Tomorrow, I'm going to go to the hospital and have an actual tiny baby.
I think we're ready. The grandparents are here on child care duty. The birthday girl has been amply feted, and I even managed to finish all four princess dresses and the cloak in time. I have finally acquired the big sister gift.* There's still plenty more sewing I could do, but it may or may not happen depending on what kind of baby we get. We have a dresser full of teeny weeny washed baby clothes and 3 dozen washed diapers. Our bedroom is set up so all four of us can sleep together if necessary.
B and I went out to dinner and a movie tonight, sans child. We saw Up, which was just fantastic. I loved it despite the fact that I could see every single emotional plot point a mile off - I mean, how much more literal a representation of a metaphor can you have than a man with a house strapped to his back? But I don't really watch Pixar movies for the convoluted plots. The quality of animation, the fun characters, the wonderful talking dogs, the great touches of humor that had us laughing out loud at times - that's why we go see Pixar movies. I would definitely rank this one up with The Incredibles and Ratatouille.
Off to bed now, since we're going to have to get up way too early in the morning. Hopefully, this time tomorrow I'll have a healthy newborn sleeping next to me.
*I had left it too late to order something online, and when one of her birthday presents from a relative turned out to be a doll, we decided to get her something else. But then I drove out to an incredibly cool toy store (they have, no exaggeration, the ENTIRE line of Playmobil products), and discovered an anatomically correct boy doll, which I was able to purchase for the price of taking 2 minutes to fill out a preferred customer card, and FIVE DOLLARS. Down from $25. Zowee. At that price, I was able to get the doll carriage K had been asking for as well.
Showing posts with label second time around. Show all posts
Showing posts with label second time around. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Monday, April 6, 2009
Dubious milestones, part 24 of an infinite series
When I was pregnant with K, starting at about 32 weeks she started amusing herself by alternating between slouching down in my pelvis in transverse position and stretching herself up into breech, jamming her hard little head into my ribs in the process.
At a mere 29 weeks, Wulfrith has discovered the same trick of jamming his head into my ribs. I guess this is one of the milestones you get to experience when you have babies that don't care to go head down. I suppose I can take comfort in the fact that I may never know what it feels like to get kicked in the ribs.
It's very cute of you to try and imitate your sister, sweetheart, but there's no need to be precocious.
At a mere 29 weeks, Wulfrith has discovered the same trick of jamming his head into my ribs. I guess this is one of the milestones you get to experience when you have babies that don't care to go head down. I suppose I can take comfort in the fact that I may never know what it feels like to get kicked in the ribs.
It's very cute of you to try and imitate your sister, sweetheart, but there's no need to be precocious.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
28 weeks
I had my 27 week prenatal checkup last week and a "check to make sure the baby's still growing" ultrasound today. All looks very well.
After being scolded about my lack of weight gain and measuring behind at 23 weeks, I have now gained a lofty 6 pounds and am measuring a bit ahead. This doesn't surprise me given that while I was in Michigan, I was suddenly attacked by The Hunger. I would have a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch, then make another one an hour later. I would get up to get a snack and grab two other snacks for later because chances were good that "later" would be within the hour. So I guess that's what it's like to be a preschooler going through a growth spurt, even if I wasn't actually the one growing.
Though actually, I am. My stomach grew visibly last week and I finally have an undeniably pregnant shape. My stomach still doesn't stick out to the point that it can't be hidden with a sweatshirt and even if people suspected that I was pregnant, I don't look big enough that they would probably ask for fear that I'm just chunky, but I'm definitely round. My belly button has gotten visibly shallower in the past week as well, and the skin on my abdomen is feeling stretched and sensitive.
Wulfrith measured perfectly on the ultrasound - 28 weeks, 3-4 days (a couple days ahead) and two pounds, 9 ounces. I am no longer worried about his growth or mine.
It's still too early to really worry about positioning, so I will simply note for the record that he is transverse, has been hanging out in that position for at least 6 weeks and is in exactly the same position K spent about 18 weeks in. I asked the doctor what the chances are that he won't turn, given that K never did, and he said pretty good. Babies who like to take weird positions usually do so because there's a structural issue that makes it more comfortable for them. Ah well. He'll come out one way or another. I have another ultrasound at 36 weeks, so we can decide what to do if he hasn't moved by then.
It's definitely the third trimester. I'm tired yet find myself concocting plans to rearrange every single room in the house and sew a tent to cover it. I've had a rotten cold for the past several days, and have discovered that a violent cough and the third trimester don't really mix (if you've been pregnant, you can probably figure out what I mean when I talk about undesirable side effects of coughing. If you haven't, feel lucky). My uterus hasn't grown far up enough in my abdomen yet for him to jam his head into my ribs in that lovely way K did for the last ten weeks, but I'm starting to feel the periodic pressure of his head just below my ribs. He's also large enough to make my abdomen dance and undulate in an entertaining yet highly creepy way.
Less than twelve weeks to go. Eep.
After being scolded about my lack of weight gain and measuring behind at 23 weeks, I have now gained a lofty 6 pounds and am measuring a bit ahead. This doesn't surprise me given that while I was in Michigan, I was suddenly attacked by The Hunger. I would have a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch, then make another one an hour later. I would get up to get a snack and grab two other snacks for later because chances were good that "later" would be within the hour. So I guess that's what it's like to be a preschooler going through a growth spurt, even if I wasn't actually the one growing.
Though actually, I am. My stomach grew visibly last week and I finally have an undeniably pregnant shape. My stomach still doesn't stick out to the point that it can't be hidden with a sweatshirt and even if people suspected that I was pregnant, I don't look big enough that they would probably ask for fear that I'm just chunky, but I'm definitely round. My belly button has gotten visibly shallower in the past week as well, and the skin on my abdomen is feeling stretched and sensitive.
Wulfrith measured perfectly on the ultrasound - 28 weeks, 3-4 days (a couple days ahead) and two pounds, 9 ounces. I am no longer worried about his growth or mine.
It's still too early to really worry about positioning, so I will simply note for the record that he is transverse, has been hanging out in that position for at least 6 weeks and is in exactly the same position K spent about 18 weeks in. I asked the doctor what the chances are that he won't turn, given that K never did, and he said pretty good. Babies who like to take weird positions usually do so because there's a structural issue that makes it more comfortable for them. Ah well. He'll come out one way or another. I have another ultrasound at 36 weeks, so we can decide what to do if he hasn't moved by then.
It's definitely the third trimester. I'm tired yet find myself concocting plans to rearrange every single room in the house and sew a tent to cover it. I've had a rotten cold for the past several days, and have discovered that a violent cough and the third trimester don't really mix (if you've been pregnant, you can probably figure out what I mean when I talk about undesirable side effects of coughing. If you haven't, feel lucky). My uterus hasn't grown far up enough in my abdomen yet for him to jam his head into my ribs in that lovely way K did for the last ten weeks, but I'm starting to feel the periodic pressure of his head just below my ribs. He's also large enough to make my abdomen dance and undulate in an entertaining yet highly creepy way.
Less than twelve weeks to go. Eep.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
End of the week review
*I worked all day at the library today, then came home, took a nap and started in on the second job. Only to discover after an hour that the server had been taken down for unplanned maintenance (although I only found out a couple minutes ago that's what it was - thanks for letting us know so expeditiously, guys). This wouldn't bother me so much except that we were told to have our hours into the payroll system by 3 this afternoon, so I had to put my Friday hours in before actually working them. Ack. Well, I'll figure out how to handle this next week, I guess.
*Tonight after dinner, K went into the cabinet, got out several cookies and came to give me one. Then she told me that two of the other cookies were for Daddy. It was very sweet and touching. Of course, it was sweet and touching in a way that meant that she got two cookies as well, but a year ago she would have been trying to hoard all five cookies for herself so I'll count it as significant progress in the "thinking of others" arena.
*In Friday night tv, Dollhouse was a definite step up in quality from previous episodes and Battlestar Galactica had about as good of an ending as I could hope. This week's episode of Dollhouse also had a fairly clear message from Joss Whedon of "In case you thought I was trying to say that human trafficking is in any way acceptable or that I'm trying to glamorize it, no, I'm really really not."
*B had the day off yesterday, so we were finally able to go see Watchmen. I admit that it's been quite a while since I've read the comic, but from what I remember, the movie was remarkably faithful to the comic. It was definitely incredibly graphic, but it helped create a tone that was very consistent with the story. Since the point of the comic was to provide a non-glamorized view of what real-life superheroes would really be like, the depictions of violence that didn't spare the viewer at all seemed pretty appropriate. Mind you, that meant I watched quite a bit of the movie through my fingers or with my eyes averted since I have very little stomach for graphic violence, but this is one of the very few movies I can think of where it didn't seem gratuitous.
