A picture of something I have peed on!

A year ago today I found out I was pregnant. I can't believe it has been a year. I wanted to tell Brad in some cool way, but I can't keep secrets at all, so I called him at work and told him. No fanfare or anything. I remember I could tell he was smiling over the phone and when he got home he was so in awe, we both were. I struggled with infertility and sometimes thought I would never get pregnant, now I can't wait to get pregnant again! Okay, I think we will wait a little while :)

The day has come...

Nope, no baby yet; but as of eight minutes ago, it is now officially my due date. My mother-in-law is in town to visit Brad's grandma in the hospital. Unfortunately they have to leave tomorrow. That totally sucks because it means they most likely won't be able to see the baby (unless I go into labor and have the baby by tomorrow midday, probably not going to happen).

I know I should be appreciating all this free time in which I have been reading, watching Friends, playing games online, etc. but I really just can't wait to meet her. It is the craziest feeling knowing that at any time, most likely within the next week, my life is going to change forever. There really is no way to prepare for it; right now my life is the same as it has been, and then all at once, it won't ever be the same again.

I will update as soon as I can after her birth.....

Almost there....

Wow, another post. It has only been over two months. How are you all? Well this will probably be my last post before our little girl shows herself. I am 37w4d. I have no idea when she will come, but she can't stay in there longer than 30 more days (two weeks late), hopefully way sooner than that. I am now on a leave of absence from beauty school. I wanted to stay longer, but since the baby has dropped I can't stand or walk around for hours at a time; I get bad leg pain and numbing. So for the last week I have been hanging at home and nesting. We just had our baby shower last weekend. It was awesome. We did two great activities that I think should be done at every shower; decorated blank onesies with fabric and made an alphabet book for the baby. Here are some pics:







Also, I made a fabric pennant banner that says our daughter's name, Kennedy Mae. I couldn't get a good picture of it up, but here is a close up of a couple of the pennants. It was super easy because I did the no sew version where you cut out a diamond of fabric and then fold it in half over yarn and hot glue gun it together. Easy.







I really still can't believe I am going to have a baby. But I will post again with pictures of my newborn baby girl!!!!!

Here I am at 26 weeks. I think I finally look pregnant and not just fatter than usual! I am just freaking out that Michelle Duggar had her baby because we were exactly the same gestational age with our babies and that means that I could have my baby right now and she would most likely live. So thankful that my pregnancy has been very healthy so far. I am still down 10 lbs from my pre-pregnancy weight and have not gained anything.
I am so so lucky because a friend of my Mom's who has a four year old daughter, gave me A LOT of her old clothes. I basically don't have to buy much more baby clothes until she is like three. I hope someone else I know (Amber!) has a baby girl so I can pass these along someday. See the proof below of me with all my loot.


On the name front I think we are definitely leaning towards Kennedy... or Amelia... or.... It is a really hard thing to decide this.

January is going to start making this whole baby thing even more real because we will be touring the hospital and taking an infant care class and what not and also having our baby shower. So keep the last couple weekends in January open (the 24th or 31st?)

I keep livin this day like the next will never come

18 weeks pregnant
Originally uploaded by flyabuv

So yeah, I haven't posted in a month. Sorry about that, I know my few readers have been very disappointed. I am still pregnant and actually considering the fact that I am actually going to have a baby! It still doesn't seem real. My mom is coming home today after being gone for about two months. It will be great to see her but I am expecting some tension because we have been living in her house while she was gone and I know she wants that control of being in charge of her own house back. I know living with her will work out it is just hard balancing that mother/daughter relationship with the landlord/tenant relationship. Especially when it comes to cleaning as I have been known to not do it.
I am 18 weeks pregnant and just had to buy some maternity pants this week. I still have not gained any weight and am actually down 10 lbs from my starting weight. I am eating pretty healthy when I eat, but I just don't think I am eating enough during the day. I think that starting tomorrow (because of my mom) I will be eating more and more healthy. I did start drinking caffeine a few weeks ago, I didn't drink it the first 13 weeks or so, but I just love soda so much! I only drink one every couple of days or so and that is my only source of caffeine and hfcs.
I am scared that I may get or already have gestational diabetes. If you have read this site before you know that I have insulin resistance and PCOS. So I already struggled with my blood sugar before getting pregnant, so now I may already have GD. That scares me mostly because I am seeing, and hope to be delivered by, a midwife. I don't want to become high risk and have to have a high intervention delivery.
I am planning on getting a couple books about GD from the library and changing my diet where necessary.
Now that life will be getting into a regular routine since we are done moving, cleaning my Mom's house, and my Mom will be back; I think I will be getting more prepared for having this baby. I want to read more parenting books (I already have a list) and start knitting and crocheting like crazy.
Here is a pic of me at 18 weeks. I was already fat, so mostly my baby is just pushing that fat forward, but I can tell that my stomach is shaped differently now. Brad commented that the lighting makes it look seedy, like the Fiona Apple video "Criminal"

