Happy New Year!

Well only an hour and a half left of 2005. What a year!

At the very beginning of 2005 I went in to the doctor because I was having such pain in my ovaries. I was pretty sure they were going to tell me it would require surgery or possibly a hysterectomy because of all the cysts I had. And here we are almost exactly a year later and I'm 27 weeks pregnant with our son Nicholas! Amazing what can happen in just one year!

I know there were lots of other things that happened in the world last year that weren't nearly as good, but I'm trying not to dwell on those. Instead I'll hope that everyone has as wonderful a 2006 as my 2005 was.

Happy New Year everyone!

More beadlings!

Ok, I'm starting to need to put my feet up more and more and I just can't seem to get into a book, which is pretty weird for me. Instead I want to DO something. So I started beading and now I am taking pics to share because I think they're so cute!

I made this one this morning for Tom. No symbolism, but it looked like a neat one to make and he liked it. I improvized on the leg length and the design to make it look like a black widow.



I just made this one this evening for Jessica. She really likes purple and green and hates bugs. So here's a cute purple and green bug that might help her get over her phobia.

I haven't given in to pressure, I was just thinking of you!

Ok, I did not give in to xmas pressure! I didn't! But I was thinking of everyone I was going to see at Christmas and I've been in bed a lot lately with my feet up (stupid swollen ankles) so I was getting bored. Since I'm seeing everyone in a few hours and I highly doubt you'll be checking the blog this early I took a pic of the beadlings I made and will put it here so everyone else can see them. I love beading! It's so detailed and fun! I've started improvising on some of the patterns in the book and playing around with colors. I made an angel for my mom yesterday to wear on her lapel, and a fairy for Liz to wear. Wish I had pics of those, they were really neat colors. Liz helped me pic the colors and branch out from only doing the white and irridescent ones like the book.

Here's the pic.


I did specific colors for everyone too while I was thinking of them.
Purple with a hint of green for Jessica because those are her favorite colors.
Pink with a hint of blue for JM, because she has a new granddaughter all the way up in Canada and Nicky of course is on the way.
Green for Maryellen, because I just know she's going to be giving Nicky a cousin in the relatively near future and I just don't know if it will be a boy or a girl yet.
Blue with white for Donna who is absolutely thrilled to be having her first grandson in March!

For the boys though I thought angels (or fairies, did you notice the new wings I did on Donna and Maryellen's?) were a bit girly for them, so I thought of something else. They were both a lot more complex, and I had to fiddle with the colors a bit since I didn't have enough of the 'right' beads to do them, but I think they're neat.

For Charles, who has been plagued by screen-eating grasshoppers, a grasshopper that will NEVER chew on his screens!
For Scot, who will be a wonderful daddy someday in the relatively near future, a seahorse. They are only one of the naturally wonderful fathers out there! (But I promise you won't actually have to give birth to your baby Scot!)

Anyway, I hope they like them, even though they're really not xmas gifts, but just more like tangible thoughts I guess.

Merry Christmas everybody!

Morning sickness AGAIN?!

Ugh! I tossed my cookies again this morning. Right after taking my morning pills too. But I didn't retake them just in case I absorbed them. Actually there were no cookies to speak of, mostly phlem and acid. YUCK! So of course Tom had to take me to IHOP for breakfast to make me all better. :) It worked. Very weird that the puking has been twice lately and only once when I was actually nauseated all the time.

I'm trying hard to resist the make something/anything urge that came upon me last night. I'm soo tired! I am NOT staying up all night to bead or origami anything! I'm not giving in! I'm resting! I mean it!

Really...

:)

Season's Greetings!

Well this is going to be an interesting year! Tom and I have a LOT to be thankful for as this year draws to a close. Of course the most wonderful thing is that we have Nicky on the way! ;) By the way, the new belly pic is up, today is 26 weeks! YAY!

Unfortunately though we're flat broke this year and so haven't done a darn thing for Christmas!! Normally I'd be running around like a chicken with my head cut off trying to make something, bake something or buy something even if it wasn't as good as I wanted it to be. But this year I just can't get up the energy or drive to do it. I feel a little guilty still, but not nearly as guilty as I did on all the other years when I felt like I was scrambling to do Christmas justice. So I'm afraid I'm telling everyone this year that I'm still working on everyone's gift, and he'll be done in March! Tom and I will be making photo announcements and sending those out, so those will just have to serve as our Christmas cards this year, three months late. Hope no one is horribly disappointed, but we just haven't even got a dollar to spare this year. Not even for postage to send cards.

BUT that said, everyone is invited in advance to our place next year for Christmas! In fact I insist everyone come! We're going to have our baby's first Christmas and we'll be doing it from home so you've all got to make the trip! Now, I have no clue where we'll be living by then so we'll just have to keep you posted. We might still be in the mobile home in Citra (we're moving next month!) or we might be building a new house, or buying one by that time. I'm not quite sure yet. But wherever it is, we'll have a great time!

Now, for some holiday fun let me direct you to the coolest website ever! Check this out and feel free to email me your creations! Make A Flake

On to Plan B...

What, you didn't know we had a Plan B? Well, we didnt' until today... I just spent most of the day talking with Dad and JM. We worked out the numbers, and while it might change when Tom gets a job, right now we just aren't going to be able to afford to do the modular home. Even with the car payment being rolled into the construction loan we just can't do a $1000+ payment for the house. It's over half my salary and it's just cutting it way too close.

So we now have a short term plan and a long term plan.

Short term, Dad and JM have a mobile home on the other side of their property. It's where Tom's grandparents lived once they couldn't live in the house we're in right now anymore. Right now it's just being used for storage and it's in a LOT better shape than the place we're in. Not a palace or anything, but at least cleanable and heatable. It even has a fenced yard we can let the dogs out into and not have to walk them so much once the baby comes. So anyway, the plan is to move all that stored stuff out and over to this place we're in now. We'll clean it up, assess all the plumbing, electric, carpets, etc. Replace what really needs it. Then move over just our best stuff that we're keeping (we have soo much junk that just needs donating or selling). We'll start working on this plan after the first of January and hopefully move in by the end of January.
The good things are: It's much more livable, and cleanable. It has a fence, and it will be rent free with only an electric bill (has well water).
Bad things are: The road is pretty bumpy, but I'll just have to go slow and use a cushion. We won't be getting cable, phone, or internet and that sucks, but the bills will be small and that's really good. The electric should be less than $100 and that's soo much better than the $300 we're paying now!
So all told, it seems to be the smartest thing to do. And I'm sure JM isn't too upset about getting to live so close to the baby either. ;)

The long term plan (6 months to a year out) is that we'll be living with minimal bills. Tom's job will be full time (that's the plan anyway) at least until Nicholas is born (then we'll have to see). My check will cover all the regular payments and living expenses. We'll be socking Tom's entire check into savings and paying off the car payment. I think we can get the car paid off this way in one year. That should really help my credit and give us some savings to help make a better go at buying a house. When the car is paid we'll reassess what our property is worth. We're betting it's going to go up quite a bit relatively quickly (speculating I know, but it's actually primely placed, it just has a shack on it) and hopefully we'll be in a much stronger bargaining position after about a year of making all payments on time, having savings, and having no car payment.

Am I nuts? Probably. It still is very disappointing to have had my hopes up so high about getting a new house. But I have already had my cry when I got home today and now I'm working on creating a new vision for what our immediate future will look like. Not ideal, but Nicky's not going to be remembering the house we were in for his first year anyway. And heck, at least we can actually clean it and it's sealed from the elements. Major improvements over where we are now!

Time now to take these lemons and make some lemonade!

What a rollercoaster!

Well somehow we have the internet back today. Whatever! I'm not sure how or why, but I'll take this opportunity to post. I still think we will probably switch soon from DSL and the land line phone to cable internet. It's a LOT cheaper!

The house situation is frustrating as can be! We have the financing all done and all they want is for us to sign the Mortgage Approval paperwork, but I don't feel good about it at all. They want us to pay over $15,000 in closing costs! That seems a bit excessive to me! AND I don't think they're counting the property as a downpayment like they should. Tom and I are going to have to get a real estate lawyer to look at this with us before we sign anything. I'm meeting with the PC homes financing person to go over it on Friday morning and then we'll see about getting a lawyer that JM knows to look at it too.

I'm thinking that if I can make it through this house building crap that raising a baby can't possibly be too hard! Sheesh!!

On the bright side, I felt the baby again last night/this morning when I was half asleep from the outside again! I can't wait till my mom and Liz come up to see me! I hope they get to feel him too! Hmm, so far it's only been in the early early morning, so maybe they'll just have to sleep with me! Tee hee!

Streamlining the finances

Well Tom and I have pretty much decided we're going to cancel the land line phone completely and go to just having the cell phones. So be sure to call us on the cell phone numbers.

Tom's finishing up his classes this week and then getting a full time job. Once that happens we'll be looking into getting some kind of cheap internet connection. DSL, cable or something, whatever is cheap.

Till then, I'll only be updating the blog from work, so it might not be as often or as colorful with pictures and stuff, but I'll keep you posted.

For example, this morning when I woke up I got to feel Nicky kick from the outside for the first time! It was way up high too! Very neat!

Oh, by the way the email is down too! So leave messages here, or at my work email if you have it.

Argghhh! Lost the internet connection at home!

Just a quickie post from my in-laws computer. I've lost my internet connection at home for at least the next two weeks. I'll check in as I can before and after work, but for two weeks I'm afraid I'll be playing some offline games and reading a lot. On the bright side, Tom and I have taken this quiet time this weekend to clean up all the children's books I've been storing since I quit teaching. I have a whole library of kids books for Nicholas! No baby books, but lots of children's books. Yay! Now we'll have to make sure to have shelves up somewhere to put them all!

My bellsouth email address isn't working either by the way. If you have my cell or home number though, feel free to call me. It's crazy, but they turned on the phone and off the internet on the same day. GRRR!

6 months pregnant!

