Let the renos begin!

$800 + dollars later, we are home with two new toilets, paint for our external back fence, some screening for our patio door, grass seed and other odds and ends, and this is just the beginning! Nothing like a baby on the way to force the "project hand"!!!

Time to give our handyman a call (yup - we have a GREAT handyman!) and outline the multitudes of jobs we have to get completed this summer leading up to our first born. Looking forward to it all, actually, but it just simply feels good to have started, which for this Type A big picture thinker, is half the battle. You know the type, don't you? The ones who have wonderful, gradiose and creative ideas, but can't seem to break the process into smaller parts and GIT ER DONE!

So yeah...it wasn't warm and lovely weather like I was hoping, but we got something done, and THAT feels like a ray of sunshine to me nevertheless.

Death by common cold?

EVERY SINGLE BREATH IN AND OUT, IN AND OUT, IS A GAME OF WILL - the will to make it one more breath without hacking and wheezing through another bout of coughing. EVERY night and EVERY morning - and at least once during EVERY night - I attempt to breathe through stuffed nose and sinus congestion and EVERY morning, I pray that today will be the day that I feel marginally better.

All I know is that the pregnancy books never really warned me against coming anywhere near anyone with a common cold. Who knew that a simple cold, lovingly caught at the same time my body is busy piecing together a placenta and growing a fetus, gets the complete shaft from my immune system, if running rampant through my weak but bigger every day body? Who knew that every single symptom of cold would stick around like a couch potato teenager moving back into his parents' place over and over again? I didn't. And when you add that to the extreme daily levels of exhaustion I battle against each day, it is NOT pleasant!

And NOW. NOW I have a damn headache from coughing so much!

I just keep repeating to myself:

"At least I am not nauseous."
"It will be worth it"

Right? RIGHT?

right.

Cue the laughing babies from the previous posts.

Weeping over losers / My Heart's beat

Admittedly, it was an emotional night of The Biggest Loser - I mean, WOW, what changes they have gone through, and boy, those reunions were pretty heart-wrenching, but I MUST have crazy hormones because I haven't stopped crying! All the great news and the bad (Laura's hip stress fracture) - sometimes reality TV is all too real, you know? But then again, the ladies reading this blog know how great a "good cry" feels - especially if you aren't actually sad.

And I most certainly am not. Today, even though I am still hacking up a lung, was a GREAT day. Today I heard the little squishy bass beat of my baby's heart (139 bpm)and saw the little raspberry (literally - he/she is the size of a raspberry) swimming in this little black sack inside my belly. Cool, eh?

This early ultrasound was scheduled by my doctor as a means of putting our minds at ease after the miscarriage we suffered back in November. I didn't realize this was an option, but once, at this juncture - 8 weeks - you hear the heartbeat and know all is developing properly, your chances of not miscarrying are a lot better. So. Phone calls were made to the grandparents and the parents to confirm that all is well, and now the fun really starts...

If only I can shake this cold, and get a bit more energy on a daily basis, then I would be jumping and singing and full of happy sunshiny charisma. However for now I will settle for a calm peace and contentment and get my butt to bed to see if I can sleep without hacking up a lung!

What a great day, though!

My little obsession

I cannot think about anything else. Really. I am going to have to keep myself very very busy today to avoid thinking about my ultrasound tomorrow morning. I'm not nervous, really, but anxious for certain. I have been fighting just to survive this cold over the past week, and it has been consuming so much of me, you forget that my body is doing double duty. I just hope that noone has suffered for this wear and tear!

So yeah...I am very excited and can think of nothing else right now. So some gardening, some home organization and as always a nap or two throughout the day should get me through.

Tomorrow's going to be a great day!

What do you hear in these sounds?

Okay. So all I have between hearing my baby's heartbeat and now is the long weekend. Fantastic. At 7 weeks, (and closer to 8 by Tuesday), it should be possible to hear the baby's heartbeat via ultrasound (well...maybe the traditional one, but likely via a vaginal 'wand'. Thankfully I have never been squeamish about exams and other intimate moments like this, because when you are pregnant...it's all access baby!), which will make our pregnancy much more 'viable'. If I am not mistaken, it is possible also to be able to detect multiples (or confirm just one fetus, too, which is fine!). So excited!

I have to say, though, that the sounds that are out of the ordinary these days are my wheezing cough, sniffling sinuses, growling stomach, and unpleasant um....poofing. That, and continuous, nonstop yawning. MAN, your body is taken over by this thing! It doesn't seem to matter how much sleep you get (although I can only imagine that if I had to do with LESS sleep, I would be collapsing mid-day each day), you are ready to put your head down all day long for a nap. I can only imagine how tough it is for Moms that already have a little one at home, or worse than that, have a full time job PLUS little ones at home. BRUTAL.

But all worth it and they SAY it goes away after a while - for me within a month or so now? (I am hoping).