*The same things has happened this week that happened last pregnancy: the day I started my third trimester, my pelvis started aching. It's more in the hips and lower back this time instead of the pubic bone, probably because Wulfrith is lying even farther back in my abdomen than K, which I didn't think was possible. I'm doubly glad now that I got travelling out of the way last week so I didn't have to traipse across the airport with my hips feeling like they're about to fall apart. Ah, the delights of the third trimester - aching joints, reflux, exhaustion, sciatica, ever-decreasing lung and bladder capacity... all sending the message that it's all downhill from here. Of course, at the bottom of the hill you get a baby, so it's worth it.
K informed me tonight that she wants two babies, a baby brother and baby sister. Sorry kid, there's just the one with no options of adding on. But it's good of her to remind me how much worse it could be. Yikes.
*Tonight after dinner, K went into the cabinet, got out several cookies and came to give me one. Then she told me that two of the other cookies were for Daddy. It was very sweet and touching. Of course, it was sweet and touching in a way that meant that she got two cookies as well, but a year ago she would have been trying to hoard all five cookies for herself so I'll count it as significant progress in the "thinking of others" arena.
*In Friday night tv, Dollhouse was a definite step up in quality from previous episodes and Battlestar Galactica had about as good of an ending as I could hope. This week's episode of Dollhouse also had a fairly clear message from Joss Whedon of "In case you thought I was trying to say that human trafficking is in any way acceptable or that I'm trying to glamorize it, no, I'm really really not."
*B had the day off yesterday, so we were finally able to go see Watchmen. I admit that it's been quite a while since I've read the comic, but from what I remember, the movie was remarkably faithful to the comic. It was definitely incredibly graphic, but it helped create a tone that was very consistent with the story. Since the point of the comic was to provide a non-glamorized view of what real-life superheroes would really be like, the depictions of violence that didn't spare the viewer at all seemed pretty appropriate. Mind you, that meant I watched quite a bit of the movie through my fingers or with my eyes averted since I have very little stomach for graphic violence, but this is one of the very few movies I can think of where it didn't seem gratuitous.
*The same things has happened this week that happened last pregnancy: the day I started my third trimester, my pelvis started aching. It's more in the hips and lower back this time instead of the pubic bone, probably because Wulfrith is lying even farther back in my abdomen than K, which I didn't think was possible. I'm doubly glad now that I got travelling out of the way last week so I didn't have to traipse across the airport with my hips feeling like they're about to fall apart. Ah, the delights of the third trimester - aching joints, reflux, exhaustion, sciatica, ever-decreasing lung and bladder capacity... all sending the message that it's all downhill from here. Of course, at the bottom of the hill you get a baby, so it's worth it.
K informed me tonight that she wants two babies, a baby brother and baby sister. Sorry kid, there's just the one with no options of adding on. But it's good of her to remind me how much worse it could be. Yikes.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
What goes around comes around
Particularly when it's the flu.
K is mostly better, although I was quite glad that they put a pullup on her at daycare yesterday when I took it off and discovered it was excessively grody. For all my years of cloth diapering, I have to admit that very occasionally you get the sort of diaper where it's very nice to just be able to toss it in the trash, and very very nice not to have to deal with cleaning up dirty underwear and pants instead.
This, of course, was the cue for B and I to wake up sick yesterday. Thank goodness K was well enough to get shipped of to daycare so we could sleep all day. Today, we're still tired but recovering.
We also seem to be able to eat again, which is a relief. The very few things I ate yesterday came back up, just in time for me to go to a prenatal visit today and get scolded about my weight gain. As in, I should try it sometime.
It's an odd feeling, being told I absolutely have to gain weight, especially since I spent the first nine months of last year fighting a creeping weight gain. But I feel just as powerless to make my weight go where I want it to go as I did then. There was the 16 weeks of morning sickness, extended by one major and two minor bouts of stomach flu (twice, B came home from work complaining of a "funny tummy," which would then result in another two days of throwing up for me after I had thought the worst was over). At my last appointment, I had finally managed to gain three pounds, bringing my pregnancy weight gain to -12. But this time, I hadn't gained an ounce, and I'm not sure that one day of not eating can account for that. I'm really truly trying to eat as much as I can and I'm certainly not staying away from fattening foods. I guess I need to get back to my nightly large mug of chai or hot chocolate and maybe switch to whole milk instead of 2 percent. And maybe add a bowl of ice cream.
This wasn't remotely a problem last time, when I gained 35 pounds and had my ob vocally worried about gestational diabetes when I gained a shocking 8 pounds in four weeks. *eyeroll*
I would be more worried if four weeks ago Wulfrith hadn't been measuring ahead at the last ultrasound and estimated at weighing a pound at only 19 weeks. He's also increasingly vigorous (with a devilish sort of aim for kicking a tiny foot directly into bladder) and my uterus is growing up in my abdomen appropriately. True, I didn't have to give up my pre-pregnancy pants until last week at the beginning of 22 weeks, but at least I finally did. Chances are good that Wulfrith is feasting happily on my fat stores and I'm taking my vitamins, so I'm not truly worried. But I'd like to meet the woman who can be truly zen in the face of things not going according to textbook during pregnancy.
This all contrasts to several conversations I've had recently, which all center around people being amazed that I'm five months pregnant and don't look pregnant at all. And I'm almost always congratulated for this, as if it were something I had any control over, or more to the point, would want. Part of it is being tall and long-torsoed, part of it just seems to the way I carry babies, and a lot of it has been spending 2/3 of this pregnancy unable to eat. But if I were to go by these conversations, not gaining weight is a good and admirable thing. I know that our culture is so screwed up about weight that people who've lost weight because of serious illnesses often get complimented on their weight. But are we so screwed up that not gaining weight when your pregnant, a time when it's important not only to your health but very much to the health of another person it's still seen as good?
I don't see the charm in being complimented for something that's causing me a fair amount of stress. Maybe the next person who admires how little I'm showing would like to take my place at my next prenatal appointment and let the nursing student worry them over their miniscule fundal height.
K is mostly better, although I was quite glad that they put a pullup on her at daycare yesterday when I took it off and discovered it was excessively grody. For all my years of cloth diapering, I have to admit that very occasionally you get the sort of diaper where it's very nice to just be able to toss it in the trash, and very very nice not to have to deal with cleaning up dirty underwear and pants instead.
This, of course, was the cue for B and I to wake up sick yesterday. Thank goodness K was well enough to get shipped of to daycare so we could sleep all day. Today, we're still tired but recovering.
We also seem to be able to eat again, which is a relief. The very few things I ate yesterday came back up, just in time for me to go to a prenatal visit today and get scolded about my weight gain. As in, I should try it sometime.
It's an odd feeling, being told I absolutely have to gain weight, especially since I spent the first nine months of last year fighting a creeping weight gain. But I feel just as powerless to make my weight go where I want it to go as I did then. There was the 16 weeks of morning sickness, extended by one major and two minor bouts of stomach flu (twice, B came home from work complaining of a "funny tummy," which would then result in another two days of throwing up for me after I had thought the worst was over). At my last appointment, I had finally managed to gain three pounds, bringing my pregnancy weight gain to -12. But this time, I hadn't gained an ounce, and I'm not sure that one day of not eating can account for that. I'm really truly trying to eat as much as I can and I'm certainly not staying away from fattening foods. I guess I need to get back to my nightly large mug of chai or hot chocolate and maybe switch to whole milk instead of 2 percent. And maybe add a bowl of ice cream.
This wasn't remotely a problem last time, when I gained 35 pounds and had my ob vocally worried about gestational diabetes when I gained a shocking 8 pounds in four weeks. *eyeroll*
I would be more worried if four weeks ago Wulfrith hadn't been measuring ahead at the last ultrasound and estimated at weighing a pound at only 19 weeks. He's also increasingly vigorous (with a devilish sort of aim for kicking a tiny foot directly into bladder) and my uterus is growing up in my abdomen appropriately. True, I didn't have to give up my pre-pregnancy pants until last week at the beginning of 22 weeks, but at least I finally did. Chances are good that Wulfrith is feasting happily on my fat stores and I'm taking my vitamins, so I'm not truly worried. But I'd like to meet the woman who can be truly zen in the face of things not going according to textbook during pregnancy.
This all contrasts to several conversations I've had recently, which all center around people being amazed that I'm five months pregnant and don't look pregnant at all. And I'm almost always congratulated for this, as if it were something I had any control over, or more to the point, would want. Part of it is being tall and long-torsoed, part of it just seems to the way I carry babies, and a lot of it has been spending 2/3 of this pregnancy unable to eat. But if I were to go by these conversations, not gaining weight is a good and admirable thing. I know that our culture is so screwed up about weight that people who've lost weight because of serious illnesses often get complimented on their weight. But are we so screwed up that not gaining weight when your pregnant, a time when it's important not only to your health but very much to the health of another person it's still seen as good?
I don't see the charm in being complimented for something that's causing me a fair amount of stress. Maybe the next person who admires how little I'm showing would like to take my place at my next prenatal appointment and let the nursing student worry them over their miniscule fundal height.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Breathless anticipation
It's very hard to be three years old sometimes, to have the ability to anticipate things but not have a real sense of time yet.