Today is the day! I'm exactly 24 weeks now by my Ovulation date! Even though my OB says I'm like 24 weeks and 4 days or something I'm still sticking to my original due date and that means today is the day! I took a new belly picture too. I had to pull my shirt down low so it looks a little funny, but I think you can probably tell I'm pregnant by now. :)

Last Monthly OB Appointment today!

Ok, today I had my monthly OB appointment. After 2 hours of waiting in the waiting room I finally got in. I wasn't too upset waiting since there were so many other much more pregnant women there! One had some kind of funky pain and was pregnant with twins. Another was 37 weeks pregnant and in the middle of early labor. I was definitely ok with them going first!

When I got to see the doctor, my blood pressure was great at 108/62. My weight was up to 286, which is 11 pounds total for the pregnancy (which he said was just fine) and my hydration and everything was good.

This will be the last monthly appointment because from here to 32 weeks I'll be seen every other week. Then at 32 weeks it will start to be weekly visits. Tom asked if I was being considered a high risk pregnancy and the doctor said yes, but that I'm doing really great! He considers my asthma the most troublesome unknown quantity, but I have the pulmonology function test and visit with the pulmonologist next Wednesday so hopefully we'll get that good and in control. Of course WE all know I'll be tons better with the asthma when I get my new house (at least I hope so!) but hopefully the pulmonologist will have some helpful thoughts as well that I can implement now.

Speaking of the house, I talked with PC Homes today and they are just waiting on the employment verification at this point. Then we're good to go. I'll check to see where the heck the hold up is tomorrow (if it's still there that is). I can't wait to get in my new house!!! Hmm,I think I say this in one form or another in the last several blog entries...

The Big Ultrasound Isn't So Big

Well I just had my "Big Ultrasound" today. This would normally be the one where we'd learn the sex and everything, but since we've had two Level 2 Ultrasounds already this was actually a bit of a disappointment after the high resolution of the level 2 machine at Shands. This was really fuzzy. You can see from the new baby pictures that these aren't nearly as clear. We did get a DVD, so maybe we'll see more on that.

The important thing was that Nicky is healthy in there and growing well. He's measuring at 24 weeks and 3 days, but going by my ovulation date I'm only 23 weeks and 4 days. He's doing just perfect in there!

There were so many deliveries in progress today so my OB appointment was bumped up to tomorrow morning. So I'll get to see the doctor then. I'll update and let you know what he says.

Been working on the registry today

My Dad and his wife Gwen came by today for a nice visit on their way back to GA. We watched Nicky's videos of his first two ultrasounds so that was fun! Then went for a nice lunch out. It was so good! It's been forever since we have eaten out! Gwen asked if we were registering somewhere and I remembered we haven't really looked at our Babies R Us registery for a long time and many things have changed since then! So this evening I spent some quality time online and have been working on the BRU registery. I still haven't messed with the Target one we started. I suppose I should do that too. Maybe tomorrow. ;)

Nicky is moving around in there. At one point this evening I felt a little push and a bulge in my stomach down low on the left. I had Tom put his hand there and it moved away! That was him! Neat!

Just had to share this picture:



So much love in this house!

The Nursery

Ok, this must be some kind of record...two posts in like, 30 minutes! LOL!

Ok, I just had Tom scan the mural design that I did. I've shown it to Tom's mom, who is the one that will be doing the mural, and she seems to like it, well she didn't laugh or anything so I'm taking that as a good sign. :)

Here's the mural design.

There are two different bedding designs I'm debating on, here's both. What do you think?

One Little Froggy
or
Sammy The Frog

I like that they're simple and won't dictate too much to the rest of the room design, like the murals and wall art. We'll only be getting the bedding and perhaps the hamper. The curtains, wall art, lamps, diaper thingy and all we'll probably skip.

I like the colors in the One Little Froggy one best, but that's really hard to tell for sure from a picture online. I like the stylized frog in the Sammy the Frog design best, but I can just use that for the mural.

The crib and any other furniture will be white. And we're pretty sure the floor in the new house will be linoleum with a darker wood plank design. Kind of a darker oak finish if I remember right. We'll probably get an area rug for the baby's room though. I'll get some kind of chair, glider or rocker, but no clue about what that will look like yet. The only one I really loved so far was a huge chair that swiveled and rocked and was covered in red toile. Weird. It was also $600.00 (insert laugh here).

This is going to be so much fun! Now if I can just GET the house!!

Fun with PG (Pregnant Guts)

Ok, check out this site. You can move the slider and see what's happening in there! It's so fun! I'm at 23 weeks and 1 day today. Look what's happening to my poor intestines! Haha!

http://www.umm.edu/pregnancy/9monthmiracle/tools/fetaltool.html

Today I felt Nicky kicking up a storm. That was nice because I've only felt him a little bit for the last few days.

Things are progressing with the house. Tuesday the appraiser guy came out to look at the property. He said the big oaks raise the value. Yay! And here I thought they just dropped limbs, acorns and leaves all over the place. Then today the mortgage broker called and faxed over an employment verification form thingy. I signed it and sent it back to her today. We'll call this weekend, or maybe even go down there to Ocala and see what's the next step. I wanna have my house!!

The One Day Hat

Well, before I could justify buying some cute soft yarn to make something for Nicky I had to actually complete a project using the yarn I've got. SO I sat down on Sunday and made a hat! I think it's pretty cute, but the funny part is it looks NOTHING like it was supposed to! I have no idea how I went soo wrong, but it was supposed to be a regular stocking cap kind of thing. Well, here's a few pictures to show you what it ended up looking like! Oh, pay no attention to the wild bangs, I finally gave up and trimmed them myself after seeing the pictures! I need a haircut in the worst way!

Here's me with hat:



AND here's Benjamin modeling the hat! He's soo cute! :D



So now I'm working on a scarf to match. It's harder than it looks too. I wonder what that is gonna end up looking like?

What the heck?

So this morning, right before I'm going to eat breakfast (Tom was in the process of fixing me a turkey sandwich), I am in the bathroom getting ready when I cough (which I do a lot these days) and then my mouth starts watering like CRAZY! And then, well you probably know what happens next... I totally puke! What the heck? This is only the second round of actual puking during this pregnancy, for which I am grateful, but at 5.5 months? Weird.

It hasn't repeated during the rest of the day, so hopefully it was just some weird anomally. Oh, and the turkey sandwich went down great! I love leftovers!

Speaking of leftovers, we finally finished the rest of the turkey and green bean casserole today. The pooches have been feasting on the turkey stock Tom made (leftover from when he made his gravy) and we pitched in the last of the stuffing bits this morning. Now we're down to mashed potatoes and gravy, and probably only 2-3 servings of that! Wow! Thanksgiving lasted 5 days this year! I wonder how many days we'll get out of Christmas? ;)

I heard from the pulmonologist's office today. They want a chest x-ray before I see them, and they don't think they'll be able to get me in until end of December or January. Um, huh? I'm sick now and having asthma and bronchitis issues now. Sheesh! And a chest x-ray when pg? Not sure how that will go down. They're calling my OB's office for more info so we'll see what happens. I don't think I better hold my breath on that one.

Left over Turkey anyone?

Well I haven't gotten to the point of having perlo* for dinner yet, but I have had turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy, green bean casserole and cranberry sauce every meal for two and a half days. And you know what? I'm still not sick of it! I love holiday food!

I had my first definite Braxton Hicks contraction today. Just one that I noticed. It didn't hurt at all, everything just got tight. I've probably had more, but this was the first one I really noticed.

I can feel Nicky kicking every day it seems. Sometimes he kicks more than others, but I've pretty much felt at least a few little ones everyday. It's very reassuring to feel that. I can't wait till they're harder and everyone can feel them. AND then I want to SEE them too! I don't know if the anterior placenta will interfere with that or not. I would think I could see them sometime in the third trimester, which isn't too far off now!

I'm 22 weeks and 2 days today, I think the start of the third trimester is officially at 28 weeks. Dad got me a Bebe Sounds monitor which is kind of like an electronic stethoscope with headphones, which is a LOT more comfy than those stupid earpieces on Tom's stethoscope. I don't know how doctors can stand the pain of those things. Maybe I just have a huge head, but they kill my ears! We pull it out and try to hear the baby a few times a week. So far we can hear a lot of wooshing, probably from the placenta, I can hear how much my finger joints creak as I hold it, and I can say that I have pretty loud intestines, but that's it so far. We'll keep trying though.

I don't think I updated this on the blog, but I went to the OB on Wednesday for this pesky chest cold. They wanted to see me before the holiday. My OB actually listened to me, and agreed that I should see a pulmonologist. He set up a referral and the pulmonologist's office called me the same day to confirm my info. They'll set up an appointment with me next week. FINALLY someone seems to care enough to actually DO something about this bronchitis/asthma crap! WooHoo!

On that note, I'm actually finally starting to feel better too. I went all day yesterday without medicine, although I did it last night to let me sleep. Weird how it always gets worse at night. I've gone today without meds too, so we'll see if I need it tonight or not. So far, so good.

Dad's coming to see me tomorrow on his way home to Georgia. I'll show him the video of Nicky's ultrasounds. That should be fun. I like showing him off already and he's not even born yet!

*Perlo is a traditional southern dish of whatever meat you have and rice. This was the closest reference I could find online. It was a notorious dish in my house growing up and my dad hated it more than just about anything. Funny, but I don't remember actually every eating the stuff. I think we just had turkey sandwiches for a week after every holiday. Yum!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Yay! Turkey Day is finally here!

Tom's been up since 6:30 cooking the turkey. He also made cranberry sauce from real cranberries and mashed potatoes and gravy. Yummy!! I made a double batch of green bean casserole. I can't wait to eat!

We're heading over to citra where we'll feast with Tom's dad, JM, his mom, and his sister. I can't wait! We're all spread out this year, I called up Jessie, she's feasting right now with her friend's family, and my mom, Liz and Jodi are no doubt feasting up a storm with Jodi's parents. And my dad is feasting with Gwen's family down south at one of her kid's houses.

Enjoy your feasting everyone! Cause next year you're all coming to my house!! BwwaaaHaaHaa!!

Hope you all get lots of yummy food and good company. And not too much of a tummy ache!

