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Bumpday – Week 29

Jan 18th, 2012
by gazelle.
7 comments

I had the architect take a picture of me last night when I got home, but I hated it, and tried to edit it, and then deliberately accidentally deleted it.  Also, I am not, apparently, one of those pregnant women who enjoys looking at the pictures of my body and the changes. And right now, I’m needing positivity, and since the photo didn’t make me feel positive, I am 100% positive that I don’t need to share it.

So – news!

Baby size:15.2 inches-ish; 2.5 -2.75 lbs (about the size of a butternut squash)

Is it my imagination, or is this a bit...phallicUnder Creative Commons license: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

 

I’m feeling: Pretty good, not any more awkward than last week. I’m still having trouble sleeping, which I’m assuming will not get better any time soon. I actually feel mostly better than last week.

Physical changes: I’m still an innie, but the belly button gets shallower every day. I am itchy, itchy, itchy, though. I would bathe in lotion if it were practical and not extremely messy sounding. I’m having more round ligament pain this week, which worries me, because how much bigger is this belly going to get?

Baby stuff: Alvie Bean is still wicked active. It’s been nice, actually. The architect has got to have a lot of baby/daddy time. He can see him move & feel not just the kicks, but the random crawling about. I can feel him get the hiccups about once a day, which is just amusing.

Body Image: It goes back and forth. I haven’t stepped on a scale in a while, and I’m not going to. I eat healthy. I exercise as much as I can with the rest of my life stuff going on. Yeah – I eat ice cream waaaay more often than I did before, but for the first time in years, I can eat ice cream without nasty lactose intolerant side affects, and I’m going to keep on with that until Alvie’s born and I can no longer digest dairy again.

Food stuff: I have been craving chicken and dumplings lately. I was super excited yesterday when it was the special in the cafeteria where I work. I should have known better (it is, after all, called a cafeteria, and that is seldom the locale for fantastic food), but it was so disappointing! So now, I think I need to make chicken & dumplings this weekend. Yum. Comfort food!

Prep Work (Things to do between now & Alvie Bean Day)

January: Find a pediatrician, lock down a daycare, recycle all the old electronics in the office, get the carpet cleaning appointment made, find a maid service for quarterly deep cleans, finalize shower list for shower giver! And now, find a new doula, since mine quit last Monday.

February: Attend childbirth & breastfeeding classes, take babymoon, make sure all essentials are purchased (diapers and carseat at this point!), pack hospital bag

March: Finish getting less essential essentials (rocking chair, crib, changing table, other random stuff), make a plan for freezer meals, finish getting nursery ready, sign up for FMLA

 

Dump(ing my depression on the internet) Day…

It’s very hard to separate the upcoming birth of my son from my thoughts about my father. My dad will start radiation and chemo in about 3 weeks, and it’s very unlikely that either he or my mom will be able to fly out to see Alvie post-birth. My current plan is that as soon as I’m cleared to travel, the architect & I will fly back to South Dakota and I will stay for a week or two so that my dad can meet his grandson.  I’ll probably have to fly back by myself (eek!) but at least will have the architect for the trip out.

Right now, I’m just trying to figure out how to stay calm and strong for the baby and for my mom, finish grad school (5 more weeks!), continue to do my job, and then have a freaking baby. I was right on the edge of too much before, and am at a little of a loss on how to stay afloat and sane now. I alternately want to drink all the beer in North Portland (bad for the baby! and for me, too, I suppose) and just go run Wildwood Trail (ditto w/ the bad). Finding the time to relax is harder than I thought it would be – so much work and homework, and then I’m tired.

I feel really needy right now, but I’m not quite sure what it is I need. Perspective? Help? More time? Fewer commitments? To win the lottery? Balance? (Yes.) I am going to try to post a little each week on how I’m doing in regards to all the shit I’m wading through. I know I’m not the only one to go through something like this, and I am not try to win (or even compete in) the pain olympics, but it’s still hard. I also know that we’ll come through this time.