I made two mistakes when putting K to bed the other night. The first was to bring up the trip to visit my mother she and I are taking sometime in the next six weeks (place tickets haven't been bought yet, so the exact timing is still to be determined). The second was when K brought up the princess dress like the one a preschool classmate has that she desperately wants, I didn't put her off with something vague but instead suggested that her grandmother might buy it for her birthday.
The next morning, I went into her room to discover a duffel bag out on the floor with several shirts inside, clearly packed for our imminent trip. And the day was pretty much evenly divided between asking if it was her birthday and asking when we were going to the airport. It's very hard to deal with a preschooler who has no real concept of months yet. The best we can do for the moment is get across "Not now."
For the trip, we'll probably make up a calendar where we can cross off the days, and hopefully that will give her something more concrete to see how the time will pass. Her birthday, over four months from now, seems a bit far away for that tactic. I had actually been planning to start making her some princess dresses in the not too distant future but haven't had the time to sit down and sew, so I bought a cheap dress today and have offered it up as a potty training bribe, in exchange for dry pants for the rest of the week. We shall see how successful that tactic actually is. Bribery has never once been an effective technique for us because, heh, K isn't very good with delayed gratification. She didn't want one sticker on the sticker chart, she wanted to be able to artistically arrange multiple stickers on the page without being constrained by little boxes. It only managed to turn every potty session into a completely different power struggle than the typical one.
I'm rather thankful that the baby is still abstract enough in her mind that having to wait until June isn't too hard on her. Finding out that it's a baby brother and getting to see better pictures definitely caused her to have a big leap forward in interest, but my tactic of buying her a doll to be a practice baby brother managed to head off any disappointed about the baby not appearing right away (I had wanted to get an anatomically correct doll, but she insisted on a pink one. However, according to her it's still a boy doll, it's just a baby brother that wears pink. Way to fight gender roles, my dear). But all of her play lately has shifted from mommies and babies to big sisters and little brothers, and she's suddenly wanted to have our books on where babies come from read to her a lot. It's clearly processing through her busy little brain, but I'm just as glad that it's not real enough for her yet for her to start asking when her little brother is arriving every five minutes too.
I made two mistakes when putting K to bed the other night. The first was to bring up the trip to visit my mother she and I are taking sometime in the next six weeks (place tickets haven't been bought yet, so the exact timing is still to be determined). The second was when K brought up the princess dress like the one a preschool classmate has that she desperately wants, I didn't put her off with something vague but instead suggested that her grandmother might buy it for her birthday.
The next morning, I went into her room to discover a duffel bag out on the floor with several shirts inside, clearly packed for our imminent trip. And the day was pretty much evenly divided between asking if it was her birthday and asking when we were going to the airport. It's very hard to deal with a preschooler who has no real concept of months yet. The best we can do for the moment is get across "Not now."
For the trip, we'll probably make up a calendar where we can cross off the days, and hopefully that will give her something more concrete to see how the time will pass. Her birthday, over four months from now, seems a bit far away for that tactic. I had actually been planning to start making her some princess dresses in the not too distant future but haven't had the time to sit down and sew, so I bought a cheap dress today and have offered it up as a potty training bribe, in exchange for dry pants for the rest of the week. We shall see how successful that tactic actually is. Bribery has never once been an effective technique for us because, heh, K isn't very good with delayed gratification. She didn't want one sticker on the sticker chart, she wanted to be able to artistically arrange multiple stickers on the page without being constrained by little boxes. It only managed to turn every potty session into a completely different power struggle than the typical one.
I'm rather thankful that the baby is still abstract enough in her mind that having to wait until June isn't too hard on her. Finding out that it's a baby brother and getting to see better pictures definitely caused her to have a big leap forward in interest, but my tactic of buying her a doll to be a practice baby brother managed to head off any disappointed about the baby not appearing right away (I had wanted to get an anatomically correct doll, but she insisted on a pink one. However, according to her it's still a boy doll, it's just a baby brother that wears pink. Way to fight gender roles, my dear). But all of her play lately has shifted from mommies and babies to big sisters and little brothers, and she's suddenly wanted to have our books on where babies come from read to her a lot. It's clearly processing through her busy little brain, but I'm just as glad that it's not real enough for her yet for her to start asking when her little brother is arriving every five minutes too.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
19 week ultrasound
We went in for the Level II ultrasound today, the Big One where you get to see a baby that finally looks completely human. Everything looked absolutely perfect - we saw tiny little fingers and toes, a four chambered heart, a normal brain, an alternating cute and bizarre alien looking face, the cute little mouth opening, swallowing and sucking on fingers and an intact spinal column. And a penis.
So yes, we're having a boy! We were pretty neutral on the subject, although I had looked forward to barely having to buy any more clothing if we had a girl. Fortunately, I've been buying K some boys' clothes all along - the advantages of a daughter who likes dinosaurs.
To reward him for being more revealing than his sister, I will change his nickname from a girl's name to a boy's name. So our incipient offspring is now Wulfrith. Now all we have to do is work on his actual name. We had a boy's name for K, but we weren't in love with it, so we're revisiting the issue. If you have any suggestions for your favorite boy names, we would love to hear them.
So yes, we're having a boy! We were pretty neutral on the subject, although I had looked forward to barely having to buy any more clothing if we had a girl. Fortunately, I've been buying K some boys' clothes all along - the advantages of a daughter who likes dinosaurs.
To reward him for being more revealing than his sister, I will change his nickname from a girl's name to a boy's name. So our incipient offspring is now Wulfrith. Now all we have to do is work on his actual name. We had a boy's name for K, but we weren't in love with it, so we're revisiting the issue. If you have any suggestions for your favorite boy names, we would love to hear them.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
18 weeks
Five weeks into the second trimester, I'm finally feeling like I've left the first behind. I haven't thrown up in three weeks and I don't need to take a nap to make it through the day. My appetite hasn't really kicked in yet, but at least I'm not losing weight any more.
Last pregnancy, I gave up on normal pants at the beginning of 17 weeks, and had spent the two weeks before that having to unbutton them by the evening. This time, I'm still wearing normal pants without any trouble. Part of me worries about this, but the regular renditions of the Fetal Fandango I'm being treated to are mostly reassuring me. I also had to give up on a pair of jeans today when I was able to get them on and fasten them, but decided it wasn't worth having to make it through the day that uncomfortable (although part of that might have been due to *ahem* pregnancy related intestinal slowness adding bulk to my abdomen). I can feel my uterus right under my belly button which is right where it should be, but it just isn't sticking out at all. It seems like since my stomach wasn't exactly flat before I got pregnant, baby has steadily been replacing fat as I've lost weight, leaving me the same shape. Still, I'm not a remotely pregnant shape, so I still fret a bit.
Speaking of fretting, it's way, way too early to even think about the fact that this fetus seems to heavily favor lying transverse, as evidenced by the amount of time I spend getting simultaneous kicks 8 inches apart on either side of my stomach, right? Even though K also heavily favored lying transverse from about as early I as I could feel her, and stayed that way until birth? And even though the reading I've done on transverse lie is that it's almost always for a reason (uterine abnormalities, fibroids, weird pelvis, etc) and therefore has a high chance of happening again? Although I'm not quite sure why I'm bothering to fret about this, because ultimately if this fetus decides to settle into my pelvis like it's the world's comfiest hammock like its sister did, well, I'll have another c-section, which is a prospect about which I'm pretty much neutral. Recovery from abdominal surgery isn't fun, but it will certainly make other parts surrounding scheduling child care a lot more convenient. And 18 weeks is far far too early to worry about fetal positioning. This is just an excellent example of how my brain likes to not merely borrow trouble but take a mortgage out on it.
We have the big ultrasound next week, which will hopefully allay any concerns I have about growth. And maybe Aethelryth will be more generous than K and let us see its sex. It will be a lot easier to help prepare K if we can start talking specifically about her new brother or her new sister. And frankly, all we got out of being involuntarily surprised last time was a lot of green and yellow baby clothes. I'm not a big fan of surprises, so I'd just as soon get it out of the way next week.
Last pregnancy, I gave up on normal pants at the beginning of 17 weeks, and had spent the two weeks before that having to unbutton them by the evening. This time, I'm still wearing normal pants without any trouble. Part of me worries about this, but the regular renditions of the Fetal Fandango I'm being treated to are mostly reassuring me. I also had to give up on a pair of jeans today when I was able to get them on and fasten them, but decided it wasn't worth having to make it through the day that uncomfortable (although part of that might have been due to *ahem* pregnancy related intestinal slowness adding bulk to my abdomen). I can feel my uterus right under my belly button which is right where it should be, but it just isn't sticking out at all. It seems like since my stomach wasn't exactly flat before I got pregnant, baby has steadily been replacing fat as I've lost weight, leaving me the same shape. Still, I'm not a remotely pregnant shape, so I still fret a bit.
