I'm off!

I realized that I haven't been posting and commenting very much recently. I've been totally crazy busy at work because, well, I'm taking the next 10 days OFF!

Yep -- I leave tomorrow for vacation!

We've had this planned for a while, but it just kind of crept up on me because I have been so dang busy.

But tomorrow we leave for Rome (5 days) and Paris (3 days). And I am super beyond excited and we have loads and loads of fun meals and activities planned. (Except I don't get to drink the wine or eat the soft cheese. But I'm not focusing on that.)

So I'll be gone for a bit but look forward to checking in upon my return. May this week be full of nothing but good news for everyone.

The woman who ate Manhattan

I am officially enormous.

That's the bad news. The good news is that at our 21 week appointment yesterday, all looks exactly as it should, the little one's heart was thumping away at 145 bpm, and it's all wiggly and has a somewhat simian appearance in profile. (Hence our new nickname "Monkey".)

And I am happy beyond happy about that good news. I go back in 3 weeks for a check and then in another 4 for my 28 week appointment where we test for fun stuff like gestational diabetes. And since I can now feel wiggling a fair amount, I have less fear that the Monkey has expired.

My current fear is about me and my pace of weight gain -- it's kind of stressing me out, and while I can rationalize it away in a variety of manners, it is stressful. Here's the story:
- I am nearly 5'9" and my desirable weight is <135. (I've been as low as 120, but not since I was 30.) I have a pretty small frame, and until I was older than 35 used to be able to eat whatever I wanted, but now there is real risk of porking out if I submit to my desires for dessert(s).
- IVF helped me pack on about 10 extra pounds, so my first weigh-in at the OB (8 weeks) had me at 145 (grrrrrr.)
- I just clocked in at...(wait for it)...165. I'm only 50% of the way to full term and already I have put on 20 lbs on top of the 10 I already had. And so I am kind of stressed out that I am going to be giganto-girl during and after this pregnancy.

I know that this is silly, and I can even come up with a good medical reason to have gained so much weight (more below) but I just feel icky about it. I love my round belly and am very happy that there is a healthy Monkey wiggling away, but I will admit to being pretty freaked out about my size, especially my increasingly enormous rear and the fact that I seem to just be spreading wide everywhere. I guess I just wasn't prepared for such tremendous body changes and I appear to be having a harder time adjusting to them.

And I'm worried, too. In Feb, my thyroid levels had gone kind of wonky and I got put onto synthroid to bring my TSH level down from 4, which we all thought was too high. And I've been having it monitored very regularly and it has been below 2 through this entire pregnancy, but last week my TSH was up to 2.5, so I have had to up my medication again. And now I'm worried about all of the issues that hypothyroidism can cause during pregnancy. I know that mine is anything but uncontrolled, and that lack of control is the cause of the problems, but I still worry a bit. And I wonder if whether the low thyroid function is what is causing the weight gain, or whether I am just meant to be round.

Either way, I'm trying to be ok with the weight gain but I'm just not. And I feel both stupid about even caring, and somewhat reasonable, both at the same time. I dunno -- I guess I didn't realize that being pregnant would be this emotionally complicated.

I've done it

I think that, now that I can feel the little one moving pretty regularly and have passed the anatomy scan, now I might actually believe that there will be a baby.

As part of my believing in the (oh please don't let me jinx this) potential baby, I posted a little ticker thingy on my blog. I figured there's got to be some time when I stop being so neurotic about this pregnancy and start settling in and enjoying it, and this seems as good a time as any.

So that's it: I'm pregnant, I feel pretty damned good (I seem to have learned to minimize the reflux), I'm rocking some comfy elastic waist pants, and I can feel the little one move as I type this. There's no drama and I love it.

Anatomy scan -- check!

We have a healthy 19 week old fetus bouncing around inside of me.

Today was our anatomy scan and everything is, despite my anxieties to the contrary, perfectly, absolutely normal.

I really really enjoyed watching the bebe for a full hour and getting to see all of the different pieces and parts. There are 4 chambers in the heart, which was pumping away at 145 bpm and looking good and healthy. There are 2 kidneys, a gall bladder, a stomach, a liver -- all of the insides are where they should be and appear to be functioning well (I loved the renal blood flow check -- that is just so neat). 10 fingers and 10 toes, 2 ears and 2 eyes, a properly formed brain -- everything was normal and we could SEE it.

A lot of time my inner luddite comes out and I protest hat modern technology has made life harder and more stressful, not easier, but this, this was cool and I'm super happy that the science exists for me to be able to see inside me and the little one to check it all out.

What did we not see? Boy or girl parts. We are still trying to keep this a "mystery baby" and so the tech was great about telling us when to turn our head away and didn't use any gender related pronouns throughout (although, weirdly, I kept slipping into the "he" and "his").

However (and you knew that this could not be drama free), the Boy thinks that he saw the gender on the computer screen with all of the measurements. Up in the upper righthand corner was "Sex: F." And while F makes me very happy (as does M -- I'm just going for healthy), I have a very strong suspicion that the information across the top of the screen was not le bebe's, but actually mine, since also at the top of the screen was my name and SSN.

The OB's office called to confirm that they had received the results and that they were all normal, and I asked the nurse whether, on the screen with all of the data, that was my info or the mystery babe's. Turns out, per the OB who called me back, it was mine. But now the Boy doesn't really believe me and he kinda wants to know the gender. But I am holding firm and really would like the surprise.

We got loads of pictures which I have been trying not to ogle all day (I am supposed to be doing a rather odious spreadsheet task), but here are 2 of my favorites. They crack me up and make me weepy, all at the same time.