Moving On

It is moving time again! Brad and I have moved every year since we have been together (this is our fourth time moving I think). I think this will start to change since we are having a baby, you know, stability and all. But since I am in school full time right now and don't have a job, we can't really afford much on only Brad's income. So.... we are moving in with my Mom!!!!!

We had actually decided to do this before we found out we were pregnant, but now it makes even more sense. My Mom needs the money and we need the discount in rent. We are getting two of her bedrooms and paying her $600 a month (including all utilities). So our only other bills are like food, cell phones, credit card payments, oh and the storage unit we have to get to store some of our stuff.

We are in the middle of moving and it is hell. We don't have to be out of our apartment until October 9th, so we have been taking car loads of stuff over to our new house almost daily. But the issue is, my Mom is out of town for a few weeks and she wants us to be completely moved in and the house clean by the time she gets back.

This is hard because my Mom has so much unorganized stuff! I am slowely sorting things and making room. I just went through her medicine cabinet and threw away SO MUCH expired medicine; what used to take up a whole cabinet in the kitchen, now takes up one shelf.

Also, it is hard because we have two cats; and so does my Mom. That's right, we are now a FOUR cat household. My Mom's two cats, Hailey and Jolie are inside/outside cats. They are tough, but friendly and go outside to use the bathroom and frolic and then come inside to sleep or relax. My cats, Beans and Rice, are inside cats; we are willing to make them inside/outside cats but they aren't yet. The cat introductions are not going superbly well. Beans and Rice are very trusting and interested in these new "friends"; Jolie and Hailey hiss and growl. Oh well, I'm sure it will get better

PREGNANCY RELATED:

I am now 11w4d pregant. I am nauteous all the time and have thrown up some. I am crying over tiny things and I'm sure freaking out Brad. Brad hates it when I gag, he says it too close to throwing up and I say there is a big difference!

I am really frustrated because I still don't have insurance. I am in the process of getting AHCCCS and it is hard. They need so much paperwork!

I will try to post some pictures of our new house some time next week after I clean it more.

Yep, I'm knocked up

I haven't posted anything of substance in a while, because on July 17th I found out that I am PREGNANT!!!!!!! And that is all I have wanted to talk about but I wanted to hold off for a while. I am now 10 weeks 1 day and am very excited. My periods are so random and I don't ovulate on time because according to the ist day of my last menstrual period I should be about 12 weeks, but I went to the doctor and got a sonogram and according to the size of the baby I am only ten weeks. We got to see the heart beating any everything. Pretty effing awesome.

And I know this is cliched, but it happened like the week after I stopped thinking about it at all. We had been trying for about a year and even did a couple of rounds of clomid earlier this year. Then I started school on June 22nd and was so busy and having so much fun that I just stopped thinking about trying for a baby and then we conceived probably the second week of school. Crazy right!!!!!

I am due in March

Make a pregnancy ticker

TMI

If you are guy, you may want to stop reading now.

I actually started my period today! It has been 67 days since my last one (and no I was never pregnant). I have an appointment for a new ob/gyn in April (there was no openings before then). I am so happy that my body is showing at least this sign that it is working. In January I did a round of clomid 50 mg, but obviously it didn't work. I am annoyed because I don't even know if I ovulated at all because my previous gyno didn't monitor that. I will push for that this time.

This is a great tool for tracking your menstrual cycles. It looks pretty, and is very easy to use; then it predicts when you will ovulate.

Imagination or Symptoms?

I can never tell if I am having real symptoms or just convincing myself I have symptoms after reading what symptoms I "should have". Case in point, when I read side effects for medicines I'm taking, I start to have those symptoms. Really? Or am I just imagining them? The same thing is happening now with pregnancy symptoms. Not that I am not having those symptoms, but some of them can mean that my period is coming as well. Oh well, I will just keep waiting and taking a hpt every couple of days (still negative as of Monday). I really want to save up some money and go to a Reproductive Endocrinologist (my insurance doesn't cover it) because I feel I will get better care there. My regular OB/GYN is just not cutting it. Anyone want to give me the name of their awesome Phoenix based OB/GYN with me?