Speaking of fretting, it's way, way too early to even think about the fact that this fetus seems to heavily favor lying transverse, as evidenced by the amount of time I spend getting simultaneous kicks 8 inches apart on either side of my stomach, right? Even though K also heavily favored lying transverse from about as early I as I could feel her, and stayed that way until birth? And even though the reading I've done on transverse lie is that it's almost always for a reason (uterine abnormalities, fibroids, weird pelvis, etc) and therefore has a high chance of happening again? Although I'm not quite sure why I'm bothering to fret about this, because ultimately if this fetus decides to settle into my pelvis like it's the world's comfiest hammock like its sister did, well, I'll have another c-section, which is a prospect about which I'm pretty much neutral. Recovery from abdominal surgery isn't fun, but it will certainly make other parts surrounding scheduling child care a lot more convenient. And 18 weeks is far far too early to worry about fetal positioning. This is just an excellent example of how my brain likes to not merely borrow trouble but take a mortgage out on it.
We have the big ultrasound next week, which will hopefully allay any concerns I have about growth. And maybe Aethelryth will be more generous than K and let us see its sex. It will be a lot easier to help prepare K if we can start talking specifically about her new brother or her new sister. And frankly, all we got out of being involuntarily surprised last time was a lot of green and yellow baby clothes. I'm not a big fan of surprises, so I'd just as soon get it out of the way next week.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Auld lang syne
Looking back, 2008 was a pretty decent year. Obama won the election, I found a part-time job that's adding decently to our bottom line and K is happy, healthy and thriving in preschool. And we managed to hit the one cycle in three when I actually ovulate and seem to have acquired the sort of pregnancy that sticks around.
If you look back at my journal for the past six months, you would probably mostly get the impression that I was tired a lot. That would be because I spent three months trying to work thirty hours a week while taking care of a young child without benefit of daycare, and then once we got her in preschool, I promptly became pregnant and got knocked flat by the first trimester. It's a case of appearances being deceiving - it may have looked in my writing like I was tired and unhappy, but it's more that my mental energy was being sucked in other directions. And as hard as the first trimester was, I happily (if not always stoically) endured it.
In 2009, I have three goals:
1. A healthy baby in June
2. Implement a housework schedule and do better with meal planning
3. Try a lot harder to improve our social life
Hopefully all three are reasonable and achievable. Here's hoping that 2009 brings much better fortunes for the world in general.
If you look back at my journal for the past six months, you would probably mostly get the impression that I was tired a lot. That would be because I spent three months trying to work thirty hours a week while taking care of a young child without benefit of daycare, and then once we got her in preschool, I promptly became pregnant and got knocked flat by the first trimester. It's a case of appearances being deceiving - it may have looked in my writing like I was tired and unhappy, but it's more that my mental energy was being sucked in other directions. And as hard as the first trimester was, I happily (if not always stoically) endured it.
In 2009, I have three goals:
1. A healthy baby in June
2. Implement a housework schedule and do better with meal planning
3. Try a lot harder to improve our social life
Hopefully all three are reasonable and achievable. Here's hoping that 2009 brings much better fortunes for the world in general.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Followups
K woke up with a fever Sunday, but ate reasonably well with nothing coming back up. After a two hour nap, she woke up at a normal temperature and spent the rest of the day fairly cheerfully, so I don't think the bug even lasted 24 hours. She was more than well enough to send to daycare Monday, thank goodness.
As for me, I'm left wondering if there's a specific deity in charge of applying the smackdown to people with the hubris to state publicly that their morning sickness is easing up and spending an entire day thinking, "You know, I don't feel too bad." Because I'd love to know specifically who I can thank for the coughing fit Sunday night that made me lose my entire dinner.
We had the nuchal translucency scan* on Tuesday, and everything went very well. It seems like Aethelryth is taking after its big sister when it comes to cooperating with ultrasounds - its head was jammed into the side of my uterus, making it very hard to see the edges clearly so we could get measurements. The doctor tried jiggling my belly several times to encourage Aethelryth to move a bit, but it just sat there calmly, practicing its bicycle kicks and waving its hands. We did get the measurements we needed and everything looked fine, but I'm not sure how well this bodes for finding the sex at the next ultrasound at 19 weeks. K, after all, was so far head down in my pelvis at twenty weeks that we had to go back the next week to get a proper look at her brain (this of course being the child who later turned transverse and spent 10 weeks jamming her head in my solar plexus). The first week, she was too wiggly to see the pertinent bits and the next, she had both feet, her elbow and the umbilical cord all in the way. Clearly I don't produce children who are cooperative with ultrasounds.
In any case, it was lovely to see Aethelryth again and see how it had more than doubled size in three weeks, growing from a little gummy bear to something remarkably baby shaped with a recognizable profile and limbs waving about as it practiced its calisthenics.
We are leaving Saturday to spend most of a week in Michigan with my mother for an early Christmas. I think I'm a little bit in denial about this, given how often I forget that it's THIS weekend we're leaving. I keep thinking it would nice to finally decorate the house for Christmas, then I remember that this will merely be an invitation for the cats to dismantle them and lose half of our meager Christmas decoration collection under the furniture. It's bad enough that they were stealing wise men out of the cloth nativity my mother gave K last year. I don't want to find a spit and cat-hair covered baby Jesus behind the entertainment center next July.
*Between 11 and 13 weeks, a number of genetic disorders and neural tube defects will cause a swelling at the back of the neck, so the combination of an ultrasound with blood tests at that stage provides a non-invasive way to see if there are any problems that might warrant further testing. As a point of irritation: it's explained as a test for Down Syndrome, because that's one of the most common genetic defects that allows a number of babies to survive, so it's what most people have heard of. But it tests for a great deal more than that, and I rarely see that brought up when people discuss the ethics of the test.
As for me, I'm left wondering if there's a specific deity in charge of applying the smackdown to people with the hubris to state publicly that their morning sickness is easing up and spending an entire day thinking, "You know, I don't feel too bad." Because I'd love to know specifically who I can thank for the coughing fit Sunday night that made me lose my entire dinner.
We had the nuchal translucency scan* on Tuesday, and everything went very well. It seems like Aethelryth is taking after its big sister when it comes to cooperating with ultrasounds - its head was jammed into the side of my uterus, making it very hard to see the edges clearly so we could get measurements. The doctor tried jiggling my belly several times to encourage Aethelryth to move a bit, but it just sat there calmly, practicing its bicycle kicks and waving its hands. We did get the measurements we needed and everything looked fine, but I'm not sure how well this bodes for finding the sex at the next ultrasound at 19 weeks. K, after all, was so far head down in my pelvis at twenty weeks that we had to go back the next week to get a proper look at her brain (this of course being the child who later turned transverse and spent 10 weeks jamming her head in my solar plexus). The first week, she was too wiggly to see the pertinent bits and the next, she had both feet, her elbow and the umbilical cord all in the way. Clearly I don't produce children who are cooperative with ultrasounds.
In any case, it was lovely to see Aethelryth again and see how it had more than doubled size in three weeks, growing from a little gummy bear to something remarkably baby shaped with a recognizable profile and limbs waving about as it practiced its calisthenics.
We are leaving Saturday to spend most of a week in Michigan with my mother for an early Christmas. I think I'm a little bit in denial about this, given how often I forget that it's THIS weekend we're leaving. I keep thinking it would nice to finally decorate the house for Christmas, then I remember that this will merely be an invitation for the cats to dismantle them and lose half of our meager Christmas decoration collection under the furniture. It's bad enough that they were stealing wise men out of the cloth nativity my mother gave K last year. I don't want to find a spit and cat-hair covered baby Jesus behind the entertainment center next July.
*Between 11 and 13 weeks, a number of genetic disorders and neural tube defects will cause a swelling at the back of the neck, so the combination of an ultrasound with blood tests at that stage provides a non-invasive way to see if there are any problems that might warrant further testing. As a point of irritation: it's explained as a test for Down Syndrome, because that's one of the most common genetic defects that allows a number of babies to survive, so it's what most people have heard of. But it tests for a great deal more than that, and I rarely see that brought up when people discuss the ethics of the test.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Exhaling
So I did something else on my birthday a month ago that I haven't been talking about. I took a pregnancy test. And it was positive.
I've been keeping quiet any place public because of the general anxiety of early pregnancy - it was a shock to me that it happened at all without any more chemical help than metformin, and I had a hard time believing that there was anything there at all, let alone something that would last.
But I had an ultrasound this afternoon, which revealed:
One (1) gestational sac, containing one (1) blob-like embryo measuring approximately 9 weeks, with a teensy little blinking heartbeat at 167 bpm. All exactly as it should be.
I know far too many people who've had a good first ultrasound only to have it all go to hell later on in the pregnancy to feel truly secure. But I feel much more confident now that I know there's something in there doing what it should.
Confident enough to start talking about it publicly and introduce K to the idea that she will be getting a baby sibling for her birthday. She was intrigued at the thought of a baby coming to live with us and fascinated by the ultrasound pictures, until her dinner arrived and then the pepperoni on her pizza took precedence. Priorities, after all.
