One more sleep til The Big Ultrasound. (Well, technically two, since I’m drafting this the night before I’ll post it, but whoo doggy, we are RIGHT THERE.)  I can’t wait.  Dave can’t wait.  Once we have the thumbs up, Dave gets to tell people.  It’s entirely a double standard, and I totally own that, but it’s different when you’re the one dealing with the physicalities of the situation. 

Here’s what’s happening in the ol’ body o’ gretchen, top down.

Headaches, on occasion, which is odd because I have never been a headache-getting person.
Also, anxiety. See: post from two days ago. Weird dreams as well, and the whole "I am going to die of sleeping" fatigue bit.

Super smell.  I can smell everything. For someone whose nose has been worn out by a lifetime of allergies, it is weird to be so smell sensitive.  Especially in spring in Maine. Also, it is not so exciting when 40 middle school students return from PE, smelling either of too much AXE body spray, or too little general purpose deodorant.  And the regular stinky kids, eewwww. So gross.

Bleh mouth. Can’t really describe it better than that. My mouth feels bleh a lot of the time.

Holy nipples!  I have some big girls anyway, and I think they have swollen (um, the whole breast, that is) but my nipples are very sensitive.  They are hard more often than not, and itchy as shit (STILL! After Lansinoh and Aquaphor!) and spiderwebbed with blue veins.  I have never been one to sleep with clothes on, but now I find sleeping in a t-shirt provides a barrier against the sheets and Dave and the cat that is necessary.  As a stomach sleeper, I thought I would be okay until I had a belly (er, a baby belly) but no.  I rearrange my feather pillows and elbows to provide a prop and airspace for the boobs, and still end up on my back. Boooo.  Even hugging Dave makes me wince if I’m not cautious about the approach.

Heartburn. ERGH. Heart. Burn. Sucks.  Tums are my friend.

Nausea.  . .  after the graduation on Saturday, I’ve had a few more big, and sudden, wallops of nausea, but no vomiting, which is nice.  Ginger ale and saltines are kept at the ready now.

Cravings:  I am a sweet tooth. It is a vice.  Given the choice between chocolate and chips, I will always, always choose chocolate.  However, my sweet tooth has been replaced by a meat tooth.  I am NOT a meat person, fish is my favorite, chicken I eat as my "well, I should eat some meat" but red meat? NEVER. Until now.  I find that my strongest craving is for protein of the red meat variety.  I have eaten more red meat in the last 3 weeks than I have in the last YEAR, anyway. Yeesh.

Every night, I have to pee.  I’ve actually made the midnight pee my Synthroid hour as well, but last night I missed it because I was up at 1 instead of my usual 4 am.  I also feel like I’m not only peeing more often, but I’m peeing MORE. It’s odd.

Body wise, I’m feeling puffy.  I started off heavier than I really wanted to, so I’m already feeling like shit about that.  I’m exhausted when I get home, IF I get home at my usual time, and so much is going on at school that I feel overwhelmed.  My summer plans include getting a pool pass and going for the pre-opening lap swim, and signing up for yoga again.  My regular teacher doesn’t do a prenatal class, but there is one on Saturdays at a studio, so I’m considering doing both regular yoga at the Y and the studio prenatal stuff.  I need to be walking, and the crazy end-of-year schedule coupled with the unrelenting rain has hindered that.  We walked a lot in Florida, and I’m looking forward to some sunny afternoons.  When the pool closes in August, the Y has a prenatal water class that I’d like to take, if my schedule can work it. (Why do most prenatal fitness classes happen during the DAY? grrr.)

