Tummy Time

22 weeks and we are the size of a papaya! After that, I pretty much stop reading as the words cantaloupe, honeydew, and watermelon start to appear. Yikes.  Now, if you're good at math, 22 weeks in means only 18 more weeks left - or really - anywhere from 14-18 weeks if the little guy decides he's too big for his home. 14 weeks is really just 3 months plus a little bit - even more Yikes!!

It has been requested by some for some tummy pics. Here you go!  For those wanting data for "scientific purposes", which really, it's just fun to know: I am 11 pounds up from where I started before I was pregnant, and technically should gain one pound a week for the next 18 weeks. That puts the grand total right about 30 pounds. Am I aiming for a pound a week? Not really. I can't say that I'm aiming at all. I just try to picture the little guy sitting in front of me and whatever I eat I'm feeding him too. That makes the veggies go down a lot easier.

 

12 weeks. Funny how it seems like so much fun to lift up your shirt and show the world at 12 weeks. Not so much fun to lift your shirt up after 20 weeks.  In reality, the little guy is so small at this point in the beginning, and so low in your abdomen, you should really be pulling your waistband down for a picture, not lifting up your shirt, but you get the idea.

 

17 weeks and 20 weeks. The self-pictures aren't that great. Just look at the tummy and ignore the room. The funniest part of this time frame is in the morning, I would roll out of bed and still not feel pregnant, or look it either. As the day progressed, my stomach would "fall out" as I called it, gradually getting lower and farther out. I'm sure eating lunch and dinner helped that "falling out" part.  Each night I would go to bed and it would fall back in.

 

21 and 22 weeks. Starting to look pregnant all the time, and apparently safe enough for total strangers in the store to start asking me questions about "When are you due?" and "Ooh! Boy or girl!" I thought I would hate that, but when it actually happens, it's fun and it makes me smile. The lovely Korean couple that owns the dry cleaners we go to smile at me every week and ask how I am doing. When they first found out we were having a baby, they both came around the counter with big smiles on their faces, each asking if they could put a hand on my tummy. Then together they blessed the little guy and said "May he have all the joy and luck of all the gods on Earth and in Heaven." Really??! From the dry cleaner people? Totally made me tear up. Now they bless me every week. They also help me carry the clean shirts out to the car - because I can't carry shirts on hangers any more? - and give Toby some love too. Definitely a happy store to visit.

Back to food and gaining a pound a week. Let me break it down for you so you can see where I'm coming from...

0 - 8 weeks
This is almost really where you wish you were living 100 years ago and not in modern day. Thanks to technology, medicine, and drug-store tests bought online so no one would see me in the store, I knew the very first day I was pregnant.
Happy feelings? YES.
Makes you giggle in your bathroom and jump up and down and spin in circles because you really don't know what else to do? YES, and I scared Toby.
Scared to death until that magical 12th week date? YES

Now, I'm a grown-up, I've read the medical books, I live in reality and I know how it works. For those first 12 weeks you live with a "what if" or "hang in there" in the back of your head for every step you take. There's also the "if it was meant to be, it was meant to be" mentality. Everyone has their own theories and ideas, and I embrace all of them. Whatever gets you through the day and makes it work for you, so be it. Of course, the good thing in knowing you are pregnant is you can live your life accordingly: eat the right foods, have reasons of why you are so tired, not eat and drink certain things...but I would be lying if I said I wasn't holding my breath for that first 8 week appointment.  There are many good things about being 35, being pregnant and 35 in the eyes of your insurance company is one of them. I appreciate the extra tests, check-ups and blood work. I enjoy learning all that we can. Being 35, you get an ultrasound at 8 weeks (ooh, internal, I might add.) What does an 8 week ultrasound look like? Think back to the 6th grade when we all learned how to program a triangle on a Mac computer to draw a square on the screen - that triangle, that's what an 8 week ultrasound looks like. But you get excited, you cheer (something is in there!), and they send you home and say come back in 4 weeks.

