2nd Trimester down, 1 more to go!
Weeks 23-28
High Points
We are having a….
We found out the gender of the baby and told our families at Christmas. We each picked out something that we would put in a Christmas present for our moms to open. When my mom opened hers she had a similar reaction to when we told them I was pregnant- "oh how cute baby stuff". And I looked at her and said, we are trying to tell you something. She quickly realized, "oh it's a boy". A quick response from my aunt, "I wanted a girl!" :) So yes, we are having a baby boy! (Matt is very happy that his "manliness" won). Matt’s mom's reaction was also similar to her joy and excitement when we told them of the baby. She knew right away and was very excited. I think the grandpas are pretty excited for a boy too.
Baby on the move- Matt felt the baby for the first time around week 25. I have been feeling the baby squirming around in there for a while, but because my placenta is towards the outside of my belly, the doctor had said it could take longer for Matt to be able to feel it. One night baby schuckers was going nuts in there. I took Matt’s hand and placed it where he had been moving. Any time I do that, that little stinker stops moving! So I told Matt to wait patiently and then his eyes lit up and his mouth opened in awe. I instantly had a smile on my face because he had felt his son.
It is an incredible feeling knowing where the baby is. I always thought it was strange when pregnant women constantly have their hands on their baby bumps, but I find myself doing the exact same thing without even meaning to. You find comfort in feeling that baby; and the fact that you can distinguish where they are is surreal.
Now that Matt has felt the baby, there are times he has his hand on my belly after baby schuckers has been moving all around and all of a sudden there is a calm and a pressure right where Matt’s hand is. It is almost as though the baby knows exactly who that is and wants to be closer and can be calm and still. Again, surreal.
Low Points
Stomach Flu...-These past 5 weeks have had a few more low points than I expected. Getting the stomach flu is not a fun experience to begin with. While being pregnant it made it even more miserable. The baby has been moving so much more and while I was sick he would not stay still. Having a squirming 2 pound baby in there made the nausea 10x worse. I had lost 5 lbs in 24 hours. I had started getting sick at about 9:30 at night and continued vomiting consistently until 5am. The next morning I was able to start sipping water that would stay down. Matt had called the doctor for me to make sure there wasn’t an issue. The dehydration was the biggest concern, but since I was slowly able to sip water, they said it should all be OK.
Matt was a wonderful husband taking care of me, monitoring my temperature, getting out of bed with me every time I got sick, just to be there for me. He was my comfort. And then, he got sick… Thankfully, my worst was over once he had started. I was not able to be as helpful to him as he was to me, but we started to switch roles a little bit. There’s no one in the world I would rather get sick with than Matthew :)
We took a nap by the fire after 36 hours of the worst was over. I was in the black blanket before getting up.
Hormones...“you’re a crazy psycho b*, Hormones”- After being sick, I was so depleted on so many levels. I was dehydrated, my eating habits were not normal, sleeping had been off all week because of being sick and I hadn’t worked out all week. I felt broken emotionally. I usually get a case of the "winter blues" to an extent, but this has been extreme. There was a day I couldn’t stop crying. Matt did everything right to help me and it still didn’t work. He knew I wanted to go for a walk with our dog Cori, so we did that and I still felt empty and unhappy. He would try and ask what was wrong and I kept saying, nothing I just couldn’t stop feeling like this. I felt so horrible because I started having feelings that it was because of the baby and the hormones and I just wanted to be done feeling like a different person.
Most days of the week, I do feel fine. There are times I don’t feel like I am in my own skin, but I am not unhappy. There have been 2 specific days during these last 5 weeks that my emotions became unbearable. I am slightly fearful for when the baby comes how my hormones and emotions will react. I am so grateful that once he is here, it will be nicer weather that I hope that makes a small difference.
