It Just Hit Me

I am having a baby. Well, kind of... you know what I mean. I just read a blog of a woman who got pregnant via IVF the same time Angie did. She delivered her twins yesterday. Angie is creeping closer and closer to term every day. Without the physical reminders, and even the visual reminder since I haven't seen Angie in awhile, it is surprisingly easy to forget we have a baby on the way. It still doesn't seem completely real to me. I am sure it is a whole 'nother story for Angie!

Obviously I can do little to prepare for the baby's arrival being in China and all, but I am doing one thing (well, two things as I am still dutifully following my induction protocol). I am enjoying every second of my final few weeks of being mommy to just one kid. And what a super special kid at that. We have a lot of down time here in China and without Trevor here for two and a half weeks, I am spending nearly every waking, and sleeping, minute side by side with Fletcher. And I can't think of any place I'd rather be. He loves life and loves being with his momma, and I feel the same way.

It is so exciting, but also a little scary, to be adding to the family. I suppose most moms feel that way on the cusp of having their second child. Only I don't have the swollen feet, aching back, strained muscles, and fatigue of those other women. So instead of just wanting the baby out, and soon, I get to be a little more introspective.

Angie has an appointment tomorrow and Friday will be 35 weeks, gulp. I called her in the middle of the night yesterday (it is handy to have a sister who works nights when you are in a time zone with a 13 hour time difference). She is feeling fine. The increase in bp meds did the trick and if anything her pressure is slightly lower than normal, although nothing alarming. Her youngest has pneumonia, though (get better soon Michael!), and I am praying it doesn't spread to her (or her other son).

I am hoping she will put up a post after this next appointment, but I am not holding my breath. I guess carrying my daughter is enough of a sacrifice so I can't really be mad that she refuses my requests for posts. I would also love to see a belly shot, since I delivered Fletcher before I took any of those. Shirt down will be fine. Whadda ya say, Ang?

First Missed Appointment

Angie had her first solo OB appointment of this pregnancy as I obviously could not fly in from China to attend (well, not entirely solo since at a bare minimum Smykeeny Baby was with her, if not her boys). I was hoping to have easy phone access here, but that has not proven to be the case thus far, so I emailed Angie late last night to find out how it went and here was her response:

He doubled my BP med dose b/c my blood pressure was 140/90, so I am getting high on them again, that's good. They have urine collection devices for babies that they put an adhesive baggie over the privates with a few cotton balls in it and when he pees it goes into the cotton and you just squeeze them into a container. Also my weight is still good and no protein in my urine. Also Jay was watching Trey and he was outside at the fence with the neighbor girl and Jay came out and Trey was like "Jay we were about to kiss," so Jay ruined Trey's first kiss!

Should I be worried? I am choosing not to be worried (at least about the blood pressure part... I might be a little worried that Angie gets a buzz off her bp medicine and that Trey is becoming such a ladies man!). Oh, and the part in the middle about the cotton balls is in response to my question about how in the world I am going to collect the urine sample from Fletcher that the hospital requested. The boy doesn't exactly pee on request.

Induction Initiated

I told my mom of my plans and she said, "that sounds just like you." Meaning, of course, that I have once again put aside concern for my comfort and well being in order to try to give my child optimal nutrition. Except that wasn't what she meant at all. What she meant is that I am once again embarking on an endeavor that I researched thoroughly then promptly blew off until the very last minute and now am scrambling to play catch-up. What can I say, she's my mom and she knows me best.

And also like me I have a rationalization. You see, I initially decided against trying to breastfeed because I knew it will be tons of prep work and no guarantee of payoff, as it is basically a crapshoot whether or not I will make enough milk to actually feed a baby. I just didn't want to waste the precious last few months when Fletcher can still be my sole focus being attached to a breast pump, and more specifically, waking up in the middle of the night to pump. I know I have lots of interrupted sleep in my future and didn't feel like accelerating it a month or two, you know? But the more I thought about it, I just figured that with the right mindset it really isn't going to be that much more work (particularly now that the next handful of weeks we will be on our trip and hopefully will have a lot of downtime) and if it gets to be too much, then I will just stop, and not feel guilty about it. This way I am letting my body decide. Who knows, it may surprise me (it has before, although not normally in a good way!).