12 weeks
I knock on wood and say thank you to the karma gods and mother nature every day for not being sick in the first 12 weeks. I was HUNGRY and TIRED, but never sick. I was hungry enough to steal food from small children and not even feel bad about it. I would wake up, grab an apple and bottle of water, teach class in the morning, come home and have breakfast #2, go to my own workout class, come back and have either breakfast #3 or lunch #1, and crash. Crash hard. A good solid nap for 2 hours that took another hour to wake up from the fog. The kind of nap where you wake up and feel drunk and just can't clear your head. Out of curiosity, I would weigh myself every morning, but nothing. All that food was going somewhere. Yup, the little monkey was using it. Funny how something so small can demand so much of your attention and resources, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Yes, I went just as hard and fast at boot camp as I had the months before. I tried to change nothing, just keep going. I think deep down in my head and heart I thought that this little guy or gal (which is why I switched to little monkey, it just made it easier to think about) would have to keep up with us in real life, and we would have to keep up with them, might as well start keeping up with me now. The little monkey fought back though. I could still run straight lines, but turn right or left or have to get on the ground and get up quickly, and I would get dizzy. I called a truce with the little monkey and at 13 weeks started changing up my workout routine, but just a bit.

The 12 week check-up with ultrasound was a total tearjerker. What used to look like a triangle inside some alien goo now looks nearly human, if not a little bit alienish, or predator, depending on what movie you like better, and you see the baby human shape you recognize and you smile at the computer monitor and say "Hello, nice to meet you. We are your parents."  Your heart melts, you get a lump in your throat - you do get creeped out a little, because really, it is still kind of weird that there is a small human growing inside you - and you go home to grow.

13-16 weeks
This is when you are supposed to feel your best. If you were sick, that should be over, and you feel normal again. To me, there was nothing good about feeling normal. It was weird. It's like I would almost rather feel sick, at least have a symptom of something to show/prove/remind me that I was still pregnant. Walking around town feeling normal with what appears to be a  beer gut from one too many frat parties was not the happy feeling I was hoping for. I did worry in the back of my mind for 4 weeks. On that 16th week doctor visit though when you hear the heartbeat, all your worries go away and you can literally feel your heart getting bigger, making room for all that is yet to come.

17 - 20 weeks
More of not feeling sick, but not yet feeling baby either. We didn't know yet if the little monkey was a boy or a girl, but we had a few saving graces. I started to look pregnant, which was nice, almost as a daily reminder in the mirror. We started telling people - the grandparents!! And in you're head, you keep thinking "we're almost half-way there" as if being half-way was some sort of magical safety net.

20 weeks - Today
It's a boy! Somehow, if you weren't paying attention before, knowing who is showing up at the end of this definitely snaps you back to reality. I've started to feel the little guy wiggle around and do flips. The very first time I thought I felt him, I was working at the computer and leaned across the desk. I think I squished him, so he pushed back. I turned off the speakers, leaned back in the chair and lifted my hands in the air.
"Hello?"
Nothing.  So I leaned forward and went back to typing, only to feel the flip again.
"HelloOOOO? Little monkey. Come out and play!"
I must admit. It's awesome and weird and wonderful and creepy all at the same time. There is a life form in there, moving around and getting comfortable. And telling you he doesn't want to be squished. My favorite thing is when Toby sits on my lap and warms up the front of my tummy. The little guy seems to like the warmth and will come flip in the front part of my stomach. The minute Toby goes away, the flipping stops. I don't think Toby knows or feels it, but the minute Toby comes back, so does the flipping. Kyle's had a chance to feel the flip too, but just here and there. I look forward to the kicks and punches that will follow. The hunger has stopped. I can't say that even normal hunger has returned. Two bites and I'm done. Chalk that up to all the organs getting moved around. Two bites here, two bites there. Just keep in mind you are feeding a growing boy, so eat only the good stuff.

And Kyle...Kyle has been the most wonderful in all of this. Never asking "are you sure you should do that?" or "hey, be careful". He sits and listens as I unload on him every evening with all the new things I've learned. His favorite line in the beginning was "just tell me the rules and I'm good to go". He has joined me at all the appointments, been supportive in every way, interested in what's new today, and caring when I complain, although I try very hard to keep my mouth shut as I know I have nothing really to complain about. Karma is listening. We laugh together about the childhood trials we went through and what we may be inflicting on this little guy: braces, glasses, acne, twisted shins, growth spurts, growing pains, lanky arms and legs that need their own brain to control them. Sorry little guy! We'll help you through it. We're experts.

And so with 18 weeks left, maybe a little more, a little less, I want at the same time to speed through to the end to meet our new little guy, but at the same time want time to go ever so slowly. Make sure everything grows properly. Make sure we don't miss a minute. Make sure we get his room ready on time! We haven't really started yet!

Sorry for the long read this time. To repay you for your kindness, I give you a picture of our snuggle monster, Toby, who has no idea what or who is in store for him in the next few months.

Until our next adventure, keep on smiling, snuggling, and smelling the world around you.

Big hugs,
Mandi, Kyle, Toby, and the little guy