Workouts
Since the holidays have ended, I have been doing much better on my workouts and eating (except for the stomach flu week). I was able to run outside with my soccer program during one of our conditioning days. Of course I was towards the back, but it felt so good. I also did the fitnessgram push up test with my PE class and was super proud I did 30. The most I have ever completed with my classes in the past was 50, so not focusing on push ups as much lately and being pregnant, I took 30 as a win.
Running- While running I have had 2 occasions that I have gotten really horrible cramps on the right side. I had to stop once, and the other time I was able to walk and start jogging again. With the cold, I have been doing the majority of my running on the treadmill or split it up with elliptical as well. When I run on the treadmill at home we have this wonderful mirror right in front of the treadmill that makes me feel really good about myself (if you can’t tell, this is sarcasm).
As I run (very slowly by the way), my legs start to feel heavy at times. My breathing feels great, but my body just doesn’t respond in the same way I am used to. I think the added blood volume and weight has something to do with that. I look a lot more awkward in that glorious mirror too. I have realized that part of the problem is I am not used to carrying 5% more of my body weight.
Biking- Matt moved my handlebars all the way up so that I am little more comfortable with my growing belly. I can go in aero if I wanted to, but I don’t need to at this point. I am much more comfortable staying up on my handlebars, so I am good with it. My watts are super pathetic. Again, my breathing seems fine,
but my legs just don’t seem to respond as well. There are some days I feel awesome and I can hit some good watts (I held 125-135 pretty well for 2, 10 minute sets the other day- pretty jacked about that, ha), but most of the time I just want to move. Most of my workouts are cadence focused, rather than pushing the watts. The motivation at times is just not there, that easy spins is a win for me.
Swimming- Swimming has felt great. I have realized that I am getting slower and slower, but I feel strong and smooth in the water. I am constantly focusing on my form in hopes that it is starting to get better. My fast 25s have been about 2 seconds slower than my fastest 25s pre pregnancy, but I can keep it consistent which makes me feel better. I also feel like after focusing on my form so much, I can tell it is working because I am not as tired/out of breath as I have been in the past going about the same speed. Huge win. One of my workouts was a 3300 (for those of you that don’t know that is barely over 2 miles). I completed the workout 10 minutes slower than the prescribed time, but I was still super jacked that I completed this workout feeling good. It is the longest swim I have done in a while and I loved every length of it, even though I was slow as molasses :)
Strength- I have been doing strength with me PE class and soccer teams throughout the week. I focus a lot more on body weight lately or lighter weights. The other day with the soccer team, my first push up, my belly hit the floor and that was a little weird. I should probably be doing more strength, but with the lack of motivation/energy, again, I will take what I can get.
I did earn Gold status for Ironman from the 2016 season. (Matt got silver!!)
I keep getting emails about early registration for different races that I cannot take advantage of. I have started to come to the realization that the first year I have earned this “status” I will not get to benefit from any of the perks. It has been quite a bummer, but I am hopeful this won’t be my only year in earning this award.
Being in this world of unknown with how the birth will go, along with the recovery and lifestyle change is a big frustration and fear I have. I am a planner and I love to consider the races I want to do and start preparing for them around this time. Right now, I feel like I can only be considering sprint races. I am really hoping I can do longer races towards the end of the summer, but I also don’t want to over do anything.
Some things I have been doing/learning
Baby Registry- I have been preparing our baby registry now that we know the gender. We decided to register at Buy Buy Baby and Amazon. It has been really hard to figure out what you actually will need/use. I went on pinterest and tried finding different articles to identify top items to register for. Some friends recommended taking a look at their registries to get ideas as well. I am hoping that after the baby comes I can try and write a blog about the items we actually use/need vs the items that you don’t necessarily need. Most of my registering has been online. Matt and I went in to Buy Buy Baby to ask about the bigger items and get information on what would be best for us. Being able to do it on the computer is something I prefer though.
