more sensitivities I thought being emotional was supposed to happen more in the first trimester, but not for me... I am SO much more emotional these days. Oh well.
My sense of smell is still awfully strong, although I think it has toned down a bit. I can't believe how well I can smell. I often find myself holding my breath while walking past people in the grocery store... smells are really just that strong for me. I hate opening our refrigerator because it is so gross to smell so many foods at once. Isn't that bizarre? My hearing is quite acute, too. I keep hearing things (like hums in the car that I never noticed before) and thinking about how annoyed dogs must be all the time from the insane amount of noise pollution out there. As I write this, there is a little girl across the street who has a tiny chime on her bicycle, and the sound of it... a long ways away... is driving me crazy. Keith has always had a really good sense of hearing and I have thought he was just being whiny when he pointed out some ridiculously small noise, but now I can't believe he doesn't complain about it more... intensified noises can be so nerve-wracking!
I've been fighting off a cold the last few days. Actually, I think I've been fighting it for a few weeks, but it's getting me now. Probably because I'm eating dairy again and I had dessert a few nights ago. Woke up sick the next day, just like clockwork. My body is amazing like that. (Amazingly ANNOYING.) I'm feeling awfully achy though, so I really hope it's not the flu again.
2008-07-16 (17 weeks)
baby names I can't lay on my back or stomach anymore. I knew that was going to happen, but I still feel a little bit dismayed. I don't mind the stomach part so much - I'm not supposed to lay on it anyway because of my kyphosis - but I really miss laying on my back!! I keep waking up at night because I've rolled over to my back and then have to roll back to my side.
We've had several favorite baby names (first + middle combos) picked out for a long time, but are thinking through the whole naming process again anyway. The more I look at baby names or research additional meanings behind our favorites, though, the more I love the names we've already picked out. I'm finding that I really don't care what the baby name sites say about the names I like... that's probably a good thing, right? That I like them even if other people don't? I've been thinking about baby names for four years, then repeatedly running them past Keith for refinement, and I'm not finding that pregnancy makes me better at thinking about them than before.... so I still like the ones we've had for a while. We haven't been looking at baby name books; there are just so many lovely and good names out there that it is easier to figure out our qualifications and begin from a narrower list. The only themes that we've really considered have been in the categories of Bible names, missionaries, favorite authors, and favorite literary characters. But we also want the names to have special inherent meaning apart from the namesakes and, of course, be nice names of their own accord. I guess I can't really talk about it much more than that if we don't want to spill the names ahead of time, but all of that to say... I have baby names on the brain today.
2008-07-10 (16 weeks)
little things Last week I kinda went back and forth... sometimes I was showing, sometimes not. Now I'm definitely showing all the time. Still wearing my normal clothes, which is a blessing, but I don't think it will last much longer. I'm still tired, but not so much as the first trimester. I get slightly nauseous if I don't eat, but I'm all done puking, hurray! Headaches have subsided since I've been going to the chiropractor, which is also making me a lot more comfortable in general - my back and neck feel tons better. I'm having vivid dreams but not really about the baby. I think I can feel the baby move, but when I put my hand on my uterus, my own heartbeat is so strong that it's hard to notice anything underneath that. I'm really looking forward to when Keith is able to feel the baby moving.
It's been tough to eat enough lately. Being sick added to that but now I think it's just that I feel full all the time because the baby is so big in there. I've been really working hard to get enough calories each day but it's funny that it is so much of a chore! I thought I'd have to be careful not to eat too much and here I am having to force feed myself even a normal amount of food, then another 300 calories on top of that for the baby. There was a while there when it was a struggle even to eat 300 calories through the course of the day, and then I'd have to try to catch up at dinner. Oh well, at least I'm not gaining weight too rapidly... more like fighting to gain any at all. Nothing really sounds appetizing or worth making, although I'll eat anything set in front of me. It's like I just have no imagination when it comes to finding something to eat. Sushi's the only thing I've really been wanting, and of course I can't have it, so I've been buying (and delighting in) the vegetarian sushi at the grocery store deli every now and then. I'd love some easy, healthy pregnancy recipes if anyone has good suggestions.
2008-07-08 (16 weeks)
second prenatal We went to our second prenatal appointment today, and I enjoyed it much more than my first one. I haven't been calling my midwife or support staff when I've been so sick and all, even when I felt super miserable, because I just didn't really feel confident about it or know how much I was supposed to contact them. (By the way, apparently there's been a really rotten ten-day flu going around that has two weeks of aftermath - it sounds really similar to what I was feeling.) They encouraged me to call often and so I really appreciated that. I think I've been kind of intimidated by this whole going-to-the-midwife thing, not having ever done it before. The baby's heartbeat sounds good - we stopped and had a lengthy discussion about Dopplers before they put it on me, but I ended up deciding I wanted to hear the heartbeat again, so much for research :) - and I'm measuring at 17 weeks, so just right. They said the baby was kicking like a soccer player, which made it hard to actually hear the heartbeat for a while, but I was kinda proud. They had a plastic mold of how big our baby is at this stage (just the size of my hand, from head to bum), and it made me so happy to hold it in my hand. Keith could tell I didn't really want to give the plastic baby back, which was pretty humorous and unexpected to both of us! I guess I am just really excited to hold our baby.
The best part was getting to talk with Becky, who is the main doula and will probably be mine. I met her when we first checked out the birth center, and it was so clear that she loved the Lord and I just liked her so much. I've been hoping since then that she'd be my doula, but I haven't seen her since or really known how the whole doula service part of the birth center worked, so I asked all about that today and she told me how she does it and it made me SO HAPPY because it sounds like she is exactly the kind of doula that I want. I didn't realize it until we were talking but I think the doula aspect of labor is way more important to me than the midwife aspect. I love what doulas do and I want to know how it is to be supported by a doula through labor so that I can be that kind of support person as well. I really want someone who will walk through my birth plan, come to my house and labor with me through the early stages, be an encouragement, suggest good positions, give massage, all that kind of thing. She described all of that and said she even likes to do a sort of practice labor time in the birth center, just to see what kind of roles I will want those around me to take. It was all tremendously encouraging and left me feeling so happy, and it made Keith happy to see me open up with them. So we came home and read all about red raspberry leaf tea and are steeping my first two quarts of it now, and I am happily reading birth stories and looking forward to my own.
