Life and Death

Yesterday my best friend gave birth to her twins at 35 weeks. They are both perfect and weigh in at 4 pounds, 4 ounces each. The little girl, Kaelin, had no problems, and the boy, Brendan, had to be on oxygen. Still not too bad for those little preemies! They'll be in the hospital for a week or so. Everyone is doing great and is thrilled about their healthy arrivals.

Onto the sad news from yesterday: my husband lost an old friend - his cat. It was a cat he found in college and took in for a few years. After his allergies got the best of him, he gave the cat to his parents to take care of. They have kept it ever since. Over the weekend we saw the cat and it had terrible sores on the side of its body. John convinced his dad to take it to the vet on Monday and the vet said it was cancer and it had spread all over. The best thing was to put the cat to sleep, which they did. My husband was very upset about it - more than I thought he would be.

I did the best I could to support my husband and just let him be upset about the cat (over the phone of course, since he's traveling). I mentioned that it was hard because I had never seen him like this before. And then he told me something that hurt - he said "well, I've never had anything like this happen to me before." I almost cried upon hearing that. I know that losing babies to miscarriages is completely different for a man and a woman because the man has no physical connection to the baby yet. But it still hurt to know that our lost babies don't even compare to a cat.

I'm not being hard on John - as I said I know the miscarriages were totally different for him. He did not experience them in his body and feel the connection the minute we found out we were pregnant. He didn't bleed and cry and suffer the emotional trauma that I did. I know that. But it still hurt just the same. I won't mention it to him because I know all this is different. And I will get past it - it just upset me at the time and I wanted to write about it. If I lost my own cat, I would probably feel many of the same emotions that I felt when losing my babies because my cat *is* my baby right now. I know it's very difficult to lose a pet, especially one you've had for so many years.

For my readers, please don't judge my husband. I think it's probably a normal reaction for almost any man and he just wasn't thinking. I'm really ok because I know when Pea is here, he will have an emormous love for her and there won't be any question about his feelings towards her. Men need to see and touch, women just need to feel it in their hearts.

The Halfway Point

Today is pretty significant in my mind - I am 20 weeks and officially halfway through my pregnancy. Of course Pea may decide to stall and I could go 41 weeks or something like that, but based on the standard 40 weeks, I am halfway there. I couldn't be happier about this day - I'm just so thankful to be here.

It's funny though, if you told me just 6 months ago that around Thanksgiving I'd be 20 weeks pregnant, I would have laughed. It didn't seem possible. I'm still stunned when I think about how far along I am, and I still get a little nervous when people ask me about the baby - like it's too early to be talking about it. Even though it's getting quite obvious, it still feels strange to admit it or talk about my little girl. I'm not sure that will ever go away. Even when she's born, I probably won't feel like she's mine right away! I've actually felt guilty when people give me gifts for her - I just can't explain it.

But don't get me wrong - I am happy and I'm positive and I know everything will be ok. It's just hard to break out of the "if" mentality. Even now at 20 weeks.

I definitely had some misconceptions about what it would be like at 20 weeks:
- I thought I'd feel the baby kicking all the time. Nope, thanks to the anterior placenta. But I do think I'm starting to feel her more regularly. No strong kicks, but I definitely feel some more flutters in there.
- I thought I'd be very obviously pregnant-looking by now. Most people can tell I'm pregnant now, but I'm still not big enough for people to just come out and say something. People could easily mistake me for gaining some extra pounds if they aren't used to seeing pregnant women.
- I thought I'd feel completely confident. This goes with my statements above - I am happy, excited, positive, but still a little nervous. The world of FertilityFriend is excellent and has seriously gotten me to where I am today, but you are also exposed to so many terrible things that can happen. You see so many truly tragic stories that break your heart. I wouldn't change anything - I'm so glad I know about these things and have gotten to know these women, but it all goes back to the innocence lost. You try hard not to think about what can go wrong and you just have to assume at this point that everything will be ok. But I start to second guess myself - is it really time to buy a crib? What if something happens? I guess there will always be "ifs".

Hmmm, I think this post turned out to be kind of depressing, when it really is a celebratory day. I guess I'm just being reflective. I have too much time to think right now!

Happy 20 weeks, Pea! I can't believe we're halfway there to meeting you!

Baby Dynamics

As many of my online friends know (and I'm sure they can relate to stories like this themselves), after my miscarriages, I found out who were my true friends and who weren't. The true friends hugged me and told me they were sorry and just let me cry and be sad for as long as I needed. They didn't tell me what to feel, they didn't make insensitive comments (and if they did - they caught them and apologized). And most importantly, they continued to love me for who I was and were still my friends.

Then there were those people who didn't understand why I couldn't be "over it" yet and the ones who spouted out the "it was God's will" or "there was probably something wrong with the baby - it's better this way" remarks. Or even those who decided that they didn't want to be around me because I was too depressing and could not relate to them anymore because they had children.

There is one friend in particular that I have ranted about several times during all of my trials. This was the friend who told my best friend that she would just send me card after my first m/c and then wait a week before telling me she was pregnant so that I had enough time to "get over it". She's also the one who said "what makes me so sad is that our babies would have been so close to the same age". After the second m/c, she called and acted concerned about the fact that I was hosting her baby shower the next week, but it didn't go beyond that one call. It was forgotten after that - it was all about her. After the third m/c, she just didn't even bother to call or say anything. I guess she was tired of it.

After that third loss, I just gave up on her. I was pleasant enough when I saw her at Bunco, but I never called or emailed or initiated contact. It was just too hard to be around her and I was always too worried about what she might say. When I got pregnant again this summer, I decided that she would be the last to know - out of spite of course. I just didn't bother to call (which was easy). But our husbands are friends too and we all finally arranged to go to dinner last week. I figured she knew I was pregnant by then, but she didn't say anything. It turns out she didn't find out until John told her husband earlier that week before we went to dinner.

