Ultrasound #5

Well, from a photogenic standpoint... it's the lousiest picture yet! BUT... all is well and that's what's important :)

My RE told me to make an appointment with my OB, but that she'd have the appointments overlap a little bit, so there's another RE apointment next week, but it might be my last.

Evening sickness continues. Still just horrible nausea and indigestion. Eating more often does help, but it's not the cure.

Food is tricksie

OK, I'm having a pretty darn good day sickness wise... probably my best day all week. Still a little clog in my throat, but not the full-fledged nausea I've had for most of the week.

 

Here's my plan: eat every 1.5 - 2 hours even if I'm not hungry.

Based on the premise that my stomach gets angry when it's empty and because I didn't actually feel hungry yesterday or today. (I know, huge change from last week when I hit ravenous every half hour!)

 

half a granola bar at 8:30.

oatmeal at 10:15

1 doughnut at 11

-- zantac at noon --

lunch at 12:30 - philly cheese steak and mashed potatoes!

banana 3:30

 

planned food...

PB crackers at 5

half pb&j at 6:30

a little something else at 8 (baked potato? mac n cheese? cereal? pudding!?)

 

And I'd like to point out that I actually ate MEAT today! Not forbidden lunchmeat (which I've had twice this week), but real meat. I don't know when I last ate real meat but I think my sense of time has definitely warped.

 

Another oddity I've noticed... it's very hard to choose something to eat, especially after I've started feeling sick. But if I just start eating, I do tend to feel better and so far have been able to eat my meal (except that chicken last weekend, it was evil and couldn't be eaten - yes, I know I found it to be delicious the day before, what's your point?). 

 

To illustrate my point - nothing sounded good for lunch except mashed potatoes. I ordered the philly because I didn't think it'd be stinky and I could at least eat the bread. Well, turns out I ate half the darn thing, meat, cheese, onions, and mushrooms! I did pick out the bell pepper because it just seemed to be too much and it was huge chunks, so I banished them from the sandwich (better safe than sorry.) Being able to eat was particularly important today because it was a team outing and of the 4 of us, half don't know my little secret. So I was very pleased with the meal, with keeping my pregnancy secret, and with not feeling nauseous. A banner day!

 

Morning sickness and other fun things

I think I officially have morning sickness evening sickness now. I feel fine when I wake up. There are no saltines on my bedside table. I feel good. Unfortunately, it's the best I'll feel all day, because it's all down-hill from there. I feel I'm at my worst from about 2pm-10pm.

I need to eat pretty quickly somedays. Other days I can wait and eat at work. My typical breakfast of oatmeal has been treating me just fine. But then I need a mid-morning snack - a banana or peanut butter crackers.

And then I need lunch. But by lunch time, I need lunch to be non-smelly. I don't like smelly food. Smelly food includes all sorts of horrible things like roast chicken or any type of cooked meat. Bread is good. Salad can be alright. I don't eat much for lunch.

About 2 hours later, I need a snack. Crackers, granola, that sort of thing. Grapes are good. I ate an apple yesterday, but that didn't sit well.

About the same time, I also start getting indigestion and random waves of nausea. These continue until I go to bed. By later afternoon, I feel pukey - like all the puke in the world is in my throat fighting to get out. Pukey-burps come along with it. Taking some Zantac mid-afternoon helps (and is doctor approved), but doesn't make it all go away.

I still haven't puked, but I did have a plastic bag next to me on the drive home yesterday just in case.

I also get this weird taste in my mouth that goes on for most of the day. Do you ever get an aftertaste of calcium? If I eat a viactiv calcium supplement or eat a Tums, about 30 minutes later I get the nastiest taste in my mouth (this has always happened to me, it's not a pregnancy thing). Well, I seem to get that taste all the time now. Dr. Google tells me it's common, and the only remedy is chewing gum, sucking candy, or lots of ice water. I need to go get some gum.

7w1d - ultrasound #4

Drove out to Tomball early this morning for an ultrasound (ok, left the house at 8am, early for me, probably not for everyone else, can I help it if I like to sleep??)

The little bugger looks huge compared to last week! Last week was a mostly unidentifiable blob - you could only tell the baby from the yolk sac because the baby was fluttering. This week, the baby is definitly the largest thing in there. Now I don't know if you can tell by these pictures (she's a great doctor, but not such a great photographer, ok?) but in the one on the left, the shape of the baby matches the little picture in the count-down banner at the top of the page! Very exciting stuff :) And we got to see the heartbeat again, only this time it's just at the center of the embryo, it doesn't appear as if the entire blob is fluttering.