I’m not doing the C25K plan, obviously, but it’s still a goal.  When I was doing it, I had an asthma attack EVERY TIME when I got home, including one particularly freaky one where I had lost my inhaler on my route, and came home wheezing and Dave wasn’t here, so I laid down on the couch with my eyes closed and yoga breathed to not panic and try to keep getting oxygen in, etc, and when Dave got home we found the inhaler just out on the street, but STILL. It was freaky.  So, perhaps I’m being too. . . .whatever . . . but I think that after the squidlet arrives, I will be able to refocus on the whole fitness thing that was suspended when we started to TTC because I was in a pretty good place when I STARTED a year ago, and didn’t expect to be starting heavier than that, but I am.   I’m nervous about gaining more weight, but I have to, kind of, right?  I don’t even know what I weigh right now, I’m sure I’ll find out on Friday, and I’m sure it will depress me, because I already feel thick.  I wonder if I would feel just as worried if I’d hit my goals before I got pregnant, if I’d feel like I would be undoing a LOT instead of say, half of my goal. Sigh. Who knows.  I hope the energy of the second tri coinciding with my most active months of the year helps me feel better about this.

I look at various belly pics, and see people who look thinner than me at my thinnest with captions like "21 weeks!" and then I see others looking very pregnant at 15 weeks, and I know that it has a lot to do with build and height and all of that, but I have this absolutely asinine fear that I will just get FAT and never look PREGNANT.  One of the things that I think will be GOOD for me if I can get squidlet into the uni childcare and keep my GA position is that the childcare is on the other side of campus from the ed building, and I would be able to get some exercise walking back and forth.

So, now that the career issue is somewhat decided, my new anxiety is body-centric.  I sense that it’s just going to shift around for the next 31+ weeks.

The day I found out, April 6, I went to school and came home and went to Amy’s.  When I pulled out of the driveway, this song came on that I’d never heard, and it seemed really spookily fitting, the chorus anyway.  But I didn’t know who sang it (maybe DMB?) and didn’t know the title.  It was reassuring, though, you know, like . . .  a sign.  And on my way to my first doctor appointment, I heard it again, and decided that yes, it must be DMB, and hearing it AGAIN MUST be a sign.  Especially since I’d kind of put out the BatSignal to have a sign sent from the dead friends, which, creepily enough, has worked in bizarre ways more than once.  And the sign/song itself clicked together when the other day, American Woman came on the radio, and I immediately flashed to hanging out over the river and having one of the dead friends singing "American Woman…. stay away from meeee…."  Um, not because he wanted me to go away, but because I was in Canada, and an . . . American woman. You know. Stupid stuff.

I looked up the song today, and funnily enough, it’s NOT "Miracle baby" which I thought it was, and didn’t want to be my sign because that sounded way too double-Z Cheezzy. The song is behind the cut:

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So, for our plan of not telling people, I’ve actually told quite a few.  All women, with the exception of my husband and my dad, and all women that would probably need to know if something bad happened. Working in a K-8 school, where 95 percent of the staff is female, that means I’ve told maybe a dozen people, tops.

The last person I told was an ed tech that works with one of my students.  She had been out on maternity leave, and the first lunch back she sat next to me and said "So, I hear you’re not coming back . . . do you have any plans?" and my coteacher sort of snorted and said "OH yeah,she has plans" and looked at me, so I leaned over and whispered to Rachel "Yeah, I’m pregnant."  She just about jumped out of her chair, she had such a physical and excited reaction.  I told her it was hush hush mostly (and mostly its the kids I don’t want finding out) but yeah, I’m pregnant.

Today she came with us on a field trip, and while the kids were doing a laser thing, we talked about it more.  She told me that one of her friends had just miscarried at 9 weeks (I’m 7) and she felt awful about it (Rachel) because they had told everyone, started buying stuff, etc etc.  And I agreed that it really was early, but I was only telling a few people, etc etc.

