There's a little baby in there!

18 Weeks

I'm sorry I haven't posted a picture of my belly. All the ones I've taken suck because I'm either having a hot flash or we're trying to get out the door or both. I have a strategy on how to get a good photo though and I think I should have one by tomorrow.

So, I'm feeling pretty good these days. I'm 18 weeks along now and my pregnancy is pretty obvious unless I'm wearing my puffy coat. People don't give me a seat on the subway because I'm usually wearing it. Last Thursday I walked onto a very crowded train after work and I was tired so I decided to unzip my coat so that people could see my belly. Someone instantly shot up an offered me a seat. "Thank you so much," I said. Then I realized that I had just taken the seat of a woman who probably needed it more than I did. Meanwhile, hoards of healthy, young men sat stationery in their seats with their legs spread open and their eyes closed. Once I start showing more and the weather is nicer so that I'm not wearing this big coat, I know that this issue is going to drive me insane. I watch this all of the time. Young, healthy men sitting with their legs spread, taking up two seats while pregnant women and old people cling to the pole and stand. On more than one occasion, I have stood up to offer my seat to an ailing person or a pregnant woman and a young healthy person has SAT DOWN IN IT. I have had to say, "no, I didn't get up for you. I got up to offer her my seat or him my seat." New Yorkers turn into a different breed of asshole when they are commuting. It's really unbelievable.

So, anyway, that was a milestone. Someone offered me a seat on the subway because they could see that I was pregnant. Another milestone - I can feel the baby moving! It started in the beginning of my 17th week. I started to feel little flutters. I wasn't positive that this was the baby but I had a feeling it was. They've gotten stronger now and I'm certain it's the baby. It's so freaking weird to feel this little guy moving in me but it's weird in the very coolest way. It's like the baby is saying hello to me, asserting it's presence. "Hello baby," I reply. I just love it when it happens. Everything else stops around me and I just listen to this little one for a bit.

I'm acutely aware of how hard this baby is working on growing in there. It takes a lot of effort to form into a human and this baby is doing it! I root for it every day. I'm proud of it and I have a deep affection for it already. I can't imagine what it will feel like to meet it. My heart will just explode I guess.

I've made some decisions lately that have really helped me. I decided to quit a bunch of things. The past year or so has been about letting things go and getting ready for this baby. I've had to learn to say "no" like never before. It's such a challenge when you want to people to see you in a certain way. So I've been quitting and trying not to care what people think about this. But things sneak back in. I sign up for shit without even being conscious that I'm doing it. I came to a point last week where I realized I had too much on my plate again. Usually, I will pick one thing and quit it. Instead, I quit it all. It was really hard to do and some people tried to pull me back in but I finally put my foot down and they let me go. I have to say, I am so relieved. I need to focus 100% on this baby now. It could be the most important thing I ever do in my life. In a good way. I want to give it everything I have.

I've been reading a lot about birth now and I'm starting to get much less afraid and much more excited. It's crazy how opinionated people are about how babies come into the world. It's such a hot button topic for people. Everyone is so curious and asking me all sorts of questions about how I'm going to do it. I really need to just shut up and stop divulging my plans. For one, I have no idea what will happen for sure that day(s) and two, it's none of their fucking business.

I made the mistake of telling one of the women I work with that I'm going to try and have a natural childbirth in a birthing center. She keeps asking me about it and she's super apprehensive. I hate that I disclaim it to her or apologize to her for it. On Friday she asked me about it again and I said, "but the labor and delivery ward is just one floor up, so if I can't take it then I have the option of going up there." She said, without thinking I presume, "I have a feeling you'll be making that trip." I really wanted to knock her the fuck out. Thanks for the confidence bitch. I didn't say anything though. It's not worth it.

The good news is that most of my life I've known I wanted to have a baby but I've always been terrified of the pain and I'm just not terrified anymore. Of course I have some fear but it's far outweighed by excitement. I know that many things can go wrong but I also know now that many things can go right. That it's possible to have really powerful positive feelings, physical and emotional. Then, of course, there's the meeting the baby part of it. It's going to be unreal.

