Heartburn is not my Friend.

Well, the time has come for my pregnancy to no longer be a piece of cake, easy as pie or whatever other appropriate dessert reference you would like to insert. For the last 4 days, I have not slept much. I keep tossing and turning in order to get comfortable (especially to relieve the numbness in my arms). And in the past 3 days, I have developed what appears to be some nasty heartburn. I'm used to having reflux, which is fairly nasty but at least causes no pain. But the heartburn is new. I hope it doesn't continue for the next 11 weeks, but my educated guess says that it will.

29 weeks

I'm now at 29 weeks and 162.0 pounds. This means that I've gained 19.5 pounds thus far. I think that my weight readings last week must have been off (perhaps I was retaining water?) because it did seem like I gained a lot of weight all at once and I don't think I actually "lost" weight this week.

The baby has been kicking a lot lately. He doesn't seem to be too active after 11 pm and although I'm not sleeping well, I'm pretty sure he isn't kicking at night. It seems like it takes him a while to wake up too. I start feeling him a lot around lunchtime. He is still kicking me on the right side only. I guess he is head-down but not quite vertical and his feet must be pointed towards my right. That's my only explanation for it.

Today, we bought a Sealy mattress for the crib and picked up my glider rocker at the BabysRUs. We also went to Jordans furniture and bought a 7 drawer dresser, which will also serve as a changing table. Here is a link to what it look like: http://www.thefurniture.com/store/proddetail.asp?prod=PLSKI-633100

I think it's so cute - each of the faces of the drawer can be customized with slide-out panels. The dresser comes with red, blue, green and wood colored panels, but we might paint the green panel the colors that we are painting the walls so that it matches nicely.

We also ordered bedding for the baby's crib: http://www.babysupermall.com/main/products/kli/kli5703beds.html?aff=frog. I ordered a bunch of the accessories too (I'm such a sucker!). I especially like the turtle throw pillow. I got an additional set of sheets and another window valance in order to fit our larger window.

In addition, we signed up for childbirth classes, which we're taking over one weekend - January 10-11, 2009. I feel a lot better now that a lot of this is out of the way.

My husband is going to start painting the baby's room this week while he's working from home and I'm at the office. I can't wait to see how it all turns out!

28 weeks, 3 days

I am 28 weeks, 2 days pregnant now. I guess I'm officially in my 3rd trimester and seeing the midwife/doctor every 2 weeks instead of every 4 weeks. I had my appointment today. The baby's heartbeat sounded great, around 140 beats per minute. I now weigh 163 pounds, which puts me at a 20.5 pound weight gain. I thought I was doing just fine on the weight gain, but the new midwife that I saw today says that the new thinking is that a woman should gain between 20 and 25 pounds during her pregnancy. I had thought 25-35 pounds was normal. Oh well. It appears that I'm going to gain more than 25 pounds given that this is only 4.5 pounds away and I still have 12 weeks to go! Then the midwife told me not to worry about it, which makes me wonder why she brought it up in the first place?

I'm not sleeping well these days. I toss and turn and have to change positions about once an hour. I guess I knew this was coming. I just hoped it would come later. It's not that I can't get comfortable to start. I just end up uncomfortable later on. When I lie on my side, my shoulder and arm end up going numb and so then I flip over to the other side (which is not necessarily an easy process). And I'm not making sleep easy for my poor husband either, who is waking up with my tosses and turns. It may be time for me to sleep in the guest bedroom.

I was in Florida on vacation last week, visiting with my parents and sister. Man, the weather was awesome. I went swimming in the outdoor pool 5 times and was really proud of myself. When I first started, I could barely swim 10 laps of freestyle straight. By the end of the week, I was swimming 40 laps (1000 yards) straight through. Each swim, I did 60 laps, which isn't bad for a 7 month pregnancy woman. I just wish I could keep up the exercise back here in Boston.

Gestational Diabetes? NOPE!

Today, I had my monthly check-up appointment with my midwife. Before I saw her, I went to the lab where I had to drink about 6 ounces of this utterly disgusting sweet orange liquid. It was about 10x sweeter than orange Gatorade. After 1 hour, they drew my blood to check the glucose levels. I will hopefully find out later today whether or not I passed. Hopefully, I did pass or I'll have to do the 3 hour test (and I'd rather not have gestational diabetes).

The checkup went well. My blood pressure was 105/70. The baby's heart beat was strong and he was moving around while the midwife was examining me. She said that the baby is still neurologically immature and there really isn't a pattern to his movements yet. She says that starting around 28-32 weeks, I should notice more regularity to his movements.

UPDATE: I passed! Apparently, my blood glucose level was 109 and anything below 139 is a pass. I also found out that I'm not anemic (which seemed to surprise the midwife since she said "and you're not even anemic!") So I'm very happy that I (and the baby) are super healthy!

26 Weeks!

I am now in my 26th week: Cumulative weight gain 15.5 pounds, Total weight is 158.0 pounds. I'm still feeling good, but I must say, I AM TOTALLY SICK OF PEOPLE ASKING ME HOW I AM FEELING. I can't get mad at them because they are just being nice, but I get the question at least 3-4 times a day. And what do they expect as an answer? I say "Just fine" or "good!" But sometimes I want to say, "Well, I had really bad gas last night and so that sucked my proverbial left nut" or "the baby didn't move all that much in the last 2 days and I'm worried he's dead" or "I feel like a total fat ass!" But I'm trying, using all will power, not to snap at these people. One person didn't ask me how I felt. She just said, "You look beautiful." I need more of those!

It's snowing today for the first time in this 2008/2009 winter. It's also the first snow since we moved to Needham. I think it's beautiful and I'm glad my mom isn't here to say "Look at that white shit falling out of the sky." I'm glad she's happy in sunny and warm Florida. New England rocks!

Update: I went swimming today (64 laps) and did a bit better than I did last week. It is very strange to swim with this big belly. I am still able to do my flip turns, but I wonder how long that is going to last. I wish I could get more exercise, but sadly, there's just not enough time in the day and I'm too lazy/tired to get out of bed early in the morning. But at least I have my walk to and from the train. Round trip, I walk just over 2 miles and so at least it's something.