 

For anyone who is interested in keeping up with my dad’s progress, he does have a Caring Bridge site. The journal is updated about once/day – either by me or my mom.

Thank you everyone for your best wishes on my dad’s behalf. The internet is awesome.

 

In conclusion

Baby = good

Me = crazy

Architect = awesome

Friends = more wonderful than I can express

Three (3!) Things Thursday – super depressing edition

Jan 12th, 2012
by gazelle.
9 comments

1. Last night’s swim wasn’t very good. I’m trying to not be too hard on myself. I got dressed (first time since Monday morning!), left the house (again, first time since Monday!), and got in the water. Also, I looked cute in my maternity suit. BUT – after 250 yds, I started to cramp up in my lower abdomen. Ordinarily, I’d just push through it via my patented process of “ignore the pain until it either goes away or completely sidelines you for an entire season.” However, I am trying to be a good girl and NOT push through pain right now (apparently not as recommended in the 3rd trimester of pregnancy, or honestly, in life). So, I stopped for a breather. Eventually I decided that maybe it was dissipating enough that I could give it another go. yeah, not so much. I ended up walking in the last bit of that lap as soon as my feet touched the ground.  I wouldn’t have been so alarmist, except that’s where all the false labor contractions started earlier this week, and I really would like to not do that again for at least 10 more weeks. SO – all that being said, I totally forgot to have the Ambitious One take a picture of me in my cute maternity suit. SORRY!  Pretend, instead, that this is me:

(used under creative commons license: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic)

 

2. My dad is finally awake again after his surgery on Tuesday. I don’t think he’s very alert yet, but he was extubated this morning & is breathing on his own. I am going to try not to talk about this too much on my blog because (a) my family reads this blog, and I’d like to try to keep this as a place we don’t have to deal with this too much; (b) I write this blog and am trying super hard to be upbeat, positive, and wicked relaxed/Zen, because I hate crying while writing blog posts;  and (c) I am not here trying to garner sympathy or whatever. Shit happens. Currently shit is happening to my family. And that shit has happened in the form of brain tumors. There is good news – the largest tumors were successfully removed via the surgery. And now, there is waiting. Waiting for the biopsy results so a treatment plan can be made. Waiting for my dad to fully wake up from the surgery. Waiting to find out prognosis. Waiting to have this baby – in NOT LESS THAN 10 WEEKS, Alvie, so stop punching me in the cervix…that avenue is closed – so that I can take him to meet his grandfather.

(I was secretly pregnant in this picture. Please admire how I am managing to NOT look like I’m five seconds away from barfing on everyone! I am a champion!)

3. Um – so something happy? Alvie Bean is super active this week, and when he’s not punching me in the cervix, it’s actually kind of fun. The architect has got to feel a lot of kicks in the last couple of days, which is awesome, because previously the fetus would freeze up every time someone even thought about touching my belly. (He has a bit of performance anxiety.) (Funny side story – I got home from the pool last night as said to the architect, “Guess who kept punching me in the cervix while I was trying to swim?” His response, “The Ambitious One?” ha ha ha ha – fortunately, not.  I think I couldn’t be friends with her anymore if that were the case!  :) )

 

This is a dramatic reenactment, as that is not my belly, and as far as I know, those hands do not belong to the architect. (Used under Creative Common License: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0) )

 

So – there you are. I hope I didn’t bum anyone out too much. I am going to try to be my regular glass half-full, sunny side up, cheery person, blue skies, puppies, rainbows & unicorns self soon!

Happy (?) Thursday!

Happy Birthday!

Dec 9th, 2009
by gazelle.
4 comments

Today is my father’s birthday. He is 60! The architect & I were talking the other day about relative age. When I was younger than I am now, sixty was ancient. It was so hard to believe that people who had achieved that most venerable age didn’t just drop dead from the exhaustion of living. OLD.