Still, we have a ways to go here. I want to focus on myself now and the growing baby now. One week from Wednesday we will be at 20 weeks and we will have our 20 week anatomy scan. Hopefully, we'll be able to see if it's a boy or a girl. I've enjoyed not knowing so far but I'm excited to find out. I used to really think that it is a boy but now I'm completely blank. I have no idea what it is. I still couldn't care less. I can find exciting things about both. I'm just hoping for healthy baby. Oh we got the genetic tests back and so far, so good. Everything looks normal and no need for Amnio or anything like that. Yay!

Ok, so I'll post a photo real, real soon.

MINE!

I finally got it and I'm so glad I waited. This one is in much better condition than the one I was going to get last year and it has the leaf and four chairs. It has replaced my Sevens Maternity Jeans as my most favorite material possession. Every time I walk by it I sigh a little sigh of contentment. It's just so cute and it's really tied everything in the apartment together. Finally, I am truly happy.

Whatchu talkin about DREAM?

Eve asked me if I'd had any crazy baby dreams yet. When she asked me that, I hadn't really. Then last night, I was delivered a doozie. I should be in bed right now dreaming some more but I have to get this out before the details fade.

Ok, so in my dream I'm preparing to give birth but in my dream world the act of giving birth involves a very extravagant sort of ancient ritual, ceremony thing. It's like a wedding in that you invite everyone but it happens out in the forest on an altar. So my mom and I are running all around Manhattan with this list of things that we'll need to get for the birth. At one point we're at Duane Reade getting poster board and markers because my sister is making posters for people in the audience to hold up when the baby is born. One of her signs is a big picture of a black tunnel and at the end of the tunnel are all of these people cheering. It's from the baby's perspective I guess. Oh my God this dream kills me.

The one thing on the list we keep forgetting to get is the car seat because you have to have the car seat or they won't let you bring the baby home from the forest ritual. That's a law now I think. Things keep happening in the dream and then I'll look down at the list and be like, "AH, CAR SEAT! We have got to get to Babies R Us NOW."

So we finally get to the forest and everyone is there. I mean EVERYONE. I have pulled people out of my subconscious from the 3rd grade. Also, Gary Coleman is there. Because, you know, what weird ass dream is complete without Gary Coleman making an appearance? Seriously though, Gary Coleman was there.

I'm walking around talking to everyone and showing them the altar. There's huge Altar at the top of the hill and everyone is standing at the bottom of the hill in a horseshoe looking up at it. The stone is cut into a sort of contraption that the woman (me) is supposed to straddle laying down and there is a hole cut out of the center of that so that you can see straight up into her vagina and watch the baby come, I don't know, flying out down the hill? Maybe whoever catches it has a baby next? I didn't go that far with my dream logic. I was more worried about the fact that here we were at the big day (my due date) everyone was there and I wasn't in labor. I was having no pains at all. I started realizing that it might not even happen on this day and people had come out for nothing. I started explaining this to everyone really apologetically, "it might not even happen today is the thing and if it does, it could take over 12 hours for the baby to actually come out. You would be here for a long time." People didn't seem concerned about this. Finally everyone realized that it wasn't happening and we started getting every one's phone numbers so that we could call them when the labor started and they could come back.

Then I woke up.

Dog off the bed: UPDATE

Thanks to all of you who wrote in with encouraging comments re: project dog off the bed. We have an exciting update. We bought a real nice new cushy bed for Eliott and set it up next to our bed, by Dup so that he can still see Dup when he lays on it. It turns out that Eliott loves his new bed. He only got up once last night and he even slept in a little this morning. It's a miracle! Hopefully he will continue to be content with his new spot. Thanks again everyone.

project dog off the bed

Long night, real long night last night. We’ve been talking about training Eliott to not sleep on the bed with us anymore. He has a little bed that he likes to go to sometimes that’s under the bed. It’s like his little cave. We’d like him to sleep there. When we first got him we didn’t even consider letting him sleep with us and he didn’t for about 4-5 months. Then one day he just jumped up there and, well he’s so warm and snugly.

