention it before I left, but when I went to schedule what should be my last doctor's appointments while at the office for my most recent one, a bit of confusion arose. They scheduled appointments for September 2 and 9, then stopped (I had already been scheduled through August). I asked what would happen if I went late. She gave me an odd look. I gave her an odd look. She looked at my chart again. Then her eyes widened. Apparently, my chart had three different due dates on it. I've been proceeding along with the 9/14 date that corresponds with my LMP and ovulation dates, as well as with my 6 and 9 week ultrasounds. Normally, when you measure ahead at a later ultrasound, they usually just note the measurement, but in my case someone actually added an additional due date to my record, one after the baby measured 6 days ahead at the NT scan, and one after the baby measured 9 days ahead at my 18 week ultrasound. (I hadn't even been aware the baby was measuring so far ahead at either.) My chart showed me as due 9/5, using the soonest date in the record. Yikes. I asked her to change it back to 9/14. She complied. It's the more accurate date anyway, plus if anything went awry (like, say, labor) at my dad's wedding in 2 weeks, my insurance would not cover any medical care out of state if I was past 37 weeks (according to the terms of my policy), which I would be with a 9/5 due date, but not with a 9/14 due date. It seems a bit silly, but I am not taking any chances.

More later on such exciting topics as: breastfeeding "class", additional rude comments made by people regarding my apparently grotestque size, and the horrible (but not pregnancy-related) thing that happened on our drive home.

32w3d

I had the distinct pleasure last night of overhearing my father's fiancee informing someone I don't know (over the phone) that I look huge and she doubts I'll make it to their wedding in three and a half weeks. This left me incredibly pissed off.

First, I don't think I look particularly huge. My fundal height measurements have been on target each week, and my weight gain (23 pounds) has been perfectly within reason, according to my doctor. People still tell me I don't look pregnant from behind. I don't waddle. I can still, for the most part, do the things I used to do, though I do get tired more quickly. How many pregnant people has she been around lately? Her son lives a plane ride away, so I doubt she saw her daughter-in-law during the late stages of her pregnancy (and I know she wasn't there for the birth since she and my dad decided the week her first grandchild was due was a good time to go to Europe, which I would have found incredibly insulting had it been me who gave birth at the time).

Second, and more importantly since I would feel the same way even were I currently huge (which, perhaps, I am), I don't really get why being pregnant somehow makes it acceptable to discuss my size with complete strangers. Were I not pregnant, it would be considered incredibly rude to discuss that topic. I was half inclined to discuss with people while she was within earshot the fact that she walks like an elderly person for no medical reason and that I wonder whether she'll be able to walk down the aisle at her wedding, but, well, I'm not a bitch. She also touched me without permission, which makes me very uncomfortable. PREGNANT PEOPLE ARE NOT PUBLIC PROPERTY!!! No touching and no public commentary, PLEASE.

Am I being overly sensitive? I normally really like this woman but I'm really having trouble getting past this one.

Oh, I added last week's belly shot, so you can judge my current size for yourself. It was at 31w4d, I think.

Lest anyone think I disappeared, we are on vacation for a couple of weeks. Internet access is spotty for now and will be nonexistent next week.

Preparation

We took our "prepared childbirth" class this weekend. I'm not sure how much I actually learned, but it was good to have reinforcement for things, and I think a lot of it was new for P. I have been giving him specific responsibilities (like research baby monitors or finish redoing the f'ing patio), which means he hasn't really focused at all on anything else. Things like, say, how it is that the baby will get out of me. I think he found the whole thing frightening. Also, he was the first partner to be willing to try wearing the empathy belly and concluded that he could probably handle the extra weight but wasn't so sure about the difficulty breathing or the bladder pressure. Those two things taken together seem to have given him a newfound empathy. I've gotten more backrubs than usual over the past few days, which is nice.

My biggest fear about the class was the other people, but they were all pretty much fine. The place offering it this particular weekend is in a ritzier suburb, so the attendees were largely well-educated married couples in their 30s. My biggest fear was giggling pregnant teens or really stupid questions, and the demographic pretty much precluded both. We were by far the least far along people in the class, mainly due to scheduling -- the majority were due the first week in August. We'll be on vacation for two weeks later this month, then our shower is the following weekend, then my dad's wedding. The next weekend after this that they offer the class and we are free is three weeks before the EDD, which seems like cutting it close. That said, three couples in our class had less than three weeks to go, so maybe I'm just being overly cautious.


Related to preparing for childbirth, we are in the process of acquiring a new vehicle. This makes me nervous. We both drive 1997 compact cars. Mine is largely fine, but Ps is starting to fall apart, so we're looking to upgrade. I paid cash for my car when I bought it (used), and P paid his off years ago, so taking on an expensive car loan makes me super nervous, but I know we need to do it. Eek.

