Here we are, 27 weeks pregnant, officially in my third trimester, in the 7th month, and am left with only 80-something days until the big day, but in case she comes early, my baby girl is viable for life-saving treatment. Plus, I'm only 60-something days from being full term. That's a LOT! I'm left feeling excited and anxious. But mostly excited.
As I mentioned in a previous pregnancy journal entry, I want to cherish every moment of being this close to my little girl with her cooking in utero, since I won't have this closeness with her again. I just want to make sure I savor it, and not wish it over, though sometimes, I'm guilty of doing just that: Wishing it over.
27 weeks began 4/26/17 - I wrote this post early this time, and I still can't seem to manage to get it posted until a day before the next week begins. Oh well.
What's going on with Genevieve?
This week, Baby Genevieve weighs almost 2 pounds ( about the size of a head of cauliflower ) and is about 14 1/2 inches long with her legs extended. She's sleeping and waking at regular intervals, opening and closing her eyes, and perhaps even sucking her fingers. Aww...
She's breathing in and out, inhaling and exhaling amniotic fluid, preparing her lungs for her first gulp of air! She's also more sensitive to sound, since the network of nerves in her ears are better developed than before.
With more brain tissue developing, baby girl's brain is very active now. While her lungs are still immature, they would be capable of functioning - with a lot of medical help - if she were to be born now. Chalk up any tiny rhythmic movements you may be feeling to a case of baby hiccups, which may be common from now on. Each episode usually lasts only a few moments (Thanks BabyCenter.com ).
The theme of BOTH the 26th and 27th week has been extreme exhaustion and starvation, together and always.
I'm just always so tired, no matter how much or how little sleep I get. I just constantly feel like I'm running on fumes, and frankly, it sucks. But that's life, and I don't foresee it getting any better, especially with adding a 3rd kid to the clan. Three kids man... three kids... Whew.
And the hunger! THE HUNGER!!! I feel like I'm just ravenous most of the time, so I try to eat smaller amounts frequently throughout the day to keep my crazy hunger pangs at bay.
But there's TWO things that are super annoying about my hunger:
- Since I am SO hungry these days, I get really excited to eat, especially when I'm feeling particularly ravenous. I get even more excited when I have something particularly DELICIOUS in front of me, like something I'm craving. But after a few bites, I find myself feeling stuffed to the brim, and can't take another. But wait a minute, just a couple of minutes ago I was STARVING??? I do remember having this same issue back when I was pregnant with Jack, but I thought it came later, when the bump was bigger. Oh well.
- Things that sound good at the time of creation make my stomach turn and my gag reflex spring to action when it comes time to eat. Like the other day, I wanted, and made, a salad with sesame ginger dressing. Oh man, it sounded amazing, but I took one bite, and I swear, I thought I was going to throw up right then and there. Apparently, Genevieve doesn't care for that flavor. Awful. NO THANKS.
I've gained a total of about 11 pounds since we found out I was with child. My weight has been fluctuating though, where one day I'll be down nearly 3 lb from the week before, and then the next day, I'll be back up to where I was before, plus 1 or 2 lbs. It's really strange... So I stopped really weighing myself, and will leave that to the doctor visits from now on.
But as I've learned, I basically just let my body tell me when I'm hungry, and then eat. What a novel idea. I have a tendency to obsess and worry and check and double check what I've eaten, and it can become a bit unhealthy. I have to consciously tell myself to stop worrying so much, and just eat when I'm hungry and stop when I'm full. I figure the weight will balance itself out, as long as I continue being healthy and smart about my food decisions, which I believe I am.
How about a day in the life? I haven't done anything like this before, but I think it would be a fun way to show what I've been eating throughout a typical day.
I've been living and dying and coming back to life to live again for Breakfast: cereal and milk with strawberries. I almost don't even care what cereal it is. Recently, I've been chowing down on either Honeycomb, Fruit Loops or some other kid cereal, since I'm pretty sure that's all we have. And it's dang good.
