30 weeks

Flying by, just flying by!

All is well, I put on a bit of weight in the last two weeks, so I'm plus 11kg bohooo but I noticed my hands are a bit more swollen so that will definitely contribute. I also checked the heartbeat a couple of days ago (just because I can! ehehe) and it was 136 bpm so totally normal. Not sure you remembered that I was worried it would have steadily decreased as they baby got bigger, but it's just his average it seems!

Movements are very regular, Phoenix has been transverse till yesterday so I could feel movements mostly low down and very funnily on my sides with a distinct tickling feeling. I have the occasional BH specially if I walk a bit or do the stairs, but nothing out of the ordinary. For the last couple of days Oliver has been really attracted by the belly and spontaneously would give it kisses! So sweet! Or if we both sitting on the couch he would keep his han on my belly. Bless him. We went visiting neighbours who have just had their third baby boy and Oliver was very gentle with him even if I was holding him. Hopefully he'll be happy when this one arrives and will be in the house.

Oliver's room has arrived, I will have a post dedicated to it shortly. He loves it!! But we still need to get a bed guard so for the moment Oliver thinks it's the best play ground ever and has not slept there yet (maybe tomorrow, I'm thinking to let him fall asleep in the usual bed and carry him in the new one then...). We also had the electrician in doing some prep work for the kitchen which is great and Mike is chasing the kitchen people to make sure they are working on our order.

Work is still very busy though this week at least there were no labs and a colleague of mine decided he had to do 3 weeks of lecturing now rather than later...so I'm only doing two courses instead than three which is definitely much better. The downside is that I would have had it all done within the next two weeks and now I have to do some more after that. But ah well, I'll do what I can.

Mike's aunt from Cali will be staying with us for a night or two early next week before flying back to much better weather. She did make the funeral and I mentioned before that Irish funerals are something else. The service was lovely, the priest grew up with Mike's cousin so every word was heartfelt. Oliver was also very well behaved and managed to stay quiet for most of the mass (then Mike took him outside to let him run around a bit).
And I think this is all for now, I know most of you posted on Valentine's day, but we don't celebrate that day much (me and Mike I mean) so I didn't have anything particularly interesting to say! We did enjoy a box of chocolate and a movie though, since the recession we say here that "staying in" is the new "going out" so we certainly did follow the trend for once.

Love to all.

35 weeks and tiling

Oh girls, have you ever heard of an almost 8 month pregnant woman tiling a bathroom? Me neither... but lets start from the beginning.

Mike came home on wednesday morning from Mexico, it went very well but he was quite tired and jet-lagged. With the attic nearing completion, Mike had one job to do. Tiling the bathroom. It was a project, he never did such a thing before and it seemed like a good idea at the time. Now, the builders are out of the house as of this morning, the painter is in till wednesday to decorate and that's it. The plumber was called on friday to see would he be able to come today to fix the sanitary-ware if Mike could guarantee the bathroom was ready by 8 am this morning. The plumber could not be 100% sure but said unless there is an emergency call he will be in. So as of wednesday afternoon of last week Mike was on the project. And I was too. I have to say this is a much bigger job than we though and part of the problem is that Mike is a total perfectionist who needs to plan for ages before actually get going. After deciding where to start on thursday we had the first few tiles up. Note that while tiler generally tile around pipes projecting from the wall, Mike drilled holes into the tiles so that each tile would fit like a glove around the pipe. Do you have any idea of the amount of measuring, cutting and cursing that this take? By the time it was friday I started to help with the project. We had to have it all tiled by saturday evening to be able to grout. Despite working till 2am on saturday we had not finished. Up early on Sunday, and worked until we dropped. I gave up at around 1am saying "feck the bathroom, we have three in the house already, this one can certainly wait until January", Mike decided to stay and try and get the floor grouted. He finished at 4am this morning. We had not been given enough grout. We still don't know even if the plumber is coming today! What we know for sure is that a tiling job this perfect has never been seen on Hearth and we are aching and tired from head to toes... Pictures of the whole development will be posted as soon as we move back in and I have broadband again!