*********Update***********
Just wanted to let you know I updated and added a new belly pic! Yep there's a little guy in there for sure!! My OB said yesterday that my uterus is now about 3-4 inches above my belly button. Wow!

A little research goes a long way

Well, within about 3 hours of that last post my bronchitis stuff was back full force. There were a few people at the Habitat for Humanity worksite (not students, but people with HFH) who were smoking and I was exposed again. I guess that's all it takes for me, especially since I was just starting to recover. Have I already expressed my, um, FRUSTRATION with smokers yet? I suppose so. For a refresher feel free to go back a few posts to my major rant.

Since I was in bed anyway, I had the laptop here on the ironing board by the bed and I spent the rest of the weekend researching secondhand smoke to see if I'm the only person affected by it so badly. Turns out I'm not!

So here for your reading pleasure I'm including links all about sidestream smoke and stuff. Hopefully you'll take a look and not be too upset or weirded out by how militant I'm going to be about keeping the baby (and myself) away from smoke. I hope I won't be obnoxious about it, but I will be militant about it.

Limiting Exposure to Secondhand Smoke
Secondhand Cigarette Smoke Worsens Symptoms In Children With Asthma
Cigarette smoke worsens respiratory infections in infants
Your Home:Secondhand Smoke
Secondhand smoke: Protect yourself from the dangers
Facts You Should Know About Second Hand Smoke
Secondhand Smoke - Risking Your Child's Life
Secondhand Smoke and Its Risk to Children
Ways to Reduce the Health Risks of Secondhand Smoke
What is Passive Smoking
Second Hand Smoke and Ill-Health: Allergies & Immunity
Passive Smoking During Pregnancy
Taking Action Against Secondhand Smoke Toolkit | TIPS
S.A.F.E./Stories
"What You Can Do About Secondhand Smoke"
"Fact Sheet: Respiratory Health Effects of Passive Smoking"
Secondhand Smoke: Irritating Annoyance or Serious Health Threat?
Myths and Truths of Secondhand Smoke
IAQ Fact Sheet: Environmental Tobacco Smoke
Secondhand Smoke: What It Is, How to Avoid It, Who's at Risk
Secondhand Smoke
Environmental Tobacco Smoke: A Hazard to Children

Volunteer work is hard!

Well I just got back a bit ago from taking my students out to do their service project. And about all I have to say is "OUCH!"

We did about 4 hours of hard labor for Habitat for Humanity. Most of it was moving and leveling topsoil, laying sod, carting off trash and moving boards and metal stuff around. It was cold in the morning, and never really got too hot, but we sure warmed right up doing all that work! So now I can barely move, my back is killing me and unfortunately I got way too dehydrated out there. I'm drinking now and had a lovely hot shower. Oh, and some tylenol. So far I've only found one tick on me, and it hadn't bitten me yet, but as soon as Tom gets home I'm making him check me over really good! I hate ticks!!

Tom's off selling all our DVD movies. It's painful, we had a lot of great movies and we really watched them, but we need the money right now. Paying for Abbey's surgery, all the doctor visits and medications Tom and I are on, gas, and making the downpayment on the house has really tapped us lately. Now we have to find a way to pay our monster phone bill, cell bill and electric bill. Luckily we've already taken care of the car and the car insurance so at least we don't have to worry about that. Fun stuff.

On to the good stuff!

On Tuesday night Tom felt Nicky kick! It was so wonderful for him to feel those little movements. They weren't really hard ones, but enough to let Tom know he was there. I've been feeling him a lot more also since Tuesday. I seem to feel him best when he's feet down and kicking my bladder and stuff down there. Pretty entertaining! He does it a lot when I'm in the car wearing my seatbelt. I don't think he likes the seatbelt much. (So of course I'll wear it all the time! I love those kicks!)

I'm getting much better and was able to work two half days and two full days last week. Tom is about 3-4 days behind me, so hopefully he'll be well enough to do school and work the three days we have next week. Turkey day is just around the corner and we've got to be well for that!!

Baby Nicholas is doing just fine!

Ok, this morning Tom and I went to our second Level 2 ultrasound. We got another video of it too. First off, he's looking very good. He wasn't moving around as much at the start of the ultrasound, but by the time the doctor was looking he was moving around quite a bit. He's grown a lot, nearly doubled his weight in the last three weeks! He's now weighing 14 ounces and his growth is all right on time. By my calcualation (from ovulation date) he is 20 weeks 5 days and he's measuring at 21 weeks today. Looks good! They went to measure the choroid plexus cysts and the one on the left has already resolved, it's gone, and the one on the right is smaller which is all good. The doctor rechecked everything to make sure there were no other markers for trisomy 18 and there aren't any. Hands, feet, face, head, spine, abdomen, heart, kidneys, cord insertion are all good!

We had the option of doing the amniocentis, but we decided not to for two reasons.

One, I've been sick for over a week now, my immune system is already compromised and with this coughing stressing my abdomen and diaphram I was worried about the cough itself causing complications after the amnio. The doctor said that while there is no specific research on that he thinks it is a good idea to consider it, since if we did have complications we'd always wonder if the cough caused them.

Two, everything else looks so good on Nicholas that we'd really not be able to consider terminating the pregnancy anyway, even if the chromosomes showed a problem. It might be different if he had spina bifida, severe heart and abdomen defects and hydrocephalus, but he doesn't. The choroid plexus cysts show up in 3% of all healthy pregnancies and just aren't a problem. They resolve naturally by 25 weeks and cause no issues with learning or anything. So there really wasn't a reason to do the amnio. (Whew! Cause I mean come on! Big needle in the tummy? OUCH!)

So now Tom will be working on making new DVDs of our second video for all the grandparents. I still haven't figured out how to do a darn screen capture though! But we did get two more pictures from the ultrasound today. The both are pretty awful though! If only I could get some still shots from the DVDs! Aw well. It'll be fun to research later. I'll get the new pictures up soon.

Still Sick, and now Tom is too

Ugh, I feel so icky! Tom is now sick too. Since we're both pretty much big babies when we're sick it's pretty pathetic at our house right now. We're trying to take care of each other as much as we can, but mostly just whining to each other.

We've got our next Level 2 ultrasound on Tuesday morning. So hopefully we'll get another video. Tom figured out how to transfer the video into a DVD and we've got DVD's to send to all the grandparents. That will be fun for everyone to see! I still haven't figured out how to do a screen capture though. I thought I'd just have to do a printscreen and paste it into paint, but it didn't work. Bummer! Hopefully I'll figure it out soon.

We just found out my godson Colin has type 1 diabetes. It was so scary Friday when he had to go to the hospital! But his mom was great and noticed he wasn't being himself and was too thirsty all the time. I'm just so happy she got him in to see the doctor so fast! He's going to be just fine now. He's going home today and according to his mom he's doing really well with all the shots and stuff. He's a brave sweet little boy and I'm very relieved he's going to be alright.

Liz is doing her first craft show this weekend. Hopefully she sold lots of her flower fairies and got some good experience at the same time. That would be so neat if she can turn her hobby into a side business! You should see her fairies, they're soo cute! I have a few photos here on the web of some of her earliest creations. If you can believe it they're even more detailed and beautiful now!

I think that about covers whatever I can think off. Preggo brain and benadryl are making my thinking all fuzzy. Think I'll go take a nap. Ugh! I hate being sick!!

I hate smoke (Warning...this is a major venting session!)

Well, here it is, Thursday. I've been sick since Sunday morning and have missed out on work all week except for the 2.5 hours when I came in to teach on Tuesday. I'm sick of being sick! I've called into my OB again to see what, if anything, they can do. I'm already taking Robitussin DM, Sudafed, Benadryl, and my albuterol inhaler every four hours in addition to my normal regimen of baby aspirin, metformin, zantac, and azmacort. All these drugs can't be good for Nicholas! They're all on the approved list, but taking so much all the time still doesn't seem like a good idea. Unfortunately without all of it I can't seem to breathe or sleep at all, which isn't good either. My OB just called and they're calling in a prescription for an antibiotic for me. They're worried this is going to turn into a sinus infection and bronchitis. Great. More drugs!

AND I just have to take this opportunity to vent about the reason I'm sick in the first place! Saturday and Sunday I walked around the Micanopy Fall Festival. Exercise, fresh air, what could be better for me and the baby? WELL apparently SOME people think that any outdoor venue gives them the RIGHT to smoke whatever they want. Now, I understand it's outdoors. BUT it was really very crowded. A lot of people in a relatively small space. Everywhere I went I was always catching a whiff, and sometimes a lot more than a whiff of cigarette smoke. Even cigar smoke a time or two! YUCK! Of course I tried to get away from it every time I caught the first whiff, and I'm very attuned to that odor so I'd usually smell it before Tom or JM could. But it was still getting into my lungs.

I'm so sick of having to dodge these smokers! They hang right outside of buildings on campus, walk the sidewalks in their stinking clouds. Congregate in common areas, walk around like it's their RIGHT to smoke as long as it's outdoors. Now, I'm completely grateful that I live in a state that restricts smoking in all public buildings, including shopping centers, malls, and restaurants. It helps me to be able to go places I would otherwise have to avoid. BUT I do have to walk into the mall, past the crowd of smokers. I do have to enter and exit my workplace and the other buildings on campus, through a crowd of smokers. I have to walk on the sidewalks, stop at the corners for traffic and stop at traffic lights, often in the company of smokers! It's insidious! I can't get away from it even though I personally not only choose not to smoke, but I'm very sensitive and desperately allergic to it! I've been sick for an entire week this time! Usually this keeps me out of work or school for two weeks, and even then the cough can linger all winter!

Why do I have to suffer because some people CHOOSE to kill themselves with tobacco? I understand that they think they have the right to choose to smoke. If they want to destroy their own bodies (and the bodies of the people they live with) FINE! Go ahead! BUT I really resent that their CHOICE is killing ME! AND endangering MY loved ones! I can tell you right now I don't want my child getting so much as a whiff of tobacco smoke. How am I going to protect him from it? Should I, and others who choose not to smoke, have to go around in plastic bubbles to avoid it? I suggest that the ones who are doing the smoking should have to be inside a bubble, then they can have all the smoke all to themselves and not pollute the air the rest of us are trying to breathe! Smoke in your own house, in your own car (with the windows up!) and keep it to yourselves.

