From panic to bliss in 3 minutes flat.

I FINALLY had a prenatal appointment yesterday. It feels like forever since I'd been in for one, and in reality it had only been, like, 5 weeks. But lately I've been feeling so NOT pregnant that I'd been counting the hours until I could hear the heartbeat.

And then the doctor couldn't find it.

She's all calm, shoving the little doppler thingie around and explaining the sounds we're hearing, though all I'm thinking is "Yes, but it's NOT THE HEARTBEAT." Finally after a couple minutes she says, "Well, I think we ought to try an ultrasound."

*Panic*

See, in the past, getting an ultrasound has meant getting a script from her, and then either making an appointment (as though there's any way I'm going to mentally last another 24 hours, much less 2 or 3 or 4 days depending on how busy the ultrasound office is) or going to the ER and weathering THAT environment for however long it takes for someone to spare five minutes to check you out. But then she said she'd finally gotten an ultrasound machine, so we could just hop over to the other room and take a look-see. Hallelujah! And what did we see?

A head, a spine, a hand, two thigh bones, and a heart beating around 140! Now obviously those aren't the only bits and pieces the kid has so far, it's just that, given its position (which was squished up to the top of the uterus, which is why Dr. Robinson couldn't find it) things were a little hard to see. Plus, at 14 weeks, the baby is just a wee thing of 3 or 4 inches, so it's hard to see much else anyway. But it kicked and squirmed away from the pressure of the ultrasound thingie, and we just sat and looked at the heart doing its thing for a few minutes. Lovely.

So I went from not only total panic but also from a sense of disconnect from this pregnancy to feeling very much the expectant mom again. Dan and I talked on the way home about how neither of us has much of a sense of what the sex might be, whereas the first time around we had such definite (and right on!) impressions, but I wonder if, now that I've seen it, I'll start to bond more. Regardless, I'm just relieved to know that all is well. :)

Week 14!

Well, I was a little late checking my weight for this month because we were up in Ventura visiting Dan's parents, but this morning I checked and I'm still only 7 pounds up! Unbelievable! I *knew* my last weigh-in was a fluke. Though I would not have been surprised to find I'd gained 2 or 3 pounds this week, given the way I've been eating (an entire order of Papap John's cheese sticks, anyone?)

On the way back from Ventura yesterday we stopped at the Camarillo Outlet Mall because they have a Maternity Works there. When I dragged out my stuff before the trip to get out some long-sleeved stuff (it's in the 60's up there, though we're getting there here, too! Yay for autumn!) I realized a great chunk of it is missing. I honestly have no idea where it all is. Upon further rumination it struck me that the clothes in the bags I'd been digging through were the things I'd been wearing in the months after Abby was born; I think that a lot of it got boxed/bagged before she even arrived because much of it was warm weather stuff and much of it I simply outgrew because I was a giant honking blimp. But given the current state of our garage there is NO way I'm going to find those things until we completely clean, which we hope to do soon, but until then I am woefully unprepared, clothing-wise. But the great thing about the outlet store, especially when it's having a giant sale, is that you can get a decent amount of stuff for a little over a hundred bucks. Which is what I did. Cute stuff, too; I think I'll be better dressed while pregnant than when not!

One down, two to go

I'm a little late posting this, but as of Tuesday I am officially done with my first trimester! Woohoo! It's about time. Man, that went slow.

My total first trimester weight gain was seven pounds. That's it!!! I'm stunned, and totally stoked. Heck, even if I gain 10--or, heaven forbid, 15--for the next two trimesters, I'll be in SUCH good shape. What a relief.

I did a prenatal yoga workout the other day. I bought a DVD off Amazon called "The Divine Mother." It sounds totally cheesy, but it was actually really good. The woman that leads it is 36 week pregnant, and she's joined by two other women who were, like, 17 months and 20-something months. Anna, the lead woman, narrates over the video of them doing the exercises, rather that speaking while doing them, and she has a beautiful, calming voice. She'd be great for reading hypnobirth scripts! The relaxation parts were sooo lovely, but the workout parts totally kicked my hiney! I did it two nights ago and I was more sore this morning than I was yesterday, but still not as sore as I expected to be, so that's encouraging. My chiropractor has also written me a script for physical therapist-led pilates, which I hope to start soon. I just have to find out how much my insurance is going to cover. Hopefully between that and the yoga I won't have the muscle issues I had last time. Though today I really started feeling the ligament pain that crippled me 3rd trimester last time--that's WAY earlier than it was last time, and that's a little discouraging to think I'll have to deal with it for so much longer this time. This is one of the reasons we got adjustable beds, however: so that, when I'm pregnant and start having the ligament issues that relegated me to the recliner for the last month back in 2005, I'd be able to stay in our bed. We just have to shift Abby over towards Dan's side and get her used to sleeping there instead of between me and the bed rail, which I have to remove to adjust the bed.

So I've been giving myself a little cereal treat every Tuesday night to celebrate another week down. I bought one of thoe 8-box variety packs that had, like, Cocoa Puffs and Golden Grahams and Cheerios and--the box I'm saving for last--Lucky Charms. It's been perfect, really; it gives me something to look forward to, satisfies my sweet tooth for the night, and helps me to curb my cereal craving for the whole week. What a change from my 2-bulk-boxes-a-week addiction when I was preggo with Abby!