28 Weeks

Whew! It's been an exciting week to be a pregnant lady! First off, I'm now 28 weeks pregnant...and that means I'm in my third trimester. What?! How has this happened? I am really struggling to realize that in less than three months, we'll have a baby here. In this house. Living here. Relying on us for everything. Wow. I vascillate between being incredibly excited and incredibly terrified. I have no experience with babies. Pretty much zero. I'm hoping that the "maternal instinct" that everyone talks about is something real, because I need it. I've been reading the books, but there's just so much to remember and think about. My goodness...
Anyway, here's the pregnant belly picture of the week. David took it tonight after I got home from work...I'm 28 weeks, 4 days pregnant. Isn't this a cute little dress? Thanks to my stepsister, Michelle, I have a ton of maternity shirts/dresses. Her baby, Lia, was born a few weeks ago, so she sent over a huge bag of maternity clothes. Unfortunately, I can't get my leg into any of the pants (Michelle is tiny!), but the shirts and dresses fit nicely. I'm not sure I'll have to wear a shirt more than one time over the next 13 weeks!

Monday night, David and I went to our first of seven Empowered Birth classes. I've been looking forward to these classes since we signed up several months ago, but David hasn't been too excited about it. In the few days before the class met, he asked me no less than 12 times, "What do you think this is going to be like?" And each time, my reply was, "I have no idea. I've done this exactly as many times as you have." His main concern is finding out when we need to leave to go to the hospital! I think once Angela (our instructor) answers that question, he'll feel much better. Anyway, I really enjoyed the class. There were about 9 other couples there, and (most) everyone seems pretty nice and easy to get along with. I really like Angela, and I definitely think this will be money well spent. I would really like to experience natural childbirth, but I'm not sure I have it in me. I'm a real wuss. I've never had a broken bone, I've never had stitches...I don't know what real pain feels like. I'm interested in learning how to manage pain and how to be an advocate for myself while I'm at the hospital. As I've mentioned before, I'd like to avoid a c-section at all costs, so I feel like learning how to advocate for myself would be helpful to that end. David and I were both worried that the class would be a little too "crunchy granola" for our tastes, but it went really well...until the end. We had to do some relaxation exercises together, and it was just not our style. First of all, I was physically uncomfortable through the entire thing. My head hurt, my back hurt, my hips hurt like crazy...obviously I was doing something wrong. It wasn't relaxing at all. And David's massage? It felt more like he was petting our dog, Nestle, than massaging my legs. I couldn't help but crack up through the whole thing...we were probably a little disruptive to the other, more focused, students! I'm excited about our second class next Monday...and I have to remember that we've got homework to do!

Last week, I mentioned that I'd failed my 1-hour glucose challenge test. That meant that on Tuesday morning, I had to report to the hospital for the 3-hour glucose tolerance test. I got to the hospital at 7:25am for my 7:30 appointment. They finally checked me in at 8:21. At 9:00, they took me to the lab for the first blood draw for a baseline reading. Then, the phlebotomist gave me a huge glass of the orange syrup and told me I had 5 minutes to drink it all. I swear, there had to be 12 ounces of the stuff there. I briefly considered chugging it, like I did the 5 ounces for the 1-hour test, but decided I couldn't do it. I took regular sips, while chatting to the phlebotomist. I don't think she was interested in small talk, because she just kept saying, "You have 3 minutes," then, "You have 2 minutes, " then, "You have 25 seconds." At the 25 second mark, I bet I still had a good 4 ounces left, and I did chug it. Then I'm pretty sure I turned green, and I wanted to throw up. She looked at me and said, "If you throw that up, you'll have to redo the whole test again on another day." So I managed to keep it down and settled into the waiting room. I had blood drawn from the same arm 3 more times that day (at one hour intervals) before they finally let me go at a little after noon. I was starving and I was so thirsty (I hadn't been allowed to eat or drink since 10pm the night before)! I wasn't a great experience, but I refuse to complain. I'd do anything to make sure Sprout is healthy and strong, so if drinking orange sludge and getting blood drawn is the worst there is, then I'm happy to do it. Anyway, today I found out that I passed the test, so I don't have gestational diabetes! What a relief!

Yesterday, I took the day off work and went to Louisville with my mom and my friend, Leslie to do our registry. It was a lot of fun, and it was seriously overwhelming. Leslie has two kiddos...Hannah is 4 and Noah just turned 1. She's a veteran mom, so I knew we'd need her help. If it weren't for her, Mom and I would still be standing in the middle of Babies 'R Us, staring glassy-eyed at the wall o' bottles! Leslie was a lifesaver, for sure. She took strollers down from displays and showed us how they folded, gave me her insights on what it's really like to get up at 2 am to feed a baby who's howling in the pack 'n play, and was just generally a wealth of knowledge. Mom kept saying, "We just didn't have all this stuff when you all were little! There were two kinds of bottles. I just had a little umbrella stroller. My breast pump was really just a 'milking machine'." It was a great experience to spend the day with them!

Tonight, the Practicum I class I'm teaching met for our monthly group supervision. And my students were up to something...I could tell. It turns out that they had planned a surprise shower for me...after I asked them not to! They brought tons of food, a super-cute cake, and they gave us several gifts. They really went over the top, but I hope they know that we certainly appreciate their thoughtfulness. They gave us lots of cute things (bibs, burp cloths, hats), and I think we'll be set on baby wipes for quite some time! It's so nice to know that Sprout is already so loved by so many people!

I hope next week isn't as eventful as this one, as much as I've enjoyed this week. I don't think this ol' pregnant lady could handle too much more in one week!