I would scan the pictures, but they're truly just little blobs, with only one where you can maybe distinguish some proto-limbs. I was a bit disappointed to have an abdominal instead of a transvaginal ultrasound this time - the far better picture quality from K's first ultrasound more than made up for the personal violation. But I'm going back in three weeks for the nuchal translucency screen, so I'll get much better pictures then.
How am I feeling these days? Really, really tired and very sick. I'm not actually throwing up a lot, but I spend a lot of time thinking about it. I'm really looking forward to the second trimester.
So now I let out a sigh of relief, and go back to languishing on the couch thinking very hard about not throwing up.
On a final note, I know several of the people reading this are still struggling with infertility and I'm sorrier than I can say that you haven't had as much luck as I have. I won't be hurt if you decide you can't keep reading.
I've been keeping quiet any place public because of the general anxiety of early pregnancy - it was a shock to me that it happened at all without any more chemical help than metformin, and I had a hard time believing that there was anything there at all, let alone something that would last.
But I had an ultrasound this afternoon, which revealed:
One (1) gestational sac, containing one (1) blob-like embryo measuring approximately 9 weeks, with a teensy little blinking heartbeat at 167 bpm. All exactly as it should be.
I know far too many people who've had a good first ultrasound only to have it all go to hell later on in the pregnancy to feel truly secure. But I feel much more confident now that I know there's something in there doing what it should.
Confident enough to start talking about it publicly and introduce K to the idea that she will be getting a baby sibling for her birthday. She was intrigued at the thought of a baby coming to live with us and fascinated by the ultrasound pictures, until her dinner arrived and then the pepperoni on her pizza took precedence. Priorities, after all.
I would scan the pictures, but they're truly just little blobs, with only one where you can maybe distinguish some proto-limbs. I was a bit disappointed to have an abdominal instead of a transvaginal ultrasound this time - the far better picture quality from K's first ultrasound more than made up for the personal violation. But I'm going back in three weeks for the nuchal translucency screen, so I'll get much better pictures then.
How am I feeling these days? Really, really tired and very sick. I'm not actually throwing up a lot, but I spend a lot of time thinking about it. I'm really looking forward to the second trimester.
So now I let out a sigh of relief, and go back to languishing on the couch thinking very hard about not throwing up.
On a final note, I know several of the people reading this are still struggling with infertility and I'm sorrier than I can say that you haven't had as much luck as I have. I won't be hurt if you decide you can't keep reading.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Phantom
I spent about six hours on Monday with a phantom pregnancy. I wasn't merely tired but sleepy (tired is common for me but sleepy isn't), my chest hurt, I was queasy and of the two dates I might have ovulated last month, I was a day late getting my period by the earlier date. The last time I felt like that was three years ago, when I was busy wondering if I had gotten mono again when I finally realized: "Hey genius, maybe since you've been taking fertility drugs you might be pregnant." And I was. This time, I very firmly told myself that it's not surprising for me to be sleepy given how little sleep I've been getting lately, my chest usually hurts when my period is due, really extreme sleep deprivation can make me feel queasy, and Kreskin couldn't figure out what the heck was going on with my cycle last month. Still, I found myself trying to decide how long I would wait to test and surreptitiously poking my boobs to see how sore they were. I spent quite a bit of the day carrying the secret possibility around. And then I went to the bathroom and- Oh. Definitely not pregnant then. I had been ambivalent about even trying this month since the timing was bad - we wouldn't be able to go to Acen next year and my due date would have intersected badly with the end of the fiscal year. But it's funny how much I didn't care about any of that when I thought it might have happened. Ah well. On to next month.
Monday, April 7, 2008
State of the uterus, cycle 2
It's time for another "Good News, Bad News:" *
Good news : I'm pretty sure I ovulated this month (although I didn't last month).
Bad news : it happened on day 24, which is way late. Normal would be more like day 14-16
Good news : My cycle this month was 31 days, which is well-nigh normal (down from 35 days last month).
Bad news : That means there were only 7 days between ovulation and my period starting, which, well, ack. Even if I had gotten pregnant, it almost certainly wouldn't have stuck. **
So. Where I seem to stand at the moment is that things are improving, but things are clearly still awry with ye olde hormones. After much wrangling, I got my doctor to increase my metformin dose,*** so hopefully that has helped with the normalization and as I spend more time on it, will help things improve further.
An supplementary theory is that this is my hormones normalizing after the iud removal and it's just taking a few cycles to crank up to normal. The problem with that is that my previous experience with hormonal birth control is that going off of it has a carryover effect for several months where my cycles are more normal, then start to get weird as my naturally screwed up hormonal state asserts itself. So coming off of it so badly this time isn't reassuring.
More wait and see, I suppose. Hopefully cycle 3 will show more improvement. And I'm starting to think about how soon I should to call the ob/gyn and ask for a referral to someone who specializes in infertility. She had said six months, which would technically be May. I think I may wait for June or July, since that would be six full cycles, not just six months since the iud was removed.
*With apologies to Animaniacs
**Quick primer for those unacquainted with ins and outs of the female cycle: it takes several days for the egg to meander its way down to the uterus through the fallopian tubes. Fertilization actually happens in the fallopian tubes, and the fertilized egg then hopefully enters the uterus and implants in the lining of the uterus, which is when pregnancy happens. But if there's not enough time between ovulation and period, the fertilized egg enters the uterus and surprise! Either doesn't have a lining to implant in or doesn't have time to implant properly before getting swept out to sea, so to speak. This is called a short luteal phase.
*** And this is the last time I go to my gp for anything for PCOS - I'll either call my ob/gyn or ask for a referral to an endocrinologist. First, she insisted on blood tests, but tested only one hormone which is typically found at normal levels in women with PCOS. But as it turned out, there wasn't much point to that, because when I pointed this out and told her the tests she should have done, she said that even if we did them, she didn't want to increase my metformin because she was afraid it would lower my (currently normal) blood sugar. And then she said that PCOS doesn't cause weight gain.
That sound you hear would be my jaw hitting the floor. Weight gain is one of the biggest features of PCOS, to the point that thin women with PCOS have trouble getting diagnosed. It's number three on the symptom list, behind not ovulating and polycystic ovaries. And the worry about lowering my blood sugar is just moronic because metformin doesn't cause low blood sugar unless you're diabetic, which I'm definitely not.
I finally pointed out that I've been on a higher dose before and didn't have a problem and she suggested we try it for six months. But yeesh. Not going back to her for anything more complicated than hay fever or an ingrown toenail.
Monday, February 4, 2008
Well finally
Cycle day 2.
For the first time in two years and three and a half since I had a regular period. You know, I haven't missed this one tiny bit. But it's a necessary evil, and hopefully a sign my body is working as needed.
Now the charting starts. I hadn't planned on signing up with the ubiquitous Fertility Friend, but the printable chart I found online doesn't have temperatures going below 97.5, and my temperature yesterday morning was 96.8. Once again the limitations of paper-based technology reveals itself.
For the first time in two years and three and a half since I had a regular period. You know, I haven't missed this one tiny bit. But it's a necessary evil, and hopefully a sign my body is working as needed.
Now the charting starts. I hadn't planned on signing up with the ubiquitous Fertility Friend, but the printable chart I found online doesn't have temperatures going below 97.5, and my temperature yesterday morning was 96.8. Once again the limitations of paper-based technology reveals itself.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Red tide (not) rising
I had a fairly angsty infertility post that I wrote Saturday night and decided that it was too whiny to actually post. It comes down to two points:
1. It's been 7 weeks since my iud was removed, my cycle hasn't started up yet and I'm starting to get discouraged. Secretly, I had thought that after successfully getting through pregnancy once and three years without any real PCOS symptoms, I wouldn't have as hard a time of it this time. Instead, I'm actually worse off than the first time I tried to conceive, when I was having regular cycles even if I wasn't always ovulating. This perturbs me. I don't necessarily want to be pregnant right this minute, since the timing would be better if it happened this summer. What I want is to know I can get pregnant, and that certainly can't happen without my cycle starting. However, my chest has been getting progressivly more sore over the past week, so I'm hoping my cycle might meander around these parts one of these days. Maybe.
2. I've read from people who've experienced both that secondary infertility can be harder than the first time because a, after having one child, you know much more acutely what you're missing and b, since you have a child, you can't avoid children and babies. It's that second one that's getting to me a bit. I think about 90 percent of the people I know who had babies the same year I did are either pregnant or have already had a second baby. I feel nothing but the most sincere happiness for them and don't begrudge them their fertility for a moment. I just want it for myself too.
1. It's been 7 weeks since my iud was removed, my cycle hasn't started up yet and I'm starting to get discouraged. Secretly, I had thought that after successfully getting through pregnancy once and three years without any real PCOS symptoms, I wouldn't have as hard a time of it this time. Instead, I'm actually worse off than the first time I tried to conceive, when I was having regular cycles even if I wasn't always ovulating. This perturbs me. I don't necessarily want to be pregnant right this minute, since the timing would be better if it happened this summer. What I want is to know I can get pregnant, and that certainly can't happen without my cycle starting. However, my chest has been getting progressivly more sore over the past week, so I'm hoping my cycle might meander around these parts one of these days. Maybe.
2. I've read from people who've experienced both that secondary infertility can be harder than the first time because a, after having one child, you know much more acutely what you're missing and b, since you have a child, you can't avoid children and babies. It's that second one that's getting to me a bit. I think about 90 percent of the people I know who had babies the same year I did are either pregnant or have already had a second baby. I feel nothing but the most sincere happiness for them and don't begrudge them their fertility for a moment. I just want it for myself too.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
The inexorable passage of time
Periodwatch 2008: no signs yet, four weeks past iud-removal. I thought I had some hopeful symptoms this weekend, but they turned out to be from *ahem* adjacent areas. I had been hoping that my body would interpret the iud being removed as the beginning of a cycle, but apparently it's taking its time working the extra hormones out.
It feels a bit counterintuitive after years of infertility to actually want my period, but nothing is going to happen until my cycle comes back, hopefully before I turn 80.
***
It's occurred to me that if we want to send K to preschool next fall, we need to start thinking about it now. Eep. I'm not ready to think about sending my two-year-old to school, but given how much she loves daycare*, I think she's more than ready. Philadelphia has a free preschool available through the public schools, and while I've heard bad things about the public schools, the preschool has gotten some good reviews. Since I'm not worried about how well they prepare K for college, I think it's worth checking out (and it's hard to argue with free). My main concern is that it might be too academic - preschool should be about socialization and working on developmental skills, not getting a head start on reading. Their website is remarkably unspecific regarding curriculum, so I will have to make sure to ask for more materials on it when we call for information.
Or I could stick my fingers in my ears and refuse to think about my baby getting old enough to go to school. That could work too.
This boring post brought to you by my sieve-like memory that promptly expels every single fascinating topic I think of during the day the moment my fingers touch the keyboard.
*She does a little dance when I tell her it's a daycare day and cheerfully closes the door behind me when I leave. I don't want her to be horribly upset when I leave, but does she have to be so happy about it?
It feels a bit counterintuitive after years of infertility to actually want my period, but nothing is going to happen until my cycle comes back, hopefully before I turn 80.
***
It's occurred to me that if we want to send K to preschool next fall, we need to start thinking about it now. Eep. I'm not ready to think about sending my two-year-old to school, but given how much she loves daycare*, I think she's more than ready. Philadelphia has a free preschool available through the public schools, and while I've heard bad things about the public schools, the preschool has gotten some good reviews. Since I'm not worried about how well they prepare K for college, I think it's worth checking out (and it's hard to argue with free). My main concern is that it might be too academic - preschool should be about socialization and working on developmental skills, not getting a head start on reading. Their website is remarkably unspecific regarding curriculum, so I will have to make sure to ask for more materials on it when we call for information.
Or I could stick my fingers in my ears and refuse to think about my baby getting old enough to go to school. That could work too.
This boring post brought to you by my sieve-like memory that promptly expels every single fascinating topic I think of during the day the moment my fingers touch the keyboard.
*She does a little dance when I tell her it's a daycare day and cheerfully closes the door behind me when I leave. I don't want her to be horribly upset when I leave, but does she have to be so happy about it?
Friday, January 4, 2008
Resolved
When I look back at the resolutions I made last year, I get a bit depressed. So this year I'm going to make it more basic and vague: I'll make a sincere effort to get myself in better shape for getting pregnant. It seems very likely this will involve going low-carb for a while, but I'm still getting my ducks in a row on that front. I don't want to go through a radical diet change without having a complete plan for what to eat and then have it all on hand. Our exercise bike is set up in a convenient place again, so I'm climbing back on it, and I've been keeping track of my food on Sparkpeople, which usually helps me keep within reasonable limits. That's about as far as I'm willing to commit.
I finally managed to get my iud out right before Christmas. As it turns out, it needed to be pre-approved by the insurance company, so that explains part of the delay (although pre-approval for a two-minute appointment? Really? That seems to be over the edge of absurd even by health insurance company standards).* So I'm waiting for my period to come back and we shall see. I had a couple signs of ovulation right at Christmas, so I'm hoping that will be confirmed next week with the return of my cycle. It's all wait and see at this point.
*As a data point for anyone curious about the iud experience, removal was not completely painless as advertised, but that was because 1) the speculum was a bit wider than was really comfortable and 2) my cervix gave a bit of a spasm in response to having something pulled through it. However, it was brief and certainly nothing compared to having it put in.
I finally managed to get my iud out right before Christmas. As it turns out, it needed to be pre-approved by the insurance company, so that explains part of the delay (although pre-approval for a two-minute appointment? Really? That seems to be over the edge of absurd even by health insurance company standards).* So I'm waiting for my period to come back and we shall see. I had a couple signs of ovulation right at Christmas, so I'm hoping that will be confirmed next week with the return of my cycle. It's all wait and see at this point.
*As a data point for anyone curious about the iud experience, removal was not completely painless as advertised, but that was because 1) the speculum was a bit wider than was really comfortable and 2) my cervix gave a bit of a spasm in response to having something pulled through it. However, it was brief and certainly nothing compared to having it put in.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
Fertility delayed
I went to the ob/gyn today for my annual checkup. Everything seems healthy and in place, and she seemed pretty nice. Her advice on how to proceed with trying to conceive was exactly what I had been planning on doing - try on my own for six months with charting and ovulation predictor kits, and then go in for help if it's not working.
I found out that I would be sent straight to a reproductive endocrinologist (RE), which I would prefer since even if we just use Clomid, I'd like to be monitored better this time. I didn't realize at the time last time that I really shouldn't have simply been given a prescription for fertility drugs and sent on my merry way, but in fact should have been monitored to make sure I was 1) ovulating, and 2) not overovulating and in danger of conceiving sextuplets. If nothing else, I'd like to spare myself the uncertainty of last time of not being sure if/when I was going to ovulate. Obviously I got it right, but it would be nicer to have an ultrasound tell me next time.
There's just one hitch: I asked to have my iud taken out and she said we needed to check and make sure my insurance will cover it. I'm a little confused - I want the iud out either way, so what exactly will happen differently if my insurance doesn't cover it, besides my having to pay for it? My inner Pollyanna hopes there's some sort of insurance billing voodoo they can perform to get it covered. My inner cynic thinks this is a great way to get a second office visit fee. Either way, I wasn't expecting to have to wait another two weeks and I'm feeling a little impatient. I don't really want to get pregnant this month since it's going to be insane enough with Christmas and moving, but there are other ways to ensure that doesn't happen.
I found out that I would be sent straight to a reproductive endocrinologist (RE), which I would prefer since even if we just use Clomid, I'd like to be monitored better this time. I didn't realize at the time last time that I really shouldn't have simply been given a prescription for fertility drugs and sent on my merry way, but in fact should have been monitored to make sure I was 1) ovulating, and 2) not overovulating and in danger of conceiving sextuplets. If nothing else, I'd like to spare myself the uncertainty of last time of not being sure if/when I was going to ovulate. Obviously I got it right, but it would be nicer to have an ultrasound tell me next time.
There's just one hitch: I asked to have my iud taken out and she said we needed to check and make sure my insurance will cover it. I'm a little confused - I want the iud out either way, so what exactly will happen differently if my insurance doesn't cover it, besides my having to pay for it? My inner Pollyanna hopes there's some sort of insurance billing voodoo they can perform to get it covered. My inner cynic thinks this is a great way to get a second office visit fee. Either way, I wasn't expecting to have to wait another two weeks and I'm feeling a little impatient. I don't really want to get pregnant this month since it's going to be insane enough with Christmas and moving, but there are other ways to ensure that doesn't happen.
Saturday, November 3, 2007
Regular-size me
I'm feeling a conflict of diet theories these days.
A lot of what I've been thinking about diet lately was crystallized by a blog post I read recently, which talks about the moral value society attaches to foods and how this screws us up:
I highly recommend the rest of the post. Reading it made a frightening amount of sense to me, especially after I thought about it for a while. It's the way K eats, after all. I control her menu, of course, but within the foods I offer her, she chooses what she wants and how much she eats. And as far as I can tell, she only eats when she's hungry and stops when she's full. Even if it's treat like cake - I've seen her leave half a piece on the plate because she's not hungry any more. And her body seems to tell her what she needs to eat. I don't really worry about her getting enough nutrients any more because I've noticed that over the course of the day she eats a pretty balanced diet. She may eat a lunch of only turkey and cheese, but she ate mostly cheerios for breakfast and grapes at both meals, so it balances out. *
Demand feeding also jibes well with research that shows that deprivation leads to gorging - in a study where children were offered sweets, children who were on very restrictive diets gorged themselves on the sweets, whereas the children who were allowed to eat sweets ate moderate amounts and then stopped.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this is pretty much how I've been eating for the past couple years as well. I've made stabs at following diets and "eating better," but mostly I've just eaten what I felt like and stopped when I was full. And you know what? My weight is stable and while it might be a little higher than I would like, it's healthy. My cholesterol and blood pressure are fine. So it seems like the only thing I need to change is give up the guilt, the persistent voice in the back of my head that I should be consuming nothing but spinach salad and sparkling water.