The more I’ve thought about it, I’ve figured out why I’ve been compelled to tell the people at work.  I spend the bulk of my day with them, for one, and it’s helped to have some sympathy when I need to go pee, again, or when I’m tired and leave as soon as possible, or whatever.  But also, these are people that would find out if Something Happened.  I know they would.  I know now that one of our regular subs miscarried recently, and I don’t know because she told me, but it got around. Same with a student teacher from last year.  And I know that if the sub (the intern moved away) told me now that she was expecting, I’d react . . .  differently.  Maybe too eager. SOmething.  Because she has a History, and doesn’t know I know (I never knew she was pregnant until she wasn’t) and it would be different.

By telling people now, early, I am getting such a thrill of the pure happiness that people are sending me.  If something happens, I will have at least had that experience, which is only available once, if you’re lucky.  Announcing your first pregnancy, even in these hopeful and nervous first few weeks, is really EXCITING.  Everything is full of possibility and hope and good luck, and I know that there are people sending lots of good energy to me and the squidlet from all around the world, and that is so cool.

I feel like I’ve let my guard down a bit, but what ‘guard’ is there?  Not telling won’t guarantee a 40 week perfect pregnancy.  Telling won’t make certain a devastating loss.  What’s meant to be, will be.  I’ve always lived my life thinking that, and it won’t stop now.

We still won’t tell the MIL and SILs until Mother’s day.  It makes a great gift, and it will be immediately after our first ultrasound, where, stastically speaking, the odds are 90 percent that we’ll see a heartbeat and celebrate that.  That 10 percent, if it happens, it happens.  I can’t do anything to prevent it, I can only proceed assuming everything is okay.  Which I’m beginning to feel more and more confident that it is.

The good vibes don’t hurt, though.

Today was the first appointment.  I went by myself, as it was just a medical history and form filling out deal.

If you remember, I had originally planned to use my DO at the family practice Dave and I go to.  I figured it would be easier to stay in the same practice, she seemed nice, etc etc.  But then when I had that 45 day period and the faintest hint of a line, and the negative blood test, and she never called back and I was a mess, and I thought "Fuck that."  Instead, I called my friend Jess who had been raving about her OB/GYN since we lived in the same apartment building, what, almost ten years ago? (!! TEN YEARS?!!)  She first used them for endo treatment, then she had the twins by C-Section, and the singleton followed as a VBAC. She said they were great, and I trust her opinion.  Boy, am I glad I did.

For one, the one thing I really hate about our GP office is the waiting room.  It’s a big room, linoleum tile floors, fluorescent lights, and wooden chairs, the type that you’d put at a kitchen table.  While it’s uncomfortable, the worst part is that the room is ALWAYS filled with sick people of all ages.  Gagging babies, coughing old folks, teenagers with mono, etc.  It sucks.

But the OB/GYN practice? Holy mother.  Carpeting, soft padded armchairs, lamps abound.  No sick people this morning, no one was there (my appt was at 7:45) and when I left, there was one middle aged woman reading a magazine.  No open sores, no coughing and burping into her sleeve, just …  reading. Joy abounds.

Plus, the staff seems nice (who I met, anyway) and they have OBs, NPs, and CNMs.  I felt instantly at ease, and that’s important, I think.  I also felt a small thrill, because one of my milestones was to make it to the first appointment, to get in the office and see it formyself, and not have to call back in tears before my first visit.

The first odd thing about the visit was having strangers congratulate me.  I mean, my family has, my friends have, a great portion of the internet has, but that’s different.  Those are the people that insist you don’t look fat, and that you’re smart, and that you’re funny and good and all of that.  But to have strangers, people you’ve never met, smile and say "Congratulations, your first?" well, that was just cool.  Some sort of rite of passage, I think.

The second odd thing was at the end of the medical interview, when the nurse started making a pile. Hmm, I thought, that’s a big pile of forms…. OH WAIT. Not forms.  Propaganda!  I got magazines, 2 babytalk, one that is full of Lennart Nilsson pictures by month (so, my favorite).  And coupons (whatever) and a Desitin sample, and information of what Maine fish to eat, and inormation on a thyroid study and how do I carry all of this out?