Finally, I added a belly shot from this week (this morning, in fact). As you can see, I've sort of exploded lately. Double eek.

27w1d: Father's Day Redux

So, I updated yesterday's post to add a picture of the sneakers, just because they were too cute to resist. Also, I forgot to add last week's belly shot last week, even though I did take it, so I added it today.

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Yesterday, in addition to giving P a small pair of sneakers, we went to see my dad. I constantly have to remind myself that having one normal parent is more than a lot of people get, and for that I am very thankful. My dad is a semi-uptight, uber-intellectual, (now-retired) attorney. Growing up, my friends were afraid of him until they got to know him. He's not the warmest guy in the world (which I think was in part what was intimidating for friends -- that and the fact that they often didn't get his quirky sense of humor), but he knows that and has worked hard at it.

My dad taught me basic algebra and how to play backgammon when I was in elementary school and asked us science questions over dinner. He built us a play house in the basement with lights and shutters and a door that closed. And he videotaped all our birthdays and holidays (and filmed "slice of life" segments too, to ensure we didn't end up with a distorted sense of our family life), borrowing a camera from a local university before any normal person owned one -- he interviewed our friends on these tapes to be sure we'd all remember who was who and how we knew them when we watched the tapes 25 years later. We get together every Christmas to watch these old tapes, a tradition that began after my parents split up, when my dad became obsessed with creating new family traditions for the three of us, traditions that now involve P and my sister in law and my dad's fiancee. He's a great dad, even if he's not like most other great dads.


Thankfully, while I look quite a lot like my mother, my personality comes almost exclusively from my dad. You know, because he's not an alcoholic and, rather than being a narcissist, always has the interests of others foremost in his heart, even though others (namely, my brother) don't always see it that way (note to my wonderful but not always sensible brother: your interest isn't always furthered by being told what you want to hear).

I have never lived more than an hour and a half from my dad. He's getting remarried this summer (congrats Dad!), which means he'll be moving, ending up three hours away, which makes me sad. And the timing (right before the birth of his first grandchild) makes me especially sad. But I know it's what he has to do for himself, a constituency he considers far too little, and I'm glad he's doing it.

I love you, Dad!

V Day

A much longer post is forthcoming, but for now I just thought I'd note that on Sunday we hit 24 weeks, aka viability day. I harbor no illusions of this being some amazing safety zone, but there's something to be said for the notion that were I to go into PTL at this point, someone might try to do something. Hooray?

To celebrate, I updated the belly shots page with images from 22 weeks 1 day and today, 24 weeks 2 days. Apologies if they appear sideways -- I'll try to fix them later. And I'll try to do them every 2 weeks from hereonout.

I also have my 24 week appointment today in about an hour. I'm not expecting anything momentous -- I assume it will be the usual PIAC, step on the scale, BP check, fundus measurement, heartbeat check. I think my sugar drink test is next month. Fun.

Half-Baked: Because You Asked

Today marks the halfway point, which seems absolutely preposterous. But evidently it is. I have my 20 week appointment on Tuesday, which I have to go to myself, as P will be getting ready to leave for Cleveland on a business trip. He put all our appointments in his calendar but then didn't consult his calendar when he booked his flight. This is very typical of him. I have to tell him 10 times about any plans we have, and he still asks about the date/time at the last minute. For him, making dinner involves me preparing him a shopping list and reading him the directions step by step. I generally find it easier just to make it myself. But I digress.

Because you asked, I added a ticker.

And because you asked, here are belly shots. I've been doing them weekly since week five. I'm trying to do them in the same tank-top and sweatpants each week (though the top was in the wash this week, so I wore the same one in a different color, and I wore different sweatpants the first week). Buddy is frequently in the photos, though sometimes he's under the covers. Thus far, the biggest changes have been from 15 to 16 weeks and from 18 to 20 weeks.

From hereonout, I'll add one (probably just adding to this post) every four weeks. So, starting with week 5 since I didn't take one week 4, here are belly shots every four weeks.

Five Weeks:



Eight weeks:



Twelve weeks:



Sixteen weeks:



And today, twenty weeks (excuse the visible underwear on the side!):



22 weeks 1 day:



24 weeks 2 days:



26 weeks 1 day



29 weeks 1 day:



31 weeks 4 days:



34 weeks 1 day:



36 weeks 1 day (sorry it's blurry!):



37 weeks, 1 day:



38 weeks, 2 days:



39 weeks, 5 days (the day we went to the hospital):



One week post-partum: