Jun 21

Baby Mama: The Final Post Before Baby

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I am very excited that I am only a few weeks away from just being one person again. Being a baby house is fun and different, but it does get old quickly. My husband says these words to me everyday, “It is weird that there is a baby inside of you.” Yes, thank you, my love, it IS weird that there is a baby inside of me; not only weird but uncomfortable and at times painful.

At the doctor yesterday, we scheduled three more doctor visits, one per week for the next three weeks. As I was setting up the third one, I realized it was quite possible that we would already have the baby before that third appointment. That was when it really hit me. Oh my heck!! We only have a very short amount of time left, we could be measuring it in days and it wouldn’t be a high number.

So then I came home and realized that I have a list of things to do. Then I look down my list and realize that I am in this limbo of time, where we are close to having the baby but not quite close enough. I do need to pack a bag for the hospital, but it is still a few weeks away, when is the right time to pack a hospital bag? So I toss that “to do” aside for a while, and keep looking down my list.  Next on the list is go shopping, well I can’t do that until after the baby shower. Good heavens! Is their anything on the list I can do early? It seems a little premature to get out the baby toys or put together the diaper bag, so those items get procrastinated too. The only thing I end up doing is washing the car seat and setting it by the car; but I feel better. I am one step closer to being baby ready.

Sometimes I forget that I have a five pound parasite inside of me, and I try to act like I am just a normal person. For example we took our daughter camping a couple weeks ago. That may have been the dumbest thing I have ever done. Normally I can sleep anywhere. However, I slept very little that night. My poor hipbones which are trying to make room for baby just couldn’t handle the baby pressure on one side and the hard dirt bed on the other side. Another time I decided that I really hadn’t been exercising enough lately so I put a Jillian Michaels aerobics video on the TV. Now her routines are a little rigorous normally, but I felt like such a failure when I was winded during the warm-up. 

Luckily I only have a few more weeks until everything is back to normal.  Or as normal as it can ever be with a brand new baby that I get to take with me everywhere.

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May 10

Baby Mama — The Last Trimester

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Here’s another great guest post from Tara as she shares her perspectives on the journey of her second pregnancy.

I am officially in the third trimester of pregnancy now. While I would rate it as easier than the first trimester—when I am always nauseated— I wouldn’t exactly call this trimester fun.  

While there are many reasons to complain about this final term of pregnancy, I limit my whining to just six reasons why I wouldn’t mind if my little boy came a few weeks early.

  1. Hurting Hips. Apparently the ligaments in my pelvis have softened, allowing my hips to spread, in preparation for birth. I think they should just wait and soften once I have an epidural, so I can’t feel any of it.
  2. Bladder pressure. Need I say more?
  3. Contractions. While Braxton Hicks aren’t painful yet, it’s still uncomfortable to try to do anything when my uterus is doing its own little work out.
  4. Frequent Doctor Visits. I now have to take time out of my day every two weeks to visit the doctor’s office. It isn’t that much fun anymore. For the first couple of visits when you are pregnant it is very cool to go to the doctor and realize there is a little baby forming inside of you, but at this point I don’t need the doctor’s help to know that there is a baby in there.
  5. Sleeping. I don’t think a comfortable position exists during the last ten weeks of pregnancy. It doesn’t help that once you finally get to sleep you have to wake up to visit the bathroom.
  6. Extra body heat. It isn’t really fun to have everyone else in the vicinity comment on what a nice day it is, when I am sweating.

 All of this being said, I suppose I will forget it all when we bring home our cute little baby boy.

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Apr 05

Baby Mama: Where do Babies Come From?

Baby Mama Series, Guest Blogger 1 Comment »

Here’s another great post from guest blogger, Tara, who is sharing her “Baby Mama” perspective with us as she journeys through her 25th week of her second pregnancy.

Gem, my two and a half year old daughter, goes around announcing that she is a big sister now that my husband and I are expecting our second baby. Gem doesn’t really know what it means to be a big sister, but, we have told her that is what she is, and she believes us.

Below are a few of the interesting things we have encountered as we have tried to explain to our toddler the big change that is coming to our family: 

  • She seems to understand that the baby is in my “tummy.” We have told her the baby is too little to come live with us yet. We explained to her that when the baby gets bigger it will come out of mommy’s tummy and come home. She obviously got something out of that because when she said her prayers that night she said, “Bless da baby get big da get out da mama’s tummy.”  
  • We have told her that the baby will be living in Gem’s room. She is very excited about this stewardship she has been given, and she reminds me at least twice a day that “da baby sleep na Gem’s room.” Even for a while she said the baby was going to sleep in her bed until I explained that the baby is going to have its own baby bed.
  • We will be having a little boy, so we decided we probably better explain to Gem that there are two kinds of people in this world: boys and girls. She now knows that daddy is a boy, mommy is a girl, Gem is a girl, and the new baby is a boy. However, if she is asked about anyone else’s gender, she looks at the person in a dumbfounded way for a while until she forgets the question. Clearly she does not understand the boy/girl concept yet.

I realize that nothing can really prepare Gem for the big change that is coming in her life, but it sure is fun to talk about it with her.

Click HERE to read Tara’s previous post.

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Mar 01

Baby Mama: Ultrasound Tell-All

Guest Blogger, Mommy Monday 3 Comments »

Well, last Friday was the big day. Ultrasound day. The day when, if all goes well, you get to find out if your new little one will be wrapped in a pink or blue blanket at the hospital.    

The day before our appointment, Tyler, my husband, had mentioned he wanted a boy. That was the first time it had crossed my mind that the baby might not be a girl. We already have a two-year-old girl, so as far as I was concerned all babies are girls and I was expecting a girl. So I shrugged off his comment, thinking to myself, “Poor soul. He thinks he is getting a boy.”

Back to the big day. The technician ushered us into a room, directed me to the big grey table (they disguise it as a bed by putting a pillow on it), and proceeded to look for the little creature growing inside of me. The technician didn’t have to say anything, though she did anyway, because we could plainly see that this little baby was no girl.

The technician then goes about her business and begins checking all the other vital baby parts. All the while, my mind was racing. “A boy,” I thought to myself. “What will I do with a boy!?”

After a few minutes Tyler was a little concerned because I hadn’t said too much. He asked me if I was “ok” with a boy.

“Of course I am,” I replied. Honestly, what else was I supposed to say? The problem was, I wasn’t really OK yet. I was thinking of all our little baby church dresses in our daughter’s closet that wouldn’t be worn by a little boy.

The story has a happy ending. Now that the idea has settled in my brain, I am thrilled to go in a completely new direction and have a little “man-child.” (That is what my husband calls our new baby.) I have even made a list of pros to prove that I am excited about having a boy.

1.   There will now be someone in the house who will actually want to play with Tyler and all his old Lego sets.

2.   NO PINK!!!! (I hate pink.)

3.   We have so many cool names to pick from that are unusable for a girl. For example: Jet, Dax, Jax, or Levi.

4.   No hard-to-do hairstyles that don’t stay in anyway. (Hairstyling is not my strong point.)

5.   Tyler will have to take a little more responsibility with this child. I can’t teach a little boy to be a little man because I don’t have any experience in that area.

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