I just don't think smokers know how much their habit is affecting others! Yesterday, on the way home from my glucose tolerance test, we had the windows down driving home. It was a beautiful day. There was some traffic on Archer road, as usual, and we ended up stuck in traffic passing and being passed by this same guy in a huge black pickup truck. His cigarette in his hand, hanging out the window, right by me. Tom saw it and rolled up the windows on my side of the car. He knew to do it because even though that guy is in his own vehicle, the amount of smoke that comes out of his mouth and window, and off that cigarette that was hanging about 3-4 feet away from me was too much smoke! People either just don't know how much their smoking is affecting others, or worse, they just don't care! I understand that they are addicted and feel the NEED to smoke. But give me and others who aren't a break! When you smoke in your car with the windows down in traffic, every car you pass if their windows are down or their air vents are on, you're exposing them to your cancerous habit. When you live in an apartment complex and smoke outside, or heck even inside with the windows down, you're exposing your neighbors to your smoke if they are sitting on their porch, coming out their door, or have their own windows open. If you're outside in a public place, walking on the sidewalk, strolling in the park, standing outside a building's entrance or exit, you're affecting every person walking by you. I can't even tell you how hard it is to hold your breath as you pass every smoker in public.

And this is only talking about relative strangers. I remember vividly, many times being in the backseat of the car with a relative who was smoking. The window right next to the smoker would be cracked just enough to let them tap out their ashes and keep the car from completely being so filled with smoke that you couldn't see. But I remember being in the back seat, my lungs and nose burning, my eyes watering, trying to sink my face down into my collar so I could try to filter some of the smoke out with my clothing without drawing the attention of the adults in the front seat. I knew they'd be angry if I complained about the smoke, think I was being 'smart' with them, or disrespectful. I can't even count the number of hours of this torture I had to go through as a child. It kills me now when I see someone smoking in their car with a baby or young children in the car with them.

Anyway, I just needed to vent a bit. I can't be at work right now because I'm so sick and I'm sooo bored of being at home! I don't see why my life has to be so impacted by people who are choosing to destroy their own bodies. I can only say that I'll be doing everything in my power to make sure Nicholas doesn't ever have to deal with tobacco smoke. I hope he never chooses to smoke himself. It will definitely be one of those things we teach him constantly from the time he's little. The same way you teach them about washing their hands after they go to the bathroom, brushing their teeth before bed, and being kind to animals.

Do they even realize how much their habit affects others? I have to be careful in everything I do because of my sensitivity to smoke, but if I can be affected then others are being affected to. Maybe not to the same degree, but if smoker's residue in a hotel room, in an apartment, in a used car affects me, there is something left behind long after the smoker is gone. It's horribly insidious. It gets into everything. One of my horrible 2week coughing episodes was brought on by nothing more than having a smokers clothes in a closed closet in the room where I was sleeping! I wasn't even able to stay in the room the entire night. By 2am I was up coughing and had to try to sleep sitting up in the living room.

Anyway, I don't know that I'm trying to accomplish anything with this rant. (Yep, what started as a vent has definitely turned into a rant.) But I just suffer so much from being exposed to tobacco smoke, and I'm not the only one out there affected this way. Maybe someone will see this and think twice about starting smoking, consider quitting, or at least consider those around them when they choose to smoke. I actually smoked myself for about two years total when I was a teenager. I must not have been addicted that badly because it wasn't that hard to give it up for me. I understand that others can have a harder time getting free of their addiction. But I still look forward to the day that cigarettes are outlawed, or at least only allowed where they can't affect others. It amazes me how they seem to take breathing for granted.

Every time I get sick like this and I see a smoker I can't help but think "I wish they had to struggle for breath, coughing so hard that every chest muscle is sore, and every labored breath feels sharp, like breathing razorblades." But then I remember that that's exactly how they are going to feel. Lung cancer, black lung, emphysema... it's not a pretty way to die. So, I actually don't wish it on anyone, but I hope that maybe if they knew what it is really like for someone like me, maybe they'd quit that much sooner. Before they DO know what it feels like.

First kicks!

Today Tom and I went walking over to the Micanopy arts&crafts festival and walked around. I'd already had a good time doing this yesterday with JM and I wanted to show Tom a few neat things I was thinking about for the baby's room. When we were first entering the fair grounds I went "Whoa!" and a few seconds later "whoa" again! I am pretty sure I felt Nicky kick me twice, hard! Wow! It was just to the left and just below my navel. Pretty high! It was just those two kicks and then I'm sure he probably fell asleep while I was walking around. But that was really neat!

The bad thing was that there were many people walking around the festival smoking! I tried hard to avoid them both days, but I woke up Sunday with a bad case of asthma. I've taken benadryl, tylenol, sudafed and my emergency inhaler, but it's still bugging me. I'll call up the doctor tomorrow morning if it's still here then.

Let me show you how Abbey's doing:
Here's how she's been a lot of the day, just resting:


Close up of the $800 boo-boo:


Now to give you something more fun to look at for the week, Tom and I are already approved for a home loan, and now they're just trying to see if they can get a better rate or higher amount. So Tom and I are picking out a few different models in different sizes so we can have a model in mind depending on what price range we'll be looking at. Here's the website of the company we're dealing with. They have pdf files of all their models. Knock yourselves out! ;) http://www.pchomecenterinc.com/

I'm the luckiest OB patient in the world!

I had another little ultrasound today! It was my regular monthly OB appointment. I think he was just curious as to whether he could see the choroid cysts on his machine or not. (He couldn't really see them.) I didn't get any pictures, I wasn't even supposed to get an ultrasound, but I got one anyway! That means I've had a total of 5! YAY me! I get another level 2 on the 15th, and then I finally get my "big" ultrasound (the one where they usually get to tell you the sex) on Dec. 6th. So I will get two more in the next month! HA! Am I lucky or what!
AND at both of the next ones I will get either a video or DVD of it! Three baby movies before Nicholas is even born! What a lucky duck I am!

Anyway, we're just as happy as can be about it. (In case you couldn't tell.) We haven't heard about the house financing yet. I called them this morning and they said they'd called in late yesterday and they were working on it right then. Hopefully we'll hear good news either today or Monday.

Abbey is doing pretty good. We took off her bandage last night and the incision looks pretty good. Not red or icky. Her leg is a bit swollen and somewhat splotchy, but I think that's all to be expected. Poor girl has to wear the elizabethan collar now to keep her from licking it though. I hate leaving her home with it on, but what else can you do? Hopefully she'll just lay down and sleep for the day. Tom's home with her a good bit of today working on his research paper, and I'm going home a little early today too. So it won't be too long. Her follow-up appointment is next Wednesday so we'll see what the doctor says then.

I think that's about it. We're actually staying home and relaxing this weekend. Maybe we'll head into Micanopy (you know, across the street) and see the art festival. I think it's this weekend. Maybe I'll even WALK there! HA!

I think I'll put a little plug in here for JM. She's my other mother-in-law (I know it, I'm just lucky!) and she does photography and photo restoration. You just have to see these cute pet photos she's been doing! Those puppies are sooo cute! AND she has a funny picture of Benjamin and a sweet Abbey photo too. I'm going to see if she'll do some maternity photos for me when I'm all big and about to pop! That will be fun! Especially since she's a digital guru who can make me look REALLY good! http://www.jmmott.com/

My poor puppy dog in her purple bandage

Well Abbey is back from her surgery. My poor little girl! She's still really sore and tired, probably all groggy from the pain and the pain meds. I just want to squeeze her but I think I better just let her rest. Poor puppy!

The vet said the surgery went pretty well, but he did have to suture her patella tendon. He said that was not a normal thing to see with an ACL rupture, and hopefully it will heal up well. I hope so!

I found out yesterday that I'm NOT getting my big ultrasound at my OB appointment on Friday. I'm SURE it was supposed to be that day, but they said I'm not scheduled for that and that we'll make the appt for the big one at Friday's appt. Whatever! It could just be my preggo brain, but I'm pretty darn sure this was supposed to be it! Grrr! Aw well, I've gotten a tape of my level2 and I'll get another level2 on Nov. 15th. I don't think it will be any trouble getting video of that one as well. Then we can get the DVD whenever my OB gets around to doing the big ultrasound. That's 3 movies! AND Tom and I really want to do the 3D/4D ultrasound for our Christmas present to each other. That will be really cool!

We still haven't heard anything more on the house financing stuff. Hopefully we'll hear by the end of this week!

Found a new ticker. Thought it was kind of neat. I've added it to the bottom of the blog. :)

My poor Doodle-bug!

Well Abbey went in for surgery this morning. They had a cancellation and decided to do it today. Hopefully she'll be feeling a lot better a lot sooner. I believe we actually have to leave her there overnight too. Poor puppy!

We also just began the financing process for buying our new house. They say they will be able to have it ready by mid-February! I hope so! AND I hope Nicholas doesn't decide to make an early appearance!

Abbey's knee and buying baby clothes

Well we found out on Friday that Abbey definitely has completely ruptured her ACL in her right knee. Right now the cartilage appears to be ok from what they can tell, and hopefully if we do the surgery fast they won't have to remove all the cartilage from that knee like they did last time in her left knee. She's on antibiotics now for a slight UTI and will go in for surgery this Friday (11/4/05). She will also be starting estrogen therapy this week for estrogen related incontinence. Apparently this is common in older female spayed dogs. It is what is causing her repeated UTI's. Luckily the estrogen pills are super cheap and will only be like 3$ a month. (UNlike her pain meds which are more like 40$ a month!) Lucky for us, our vet is letting us pay for the surgery over 3 months. Phew!

This weekend we went to my mother-in-law's house in Tampa. We had a wonderful time shopping for baby clothes and stuff! We went to a consignment shop and bought tons of cute clothes and then to Target and found some great stuff on clearance. We washed it all and folded them into one of those vacuum bags so that they'll be all nice and fresh. Donna's keeping them all at her place for us until we get the new house. (Thank you Mom!)