And I'm 35 weeks pregnant let's not forget the important bit. Picking up a pencil from the floor to mark a tile for a cut is no easy task let me tell you. I'm absolutely exhausted. The heavy job didn't seem to bother Elvis the least though, he kept moving and poking and rolling and stretching! Braxton Hicks were as always (I thought all this extra work could have induced early labour but obviously not!) no more and no less. The kicks are now right up the rib-cage and can be quite uncomfortable to be honest. I thought how to describe the feeling of the rolls and I think I found the perfect example...it's like those chairs that massage your back! Except it's in your belly! What do you think?

The scale tells me I've now piled up a total of 16kg. And I feel them all. I'm heavy and can't put my boots on without being out of breath. Not complaining, just stating!

As for other symptoms the sleeping is often interrupted by pee-breaks and generally a stuffed nose as soon as I put my head on the pillow! The lungs feel squashed and so does the stomach, Ithink I'm being a bit nauseous at times too. Still no stretch marks on the belly and have a look below...it's certainly stretching! Week 34 is missing from the series boohoo but you can see the progress.

Finally I want to apologise for my lack of commenting, you are all in my thoughts I'm hoping to get back to my usual self in about a week time!

34 weeks down, 6 to go!

My little honeydew is definitely growing! I have to say after the initial MASSIVE appearance of stretch marks on my boobs I have not suffered any others on the belly...it is still too soon to tell I suppose, but I thought I make a note of it for now. Still having plenty of Braxton Hicks, getting up much more often for peeing and I'm eating plenty. My weight is probably a bit higher than the last week but as it's not officially a full Kg I'll keep it at +15kg for now! Following the advice of the midwife who did the pre-natal I've started drinking raspberry leaf tea (I had used it in the past for menstrual cramps). She assured us it won't start labour, but after 34 weeks it should help toning the uterus, so there you go!

You guys were asking about pictures, well I don't have any really, I didn't know but at this gestational age is much more difficult to get a proper shot...we saw the belly, the cord, the head etc but no real profile view to talk about. I do have 3 pics which show the fluid (the deepest pocket), the cord flow and the edge of the placenta, but they are not very interesting I'm afraid. I'll post them though just for the blog records!

Other interesting measurements were:

BPD 83.5 mm

HC 306.8 mm

AC 285.8 mm

FL 67.1 mm

Estimated foetal weight 2.2 Kg (4lb 13oz)

Doppler:

PI 0.83

RI 0.56

S/D 2.26

HB 134bpm

Do you know much about the numbers? They are all within ranges as far as I can tell (the femur is above average, while everything else is slightly below average) but I decided not to do too much research as I know I will obsess (yet again!).

Next visit is tomorrow with the OB. As Mike is away I didn't take a 34w photo yesterday (boohoo) so I'll be posting the next set on Sunday at 35w.

Attic is also coming along, two more weeks and we should move back in!! I'll post the series of pics then.

Finally I've to admit I've given up yoga... first it was the snow and then the icy roads, today I'm just thinking I may as well save the petrol...I really didn't like the teacher, I have only mentioned it once I think how I thought it was a waste of time, as it hasn't got any better unfortunately. I'm doing my Kegel exercises and I want to start on perineal massages soon, that'll have to do!

Upgraded to a Squash! 29 weeks

We have no broadband in the temporary accommodation, so I could not update yesterday as usual!

Anyway, 29 weeks along and doing well, no weight gain which means I'm steady at +13Kg (now I'm worrying I should actually put up a bit of weight given that I'm the last trimester!!! Same old me...). Sleeping ok, getting up at least a couple of times to pee but I don't feel too tired in the morning. Turning around in the bed is becoming a bit more uncomfortable, I can feel the weight of Elvis, specially if I'm on my right side. Whichever position he is in, I have like a hard "dome" on my upper right side of the belly. I think it's his bum! It doesn't move much and I feel kicks mostly on the left hand side as if there's where the room is but Elvis is all on the right.