IN MY BRAND NEW FREE DIAPER BAG, THAT"S WHAT.  It’s the "Enfamil/Lipil Breastmilk Storage Diaper Bag, No, Really."  Okay, I added the No, Really.  But seriously! That’s what it said!  Of course, it also came with an 8 oz can of Enfamil/Lipil formula powder, I guess "Just in Case the Breast is Best Thing Doesn’t Pan Out."  Can you HEAR me rolling my eyes?  Even if, for some reason, I would need to use formula, I don’t want it sitting in my house for 8 months, so I’m going to take it to the soup kitchen downtown.

Anyway, walking out of the OB/GYN office with a DIAPER BAG is like wearing a sandwichboard that says "KNOCKED UP!"  I was instantly relieved that parking is in the rear of the building, as the office is located dead center of both SILs, and across the street from Bad Niece and her drug dealing boyfriend.  Anyone of those who saw that scene would know, INSTANTLY what was up. (Hmm, now that I think of it, maybe I should give the formula to one of my grand-nephews, since they are bottlefed . . . .)  I called Amy and told her about the onslaught of Stuff, and remarked that "I can’t look directly at the diaper bag, it’s too freaky!"  I’ve come around, and after filtering out all the crap and tossing it (heh, yeah, Sears Portraits here we come . . . not to snark on those that do Sears stuff, but in a family of photogs, it’s not a valuable coupon) I’m feeling a little like Dale Dribble: "I’m on the grid now! YEAAAARGHHHH!!!"

ALSO! IMPORTANT BULLETIN FOR THE NYC’ERS!  I am still planning on coming the last weekend of June, I;ll be in the second tri, the train (Acela) will be perfect for traveling, and I can’t wait to see all of you and some naked gay puppets.  As I told Muse, "I need to expose the baby to naked gay puppets to counter the exposure to my inlaws."   So, there you go, the  Gretchen+Squidlet  Final Metropolitan CouchSurf ’05 is on.  I plan to work out the details in a week or two as far as tickets, arranging lodging, etc.  Woohoo!

I’m a pretty lucid dreamer.  I dream in color, I can always remember tiny details of dreams, and I’m always an active participant.  So far, I’ve had two pregnancy dreams, both of which, in the end, make me roll my eyes at how I am, EVEN IN MY DREAMS.

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That stands for 5 weeks 3 days.  I’m still in the part where I count the days, because every one that I am pregnant feels like such a gift.  The panic has gone away, some, and June’s post was reassuring in an "I might as well give in" kind of way.  Sort of like wondering where your allergy meds are as your car is going off a cliff, you know?  This worry is only the beginning.

I’m tired, for sure.  I’ve even had people who don’t know comment at around 2-3 that "Are you okay? You look exhausted!" so I feel like I have tangible evidence that this is not just an anomaly.  I haven’t been too sick, but at 7 each evening, I tend to get the hot sick prickles, if anyone has those.  This is followed by the weird esophageal cramping that is like the precursor to a puke, but remember, I don’t puke. (Not since ’96, anyway. The Chicken Incident.  Nothing like hurling into a government subsidized toilet while the two mentally retarded sociopaths you are working for, sleep.) Then I swig some ginger ale, and hope for the best.  I think the evening thing is related to my vitamin schedule, as I take them at night and one is a B Complex, and B6 is found to lessen nausea.