Speaking of the new house, we're going this week to talk with the building company and see if they can build the house in the time we have. HOPEFULLY they can and we'll go ahead and start the process. If not, well, we're going to have to get creative somehow. Let's all hope they can get a modular home up and livable by March!

AND one more thing. While over at Tom's mom's house we decided on a name. Tom's pretty sure this one is it. I like to keep my options open, but I like this one too. The name will be Nicholas Charles Mott. I'm going to call him Nicky and he can go by Nick when he's in school. (And yes, I know it rhymes with a bunch of neat words. Already considered it. Thanks!)

Here we go again!

Well here we go again! As many of you know, our dog Abbey had to have knee surgery about 3-4 years ago. It was because she ruptured her anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee. Well that cost 850.00 back then. She's about 80-90% on that leg now, which we feel is pretty darn good.

Well this morning, while walking on a leash (just like before) Abbey stumbled in an armadillo hole (just like before), cried out and now won't put any weight on her OTHER knee! We gave her some pain medicine (Deramax) and crated her for the day so that she'd rest it, but it's the same now that we're home from work. We'll be taking her to the vet tomorrow morning. (I already called them this morning to arrange it.) We'll drop her off around 8am and then they'll let us know what they find. HOPEfully it isn't the same injury! Another 850.00 when we're trying to get our house isn't going to help! But I can't put her to sleep when she's perfectly healthy and has just hurt her leg! Guess we'll find out what the verdict is tomorrow. I'm pretty sure we can make some kind of payment arrangement with the vet if we have to go that route. I think we paid off the last one in 4 increments. This is the most expensive dog we've ever had! But we love her anyway!

We're back from the ultrasound!

We're back! And We're having a BOY! I can't believe it! The ultrasound was pretty good, a little fuzzy he said, but the doctor and the genetic counselor both think it's a really good chance that there is nothing wrong. The only marker they saw on the ultrasound was two choroid plexus cysts, which they said since those are fairly common they wouldn't worry too much about it. No other markers were there! We probably would have gone ahead with an amnio, except we found out the placenta is pretty much covering the entire front of my uterus, and that would make it really hard to get the needle in there right now. But in 3 weeks we'll do the other u/s and if we want to we can do the amnio then too.

WHEW! Can I even express how RELIEVED we are? We have two photos CLICK HERE, and also a videotape and a recording of the heartbeat! We'd never heard it before! And it was 150 beats per minute. YAY! I'm just so relieved and happy! I promise to try to get the recording and at least a snippet of the video on the blog. Surely I can do that with this computer!

Need something happier to think about

So here's my new belly pic. I did it a day early. But how much can it grow overnight? So here's the new one in comparison with the old ones. I don't see much difference from the 15 week picture. But maybe my boobs are just growing too.

Actual Numbers and a Level 2 U/S Appointment Made

Well, I got the actual numbers yesterday. Keep in mind this is not a diagnosis, only a screening. The Quad Screen screens for 3 disorders, and screens for Down's Syndrome in two ways:

Trisomy 18= 1:62
Trisomy 21 (by my age)= 1:511
Trisomy 21 (by my blood)= 1:2060
Open Neural Tube Defect(spina bifida & anencephaly)= 1:5000

All are considered "within normal parameters" except the Trisomy 18 which is really high.

My Level 2 ultrasound was scheduled for November 3rd which is two weeks away. They are trying to see if they can get me in any sooner than that. I told them I'd be happy to wait in their waiting room all day if they thought they could fit me in. Hopefully they'll find they have a spot for me on Monday. I just got the call today around 4pm that they'll fit me in on Monday at 12pm. So hopefully we'll know more on Monday evening.

I found the following information on the Quad Screen at This website.

"About 0.2 percent will receive a screen-positive result for trisomy 18. Of that 0.2 percent, about 11 percent will actually have a pregnancy affected with trisomy 18."

Busy day! Banned and Got Results Back all in one day!

Wow, so much to post today!
First I had a wonderful time visiting my Mom, Elizabeth and Jodi! It was so nice being all fussed over by them! Liz even made me a beautiful little pregnant flower fairy! I'll have to post a pic when I get the chance! Jodi gave me a super wonderful big jewelry box for me to stash my stuff! And Mom gave me some neat lounging clothes, pj's and some comfy shoes. I think my feet have grown already! Thank you guys for the wonderful visit!

Next, I've finally officially been banned from FF. Got a message this am at 10:03 saying my siggy was removed for having a link in it to my blog (Which by the way is ENTIRELY about my pregnancy and ttc journey. NOT an advertisement as they insinuate in their form letter.) Then I got another message at 10:06 am (Yep, only three minutes later) saying I was banned. Oh they put in all their legal-speak, but it means banned. I got my TTC chart off there long ago, but I can't see anything anymore otherwise. Too funny! So I'm officially joining the bad girl club! It was worth it though! Tons of views on that last post and I think anyone who was interested in coming over had a good chance to find their way. Yay for the Freedom Board!

My last news isn't as nice, but I'm really trying to stay positive about it. After I got my nice banning letter from FF, Tom went to listen to our answering machine message. It was my OB. He left me the office number AND his cell phone number (wow!) in case I called after 5pm. I figured it was serious, and I did just have my quad screen done on Friday am so I was pretty sure it was about that.

He said my screen came back as increased risk for Trisomy 18 and he's having his nurse schedule me for the Level 2 ultrasound tomorrow morning. (Not getting it tomorrow, just scheduling it. Probably for this week or next week.) He told me that it wasn't diagnostic and yada yada yada, but I told him I was on this support group online of March moms and that so many of them had gone through the same thing so I knew what to expect and wasn't too worried.

I'm really trying to focus on how wonderful it will be to have this extra-long U/S on a good machine, and I think that helps me not worry. Also after seeing so many of my buddies in the March Due Dates group get these kinds of results and seeing everything turn out just fine has me feeling pretty good about my chances.

Poor Tom though! He immediately looked over my shoulder to see what I wrote down and googled Trisomy 18 before I even got off the phone. He is so worried now. I have told him the baby is probably fine and shared how so many women in my support group have had the same thing. I told him that they'd be checking on the level 2 for certain markers, and that even if they do find them it still isn't a diagnosis and we'll just do the amnio in that case. I feel worse about him being worried than I feel about the test itself.

If you guys want to scare yourselves silly you can google Trisomy 18, but I really wish you wouldn't. At least not yet. Just keep thinking good thoughts and I'll post more as soon as I know more. I love you all!

Going to see my Mom!

I'm off to Lake Placid tomorrow to go visit my mom! I haven't seen her since being PG so she's in for a bit of a surprise! Pictures only can show so much you know.

I also want all my friends from Fertility Friend to stay in touch! My VIP account is running out and I'm letting it go. It's been wonderful to make such good friends there, but I can't spend money like that now. Everything has to go for the baby and our new house. I do have some good news for you guys though! We have a free site where all the girls have gone since FF went to a pay site. Come join us there for free! I hope you will visit us there! Or at least visit me here and email me with your updates!

To the new site: Your Pregnancy Is Worth Talking About

See you there!

I Vant to Suck Your Blood!

Well, tomorrow I go for my bloodwork. This is the Quad Screen which is a screen for spina bifida, downs, and some other stuff I can't ever remember. It doesn't give you a definite positive or negative, just tells the baby's odds of having one of these things. A lot of women decide not to have it because it can really stress people out for no reason since so many people get scary results and everything turns out fine.

I decided to go ahead and do it, mostly because I figure I'm a pretty low stress person. (Do I hear laughter in the audience?) And because if there does show up something questionable I'll get to have a really cool Level II ultrasound where they really spend quality time scanning the baby. I've heard these are really detailed, even better than the ones they do in my doctor's office. So I wouldn't mind having one. Then if that turns out questionable still, they offer an amniocentisis. I figure if it gets to that point we'll do the amnio, even though the idea of someone sticking a giant needle in my tummy isn't a happy thought. The incidence of a miscarriage is there, but it's pretty low, and we'd need to know if there was something really wrong. I don't know what we'd do, but we'd need to be prepared in any case.

So, we'll find out,probably in another week what the blood test results are. I'll post 'em here!

New Boy's Name Chosen Today!

Ok, Well I'm still set on Lily Elizabeth as our girl name, but a day or two ago Tom decided he didn't really like the name Zachary anymore. So today we went on the search again for boy names. We brainstormed a list below and the winner is down at the bottom. Tom is pretty set on it. I'm fine with it. LOL you didn't think I'd tell you right up here at the beginninng did you?

Ailen
Alden
Arden
Aric
Axton
Brandon
Brent
Brian
Brock
Bowen
Carson
Cole
Conall
Conner
Cory
Dean
Devon
Dylan
Elliott
Gareth
Garren
Garrett
Garrick
Glenn
Kayne
Keith
Kelwin
Kelwyn
Kenneth
Liam
Neil
Owen
Sawyer
Stephen




And the winner is... Conner!
So it will be Conner Charles Mott for a boy. We might stick with calling him his full name, or maybe CC for short. Could call him Connie, but it just reminds me of Grandma, so too feminine for me. Thoughts?

Who'd have thought I'd be so excited to have a BIGGER tummy?!

Ah ha! I knew my tummy was growing! I had Tom take a new picture today, in exactly the same clothes by the way, and I just put it up on the Belly Pic Page. Take a look and see what you think! Two weeks made a difference!

Flea free and a clean room!

Well, we're all doing fine. We had to take the pups all to the vet for their shots and stuff. Whew! That was expensive! They all had eardrops and/or pills to take for a while. We've finally finished with that. We also finally gave up on the Frontline flea stuff. It just wasn't doing a darn thing for the poor puppies! And Sampson and Abbey just finished a bunch of medicine for their flea allergies, so we went out and picked up some Advantage over the weekend. AND PRESTO! No more fleas! They're still a tiny bit itchy now, but that might just be from thier old bites, or bites they get outside on their walks. No more flea infestation though, and boy is that a relief! We'd tried the Frontline for quite a while since it also works on ticks (which we have, A LOT!) but it just didn't seem to do a damn thing about the fleas which are the real problems most of the time. So, we're back to advantage and heartguard. Maybe we'll have to try out some tick collars if we notice them picking up ticks. Ugh. I hate ticks!