Now that I am less young, and have friends in their 40s (and soon, husbands in their 40s), sixty isn’t really that old. Also, it’s been a VERY long time since my parents have been old, and honestly, I think they keep getting relatively younger.

So – happy birthday, very not-old father!

As you know, I flew into South Dakota last weekend to surprise my dad. My co-conspirator mother managed to keep the secret until the very end, although he was pretty suspicious when they got to the airport.  It was a really quick trip – I was in about 1:30 PM on Friday & was dropped off at the airport a little after 5 PM on Sunday. It was, however, a really GOOD trip.

Friday we had a birthday dinner – my mom made a zucchini lasagna & birthday cake, and it was just me, my parents & my sister. Saturday morning, I had a great run (although I was stared at by the largest buck I’ve ever seen in close proximity – 5-pointer not even five feet away from me) and then a fantastic lunch with a good friend from college and her family (and some local microbrews).

Saturday afternoon mom & I headed out east to their second home (my parents are FANCY, y’all) and we went out to dinner at this steak house where I had some of the best wall-eye I’ve had in ages. YUM!

Sunday morning was church, and then I got the opportunity to play the piano a little – something that I miss a LOT! I think a piano purchase is on the docket for the next year. I’m not very good anymore, and after making their ears bleed for a while, my mother got revenge by flinging chicken blood all over me. She claims it was an accident, but I don’t know….

Pretty soon, it was time to head out, and although the flights home weren’t quite as good as the flights out, I made it home in one piece.

I am so glad that I got to go spend a little time with my parents – it’d been almost a year since I’d seen them & almost THREE years since I’d been to South Dakota. I think I’ll be making another trip there in the spring or early summer to see all those other people that need seeing (although any of you are certainly welcome to come visit me, too, you know).

So – I leave you with the pictures:

Okay – so in my parents’ second home (which I’m sure they would like me to tell you they did NOT decorate), the kitchen has the above border. People, it is straw and pictures of chickens & eggs held to the wall with chicken wire. FOR REAL! Someone did this on purpose (there are also chicken curtains in the kitchen window). I am planning on trying to convince the architect to do this in our own kitchen. This is beyond awesome.

This last photo is of the kids’ placemat at the microbrewery/restaurant where I met my friend Steph & her family. I sat next to her son (who is almost seven) and he insisted that I help him color. About half of the above is my work (I’ll let you guess which half). He gifted me with the placemat when it was time to go & added the note you can read above (it says, “I like your coloring.”) He told me that he liked my coloring because, and I quote, he “doesn’t like people who color very good.” There you have it folks. The first grader admires my coloring because it is not as good as his own. Obviously that whole story is full of win. Other than the egregious insult, he seems like a pretty good kid, though! We did get to have an interesting debate on the merits of flying to South Dakota in the winter (pro=better flying weather; con=COLD) and the summer (pro=not cold; con=flying through summer storms is turbulent) and didn’t reach a conclusion as to which was better.

Overall – a great trip! I am so glad I went.

In conclusion – happy birthday dad! I love you!

And, for those of you who AREN’T my father, go here for your last chance to enter the holiday gift basket give-away.

Not bad, for a Tuesday

Dec 9th, 2008
by gazelle.
6 comments

I got up & made it to the gym at 6:30. I did a 3-mile hill workout in 34 minutes, which made me feel pretty damn good. Then I did about 30 minutes of lower body strength training. I added something new today – the squat cage thingie. It is supposed to help work on knee stability & quad strength, two things that are vital to me continuing to be an injury-free runner.

Got to work and was greeted with an email – “please meet at 10:45 to discuss the economic downturn.” After some surprising news yesterday, I felt more than a little trepidation leading up to the meeting. BUT – all is fine. I think that I, at least, will be in good shape for the next few months (hopefully long enough for the architect to become re-employed). 

I have a lot of stuff to do today, and a lot of away-from-my-desk stuff this afternoon, so must get back at it.

BUT – before I go, I just want to wish my dad a very happy birthday. I hope you are having a great day.