I do kick counting even though my OB (and many others) are not really in favour of it as I mentioned before, still, it makes me feel more relaxed as Elvis moves certainly much more than 10 times in 2 hours (when he's awake!) and one main difference I've noticed is that now the movements are more like rolls and shifts and pressure than hard kicks (though I get them as well). And I think I felt hiccups too! Lately I have quite a few Braxton-Hicks and the belly is really hard...I know it's normal but I thought those contractions would come and go while I seem to have a contracted uterus for a long time specially if I'm walking. I'll ask next week just to be sure.

The temporary accommodation is perfect, we've all settled in very nicely (both Patches and the Dude absolutely love it!) and it's so so convenient to our place it's almost a dream. On saturday we picked up the tiles for the bathroom and I think we now have everything. The works are progressing right on schedule, after only one week so much had been done already! This week the windows and stairs will be ordered and the steel beams positioned. We are taking pics every week so I will post a progress update in a couple of weeks to let you see how it goes!

Only four more weeks of term. I can't wait! I have my teaching almost done and it's a great milestone to look forward too.

The OB visit

Finally I can update! Yesterday after the OB appointment I was on a panel for some scholarships assignment and had no email access!! Ahhh, nearly had withdrawal symptoms! Then once home I was so so tired I didn't fire up the computer at all...

Anyway, the visit went very well, apparently Elvis has assumed position!!I did notice that I started feeling movements much higher up (as if they are in my stomach) or low down, but not on the sides so much. His little heart was beating away and everything looked good, including the amniotic fluid and the placenta seemed to be a bit higher up also.

My urine sample was fine, and so were the results from the thyroid blood work I did at my 20 weeks scan! That's great as I wasn't sure how those would have turned out!

We talked about the Braxton Hicks contractions I had (Dr. L had actually written down in his notes about our conversation!) and the fact that they are totally gone now, or at least I don't notice them at all. He said they can be very normal and unless they become very very frequent, I have spotting associated with it or the waters break there's nothing to worry about. I thought I had them because of all the travelling, but he said that really the uterus most of the time has a mind of its own! All good then!

I asked him about the weight gain and popped on his scale to see the difference from the 12 weeks weight. It says I'm "only" plus 8kg! Now, I'm pretty sure with the steroids and all I had piled up a good 4 kg between the pre-preg weight and 12 weeks, but still....it feels better. He said not to worry too much to be honest, the only problem may be for me to loose the weight after birth but it's not a huge gain by any means! Woohooo! Love the Irish philosophy! Of course thanks to all of you also for the reassuring words on weight gain and although I do love the new boobs (it does look like I had a bit of a job done!) I was also gifted with itchy stretch-marks in that same area which I'm afraid will look like a geographical map once the "thinning" effect after pregnancy and breastfeeding will occur. Ah well, I'm sure I won't really care too much!

Finally, I asked the OB if in Ireland there was such a program as the cord-blood donation. Nope. Pity to be honest...

Oh, I meant to say that now that the fear of incompetent cervix has somewhat subsided (I have hope it wouldn't be a tragedy at this stage) and with it the premature labour (again viability gave me this major relief) I have this new fear now which is the possibility of umbilical cord real nots and torsion...ah well... you know me by now, so just shake your head and say out loud "will she ever relax and enjoy?" eheheh

But yoga on monday night was great. Actually as it was my first time (missed the first three sessions), I didn't know that it was "couple nights" and that we were going to tackle labour and breathing techniques...so there were three couples...and me!! boohoooo!! I wasn't even wearing my rings so I felt quite lonely but then just paired up with the teacher thinking of myself as if I was in a lesbian couple and giggled all the way through!