There are a lot of great things about having E sleep with us. He’s Warm and snugly, he’s cute, it makes us feel like a little family and most importantly, when he sleeps with us he sleeps through the night and he sleeps in past 6:30am on Sat. and Sunday.

Today is Saturday and I was up at 6:30am walking him and feeding him and now I’m on the computer letting him sleep at my feet so that Dup can get some sleep because he was the one up with him the most last night.

The bad thing about letting Eliott sleep with us is that he is a little bull dozer. He only weighs 29 pounds but he slowly wedges his way up between us and then turns himself horizontal so that we are each respectively sleeping on the edge of the bed. We can get up and move him a few times a night but when you want to get some sleep sometimes you don’t fight him and just make due with your 12 inches. The other bad thing is that it separates Dup and I and makes snuggling and “intimacy” challenging.

I know some of you parent types are probably thinking to yourself, “well all of this sounds very familiar! I imagine it’s very similar to having a kid or two. I remember crawling into bed all the time when I was little, when I had a bad dream or I was sick. I would always sleep with my parents. I’ve seen my sister and my cousin play musical beds with their kids and I’ve heard them complain about the lack of space to sleep and the challenges of having sex in their own bed at night anymore. So it seems in a way that this is preparing us for parenthood. We're in training.

But what happens when the baby comes? I’m going to be a first time mom and I’m going to be protective and paranoid and I’m not going to want the dog in bed with us. We're probably going to use a co-sleeper but I'm going to be breastfeeding and in the middle of the night I know that baby is going to be sleeping in bed with us from time to time out of comfort and convenience. There won't be room for the bulldozer. I'm going to need more than 12 inches of mattress. And I know myself, I am going to snap and yell at Dup and Eliott in anger. I’m going to scream something like, “get that mangy dog out of the bed!” How horrible. Like it’s not going to be hard enough for poor baby E when the baby gets here. I think it’s much better to do it now so that he doesn't connect the baby arriving with his getting the boot and subsequently try and eat the baby.

I really wish he could read this or understand english or even understand basic concepts because poor baby E is confused as hell. We decided rather haphazardly that last night would be the beginning of the re-training – project “off the bed” if you will. There is absolutely no rhyme or reason in it for him. He’s been sleeping up there with us without a hitch for over a year and he loves it. Then, all of a sudden, whammo, he’s back on the floor. What did he do to deserve this?! Nothing, poor dear.

So it went like this: Dup picks him up off the bed and places him in his own bed under the bed and asks him to lay down, which he does rather sweetly and obediently. Then Dup gets back into bed. We wait about 30 seconds, listen to him get up, shake himself off, then he paces around the bed, finds his platform and jumps back up on the bed. Then Dup picks him up of the bed .... repeat about 50 times in a row. He did eventually sleep for like three one-hour intervals. At one point he got up and peed in the middle of the kitchen, which he hasn’t done in a very, very long time. He was obviously distressed. He would just pace around the bed and pace around the room. He probably only got about 3 hours of sleep total. Same with Dup. I slept through a lot of it but I was conscious of it the whole time.

Anyway, it has to be done. I only hope that last night was the worst and it will get a little easier each night.

At least he doesn’t cry.

In happier news I’m starting to show. My stomach really “popped” this week and people have taken notice. It depends on what I’m wearing but you can definitely see my little belly sticking out. I’ve always had a little belly on me and I always thought that it would be a relief to actually be pregnant so that I could be what I looked like I was. It is a relief. I like it. I think I’m going to be one of those women that gets really big though and people are like, “WHOA! YOU’RE REALLY PREGNANT! ARE YOU PAST YOUR DUE DATE?” but I’ll really only like 5 months along or something. We’ll see. I'll be 16 weeks (4 months) on Wednesday and I've gained 10 pounds total so far but I've been feeling nauseous again this week so I'm not eating big portions. My sweet mommy was kind enough to buy me some maternity clothes on-line, which I really, really need now because I only have 2 pairs of pants I can wear and one of them are jeans and I can only wear those to work on Fridays. I can't wait for them to come in the mail!

I’ll take a photo of my belly and post it later.