So I am devouring books on the subject of pregnancy, and have duly subscribed to the proper e-newsletter baby progress updates and online reading...any suggestions on what I need to start to do now? I feel like I am in a holding pattern, because obviously it is too early to shop for anything, and the weather hasn't really cooperated to make us willing to start home projects or anything. That said, this weekend will pose the perfect opportunity to begin a couple inside jobs, so I will be tackling those.

Ultrasound in 5 days. Wicked.

Is knowing always a good thing?

So I have spent some time researching prenatal testing today. I have an appointment with my doctor at the end of the month (and prior to any meetings I have with midwives) to discuss the various screening testing that you can do. The thing is...not only am I not even sure I would do anything WITH that knowledge, but to me it seems a bit counter-indicative to agree to undergo tests that come with a risk of miscarriage. I can't even imagine how I would feel if I went into this test, only to have killed the fetus - how hideous would that be?

I guess the only option I have at first is to see about early testing (called the nuchal translucency test NT) which is done via ultrasound paired with blood tests. then, and only if the results indicate I am at increased risk for Downs or other issues, will I even discuss amniocentesis. I really don't feel like adding risk to this pregnancy, and the chances are already so good that there is nothing wrong, nor will there be...

But, I THINK my doctor said that if I want amnio, that (of course) you have to book early in order to get in. Lovely. There are certainly days when our health care seems woefully insufficient, and then others - like the day I found out that full midwife services are covered by OHIP - that make me feel that the money we pay is worth it and that we are all lucky.

So...maybe it is better not knowing. Maybe what you want to do is eat right, take care to get enough rest and sleep, and simply focus on your own health and creating as healthy a life as you can inside you - and let the chips fall where they may....

What do you think?

Bumps n Lumps

I can't believe it, but I am already showing! Only 7 weeks in (not even) and I absolutely have a belly that wasn't there before. And my weight has been consistent, since I dropped about 3 or so pounds initially - it isn't because I have assumed the food fairy has given me a free pass now that I am pregnant, either!

So, I have bumps where I never did before, and of course, as normally happens to pregnant women, I have two ever-growing lumps, too, that are kinda fun!

Now...if only I didn't crave a nice glass of wine on this lazy Sunday afternoon, all would be perfection!!!

Hitting the gym

Only to watch, though! Time to head to my husband's volleyball final matches. You know, this city has pretty exceptional sporting opportunities, and the sport of volleyball is so well organized that its biggest league, the OCVL, has hundreds of teams and is so big that up in the top tier, there are former national team players, and the finals are actually televised! That said, you have to have a full team of pretty exceptional players to be at the top, obviously, and both I and my husband, although very competitive players, are this year not in the top tier. His team finished near the top of the second, or B, division, and play their match just after the initial A division match. It is bloody good ball, and we know a lot of the players in a lot of the teams, so it should be fun to go and take in all the matches this afternoon. And I have to say that I find it incredibly sexy to watch my man play and see him smash the ball down or block an opposing hard hit. Am I wrong ladies? How sexy is it to watch the man you love play a sport with authority?

Or maybe my life has, for the most part, been all about sports, so it is a personal little turn on?

6 weeks today - the heart should already be beating

So I am officially admitting it. I am pregnant again, and so far all systems point to good health for both Mommy and baby, although it is still early. I love the perfect symmetry of the timing of this pregnancy. I got the greatest birthday gift ever when I saw those two simple pink lines on my pregnancy test, and husband is going to have the joy of seeing his first born come into the world during his birthday month in November.

It is also interesting to note that although we miscarried in November last year, before the year is up, we will have a baby. How cool is that, and how heartening to think in the big picture sense that it was only three months of waiting to be blessed once again.

So Mom and Dad to be are very happy, if a bit reserved. Mom and Dad of Mom and Dad to be are very cautious, and both sets of concerned couples are very much looking forward to the early ultrasound that my doctor has generously prescribed. If all goes well, as early at 7.5 weeks (just a few days away, really) the heartbeat can be heard, and if this is the case, the viability of the birth is high (in lamens terms, that means you don't have to wait until the end of the first trimestre to heave a sigh of relief, as the fetus is said to be developing well, and that is mostly all you needed to know). So for others who are anxious and praying for good news...just know that you CAN and you will get pregnant again...maybe even within a couple of months.

Now. What is happening with my body, you may ask (or perhaps you don't want to know, but since my body has become a vessel for growing another human life, it is a bit consuming, so, tough.)? Well, other than a bit of queasiness here and there, the big deal is the loopy, foggy, completely exhausted half-asleep semi-consciousness that constitutes my waking life these days. MAN, am I ever tired! And don't even come NEAR my boobs. They are big and luscious, but look and don't touch...at least for the time being. My poor husband...

Time for a glass of milk and an early trip to bed - I am SUCH a party right now!!!