But then there's the other side of the coin, the gigantic But.
I think demand feeding is a great idea. For people with normal metabolism who don't have health conditions that are affected by what they eat. Because the simple fact is that some people absolutely cannot eat whatever they want. People with high blood pressure can't have salt, people with food allergies can't eat the things they're allergic to and diabetics really shouldn't eat foods that cause their blood sugar to swing wildly.
And people with PCOS have a condition that is caused by insulin resistance, and therefore do much better on a diet low in carbs.
So you see the dilemma? I'm all hep to the idea of the Bobby McFerrin-zen approach to eating where restriction is the worst thing you can do to yourself. And I'm seriously considering going on a low carb diet.
The problem is that PCOS is directly affected by how much I weigh and what I eat. It started to get worse after college, when I started eating a mostly vegetarian diet and therefore eating a lot less protein. I started gaining weight, which made PCOS worse. And then I got mono, which stuck around for over a year, and all of that lying around on the couch made me gain more weight and get worse. At that point, the PCOS was making me feel so awful that I couldn't exercise or be active, so it continued on a spiral that just kept feeding itself until I managed to artificially convince my body it had a normal metabolism with metformin. I got back down to a healthy weight and things seemed fine.
But it clearly wasn't enough because I wasn't ovulating. Thus my dilemma: I weigh about what I did before I got pregnant. Low-carb diets are a proven way for women with PCOS to lose weight and improve their fertility. So if I'm serious about trying to conceive, should I go low-carb?
Before anyone starts yelling about how unhealthy low-carb diets are, I will say that any low-carb diet I follow won't be rib-eye steaks with a pork-rind chaser. It will be lean meats and lots of vegetables. Basically, I would replace the starches in my diet with vegetables that have less effect on the blood sugar and give up sugar entirely to start. Then I would get to slowly add carbohydrates back in until I'm on a diet of lean proteins, vegetables, fruits and complex carbohydrates. The way my diet would like in the end is meals that look more or less normal, but with smaller portions of carbohydrates, with Barilla high protein pasta or shirataki noodles instead of regular pasta, beans or pearled barley instead of rice, and no potatoes. Or sugar. Or white bread. And that's where the thought of this makes me groan, because I _like_ potatoes and sugar and white bread (not necessarily together). And the path I would have to take to get to that point would be long and hellish.
One wrinkle is that I've tried low-carb in the past and I think the longest I've made it is two weeks. I have reflux and my stomach doesn't like it when I remove those nice spongy carbohydrates that soak up stomach acid. But I've done a lot more research into alternative foods and recipes, so I think I may be able to deal with that better this time.
So I suppose the essential question is that if the potential improvement for my fertility is worth the deprivation, given that deprivation isn't a very good thing. I guess the thing to do is see what happens when/if my cycle comes back. I don't think it's a good idea to try and give up carbs right before the Thanksgiving-Christmassugar-fest eating season, so I wouldn't try to start until January. At that point, I may have more of a clue if it wll be necessary.
*Note: I can be zen about how K eats because she eats a decent amount of food and will eat a wide variety, including vegetables. She's also a healthy weight. I understand completely how parents of very picky eaters and children who are very low in the percentile charts get neurotic about their childrens' diets - I was there myself for K's first 18 months.
A lot of what I've been thinking about diet lately was crystallized by a blog post I read recently, which talks about the moral value society attaches to foods and how this screws us up:
Teppy wrote a great post yesterday about “demand feeding,” which is a really terrible name for “eating what you want when you’re hungry and stopping when you’re full.”
That’s something I recommend frequently, as it’s a key component of the Health at Every Size strategy. The problem with it, as Teppy points out, is a whole lot of people don’t know when they’re hungry, what they feel like eating, or when they’re full. Ex-dieters, especially, are so used to categorizing foods as “good” and “bad,” and having specific foods and portions dictated to us, the thought of really eating whatever we want — as opposed to the diet version of “eating whatever you want,” which means allowing yourself one bite of ice cream SO YOU DON’T FEEL DEPRIVED (oy) — can be overwhelming and frankly frightening.
[...]But regardless, “We will give you permission — in some limited way — to eat ‘bad’ foods!” is a tremendously effective marketing strategy.
And that’s because so many of us really believe somebody needs to give us permission; simply choosing to eat fatty, sugary food because you feel like it is absolutely not an option. And then somebody also needs to put a limit on that permission, so we won’t go and devour the world. In this culture, most of us never learn to trust our bodies when it comes to eating, and we certainly never learn to trust our desires. Choosing what to eat is a daily battle between good and evil.
I mean, think about it for two seconds. People are selling plans that allow you to “eat what you want,” to the tune of billions. That’s lunacy. Because I love you, I shall offer you the Kate Harding Lifetime Diet Plan — which permits you to eat whatever you want — absolutely free! It goes like this:
DAY 1:
Eat whatever you want. It’s your body. You’re allowed.
DAY 2 THROUGH DEATH:
Repeat Day 1.
The problem with the Kate Harding Lifetime Diet Plan is exactly what Teppy talks about — figuring out what you’re hungry for and how hungry you are after a lifetime of being told you are always too hungry for the wrong foods. I still struggle with staying on my own plan, for exactly the reasons Teppy and her commenters describe. I have a major fear of deprivation when it comes to food, plus a whole lot of baggage about “good” and “bad” foods, so trying to listen to my body instead of the voices in my head involves a lot of conscious effort — which is exactly what you’re trying to drop by, you know, listening to your body.
I highly recommend the rest of the post. Reading it made a frightening amount of sense to me, especially after I thought about it for a while. It's the way K eats, after all. I control her menu, of course, but within the foods I offer her, she chooses what she wants and how much she eats. And as far as I can tell, she only eats when she's hungry and stops when she's full. Even if it's treat like cake - I've seen her leave half a piece on the plate because she's not hungry any more. And her body seems to tell her what she needs to eat. I don't really worry about her getting enough nutrients any more because I've noticed that over the course of the day she eats a pretty balanced diet. She may eat a lunch of only turkey and cheese, but she ate mostly cheerios for breakfast and grapes at both meals, so it balances out. *
Demand feeding also jibes well with research that shows that deprivation leads to gorging - in a study where children were offered sweets, children who were on very restrictive diets gorged themselves on the sweets, whereas the children who were allowed to eat sweets ate moderate amounts and then stopped.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this is pretty much how I've been eating for the past couple years as well. I've made stabs at following diets and "eating better," but mostly I've just eaten what I felt like and stopped when I was full. And you know what? My weight is stable and while it might be a little higher than I would like, it's healthy. My cholesterol and blood pressure are fine. So it seems like the only thing I need to change is give up the guilt, the persistent voice in the back of my head that I should be consuming nothing but spinach salad and sparkling water.
But then there's the other side of the coin, the gigantic But.
I think demand feeding is a great idea. For people with normal metabolism who don't have health conditions that are affected by what they eat. Because the simple fact is that some people absolutely cannot eat whatever they want. People with high blood pressure can't have salt, people with food allergies can't eat the things they're allergic to and diabetics really shouldn't eat foods that cause their blood sugar to swing wildly.
And people with PCOS have a condition that is caused by insulin resistance, and therefore do much better on a diet low in carbs.
So you see the dilemma? I'm all hep to the idea of the Bobby McFerrin-zen approach to eating where restriction is the worst thing you can do to yourself. And I'm seriously considering going on a low carb diet.
The problem is that PCOS is directly affected by how much I weigh and what I eat. It started to get worse after college, when I started eating a mostly vegetarian diet and therefore eating a lot less protein. I started gaining weight, which made PCOS worse. And then I got mono, which stuck around for over a year, and all of that lying around on the couch made me gain more weight and get worse. At that point, the PCOS was making me feel so awful that I couldn't exercise or be active, so it continued on a spiral that just kept feeding itself until I managed to artificially convince my body it had a normal metabolism with metformin. I got back down to a healthy weight and things seemed fine.
But it clearly wasn't enough because I wasn't ovulating. Thus my dilemma: I weigh about what I did before I got pregnant. Low-carb diets are a proven way for women with PCOS to lose weight and improve their fertility. So if I'm serious about trying to conceive, should I go low-carb?
Before anyone starts yelling about how unhealthy low-carb diets are, I will say that any low-carb diet I follow won't be rib-eye steaks with a pork-rind chaser. It will be lean meats and lots of vegetables. Basically, I would replace the starches in my diet with vegetables that have less effect on the blood sugar and give up sugar entirely to start. Then I would get to slowly add carbohydrates back in until I'm on a diet of lean proteins, vegetables, fruits and complex carbohydrates. The way my diet would like in the end is meals that look more or less normal, but with smaller portions of carbohydrates, with Barilla high protein pasta or shirataki noodles instead of regular pasta, beans or pearled barley instead of rice, and no potatoes. Or sugar. Or white bread. And that's where the thought of this makes me groan, because I _like_ potatoes and sugar and white bread (not necessarily together). And the path I would have to take to get to that point would be long and hellish.