Well, she was absolutely ecstatic for me. She hugged me and smiled at me all night and gave me a baby gift. She called me to go to the movies over the weekend and was one of the first people to call me after my big u/s. At Bunco, she was the first to ask to see my u/s pictures and kept telling me how she wanted to help me and give me advice and help register. This is all great and I appreciate it, but what happened here? Why do I all of a sudden get all of this attention when I really needed it more last year? I'm not stupid - I know it's much easier to be happy with your friends than be sad with your friends. But it still really hurts my feelings.

You can't help the changing dynamics between your friends once a baby enters the picture. I can already see other friends without kids withdrawing a little, and that hurts too. I used to be in that same situation. We have friends who had kids and then were never seen again. I hate that it has to happen like that.

There really is no point of this post. It's just my observation of how everything seems to change. I guess some for the better, and some for the worse. But bringing a baby into our lives is something I am truly looking forward to and I wouldn't change that for anything. I know we're in for a very different life, but bring it on! I can't wait to enter parenthood.

I wish some things could stay the same forever, but I guess that's life. But I will try my best to include my friends who don't have kids and will let them make their own choices about whether they want to see me. I guess the commercials are right "A baby changes everything". But I will make sure those who have stood by me for the long haul know how much I appreciate their love and support. I guess that's all I can do.

It's a....

GIRL! I honestly would have been absolutely thrilled either way, but I am really excited about our little girl! Even more exciting is that everything looked great in the ultrasound - everything measured on target, spinal cord was normal, heart was normal, etc. They found absolutely nothing wrong. It doesn't rule our chromosome problems or Downs, but it is still comforting to know that everything looks fine so far.

Pea was so active during the ultrasound! She wouldn't stay still for a second and the tech had a really hard time keeping her still to get a good look at her heart. She kept blocking the shot with her arm too. But she wasn't shy at all about spreading her legs open and giving us a good look there - the tech was entirely confident it was a girl. The doctor said the typical "don't go buying all pink just yet", but she said it was a girl too. She was so adorable - she kept kicking and moving around and rubbing her face. It was incredible.

My mom came with me since John is out of town. This was the first time my mom saw Pea and she was amazed - and she cried the entire time. When they announced it was a girl, she cried even harder. It was sweet - but she made me cry too! She could not have been more excited, so I'm glad she got to see.

One interesting thing that made me feel better - so far, I had that one time where I was sure I felt movement from Pea, but not much more than that. When the doctor came in to review the results with me and do her own ultrasound, she pointed out that my placenta was in the front and that it was nice and thick, giving me a lot of padding. She said that it might be awhile before I really felt her move because of that. So that made me feel good! It's hard hearing about other people feeling so much so early, but the doctor said the placenta is in the back a lot of times and that's why some women feel the baby so much earlier. Good to know!

So I'm on cloud nine right now and feeling great!

Thanks for all your of nice comments on my belly shots - you all are so sweet to me!

Finally - A Belly Pic!

Ok, this is kind of embarassing for me, but here it is - my first official belly pic. I'm 18 1/2 weeks right here:

Preparing for Pea

Last weekend we finally started clearing out what will be the nursery. It is currently my craft room and I have stuff everywhere. So it's been a big chore, but it's been fun to think about what will be in there soon. And it's exciting to be at a point where we need to start thinking about all of that. Before it's just been a plan, but now it's taking shape.

We still have a long way to go before we're even close to being ready for Pea, but the little things are neat to experience finally. We bought a new shelf/storage unit thing back in March '03 after we learned I was pregnant in preparation for my craft room moving to the 3rd floor. We didn't do anything with it though, as it was too early to start moving things up there. Well, I never got to do the move. And it took 20 months to finally start the move. So I guess it's understandable why something as small as this would make me happy. It's another milestone met. Those are huge.

So the big ultrasound is 4 days away now. I don't know what I'm going to do if Pea doesn't cooperate because I'm so anxious to know what s/he is! My cousin and his wife (who is due 3 days after me) just found out yesterday that they are having a girl. The word from my aunt is that they are "disappointed". WTH? Words that obviously come from two people who don't know any better and don't know how great they have it. I'm sure they will end up loving and cherishing that little girl with all their heart, but still - it still hurts to hear those words today. I could never be disappointed with my baby.

I had another dream about the baby last night. It's a strange one. I went to get the big u/s and it was me, my mom, the doctor and a bunch of people sitting around a conference table. Then the doctor starts handing people different pieces of a baby doll (it was a soft doll and pretty big). I got the head and torso and arms. We were supposed to examine it or something to make sure everything was ok. It was very strange. But from that, we learned that Pea was a boy. My second boy dream. I told my best friend last night on the phone that I was really starting to think it will be a boy, so I guess that's where it came from. Pretty funny. Strange I know, but funny.

I think I feel Pea!

For the past few weeks, I've had a few times where I have wondered if I felt Pea move. But I wasn't too sure. But just now as I was sitting here at my desk, thinking about how I shouldn't feel quilty about going home before 5:00 when I get in at 7:00 anyway, I felt something.

Now I think I understand the fluttering that everyone talks about. It was the strangest feeling - and it was a little higher up than I expected it to be. But I think it was Pea. I can still feel it off and on and the only way to describe it is that it feels like someone is doing somersaults in there. It's the strangest thing! But it's a wonderful feeling. I feel pretty confident that it definitely is Pea in there and not just some other random movement. But who knows for sure! I'll just keep thinking it's Pea, because that makes me happy :)