To veer away from too much panic, I’ve started a paper journal for the squidlet.  I picked up this journal months ago, red leather with a wrap around cover.  I haven’t had a paper journal in years, but this one drew me in, and was on sale for half off.  The only other thing I can do is daydream about the baby stuff we’ll want (I really hesitate to use the word NEED) even though it makes me feel like a materialistic hoochie.  There’s a consigment shop right around the corner from our house, though, that is for baby and kid stuff exclusively.  While there is some stuff I’d like to have new, just because, I’m sitting on my hands to keep from going over and popping in to see what kind of stuff they had.  If they had a used Snap-N-Go (a stroller frame for an infant seat, because the systems seem like such monsters and not that great when I see one) for instance, I could pick that up.  And even though we will probably cosleep, I want the Jenny Lind crib and changing table in white.  It’s the right texture for my room o’ textures ‘sewing room’ (can I stop calling it that now?) and while I plan to cosleep, I’d like to have that option for naps and such, and who knows, maybe cosleeping won’t work for us. (But I doubt it, the biggest obstacle will be the damn cat, whom we already cosleep with and totally hogs the bed.  We are trying to train her to sleep at the foot, but her favorite place is wedged between humans. Sigh.)  I think I’ll want a Pack and Play for the first floor, and for taking to my folks house and the beach and yard and such.  And Amy has a bassinette we can borrow, instead of buying one or a cosleeper.  I also definitely don’t want a Diaper Genie/Champ/PLastic piece of Crap Collecting Crap.  I’d rather dispose of any diapers as soon as possible, if we use disposable, thank you very much.

I was telling Amy how I also wanted a rocker or glider for the room, because I like the idea of sitting in it and looking out the window to the backyard and reading stories or nursing or just hanging out because Squidlet is awake and Dave needs to sleep because it’s a work night.  I got all emotional at that, and tried to backtrack (not only do I NOT PUKE, I am also NOT a crier.)  "I mean, we can sit in it and I will read it Henry Rollins’ poetry! And sing Nine Inch Nails songs! And dress the baby in black onesies!"  Of course, the hormones have taken over, and had me craving this ‘diaper stacker’ this morning. I am a weak, weak woman. Sigh.

The squidlet is the size of a sesame seed.  That sesame seed has me exhausted, not into making or eating dinner at all, and giving my the hot flashes. Damn.

I just did some math, and knowing that I have 35 weeks to go, I wanted to know what was happening 35 weeks ago.  Funny enough, I was smashing my finger between the boat and the dock on our way to Crumple.  Even better, the 1st tri would have ended the day the fingernail came off.  So, I just have to get through that worrying time.

It’s quite appropriate, actually.  I babied that fingernail, bandaged it every day, worried every minute that it was just going to disappear and it would hurt and OH NO.  But no, it fell off after a trimester’s worth of weeks. Cool.

So far, tired, boob soreness, food weirdness, and headache and hot flashes. Sounds about right, right? I need toast.

The whole purpose of the "Saturday, in the park" title was to talk about my walk around the nighborhood, and how I stopped to swing at Fairmount again, and how I watched kids on bikes, on the climbers, on the swings across the field,  playing catch in the field, and how as I pumped my legs, I kept chanting the mantra of "Stick stick stick, grow grow grow, thrive thrive thrive."  But, Not only did I forget to write about that, I forgot to hit SAVE, too. GAH.

ANYWAY.

We told my folks.  We drove 2 hours to the mountain, it was a beautiful spring day, and when we got there I gave them their presents.  It was kind of anticlimactic, my mom didn’t even cry.  She admitted, though, that "it hadn’t hit her yet."  My mom cries at commercials, so it’s safe to say that no, it hadn’t hit her yet.  She did offer me a beer, though, and I kind of looked at her, and my dad said "And how about a pack of smokes?" So yeah. It hadn’t hit her.

My dad (it was his birthday) said "oh, COOL!" and then asked how long we’d been trying.  THEN he asked "Did you have to do anything special?" which was one of the most cringeworthy moments ever, I mean, the internet can know about the fine details, but I couldnt tell my DAD "Why, YES, we used special internet lube and I rolled over after Dave jizzed in me. . . ." ahem.