But today??? I completely gave in to a severe pregnancy craving with a decadent doughnut from Diablo Doughnuts. There's going to be way more on this place later in its own post, but today I strayed from cereal and milk. And I don't regret it.
Left over Lunch: foil pack creamy salsa verde chicken and rice with lettuce. It kind of tasted like a Chipotle burrito bowl, and it was AMAZE-BALLS. Oh man... This recipe really knocked it out of the park, and it was just as good, if not better as left overs. Yum.
I also decided to have some watermelon, since that's a major craving for me still. It has been on my hit parade for some time now. I just can't get enough of the stuff. But today's watermelon was WEIRD. I cut into it, expecting the normal pink watermelon, but what I got was something truly bizarre. Apparently I got a yellow watermelon?? I've never seen or heard of a yellow watermelon before, and it really shocked me. I mean, truly shocked me. It tasted pretty much the same as the pink/red, but was a bit more spongy in texture, and honey-esque in flavor. I'm down with it.
: My day tends to really pick up after Jack's nap, and I usually find myself positively famished as I'm running around getting Major from school and all that other fun evening stuff and activities. Luckily, I always keep granola bars, cereal bars and apple sauce pouches in my bag, so I wolfed down a Snack cereal bar while running errands.
We also stopped at Starbucks where I got a venti cinnamon coconut milk macchiato, half-caff. Once again, I'm always tired. I needed a little pick-me-up.
I also got down with some jalapeño and lime Cheetos, which were BOMB!
Dinner : I've been so tired the past few days, and for some reason, it's like things have just been way more difficult than usual. So this night in particular, when my amazing husband got off work and saw my status of nearly ripping all of my hair out and melting down, he sent me up to take a hot shower, relax and when I came down, he told me we'd order in, to give me a break from cooking. I burst into tears right then and there. Thank you. THANK. YOU.
So we decided to order in from a local spot, Himalayan Bistro on Light St. here in the Federal Hill neighborhood of Baltimore. It was really delicious, and may have been extra delicious since I didn't have to cook, and was given the chance to just sit down for a few minutes, relax and be with my family. It was great.
: Snack Tropical Sour Punch bites, and 2 flour tortillas. Random? Yes. Yum, yum.
Today I took my gestational diabetes glucose test. Basically, it's where you drink a super-sweet, sugar laden drink and then an hour later, they take vials of your blood to test how your body processes sugar, which will determine whether or not gestational diabetes is an issue. So hopefully the test comes back negative! Fingers crossed.
I've been experiencing what I'm pretty sure are Braxton-Hicks contractions every so often. According to WhatToExpect.com, "Braxton Hicks contractions are a bit like a dress rehearsal: Your uterine muscles are flexing in preparation for the big job they'll have to do in the near future. Keep in mind that while they can be hard to distinguish from real labor, they're not efficient enough to push your baby out just yet."
Now, having done REAL LABOR before, I can safely say that they're not at all hard to distinguish from real labor. They're not at all like real labor. Seriously, WhatToExpect.com , who do you think you're kidding by writing that? Man... Talk about setting people up for false expectations!
Otherwise, most things that are the same. I still have to pee every 10 seconds. It's just a pregnant thing. It won't stop, and I don't expect it to. It's just one of those things. I mean, I just need to make sure I'm ultra hydrated to keep the leg cramps and headaches away, and the more water I drink, the more pee-breaks I take. But it's worth it. My last pregnancy, I was riddled with leg cramps and headaches, and this time around, I don't have any of that crap. Knock on wood...
I also still don't feel rested, and a lot of it has to do with the quality of sleep I'm getting, or not getting. I'm up a ton in the night, whether it's because I have to pee (again) or because Jack is up screaming (he's going through a phase), or one of the cats wants in, or the cats want out, or the cats want back in... Or my brain just won't switch off, which is another thing that has been happening a lot around 3:45 a.m., or I'm HUNGRY...