Side note, Tom cleaned our bedroom up! He vacuumed everything, even under the bed! We went through all our clothes (except the closet, I think that's this weekend) and we have four huge bags of clothes to give away! And nice empty drawers to put our wearable clothes into for a change. Nice! Of course he decided we just HAD to do all this at 11pm on Sunday night... YAWN! Mostly it was me laying in bed and Tom holding up clothes and saying "Do you want this? How about this?" LOL Hopefully I didn't get rid of anything I didn't mean to!

IF you're here from Fertility Friend, Please come see us at the FREEDOM BOARD!

You are NOT going to believe THIS!

Ok, so I go to my OB today and my weight is good. I'm at 276 which is one pound above where I started. Excellent. My blood pressure was 100 / 72 which is phenomenal! I gave my doctor copies of my two data sheets that I keep. One is on my asthma monitoring of my lung capacity that I monitor twice a day with a flow meter and I track all my symptoms. The other is a med sheet that lists all my meds I take each day and I cross them off as I take them. He was VERY impressed and he and Tom laughed about how I apparently will always be a teacher at heart and make cute charts for everything!

So then he steps out in the hall and wheels in the ultrasound machine!!!! I was sooo excited! Tom laughed and told the doctor that he'd just made my whole day. He said he had to reward me for keeping such good data. LOL! Well guess who will be getting all sorts of charts at each visit now?! Hey, positive reinforcement WORKS on me!

So anyway, instead of listening for the heartbeat with the doppler (we had the recorder with us, ready to go!) we got to get another ultrasound. I'll stick a link in below as soon as I get them up on the page, but they really aren't very good. This was the first time they got to do the external ultrasound since now the baby is big enough to be in my tummy. And the baby was moving around so much it was practically impossible to even get a good photo. Plus he/she is so much bigger now! Anyway it was wonderful to see the baby moving all around in there. We saw him/her holding out his/her hands in front of his/her face and just wiggling around. He said the placenta looked very thick and good although he didn't evaluate it for position yet.

My next one will be in 5 weeks on November 4th. That will be the one where we might be able to see if it's a boy or a girl! Very exciting!!

I'm just on cloud nine today! Quite a contrast from last night huh ;)

Ok, here's the link to the baby pictures page.

IF YOU'RE here from Fertility Friend, thank you for coming by! NOW CLICK HERE TO JOIN US OVER ON THE FREEDOM BOARD! ;)

So sad! I'm not getting an ultrasound tomorrow!

Well if you remember my nightmare that I typed back on 9/19/05...it came true! Well almost. In my nightmare I was already at the doctor and asked the nurse if he'd do an ulrasound and she said no.

Today I just had to know for sure if I was getting one tomorrow at my appt. So I called this morning and left a message for the nurse. She called me back and said that they aren't doing one! Waaaaahhhh!

She did say we'll listen to the heartbeat, so we're taking the recorder and we'll figure out how to get it on the blog tomorrow. But damnit I wanted another ultrasound picture to show everyone! Grrrr!

So anyway, I'm glad I at least found out in advance. I'm trying to prepare myself so that I won't spoil getting to hear my baby's heartbeat for the first time with my disappointment over the ultrasound.

But just so you guys know...I'm pretty upset about it.

Oh, and for all you girls from FF, thanks for coming to see me here. Now, click here to find out more! ;)

Time for a belly shot!

Thought I'd share a belly pic with you all. Now I know my belly isn't all baby, but it is finally out past my boobs which is pretty cool! This was taken at 13 weeks and 1 day!

Click here to see it!

Is it gone?

Well hopefully Tuesday was the last m/s. Keep your fingers crossed for me. I was just ill all day Tuesday, but the rest of the week was fine. No nausea. Totally exhausted, but no nausea. And I can deal with tired. ;)

Well I just can't remember if I posted this on here or not, but I don't think I did. September 17th was Tom's and my 11th wedding anniversary! Wow...11 years! Who'd have thunk it? Well, Tom and I did, but I'm not so sure about everybody else. ;) We're definitely just as much in love, if not more. We didn't do much for the anniversary, although it was funny that the Gators beat the Tennessee Volunteers again, just like they did the night of our wedding. *sigh* Memories. :)

We did go out for some yummy sushi (don't worry, I stuck to the cooked stuff Mom) and we were going to go for the movie The Corpse Bride, but it wasn't out yet. We spent the day going around town to visit maternity stores and stuff, and we found a great consignment shop for baby and kids' clothes! Super cheap clothes in really great condition. Carter brand stuff for like $2-$5! WooHoo! I know where I'm buying baby clothes now!

That was it for our romantic day. Oh except for in the middle of driving to another store all the sudden the "hunger" hit and I had to get Tom to drive straight to Whattaburger before I ate him. It's so strange how this hunger thing is happening some days! It's like if I don't eat immediately someone is in danger of losing a hand. Sheesh! Keep the pregnant lady fed!

Well, I'm heading to bed. Probably will sleep most of the weekend. (Except we ARE seeing Corpse Bride this time!) Where oh where is that burst of energy?? I'm at 13 weeks and one day today. It should be here soon...right?

It's BACK!

Ugh! Last night I woke up with the worst bout of morning sickness I've had so far. And here I'd thought I was done with it! It started around 3am and even now that it's almost 5pm I'm still having nausea. Not quite as desperate as it was last night, but more like recovering from stomach flu or something. Let's hope this is just some kind of last hurrah and it's going away soon.

Nightmare or Premonition?

Well I just remembered my nightmare from last night. It was awful! I hope it wasn't a premonition!

Want to hear it? Of course you do!

I dreamt I went to my next OB appointment (on Sept 30th) and before seeing the doctor, I saw the nurse. I asked her if he was going to do an ultrasound. And....


She said NO!

Boo hoo!

That was it. I know, not very scary sounding. But REALLY disappointing! I sure hope it doesn't come true! I wanna see my baby again!

Just for reference, how the HELL did you guys take this before ultrasounds were given so much??

Other than that, everything is peachy. I actually had NO nausea all weekend! Bliss! Hopefully it will keep up and I'll get that energy burst I'm still waiting for.

Welcome to the Second Trimester!

Well according to some I'm now in my second trimester. (Some say theres one more week, but poo-poo on that! I'm sick of being in my first trimester!)

I'm waiting for that burst of energy to hit...any second now...any minute... well, maybe we better not hold our breath.

My nausea is much better (in that it's not bugging me most of the day now) but Tom was all sick to his stomach up till about 4pm today. Luckily I was able to work from home and get some stuff done that I've been putting off. I also pulled two chat-reference shifts so I'm feeling pretty productive today!

More later I'm sure. I think I need a nap.

Getting along swimmingly

Everything is fine here. Still not eating as well as I should, because I just can't face vegetables much lately. Except peas. Peas are good. Mostly though it's been chicken fingers and sour cream. Or bacon and sour cream. Or fries and sour cream... there's a theme here I think.

Yesterday Tom took me to the store again. I was only able to get red seedless grapes (andI've eaten almost all of them today), pepperoni pizza, cottage cheese and shredded cheese. Would have gotten sour cream but I think I have enough to last another day or two. ;)

You should have seen me though, when I walked past the fish section of the meat department I was overwhelmed by the smell and ended up running up the nearest aisle waving both hands in front of my face saying "eeeaaaagggghhh!!!!" It was pretty funny in retrospect. That smell kept me out of a few aisles though. Powerful stuff!

I'm getting back on the calcium supplements though. I just don't think I'm getting enough on a daily basis with the sour cream and cottage cheese. They aren't as high in calcium as I'd hoped. I do have milk, for a while it was daily, but not lately. So back to the pills. I did manage to find some calcium liqui-gels though so those should be easier to swallow than the giant pieces of chalk I had before.

Guess that's about it. Mostly I'm sitting on my hands trying to wait for the next ultrasound. I hear some women rent a fetal doppler so they can hear the heartbeat whenever they want. That's sounding like an idea about now. It's about 25$ a month though and I'm sure I have better things to spend that on. (Like the first maternity bra I'm expecting in a few days. ;)

Have a wonderful week guys!

Ok! Ok! I'll update!

Whew! Mom sure notices when I don't update the blog for a few days! Thanks Mom!

I really do want to keep this up to date, so let me see, basically I've been doing pretty well since the ultrasound. I've pushed my new pictures on just about everyone including waitresses and checkout clerks, and perfect strangers. (Actually it's Tom's fault, he was taking them everywhere for a few days.) We're thrilled with them, and now it seems like forever before the next one. (Sept. 30th)

Work is going just fine. We're very busy of course. Sometimes I think I may have marketed the service too well! But it's all working out and the faculty and students seem pretty happy. I still love it!

I have been being careful not to let myself get sucked into all the media reports about New Orleans and others affected by the hurricane (and our leaderships ineptitude) since it seems to set off my crying and then my asthma. From the little I've seen I am so shocked, horrified, dismayed, disgusted by the way this has been handled by our government. All I can do right now is hope that all the money, supplies and help pouring in from the common people of the US (and the world) are going to make to those who so desperately need it. And I'm not even going to get into what I'm hoping will happen to those responsible for the bungling of the rescue efforts. (Of course I ultimately blame Bush, but that's probably not a surprise to anyone who has known me for any amount of time.)

Oy! Let's try not to wax political on here. This is supposed to be about me, Tom and the baby. I've been trying to pick out nursery stuff, designs & themes and such. There is so much out there! And from what I'm reading about breastfeeding it sounds like our baby won't really be spending much time in the nursery for the first year anyway! I think we've settled on an animal theme, probably mostly african animals using Brandee Danielle's design "African Plains" for the bedding. I think going with something simple for the bedding will allow for more accessories and wall art. This theme would work for a boy or a girl, but if we do find out it is for sure a girl I might go for more of a garden theme with flowers, butterflies and insects. Not sure yet though. The neat thing about that would be JM does beautiful photographs and digital paintings of flowers and butterflies, Donna can do all sorts of painting and mural work on just about anything, and Liz & Mom are doing all sorts of the Whimsey Glen stuff with flower fairies and such. We could really tap into everyone's creativity with a garden room! But maybe not for a boy... sigh. The 20 week ultrasound feels like it's a year away! (Only 9 weeks really, but still!)