My grandma called while I was there to wish my dad a happy birthday, and I told her: "Hi Grandma . .  how does Great Grandma sound?" and she was more vocally excited than my mom was.  My aunt called, and mom told her, and then the people they were meeting for dinner called and THEY found out, so, yeah, I’m Out.  I’m not here, but those people aren’t connected to my life in any big way (Uh, not the family, but the dinner friends) so whatever.  Mom called her best friend (it was the FIRST person she wanted to tell, because she has four grandkids already) and she was excited — probably more for mom than me, which is okay, Alesa is mom’s Amy, and I told mom about telling Amy before anyone else.

We hung out for a bit, and then headed home.

I’m still nervous, but that’s normal, right?  I mean, 90 percent work out, I have to remember that.  PBS had a show about Yankee inventions, and one was a vaginal doppler, and Dave and I started joking about taking the housing of a vibrator, running a studio wireless mic through it, and hooking it up to the amp, just to see if we could pick up anything. We? ARE GEEKS.

I did find some good info from my mom.  She never threw up (whoo!) but did get tired a lot.  She didn’t have GD with me, and apparently was only borderline with Kate, but they made her do insulin shots anyway, to keep the birthweight low.  (I was 9-4, and even with the insulin, Kate was 9-15.  AND? My mom smoked through both pregnancies. It was the 70s, they didn’t know better yet.  Of course, it’s that story that made Amy hesitate before buying the newborn pack of diapers because "Oh, they only go up to 10 pounds and your mom had BIIIG babies. . . " ACK!)

So, yeah.  I’m still paranoid that I’m going to go to the bathroom and find blood . . . but it hasn’t happened yet.  I haven’t been too queasy, however, I’m taking BComplex, which apparently helps with nausea, and I have noticed that if I take it at night, I wake up okay but am bleh in the evenings, and if I take it during the day, I’m weirder when I wake up, so I’m thinking that might help.  As it is, I took it yesterday around lunch, and am waiting til I go to bed to take it tonight, to see if it affects things.  My tits wake up feeling . .  okay, but by 5 or so, they are burning up.  By the time I go to bed and unleash them from my bra, they are really sore, and super veiny.  I’m only 5 weeks tomorrow, so I imagine things will increase over the next few weeks, right?

Mamas, when did you stop worrying?  When did the symptoms start to pile up?  When did you feel SAFE?

Yes, I have a ticker.  I’m way too cynical for these things, usually, and it took a while to find one that was suitable for me, but the bright colored bars and lack of mention of God makes me happy.  I considered some other options, however, which you can see behind the cut:

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Yep. Still pregnant.  I used up the second HPT this morning, and it was dark as anything, which was reassuring.

Last night, I told Dave that I really wanted a broccoli and spinach calzone, but that I didn’t think it had anything to do with me being pregnant.

"Right.  For FOUR YEARS anytime we call a pizza place we get half mushroom, half green pepper, and ALL OF A SUDDEN you want something totally different.  You are so pregnant."

Whatever. It was delicious.

We’ll go to the mountain today to tell my folks.  I just talked to my mom, who was amazingly not suspicious of our last minute plan to "give you your birthday presents" and "take advantage of the beautiful day." Hee.  She wants us to stay the night, which we probably won’t do, and they have dinner plans for 6 with some of their friends, so we have to get there sooner rather than later.  Dave’s putting on the summer wheels, and then we’ll take a shower, and then we’ll head out.  God, I hope they’re both there when we arrive, because I just want to give them their presents and have it be over, because I will explode if I have to sit there and wait for Dad to get off the slopes or something. ARGH!

We aren’t telling the inlaws for a while, which I admitted to Dave is a total double standard of mine.  He understands, though, that if it doesn’t work out, I would need the support of my mom, and not of his.  We also talk and or see my folks much more frequently than we see any of his family (despite, you know, the fact that they all live within a five mile radius of us, and my folks are 100 miles away at any given time).  I think we’ll tell them after the ultrasound, which is on 5/6, two days before Mother’s Day.  It might make a good gift for the MIL.

So, yes. Still quite pregnant, which is a totally good thing.