August 2019 – I Am Cool Now

Week 38

Published August 27, 2019 by Editor in Chief

Okay I’m getting super excited. Our place is in complete disarray, so we are not ready. But I’m getting excited. I don’t have a rainbow baby, but tempering expectations and general fear has been a big part of the pregnancy for me given how many years we’ve been at this.

Over the weekend it finally dawned on me that it wouldn’t be just David and me anymore. We’ve been together since 2007, married since 2011, so we’ve had a lot of time to get to know each other. Walking down the hall with him is the best. Driving places with him is the best. Movie nights are great. Eating at places where the food is delicious is amazing, and eating at places where the food is disappointing is super fun. Even the fight we had this morning over de-cluttering was entertaining for me. He hated it and thinks I’m a dirty hoarder. But I think we have a good thing going.

I’ve been drinking a lot of smoothies to help with the blood sugar. Starting the day off with a broccoli, kale, banana, and apple smoothie is pretty good for the metabolism. “Get away from me, your breath is awful,” he says, when I’m drinking it. “That smoothie you drink actually makes me love you less,” he declared this past weekend. Luckily he casually followed that sentence up with, “But I love you so much that it’s okay to love you less.” I don’t know if I got the exact words right. I think he phrased it more eloquently, which is embarrassing because I’m the aspiring writer, and he was just talking. But the gist of it was there: we have some wiggle room in our relationship. I’m thinking that wiggle room is going to come in handy as we welcome a new person in.

38 weeks means the baby is fully cooked. The best practice recommendation is that the baby comes out at 39 weeks and 40 weeks at the latest. A study of babies who were induced at 39 weeks versus ones who came out at 41-42 weeks revealed that babies who came out earlier were lower risk of C-section and overall had less complications or NICU requirements. So we plan to pick an induction date to make sure the baby is out at 40 weeks. I met with my least favorite ob-gyn yesterday, and she’s the one on-call for the last possible day. Luckily she has grown on me, so we are going to pick a date that…that…I don’t know. David wants to pick the latest possible date so we can continue to clean, but I am still worried I’m going to mess something up. So we’ll have to talk it over.

Here’s something else that is odd. Because we are considered high-risk (we’ve been high risk since the beginning, because of the IVF and my age), we now have weekly appointments at the ante-natal center. They measure the amniotic fluid and do a non-stress test for the heartbeat. BUT THEY DO NOT MEASURE THE BABY’S SIZE. They’re already there, looking at everything, so I don’t understand why they do not do this extra step. I’m especially annoyed they do not do it, because I am controlling the gestational diabetes with diet and exercise, but I know for a fact the devices that measure blood sugar are faulty. I did my own experiment where I pricked blood and measured using three different devices for a week, and they all threw out different numbers, and then when I did more research I learned they only have to be within +/- 20% range. My blood sugar numbers are close enough where if the device is 20% off, I should be on insulin. I’m sure I’ve written about this before. Anyway, all the high-risk facility would have to do as an extra check to know that it’s not affecting the child is to tell me how big she is every week. But they only measure every four weeks, even though I’m there being probed every week. Anyway, I’d like to know how big a watermelon I’m about to push out.

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Week 37

Published August 20, 2019 by Editor in Chief

It has been a while. These past few weeks have been busy, and my brain has slowed down significantly.

The thing that has taken up the most time is the gestational diabetes. Since I’ve been trying to control it through diet, it requires I eat every two hours. That might seem easy, but that means every two hours I have to find something healthy to eat. Even as I type this, I realize how silly this sounds. But to put things in perspective, I didn’t used to eat that often. I ate when I was hungry, upset, or it was dinner time!

I’ve also started making smoothies. Smoothies are a game changer. Here are things I put in smoothies:
broccoli, kale, banana, blueberries, almond milk or pea milk, apples, and ice. Sometimes I throw in some pistachio. And I also try to immediately wash the smoothie container, so it doesn’t get sticky.
I drink two cups and store a third cup for snacking later. They make me feel like I’m eating responsibly. That’s my smoothie story.

For the most part, I’ve been able to control the diabetes with diet and exercise. My morning fasting numbers aren’t great, because you have to eat a protein snack at night. I don’t think I’ve figured out the right thing to eat. Peanut butter is normally good.

Here are some other things that happened these past few weeks:

-We removed our fireplace, so we can move part of the office into the living room. By “we removed our fireplace” I mean we paid a contractor to do it, and then the county sent an inspector to make sure the gas was properly closed.

-My mom came over uninvited and cleaned our place. David was out of town, and she demanded I work at my desk while she cleaned our bathrooms, kitchen, bedroom and living room. It took two full days. I was embarrassed and grateful. The place felt so much better.

-On Tuesday, two days after my mother had done her cleaning, a contractor came over to patch the drywall where the fireplace was and fix up the floors. His vacuum exploded, emitting all the drywall dust and other materials in the vacuum all over our place, setting off our smoke alarm and leaving a solid layer of debris over our entire apartment. We rented a hotel for the night because of the questionable air quality, and David had cleaners come in Wednesday. I did not tell my mom this happened.

-We took several classes. In sum, we’ve taken a class for:
Infant CPR
Breastfeeding
Early childcare basics
Birthing
Hospital tour

Initially, our ob-gyn said the only class we needed to take was Infant CPR, because everything else we would eventually figure out. I hope she’s right, because I don’t remember a lot of the content in the classes, even though I took copious notes and asked questions in all of them. The birthing class was a two day class, and I think I came away from it more concerned than I was going in, which to be fair, was quite concerned. Did you know for a c-section they cut, pull your skin open, and then reach inside, move your organs, and pull out the baby? In the birthing class, they spent three hours describing a natural birth. It looks like the process involves writhing in pain for 12 hours and demanding massages and damp towels until you give in and request drugs or an epidural, but it’s too late by then because you’re too dilated, so you have to push the baby out naturally. Those three hours describing the natural birth process were not helpful.

Week 37 is a neat week, because it means the baby is technically at full term. So, any day now is okay for delivery. We are not ready for her yet though. Our place is still a mess, and I haven’t mastered taking care of myself, so taking care of someone else is still quite daunting. I think I’m moving just fine, but several people have commented that, “It looks like she’s having a hard time,” when they see me walking, so that’s rude. Those people are rude. Or those people thought I was an incredible walker before, possibly even a glider. They perceived my movements as graceful and effortless before.
Getting up and sitting down is hard, but I don’t think that’s what they’re referring to.

Our ob-gyn moved to North Carolina last week, so we have been scrambling to meet the other ob-gyns in the practice. I have two I like, and one who I have decided I do not like. If she’s the one who ends up being there on delivery day, I don’t know if I’ll have the restraint to avoid yelling, “NO, NOT YOU. WHEN IS THE SHIFT CHANGE?!”

In other news, we have book club on Thursday, and I haven’t read the book yet. Shhhh.

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Month: August 2019

Body Image

Week 38

Week 37