The Business of Pregnancy

A great friend of mine suggested that I update my blog, and what better way to update than to document the pregnancy journey?! This is our first ever pregnancy, so some old veterans have scoffed and will scoff at our inexperience, but I will effectively ignore that! I'm talented in that way.

I took my first at-home test on February 18th, but it was negative. I then had a very short , uncharacteristically late and light period a couple of days later. I'm not sure what that was all about, but we have had horribly stressful lives since August of 2008, so, I blamed stress. I started feeling sick mid to late March. I blamed stress again. I thought, "maybe I have an ulcer." I was drinking so much milk that it was weird even for me! I just wanted milk, milk, milk, milk, milk. Then the upset tummy feeling turned into this really weird full-stomach, nausea, tight throat, queasy feeling...all day...and all night. This was the last week of March / first week of April. Brian said as soon as his benefits start up again, we'll go to the doctor and get to the bottom of it. I was having horrible thoughts of hereditary digestive trouble, or toothpaste poisoning. Yes! I actually googled it! My entire esophagus felt like it was coated in toothpaste and I DO brush my teeth...A LOT!

Well, it just so happened that I was late...again. We both knew I should take another test, but it took us at least another week or so to actually go buy one (we have lives that resemble the actions of...hhmmm...a chicken with it's head chopped off). I was actually going to freak out if it said no again, because the sickness would have to be from something. Brian brought home THREE boxes of tests after one of his late-night gigs and I thought, "don't we only need one?" I took the test the next morning (April 17th)...and it looked at me and screamed YOU'RE PREGNANT!!! I think they should work that way. If I were Queen, they would. I weaseled the test into a zip-loc bag and brought it upstairs to wake Brian up. I loved telling him! He seemed to be so many different things all at once; it was great! I knew from the moment we met that he would be a wonderful father. I have no doubt.

At this point, if I didn't munch on something CONSTANTLY, then I was feeling horrible nausea. So I became a rabbit. I ate veggies and fruit almost all day, every single day. I had soup here and there, too. I have to elaborate on this "morning sickness" BS. For me, and I know it's different for everyone, but FOR ME, it has been plaguing me all day and all night. It feels like a moderate hangover. I don't puke, much, only 5 or 6 times so far. Sometimes my entire stomach feels full and nauseated clear up into my throat, to the point that I feel like I'm being strangled. I actually pull at the collar of my shirts trying to loosen them, but they are already loose. It's the progesterone poisoning giving me that feeling. Sometimes I can't stand to have my pants touching my belly either. It's more than just uncomfortable, so I either wear elastic waist pants or undo my jeans. Actually, that feeling has subsided for the most part. But the horrible nausea hasn't gone away for more than an hour or two here and there since March. I got to the point that NOTHING sounded good. I didn't want to eat anything, but I would force myself. I went from eating yummy fruits and veggies all the time, to hating them. I WANTED to eat them, but my body said NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO! I love that stuff, but it was like it had a force field of YUCK around it. Shortly after the disappearance of my appetite, I started to smell things...strongly...all the time. I ran past the bananas in our kitchen like they were related to a skunk. I pushed my smelly cat Oliver away from me. I sat on my hands in the car after I took care of my horse Tux. I could smell EVERYTHING. I still can. Just last night, Spanky came inside, and I said, "I smell cinnamon!" Everyone laughed at me!!!!!!!! So I snatched Spanky up off the ground and stuffed him into Brian's face, and asked what he smells like. Cinnamon!

I can't forget about our first visit to the doctor on May 5th! I absolutely did not want to go. I hate doctors. I hate going to the doctor. I hate people touching me, looking at me, stabbing me with needles. All of it...I hate. Yeah, and I know, "you better get used to it." Well, guess what!? I'm not going to! I don't have to, and I refuse to pretend like it doesn't bother me. My husband will hold my hand and protect me from the big, bad medical profession, so I'm ok. We have that settled now, let's move on. I knew there was a pretty good chance we would be hearing the baby's heartbeat at this appointment, but I didn't tell Brian. I wanted him to be surprised. Needless to say at this point, he accompanied me through every single portion of the doctor visit, stirrups and all. This isn't about random doctor visits anyway. We're having our first child, so of course he wants to experience it together as much as we can. Keeping the heartbeat thing a secret definitely paid off, too! The mid-wife brought out the little doppler thingy-ma-jiggy, and found it so fast that we didn't have time to realize it until we heard the little WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH of the heartbeat! Brian was soooooooo happy! I loved it!!!!!!!!!!