Nursery- I also spent a lot of time on pinterest trying to get some ideas for a nursery theme. There are some pretty cool things out there. I was looking at new born picture ideas and saw one with a baby sleeping inside of a tool box. As soon as I saw that I knew that would be something Matt would like too. Here's a little hint of what's to come. This will be part of the changing table :)
I found a website that you can mess around with the room set up according to the size of the furniture and layout of the room (http://www.babysdream.com/VirtualNurseryPlanner.aspx). I need visuals so it was nice to get an idea of what will work in the room with the furniture we registered for. You can actually do this with many different rooms in your home and they have plenty of options to customize your design.
To get an idea of the paint colors and accent wall, I used Behr’s website. You can take a picture of your actual room and “paint” the room on your computer. Again, being a visual person, super happy to give that a try. We decided to have painters come to paint, so once they do I will take pictures and show you the before/after from the Behr example to how the Nursery turns out.
Glucose test- there is a glucose test that you are supposed to do to test for the onset of diabetes. I have heard it is horrible. You have to drink this sugary drink within 5 minutes and then wait an hour before getting your blood drawn. It was suggested to me to get the drink prior to the test and go in after an hour. Unfortunately, the facility I went to would not allow this. The drink itself was not bad at all in my opinion. It tastes like a really concentrated orange flavored Gatorade. Maybe part of it is because I love sugar and consume a ton of it anyway :/ I did feel a little nauseous at one point, but otherwise it wasn’t that bad.
Pregnancy Brain- This is a real thing. I am so forgetful. When I actually remember something, I say a Thank you to the big man upstairs because I know it wasn't just me. I will spend 10 minutes looking for something that was just in front of me. I will go in the kitchen after dinner to put the food away. I get it in the containers and then don't put it in the fridge...When I am teaching there are times I can't find my words and I look like a fool. I can't even imagine what it will feel like to have baby brain...
Getting up at night- When I get up to go to the bathroom at night, I have to move very slowly while turning over in bed. If I don't the shift in my belly is uncomfortable and makes me walk weird for a little bit after. The first trimester I was getting up ALL NIGHT LONG, maybe 3 times at least. The second trimester has been great. I usually have to wake up around 4 and that's it. I am starting to notice a little more of a change as I am getting bigger.
Hormones- Hormones suck. I listened to a podcast on BirthFul that talked about the hormone level changes and different foods that you can eat to help boost production of hormones to balance things out. Usually the emotional feelings come from a drop in estrogen and progesterone so suddenly. This podcast was focusing more on the "4th trimester" (postpartum) but it had a lot of good information to help prepare me going forward. They talk about placenta encapsulation to help the postpartum women try to maintain some of those hormone levels after baby in hopes of getting back to a normal state easier. Don't know if I will do it, but it is an interesting theory.
Baby movements- It is a love hate relationship. There are times he is moving so much that it gets annoying. Then, when he doesn’t move for a while, I want him to move just to let me know everything is OK in there. His moving sometimes makes my whole belly wiggle too which is fun to see. Sometimes I stare at it hoping to see the foot or hand, but I don't think he is big enough for that yet.
People- Other people stare at your belly when they know you are pregnant. Every time they see you. As I am walking down the hall way, there are many students that will see me in passing and look straight to my belly. The first thing people ask you (and every time) is, “how are you feeling?”. Not how are you doing, it’s how are you feeling? Most of the time I do feel pretty normal. I am not sick or anything, I just have added weight in my belly. I have made a mental note to make sure I don’t ask pregnant people how they are feeling, but instead just ask how things are going in general. Keep it normal, because to me, everything is still pretty normal.
I am now in my 3rd trimester as my belly starts to grow more. According to an article I found, my weight gain is right on track up until this point.
Looking back at the beginning weeks, I was very self conscious of the changes happening in my body and I don't know why in comparison to the growth of the belly at this point. I also look back at pre pregnancy pictures and also think, man I took that for granted.
Up next, the baby nursery and probably a lot more weight gain :)