Anyway, the sleeplessness coupled with just the overwhelming feeling of being exhausted from growing a human inside my body really hurts my productivity during the day. Like I mentioned earlier, I feel like I'm just running on fumes, and it makes taking care of my 2 children, doing stuff for my husband, taking care of the house and all the stuff that goes along with that (cooking, cleaning, laundry, cat stuff, etc.), the blog and other projects I'm invested in, just that much more difficult.
I find that I'm really forgetful, and things that didn't seem so hard to do before now are a challenge. Maybe it's also because my size is increasing, so getting up off the couch or out of bed have become interestingly difficult. I don't even think I look that big, but MAN, I sure feel it. Especially when playing with Jack or going up and down the stairs. It's times like that where I truly feel winded, and feel my new weight.
SO MUCH. But there are times where I don't feel her for extended periods of time, and I really don't like that. I don't like that, not one bit. And then she moves again, and all is right with the world.
Nothing new, but things that I have purchased have either arrived, or have been put up.
We finally put up the Little Mermaid Fathead stickers above Genevieve's crib, and I'm so in love. At first, I was afraid they made the room a little too busy, but I was wrong.
The whole room is so cute, and I'm just really happy with how everything turned out. I think the thing that makes me happiest is that I had a hand in everything nursery-related this time around.
I've mentioned it like 800 times I'm sure, but I missed out completely on the whole nursery experience when I was preparing for Jack. We moved when he was only 3 months old, and I saw no reason in creating a space for him in our first home.
And Michael moved up here to Baltimore a whole month before the kids and I did, so he was the one to do the basic set-up for Jack's room. He did a great job, don't get me wrong, but it was something that I had really been looking forward to doing. And somehow, the last 2 years went by without me really doing anything to it in terms of decor.
But that changed with the discovery of our little daughter brewing. I made a promise to myself that I'd do a much better job of being proactive in the whole nursery thing, and I think I was, with the help of Michael, very successful. I just have 1 or 2 more things I want to do before I say it's finished, but we're on the road to completion.
I also received my new diaper bag, the SUNVENO backpack! To say I'm obsessed with it would be a total understatement. I think I want to do an entire post dedicated to a review of this product, and my overall purchasing, receiving and using experience. Would that be something you're interested in? Let me know down below in the comments section.
Basically, it's durable, has tons of space, easily organized, and super cute. It allows me to be hands free without the flopping-around of a messenger bag, and all in all, I'm really happy with it.
Energy. A functioning brain.
What I'm looking forward to?
I'm really looking forward to my doctor appointment next week. I'm scheduled for another ultrasound to check the placement of my placenta relative to my cervix, since during my last ultrasound way back 7 weeks ago during my 20th week, they saw that my placenta was too close to the cervix, or "low lying placenta."
Apparently, the placenta needs to be at least 2 cm away from the cervix, and mine was about 1.2 or 1.4 or something cm away. They told me to not get worried just yet, but that they wanted to check again at the 28 week mark to see if any progress in movement has occurred.
What does that mean for me and Eve? According to BabyCenter.com , "If the follow-up ultrasound reveals that your placenta is still covering or too close to your cervix, you'll be put on "pelvic rest," which means no intercourse or vaginal exams for the rest of your pregnancy. And you'll be advised to take it easy and avoid activities that might provoke vaginal bleeding, such as vigorous exercise or strenuous activity.
When it's time to deliver, you'll need a c-section, since the placenta blocks the baby's way out. And even if the placenta is only bordering the cervix, you'll still need to deliver by c-section in most cases because the placenta can bleed profusely as the cervix dilates."
So fingers crossed my placenta has migrated away from the cervix!!!
Thank you for being here and joining me on my pregnancy journey, and I hope you'll check out my previous journal entries, and come back when I update again!
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