One wrinkle is that I've tried low-carb in the past and I think the longest I've made it is two weeks. I have reflux and my stomach doesn't like it when I remove those nice spongy carbohydrates that soak up stomach acid. But I've done a lot more research into alternative foods and recipes, so I think I may be able to deal with that better this time.
So I suppose the essential question is that if the potential improvement for my fertility is worth the deprivation, given that deprivation isn't a very good thing. I guess the thing to do is see what happens when/if my cycle comes back. I don't think it's a good idea to try and give up carbs right before the Thanksgiving-Christmas
*Note: I can be zen about how K eats because she eats a decent amount of food and will eat a wide variety, including vegetables. She's also a healthy weight. I understand completely how parents of very picky eaters and children who are very low in the percentile charts get neurotic about their childrens' diets - I was there myself for K's first 18 months.
Thursday, November 1, 2007
Fertility and the future
Two weeks ago, I turned 33. It didn't get a lot of fanfare; I was insanely busy with work and none of the friends we've celebrated with in the past were remotely close enough to come for a party. So I had a quiet day with K and B, got a few books and some nice cards. Nothing exceptional. Except that for the first time, I've started to hear the ticking of the biological clock.
I hadn't worried about it the first time. I was 28 when we started trying and had more than enough to worry about with PCOS. The thing about being infertile is that you're much more concerned about dealing with the reasons for that than worrying about age-related fertility issues, particularly if you're on the near side of 30. But now it's occurred to me that I'm only two years away from the point when they start recommending the thorough prenatal screenings and considering me elderly. And that chances are that as time goes by, I'm unlikely to get _more_ fertile, so if trying for another baby is going to take as much time and assistance as last time, I should get cracking.
Fortunately, I'm finally feeling like I'm ready to consider trying. I hadn't planned on thinking about it until this summer anyway because I would like at least three years between children. And after unemployment, a major move, adjusting to a higher cost of living and dealing with the death of a parent, it just wasn't practical to start trying until now.
However, I'm painfully aware that being mentally ready for another baby doesn't remotely equal actually getting one any time soon.
For those who weren't reading last time around, my reproductive history in brief: I have Polycystic Ovary Syndrome. The brief version of this is that due to a missing enzyme, I don't respond to insulin as well as I should. This results in my pancreas pumping out higher levels of insulin to compensate, which in turn results in weight gain, blood sugar issues and massive hormone problems (and in my case, debilitating fatigue, to the point that I was disabled). The hormone problems are what causes the infertility, but the best way to address this is to get to the root of the problem, the insulin resistance. So I've been on a diabetes medication for the past five years which increases my insulin sensitivity and it works pretty well - I'm able to maintain a stable healthy weight, my symptoms are pretty much in check and when I went off the pill, I had regular periods. But it wasn't quite enough, because I apparently wasn't ovulating very often. So after over a year of trying, I took clomid and got lucky the first time out.
So you can see how contemplating a second baby isn't as easy as just going off birth control for me. It doesn't help that I have absolutely no idea what my current fertility status is. My current birth control is a Mirena iud, which has the salubrious effect of eliminating periods, so I havne't had a period since January of 2006. In the past, I've said I prefer birth control methods where I still get my period because it's a useful indicator of how I'm doing health-wise, but honestly, I've been enjoying the honeymoon from the monthly bloodletting. I haven't been having any other PCOS symptoms to speak of, so I decided to have a nice vacation in the land of Not Worrying. But now I have to start worrying and while I didn't miss my period, I kind of wish I had some way of knowing what my hormones are going to do.
The current plan is that I have a doctor's appointment in two weeks for my annual lady parts inspection and I'll ask the doctor to take my iud out and wait for my period to come back. If it doesn't come back or six months goes by without anything happening, I'll get more proactive and go back to the doctor. I may throw in asking the doctor if we can start testing to see if I'm ovulating as soon as my period comes back. But I'm not waiting a year again since I don't have as much time to wait.
It's hard to know how to feel about being infertile sometimes. I didn't have nearly as hard a time getting pregnant as many do; once we sought treatment, it only took one dose of Clomid. Comparing that to stories of ivf and miscarriages, we got off pretty easily. But that doesn't mean it was easy, or that it won't be harder next time. I also get to worry about the fact that PCOS raises your miscarriage risk by quite a lot. One weird thing is that many women don't find out they have PCOS until they try to get pregnant and can't. It's only then that they go on metformin, and since it doesn't usually work immediately, they still need a lot more intervention. But I was diagnosed with PCOS because it was making me so very ill that I couldn't possibly ignore the symptoms. And if I had been trying to get pregnant then, I would have had an absolutely miserable time of it. But instead, I was on metformin for three years, got back down to a healthy weight and mostly straightened my hormones out before trying. It's a weird position to be in: infertility made me absolutely horrendously miserable for several years. I just wasn't trying to conceive during most of them.
In any case, there's no point in obsessing about any of this until I get my iud removed. Not that I'll let that stop me from running a constant low-grade worry.
I hadn't worried about it the first time. I was 28 when we started trying and had more than enough to worry about with PCOS. The thing about being infertile is that you're much more concerned about dealing with the reasons for that than worrying about age-related fertility issues, particularly if you're on the near side of 30. But now it's occurred to me that I'm only two years away from the point when they start recommending the thorough prenatal screenings and considering me elderly. And that chances are that as time goes by, I'm unlikely to get _more_ fertile, so if trying for another baby is going to take as much time and assistance as last time, I should get cracking.
Fortunately, I'm finally feeling like I'm ready to consider trying. I hadn't planned on thinking about it until this summer anyway because I would like at least three years between children. And after unemployment, a major move, adjusting to a higher cost of living and dealing with the death of a parent, it just wasn't practical to start trying until now.
However, I'm painfully aware that being mentally ready for another baby doesn't remotely equal actually getting one any time soon.
For those who weren't reading last time around, my reproductive history in brief: I have Polycystic Ovary Syndrome. The brief version of this is that due to a missing enzyme, I don't respond to insulin as well as I should. This results in my pancreas pumping out higher levels of insulin to compensate, which in turn results in weight gain, blood sugar issues and massive hormone problems (and in my case, debilitating fatigue, to the point that I was disabled). The hormone problems are what causes the infertility, but the best way to address this is to get to the root of the problem, the insulin resistance. So I've been on a diabetes medication for the past five years which increases my insulin sensitivity and it works pretty well - I'm able to maintain a stable healthy weight, my symptoms are pretty much in check and when I went off the pill, I had regular periods. But it wasn't quite enough, because I apparently wasn't ovulating very often. So after over a year of trying, I took clomid and got lucky the first time out.
So you can see how contemplating a second baby isn't as easy as just going off birth control for me. It doesn't help that I have absolutely no idea what my current fertility status is. My current birth control is a Mirena iud, which has the salubrious effect of eliminating periods, so I havne't had a period since January of 2006. In the past, I've said I prefer birth control methods where I still get my period because it's a useful indicator of how I'm doing health-wise, but honestly, I've been enjoying the honeymoon from the monthly bloodletting. I haven't been having any other PCOS symptoms to speak of, so I decided to have a nice vacation in the land of Not Worrying. But now I have to start worrying and while I didn't miss my period, I kind of wish I had some way of knowing what my hormones are going to do.
The current plan is that I have a doctor's appointment in two weeks for my annual lady parts inspection and I'll ask the doctor to take my iud out and wait for my period to come back. If it doesn't come back or six months goes by without anything happening, I'll get more proactive and go back to the doctor. I may throw in asking the doctor if we can start testing to see if I'm ovulating as soon as my period comes back. But I'm not waiting a year again since I don't have as much time to wait.
It's hard to know how to feel about being infertile sometimes. I didn't have nearly as hard a time getting pregnant as many do; once we sought treatment, it only took one dose of Clomid. Comparing that to stories of ivf and miscarriages, we got off pretty easily. But that doesn't mean it was easy, or that it won't be harder next time. I also get to worry about the fact that PCOS raises your miscarriage risk by quite a lot. One weird thing is that many women don't find out they have PCOS until they try to get pregnant and can't. It's only then that they go on metformin, and since it doesn't usually work immediately, they still need a lot more intervention. But I was diagnosed with PCOS because it was making me so very ill that I couldn't possibly ignore the symptoms. And if I had been trying to get pregnant then, I would have had an absolutely miserable time of it. But instead, I was on metformin for three years, got back down to a healthy weight and mostly straightened my hormones out before trying. It's a weird position to be in: infertility made me absolutely horrendously miserable for several years. I just wasn't trying to conceive during most of them.
In any case, there's no point in obsessing about any of this until I get my iud removed. Not that I'll let that stop me from running a constant low-grade worry.
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