So there's the update. It turned out way longer than I thought. I can just talk (or type) forever if you let me!

And by the way, I'm 11 weeks along today! 29 weeks to go!

One more thing! I just found out I can set up word verification for the comments. This will hopefully cut down on the spam comments, so that its only you guys that can post! It should be pretty easy, there will be a word in funky font for you to translate and then it will let you post. If it's screwy and a pain, email me and let me know and I'll take it off. Death to spam!

It's a baby....baby! New pictures!

We have new BABY PICTURES! Everything went just fine at the appointment. Dr. Marichal was wonderful and Tom and I got to see the baby moving all over. He/she was flipping around, waving arms and kicking legs and just having a fun time in there. He had such a time trying to measure the little wiggler that we ended up with five pictures this time! :) Yay!

I've created a page for the pictures so that you don't have to click separate links for them. It might take a while for all the pictures to load if you have dial-up, but it will be worth it! I have the newest ones at the top and we even re-scanned the old ones so they look a little more clear. I'm also recording the measurements and due dates since it seems the due date might be changing every time I go to the doctor.

Our next appointment is four weeks away on 9-30-05. Which seems like forever! I'll be in the second trimester by then though, so that should be neat. Oh, the doctor didn't even try out the doppler to see if he could hear a heartbeat. He said it's still too early. It might be a little early to hear it on me I guess; there is a lot of "me" in the way. ;)

Click here for the new pictures!

Playing the waiting game

Well I haven't written since Saturday because I just can't think of anything except getting our ultrasound on Friday! We are hoping to hear the heartbeat and see our cute little baby. We'll try to remember to take a tape recorder with us so we can record the sound of the hearbeat if we get to hear it. I'll be 10 weeks and 1 day on Friday, so here's hoping!

Katrina looks like she'd rather visit New Orleans

Well let's all breathe a sigh of relief! Looks like Hurricane Katrina will be missing all of us in Florida pretty much. I don't think it did much to any of our family. Went south of Pt. St. Lucie for a change, way south of Lake Placid, and looks like it will miss Tampa, Gainesville, Ocala and Jacksonville completely. Whew!

I feel bad for the residents in Louisiana though. Looks like they are going to get seriously messed up by a category FOUR! Man, and we thought this was gonna just be a tropical storm blowing into Florida. Just goes to show that with all the technology we have, we still can't really guess what it's going to do in the end!

Well, we're all fine here. I might be over the nausea. It's been a few days with only small patches, usually when I'm exhausted in the evening. And yesterday I was able to stay out till 10:30 at a friend's house, have a huge dinner, and I was starving for a big mac and fries earlier in the day, after eating TWO pbj's! Hello! Looks like the appetite is back! :)

We're just waiting for Tom's financial aid to come in now. We'll pay some bills and hopefully have the money for the downpayment on the house. Here's hoping!

Annoying setback on the house

Well, today Tom heard back from the city attorney and according to the city manager the house would have to meet DCA standards not just HUD. Which isn't manufactured, but modular, so doing that will add an extra 20k to the price. Sigh. So we can still probably do it, it will just have to be a smaller one I guess.

We'll go talk with the dealer and see what they can do for 80k with meeting DCA standards. And we'll go talk to the city commission because these requirements are NOT spelled out anywhere in the city's zoning information. GRRR!

Someone should have told this guy to never come between a pg woman and her house!

We might be getting our house!

Well, Tom and I met with the city attorney today and it went really well. He seemed to accept all the data we'd gathered on the differences between mobile, manufactured and modular homes, and agreed with us that a manufactured home should be fine for our property zone.

He went straight from our meeting to see if he could meet with the city manager and confront him with the information. So he'll give us a call after that's done and hopefully we'll be able to start serious house hunting!

So exciting!

And by the way, I didn't puke last night and today's been pretty darn good! Yay!

We've crossed a line here.

The line of "it's just nausea all day" has been crossed. Ugh. Last night around 1am I was up tossing cookies. It helped for a few minutes, but the nausea came right back. I just have to keep reminding myself (when I can think past the nausea) that I wanted this! And I do, I really do. But that didn't stop me from cussing up a storm in the bathroom last night.

It's just a good thing the baby can't really hear yet.

Tom's better, but I'm turning green

Well by Saturday evening Tom was feeling much better. Apparently he had a touch of the stomach flu, or maybe some food poisoning. So while I'm exceedingly glad that he's healthy, I'm still feeling so nauseated I can hardly stand it! Dill pickles seem to help, but come on! How many pickles can you eat in one day! So Tom's taking care of me the best he can. I haven't tried ginger yet, maybe I'll get some tonight.

As it is, making it through the workday is proving to be a major challenge. I'm certainly not at my most productive! If I can just keep from hurling all over the keyboard though, that'll be something

And now the FLU?!

Well this is a fine howdy do! Tom took his first blood pressure pill last night and then this morning I couldn't wake him up! He was so lethargic it was kind of scary. I ended up working from home so that I could take care of him, and he did manage to get into the shower at 9am, but then still was nearly incoherent so went back to bed. I just kept checking on him. Tom's dad stopped by for a nice lunch and Tom was up for that around 1:00 but then by about 3:00 he's been in bed except for a few minutes when he came out, ate some dry cereal and gatorade, and then went back to bed.

I went in the room to read in bed around 9pm and he was pretty warm so I took his temp and voila! He's got a temp of 100.23 (I used the basal thermometer on him). So I gave him asprin and now his fever has broken and he's sleeping. Guess I'll be having to take care of me for a while. Of course I immediately felt like I was fuzzy-headed and headachy as soon as I saw that temp, but I checked and I'm a 98.68 so I should be ok. I took some Tylenol for the headache, but I'm determined NOT to get sick! I can't very well move out for a week though, so I'll just have to be careful and wash my hands a lot. We'll see how it goes.

Anyway, I think we'll hold off on this new blood pressure medicine until Tom's over this bug. I'm still not sure it didn't somehow lower his resistance or set this thing off somehow. I don't think it will hurt to wait a few days and check with his doctor before we try that again.

I thought I was going to be lucky, but....

Ok, I might just have to admit it now. I've had three days straight of feeling nauseated pretty much all day. I thought it was just a fluke, but it might actually be morning sickness. (Just not limited to mornings!) No actually puking yet, but we'll see if I stay away from the porcelin goddess much longer. It seems like eating helps for about 30 minutes, but them it comes back. (As long as it doesn't come back UP I'll be ok.)

So now that I've told everyone I can think of about the pregnancy after our wonderful ultrasound yesterday, and went around today at work showing my little Blobby Mott to everyone (named in honor of Chelsea who acknowledged it's striking resemblence to an actual blob) I'm just going to have to try and settle down back to work. Except that this 'baby brain' thing seems to have more truth behind it than I thought! I've seem to be dropping stuff constantly, making a mess when trying to pour myself something to drink, and keep forgetting what I'm doing in the midst of doing it! I think being pregnant gives you ADD! ;)

Well I'm happy anyway. Every symptom, even the morning sickness, is just confirmation that this whole thing actually WORKED and we're really going to have a baby! Who'd of thought!

Baby's first pictures!

We did it! We're really going to be parents! We just got back from our first ultrasound and we have two pictures of our baby bean. We couldn't hear the heartbeat yet (didn't even try actually) but we could definitely see it beating! Click the link below to see the pictures. We're so excited!

As an interesting side note, the doctor thinks the corpus luteum is on the left ovary. This means that the egg came from the left ovary, but my left fallopian tube is blocked. So if the egg came from the left ovary then it somehow must have gotten into the right fallopian tube for fertilization. Either that or my left tube miraculously un-blocked itself. Either way it's a miracle and this baby must be meant to be born! It's implanted in the right spot, definitely not ectopic, and all looks great! I'm officially 6weeks and 5 days pregnant and due on March 30th!

Baby Photos

Pregnant Hair

Well I think this will be a surprise to anyone who's seen me in the last few years. I decided I needed a haircut. What do you think? I love it and Tom even likes it! Jessica went into shock when she saw it, it was very funny. :) Tom and I decided it kind of resembles an early 1980's hairdo, like a princess Di cut mixed with a Dorothy Hammel. Remember those?

Click here to see it!

An ode to willpower

Oh tasty, yummy, sugary treat
That Tom stirred up for us to eat,
That sumptious double chocolate batch
of exquisite brownies with milk to match.

"Oh no," said I as the brownies cooled,
and as my sister stared and drooled
over a 9 by 13 pan of chocolate cake
brownies my spouse had decided to make.

He offered galantly the spoon
to me for licking, I should swoon
or shake a leg for the other room
for raw eggs are not for me till June.

I said, "No way, no how, I think
I'll put that spoon right in the sink!"
I did it too, I do declare,
And tasted none of that chocolate there.

I felt quite good about this act
but soon my will began to crack
as a lovely scent o'erpowered me then
of chocolate baking, oh heavenly sin!

But I must think about my plan,
and maintain my militant sugar ban
to hold at bay those delicate sweeties
that could lead to preggo diabetes.

I'm happy to say I made it through
the entire evening and this morning too,
and didn't have even one small bite
of that chocolatey, sinful, brownie delight.

So this is fatigue.

I've noticed over the last few weeks that I've only felt nauseated three times, and all three times was when I was utterly exhausted. Today I was just about ready to keel over around 3pm and felt awful. I managed to work through it and only left a little early. I took a nice nap when I got home though and it really helped. Not sure exactly how I'm going to manage to build in a nap ever afternoon though. Hopefully the fatigue will end soon.