So far today, I'm still battling nausea. I haven't had a day off from the nausea since it first started in March. It's very tiring, but I try not to complain too much because I know there will be an amazing reward at the end. That doesn't stop me from being irritable, moody, tired, and weepy from time to time though. Like I said, it's tiring feeling like this. Oddly enough, that just makes me want to sit around even less. Sitting still is like torture to me. Being outside working or inside (if I have to) doing housework keeps my mind off the nausea. The only time I wanted to lay around was the few times I had a POUNDING HEADACHE. Luckily, there have only been a few. I think they were from being dehydrated and unable to drink or eat anything. Actually, I could drink things as long as it was FREEZING COLD. Anything that wasn't just made my stomach churn, especially at night. Sleeping has been tough, too. I don't sleep through the night anymore. Part of it was because of the pregnancy making me have to pee in the middle of the night, but the other part is unknown to me. I just flop and flip and toss and turn and get mad and upset and have crazy weird dreams.

Mercifully, I had two good nights of sleep last week, for the first time since the nausea started. I'm so lucky, though. Brian is an amazing man, and is taking great care of me through all these new things. It's a very exciting time for us!

RRR

I’m on a mission. I’ll find out on Monday how difficult this mission will be. RRR. In this case, it definitely does not involve any sort of cracked out computer program that enjoyed malfunctioning on one of my husband’s many days of work doomed to become 12 or more hours long. Reduce! Reuse! Recycle! I like to use exclamation points.

The first third of my task, reduction, seems fairly simple. I’ll try to make changes gradually. If I can change one or two habits or choices per week, it should help. One area of my plan is to replace the burnt out bulbs in any fixture in the house(s) that is typically left on for more than 15 minutes with an Energy Star bulb, also known as a CFL. According to the energystar.gov website, “ENERGY STAR qualified lighting provides bright, warm light but uses about 75% less energy than standard lighting, produce 75 percent less heat, and lasts up to 10 times longer.” It would also be nice to end up saving money in the long run. I’m not sure the price of the bulbs is less than the amount of savings though. I guess it depends on how long I actually leave lights turned on throughout the day. I can also try to be a little more conscious of how many lights are on in the house while we’re home or not home. Right now, the lights above the kitchen sink seem like they’re always on, and they’re those ultra-bright halogen lights (shame on me). The other lights that get left on are the rows of fluorescents in the basement. I know they’re on right now. They don’t need to be.

FACT: The energy used in the average home can be responsible for more than twice the greenhouse gas emissions of the average car. When you use less energy at home, you reduce greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and help protect our environment from the risks of global climate change.

The second part of this undertaking is to reuse. I’m pretty good at this without even realizing it. I reuse zip-loc bags all the time; they only need washed and dried. I reuse bread bags. I give my old stuff to Goodwill. There are a ton of ideas online for reusing common household “trash”. For example, using old CD’s and DVD’s as coasters by sticking rubber feet to the bottom of them so they don’t slide and to block the hole in the middle. Egg cartons. I do eat some eggs. I love eggs! I found out I can use the empty cartons to sprout seedlings, or I can place them inside a drawer to hold little things like bobby-pins, jewelry, nail clippers, etc. Another interesting thing I didn’t know is that you can donate used eyeglass frames. I’m going to choose the egg carton idea for this week. I know I have at least three empty cartons in a cardboard box in the garage.

Finally, this is what sadly seems to be the most difficult part of my mission: recycling. I’ve been looking online for information about local recycling. There are no websites with complete information that I have found. I’m going to begin by recycling plastic bottles. My better half can drink pop, lots and lots of pop. I nag him to drink water, but I haven’t gotten far. According to the Container Recycling Institute, “more than 60 million plastic bottles end up in landfills and incinerators every day.” They take HUNDREDS of years to decompose. There are steps to recycling these beasties. I have to first check the recycling code found on the bottle, #1 or #2. Checking the cap is important, too. Sometimes they can’t be recycled at all. From here, I have to call around and find out what is done locally. There are rules. I’ll post what I find out.

Here’s the short version of this week’s agenda:
1.) Replace burnt out bulbs in long-burning fixtures with EnergyStar CFL’s.
2.) Turn lights off more often.
3.) Reuse my empty egg cartons.
4.) Recycle plastic bottles.

♥ þ