Anyway, according to the emails I get from babycenter.com, the little bugger is half an inch long, the size of a raspberry and it now has eyelids, an appendix and a pancreas.

Ultrasound #3 - Heartbeat!

We saw the heartbeat today, a tiny flutter like butterfly wings (and that was R's poetic description!)

The arrow is pointing at to where we saw the heartbeat. We did have a little scare though, when the gestational sac first appeared on the screen, it appeared to be empty! I think my heart stopped beating right about then. But the RE waved her wand around a bit and voila! the sneaky little bugger was just hiding from us and all is well. She said it measured at 6weeks, which is fine since I'm at 6w1d. She said they just want it to measure within a week of what they expect.

Since we've seen the heartbeat, the next ultrasound won't be until next week on Friday. Unless they can't squeeze us in, in which case we'll have to wait 2 weeks (boo!)

glowing

People say that pregnant women glow.

Now I know why. They are suffering from nasty oily pregnancy skin.

Is it just me? For the last week or so, I have felt like a walking oil slick. I rarely wear foundation, just powder - but now my powder disappears in less than an hour! I can't even get to work before it's gone. So yesterday I hit the drug store and bought some witch hazel to use as an astringint; an "oil control" face powder that I haven't used since I was a teenager; and blotting papers to keep the oil slick at bay. Ug. I still feel like I've been standing over a deep fat fryer.

ovulation = dressing nicely

Interesting article on MSN today. "Females wear more jewelry, flashier clothes when they're fertile, study says"

A UCLA studies shows that women tend to dress up more when they're ovulating, even though they're probably not even aware they're ovulating.

Hmmm… does this explain my boring wardrobe? I rarely ovulate, so I rarely dress up?

ultrasound #2

I had my second ultrasound on Monday at 5w4d! Pretty fast, huh?

The gestational sac is much bigger. You can see the yolk sac and the embryo inside it (the yolk sac is higher up, the arrow is pointing to the baby). The doctor could see the fetal pole, but you can't see it in the picture. She said that everything looked good!

Next ultrasound is this Friday (two per week until we see a hearbeat, then one per week).

** Special note to my perhaps "non-blog-savvy" relatives - you can leave a comment by clicking "comments" at the bottom of the post. I've changed the settings so you don’t need to register with blogger. - love, j

First Ultrasound - 5w1d

I had my first pg ultrasound today.

R came with me. I'm so glad that he could be there, even though there wasn't a lot to see because it was our first view of our baby. And somehow, seeing it on the screen and seeing the movement just makes it more real. Now I realize that it's not the baby moving, but rather the doctor's magic wand, but still... the sense of motion adds something.

At this stage, it's just a little blob inside a larger, blurrier blob, but the important thing is that it's just one blob. If there had been 2, it would have been a nice thrill, but I'm happy with one. If there had been more than 2 blobs, we would have needed CPR to revive R. His sense of relief was palpable at the doctor's proclamation of a singleton.

Next RE appointment is Monday - not sure why it's so soon, she said everything looked great.

Beta #3

My 21dpIUI beta is 2196.

We've scheduled the first ultrasound for Friday.

I'm getting less nervous in general and allowing myself to be giddy. But I still worry. The happier I let myself be, the more I think about this pregnancy, the worse I know it will be if something goes wrong.

I'm hoping my high hcg numbers are insurance against bad things happening, but I don't think it works that way. Still, I try to let the giddy feelings outweigh the anxieties.

Some pictures

OK, so my husband thinks I'm silly and my mom thinks I'm insane. (Write this date down, it may be the first time they've ever agreed on anything.) But I went and bought an hpt. Gee, it um, worked pretty fast. But I swear that seeing that second line just put a big silly grin on my face and I'm glad I got to see it.

I've heard of people keeping their pg tests for sentimental reasons. That seems a little gross to me, but I did take a picture. Which I'm now sharing with you even though you probably don't want to see it.

Since I had my camera out, I took a picture of another fascinating item that I've been holding on to... the bag that the specimen cup came home in.

Now wait, before you click away thinking I'm really and truly crazy, I want it to be know that I did not keep this for sentimental reasons, but for humorous ones. I simply think the graphic on the bag is the most bizzare thing I've ever seen. Especially if you consider what it's meant to carry.


So here it is.

What do you think of this?

Now I assume that the woman and the leaves and such are meant to represent fertility, especially since she's dancing under the moon. But this is for a guy's sample, so I think the female imagery is a bit odd.

But the weirdest thing is that she appears to be dancing inside a condom. It is woman as impotent phallic symbol.

I'm open to other interpretations, please feel free to share.