Where have I been?

At home, in bed. Watching a lot of Doctor Who and Torchwood. I really don't know why I don't blog more. Probably because I don't really have much to say sometimes. Oh, I could probably blog a lot about my love for all things Doctor Who, or perhaps politics (although that would depress me); but I think that would bore most people.

I am so happy that I have finally gotten one person to watch Doctor Who, my father. He has watched some of series one on Netflix online and loved them. Yay! If only everyone I told about Doctor who would watch it, then there would be like 25 new loyal viewers. I am pretty upset that there will not be a new season until 2010 and it will be with a new Doctor. I can't even explain the love I have for David Tennant. And although i don't love Torchwood as much, I just love how sexually abiguous everyone is on that show; everyone seems to be bisexual. It's awesome! On US Television same sex kisses are treated oddly, either with scantily clad women, or it somehow feels taboo; but on Torchwood it is treated as completely normal and I really like how it is done.

See are you bored yet?

Things are hopefully progressing on the baby making front. I went to the ob/gyn and got Provera to jump start my period, then Clomid 50mg on cycle days 3-7 to force me to ovulate. Right now I am on CD (cycle day) 9 so I should hopefully ovulate anyday now. The ob/gyn didn't put me on Metformin which was discouraging. Many people who have PCOS, if they get pregnant, will have a miscarriage if their insulin resistance is not taken care of. So instead I am taking a cinnamon supplement everyday, that is supposed to balance my sugar levels. So we should know by my 26th birthday (January 28)whether I am pregnant or not. Please send good thought my way (or pray if that is your thing). Thanks!

Baby name

I have always liked the name Harper for a girl. If it was my choice our hypothetical daughter would be Harper Mae Dwyer. But Brad just isn't warming up to it for some reason. Great, vetoed already and I'm not even pregnant.

Road Block

Well it's official, I do have PCOS. I went to the doctor yesterday to get the results of my sonogram. I have many cysts and enlarged ovaries. It is a nice to know I actually have something; but I am feeling a lot of anger towards western medicine and past doctors that I have had. Especially after watching this (parts 1-3). I had the same experience where I went to the gynocologist as a young teenager and the only thing they do is put you on birth control. They never told me I had a hormone imbalance or that I would have trouble getting pregnant in the future. If over 10% of women have PCOS, why are doctors not more forthcoming diagnosing it? I have a lot of the symptoms! It is crazy to think that if I had known about this as a teenager, I may have been able to lose the weight I have been struggling with since I went through puberty. PCOS is related to insulin resistance and that was most likely why I gained weight. Imagine beating yourself up for years about something that you really couldn't have changed. Oh, well I can't change the past only my future.

Since I go to a naturopath I am not on a prescription drug, only a diet and excercise change and herbal supplements. I will try that for three months and if for some reason there is no change, I will probably go to a reproductive endocrinologist at that point. Right now these are the supplements I am on
DB-7 to stabilize blood sugar and glucose metabolism.
PMS Formula - to balance hormones like estrogen
Ova Blend (not sure, but something to do with reproductive system)
Fish oil
Flax seed
Pre-natal vitamin

The two that I am having a problem with are the PMS formula and flax seed because these are not in pill form. I need to find a way to add the flax seed to my foods. I will look for recipes and just start sprinkling it on my oatmeal, cereal, smoothies. The PMS formula is a tincture where I have to drink a couple droppers full. It is so nasty tasting that I don't think I will be able to do it twice a day for months. So nasty.

Please send good thoughts my way (or pray if that is your thing). I would appreciate it.

Jealousy

Does it make me a bad person that I was really jealous when I found out one of my favorite bloggers is pregnant again? She already has three children, can't she wait until I have at least one on the way? I realize this is completely irrational and I feel bad about it. Motherhood is always something I have admired in other people and assumed I would be able to do it; but what if I can't?

I can't believe they expect healthy couples to try for 18 months before worrying about not being able to get pregnant. That is fracking forever.

Basically I am just an impatient spoiled brat and expect instant gratification in most other areas of my life; but this is not something I can rush. And really we are waiting until we are married until we are actively trying (maybe for the continued deniability for my father; I swear we sleep in separate beds!), but isn't not protecting the same as trying?