Well, we had a great weekend! We spent two nights with Gayle and Thad. Colin was adorable as usual. We had two wonderful breakfasts and they took us out to Buca de Bepo, a family-style italian restaurant. It was wonderful! Gayle and I went shopping and I was able to use the gift card from Dad & JM to buy the perfect shirt! It's lightweight nylon, has lots of room to expand, and is teal blue. We almost got my hair cut, but we ran out of time. I think I'll do that next weekend.

On Sunday we headed over to Donna's house. She took us to Babies R Us where we got to start our registery. Oh my goodness is this stuff expensive! We ran around for hours but only got thru furniture and some of the bigger things. I'll be going back sometime later to pick out the other stuff. No one should even think of buying anything quite yet! We've got lots of time and with us moving we very well might change our minds on some of the stuff before long. After we were all exhausted though, Donna took us out to a great dinner at Sweet Tomatos! I must admit I slipped a bit on my no-sugar thing and had one little blueberry muffin after two salad plates. Boy was that good!

After using it since Friday night, I can honestly say I love my new CPAP machine! It seems to work really well! The only thing is my nose is a little sore from having something push on it all night, but I think it will toughen up a bit in time.

Going to Tampa!

Well, I don't have anything terribly exciting to say. I'm still happy, still pregnant, still not puking... So that's all good!

We've had a fairly busy week. We've been watching Barney and Annie, Dad & JM's puppies, this week and that makes for a busy house! I can actually walk those two since they're little and don't pull on the leash, and Tom's walking our three monster-dogs. But with 5 dogs in the house, well I'm sure you can imagine!

Tom and I are both taking Friday off to do laundry, go get the CPAP machine and then hopefully drop off Dad and JM's little angels and head to Tampa on Friday night. Otherwise we'll take off for Tampa on Saturday morning. We're staying with Gayle, Thad, our god-son Colin, and Gayle's parents until Sunday morning when we'll go over and visit Tom's mom for the day. Then we rush back up to Micanopy and start a whole new week! If I can just keep this busy maybe August 9th will hurry up and get here!

I talked with my wonderful mother this evening and she's been so good to keep this a secret! Only our immediate families and nearby friends know I'm pregnant at this point. I'm waiting until I have an ultrasound image to email the rest of the family. Boy are they ever going to be surprised! :)

Well, hope everyone has a wonderful weekend, I'll try to make sure to update here every few days so you keep coming back for news!

Breathing is good...

It looks like I'm finally getting my CPAP machine this Friday! For those who don't know, this is a machine that blows air up your nose all night so you don't stop breathing. I have sleep apnea, and this is really the best way to treat it.

Now that I'm pregnant (I love writing that word! Pregnant, pregnant, pregnant!) I really need to make sure I'm getting enough oxygen to me and the baby, so I'm very excited. Of course I'll sound like Darth Vader all night, but maybe Tom'll have some weird Star Wars dreams or something. :)

No more Temping!

OK, I've finally done it! I've officially stopped taking my temperature every morning. I was driving myself nuts over every fluctuation, and I found out that when you're pregnant your temp is going to naturally fluctuate. So I've put the thermometer away. I still have that one pregnancy test I haven't used yet, so I might just have to try that out this week. Just to have something to look at. :)

J.M. and I had a lovely birthday party today, one day after hers and three days before mine. We had Sonny's BBQ and a watermelon for dessert instead of cake. It was so good! And I really appreciated that they went with something so healthy for me! :) They could have gotten a cake for everyone else, but they didn't, and I think that was wonderfully nice of them!

Tom and I gave J.M. the new Harry Potter book. She loved it! I've only just finished my copy this morning and I can't wait till she and Tom finish it so we can talk about it! It was so good! And I'm not giving out any hints. You are just going to have to read the book!

Dad and J.M. gave me a gift card from Lane Bryant. I'll have to go shopping! I'll make sure to get some things that will stretch with me for a little while. Jessie and I had gone to her maternity store (where she works) and tried on a bunch of stuff. Pants seemed to work ok, but shirts there, even the 3X's were either too tight in the bust or in the arms. And we still don't know what to do about bras. So maybe I'll get pants at Motherhood Maternity and shirts at Lane Bryant. We'll see.

Maryellen came too, and she gave me an adorable photo frame that opens and has room for more photos inside. I can't wait to fill it with baby pictures! Maybe we'll have to get some maternity shots in there soon! And then she also gave us a special frame that has room for a bigger photo on top and then room for a smaller photo for each month of baby's first year. That will look so cute in either my office or our new house.

Speaking of new house, Tom and I are working out what in the world we're going to do to get into a new place. Ideally we'd build on the property, but I really don't think that can happen fast enough. Probably the next best thing is going to be selling the property and buying either a house or buying a lot and a mobile home for it. We'll just have to see. I'm sure it will all work out for the best!

New Baby Ticker

Well, today went fine. Cramps seem to come less frequently, although some of them are real doozies! I found a neat ticker today. It counts down your pregnancy while giving some little info about what the baby looks like and is doing in there. I'll have to see if it shows up here.

Think I'll go ahead and take another HPT this weekend. I just love seeing those lines turn color!

And the second beta results are IN!

The numbers are back and they're great!! It had to double, well it more than doubled! New Beta is 234!! My last fertility appointment is set for August 9th. The doctor wants to take a peek with ultrasound. I think he's just as curious as I am! We'll have our first OB appointment when I'm at 10-12 weeks. I also found out they start counting the 40 weeks of pregnancy with your first day of the cycle you got pregnant. So my official counting begins on June 17, 2005. So even though my baby is only 2 weeks old, I am one month pregnant. Cool!

Don't worry about the cramping

Another bloodtest today. Should know tomorrow! I also called the doctor about the cramping. They said it is normal for some women to have cramping throughout the first trimester. She said to only worry if there was bleeding involved. So I'm not going to worry anymore. We'll see what the numbers are tomorrow and go from there. She also said that we won't get to see Dr. Marichal till about 8-10 weeks or when the beta is around 1500. Tomorrow I'll ask if they're counting weeks since cycle day 1 (June 17th) or from ovulation (July 6th). It's a big difference!

First Beta Results are IN!

I've got the beta results. Anything over 5 is pregnant. Mine was an 87! Blood was drawn at 12 days past ovulation, so probably about 11 days pregnant I'm thinking. Anyone want to bet on twins? :)

Still having cramping, not sure but it might be worse. Going to call the doctor tomorrow about it. Also getting more blood drawn tomorrow. We'll get those results on Thursday.

Fertility Background

For those of you visiting for the first time, here's a little background. Tom and I have been trying to have a baby since I went off the pill May 1994. We were married in September of that year, and had planned to get a headstart. I was only 20 when we began and turned 21 right before our wedding. In November of that same year, I went to my gyn to figure out why I wasn't getting pregnant. I'd also gained 60 pounds since May! He said "Don't worry about it, you're young." He was a quack, and his exam was very uncomfortable. I found out later that other women complained about him too, but aw well. Well, a long time and a lot of negative pregnancy tests later, we learned I had PCOS. At least I had a name for it!

My ovaries were clear when I was first diagnosed in 1996. But that doctor's only plan was two cycles of clomid. When that only produced a progesterone level of 0-2 he said my only other options were either surgery or going on the pill. I left that visit in tears. I knew I wasn't ready for surgery, plus I didn't have cystic ovaries anyway. I didn't want to go on the pill since I'd convinced myself that it was the pill that screwed me up, and it seemed to be a step in the wrong direction. So we just kept trying, and being disapointed over and over.

Years later we decided to give another doctor a chance. Dr. Marichal is wonderful, and did an ultrasound that same visit. This was in July 2002. I had just finished Graduate School and was about to start working, while Tom was going back to school. The U/S showed that both my ovaries were now completely encrusted with cysts. There wasn't a bare patch anywhere. We were quite upset. Next step was an HSG to see if my tubes were clear. This turned up that my left fallopian tube is completely blocked off. More disappointment! Within two days of this, before we could meet with Marichal again, we found out Tom's work had cut off his health insurance unexpectedly. Someone in HR had gotten a bit ahead of themselves since he still had a month to go before he was leaving. So we canceled our follow-up appointment and figured we'd start again when I began teaching elementary school in the fall.

Well, by the time my insurance kicked in, I had pretty much decided there was NO WAY I could teach and have kids. After work I didn't even want to see anyone under 4 feet tall. We put my fertility on the back burner.

After two years of teaching I was completely burned out. I started a new job the third year, August 2004 working at the UF Libraries. I loved it! I finally felt good about going to work!

In January 2005, my ovaries began to cause me pain. Sometimes one, sometimes the other. I called my doctor and he sent me for an ultrasound. That showed what we already knew, both ovaries were completely swollen up with cysts, all the way around. My doctor's office referred me back to Marichal. I couldn't get an appointment until April 6th. It was a long two months.

When we saw Dr. Marichal again, he remembered us. He also knew a lot more it seemed about PCOS. He brought me a brochure, and said something I'd never heard before. The cysts were just egg follicles that had matured, but never released. They harden into cysts, but they will REABSORB!

I was so surprised! I'd never heard of that! He also said he'd put me on Metformin and that if we wanted he was sure he could get us pregnant. So then he left the room so we could talk about it. We decided to go for it. I was 31 and Tom had just turned 37. It was now or never.

Well, by May 31st, after just 1&1/2 months of being on Met and Yasmin (a birth control pill) I went in for another U/S. And believe it or not, my left ovary was COMPLETELY clear! My right was nearly clear! I didn't think it worked so fast!

We jumped right into a cycle of 100mg Clomid on June 17th. I actually ovulated on July 6th for the first time ever, although my progesterone level was a very low 6.9 at 6 days past ovulation. (Should have been 10 without Clomid, or 15 with Clomid.)

Dr. Marichal said to check for pregnancy on Monday, July 18th and if pregnant we'd use progesterone gel, if I started a new cycle though, we'd up the Clomid to 150mg and include Progesterone therapy starting at 3 days past ovulation.

I'm so excited about being a momma! Tom is thrilled and very involved in everything. He had his sperm analysis done again and everything is fine there, so we might be able to pull this off!

Wish us luck!