I have an appointment with an RN on Saturday to go over the protocol. I am going to be using Dr. Newman's Accelerated Protocol and if you are curious you can read a little more about it here. I have taken my first BCP but getting my hands on the other drug is proving to be a bit more of a challenge, but I am working on it.

Confession

I have a confession: If I am up after midnight and on the computer, I always stop by this blog before logging out just to look at the additional day on the pregnancy ticker. Yes, if you hadn't already figured it out, that is how precious each day my little girl spends in-utero is to me.

Now, for the update. Last Thursday we had another OB appointment, the final one I will attend before my trip, so it was the last one in quite awhile for me. Everything looked great. Angie's blood pressure was lower than the last appointment, still no sign of spilling protein, good heartbeat, good fundal height measurement, baby girl is moving a lot and Angie is feeling good. Praise the Lord!

The last two action items on my list before I leave involve the legal documentation we will have to file after the baby is born (a parentage action to rebut the presumption that the woman giving birth and her husband are the parents of the baby-- it is not dissimilar to adoption proceedings, in fact, except it stipulates that Trevor and I are the biological, instead of adoptive, parents) and coordinating the cord-blood collection and storage.

I sent a half-hearted email to a lactation consultant regarding the possibility of inducing lactation, but I haven't heard back from her yet. I am really too busy to tackle this issue in the little time we have left before we leave, so if she gets back to me and things seem possible to arrange before we leave, I will look into it. If not, formula it will be.

30 Weeks

Wow. Hadn't realized it has been so long since my last post. Trevor has been trying to pick up more shifts to make up for the lack of my paycheck and we've had a lot going on with Fletcher (all good, no worries there) that has been keeping me very busy. I know that doesn't bode well for my schedule coming up this June, if I barely seem to make it through the day now, huh.

Thankfully, nothing terribly new to report about Smykeeney Baby. Angie had her one-hour glucose test last week, and the lab never called back, so it looks like she passed. Good news. The baby is measuring on target, heartbeat good, and is an active little lady. Angie reports that she kicks much more than her boys ever did.

Speaking of the boys, Angie's kids are so sweet about the baby. They love to talk to and about "Fletchie's Little Sister" and generally have babies on the brain, it seems. A few weeks ago Michael (her three year old) rubbed his belly and informed Angie that HE has Niki's (my sister-in-law's) baby in HIS belly and "she will be SOO happy!" Ha! And today at church her five-year-old, Trey, was exchanging drawings with his "girlfriend" in the pew in front of them, starting with him giving her a picture of him "so she will always remember him," then her giving him one of the two of them with a heart, and finally he drew one of him and her with, get this, their baby in her belly! Angie intercepted that one, thinking that the little girl's parents might have gotten a bit freaked out.

We are now to the every-other-week stage of appointments, so our next one is Thursday, which will actually be the last one I will be attending for over a month. When I get some time, I will go into details on Fletcher's Blog, but Trevor, Fletcher and I will be out of the country for over a month to seek therapy for Fletcher that is not yet available in the U.S. Which means I will be gone for roughly weeks 32-37. If Angie's blood pressure starts rising or anything else starts looking funny I will be on the next plane back to KC and Trevor and Fletcher will stay behind, but please say a prayer that everything goes smoothly and Angie stays nice and big and pregnant into June.

This also means that I have to get everything ready for the baby before we leave at the end of this month. She will be sleeping in my room in the co-sleeper (what we are going to do with Fletcher, who currently sleeps in our bed, is still to be determined) and once she outgrows that she will be taking over Fletcher's (gender-neutrally-decorated) nursery and he will move to the guest room. I have one package of newborn diapers and four BIG tubs of size newborn to 9 months girls clothes thanks to my cousin Stephanie and her daughter Ellen.

Other than that, the only big remaining issue is food. I am still trying to decide about that one. Had recently decided to forget trying to induce lactation given the timing of our travels, etc, but then they had to release that news story about rocket-fuel ingredients being found in powdered infant formulas. Great. So now I am rethinking things. Again. But, just in terms of logistics and my sanity, I think formula will probably be the route we will end up taking, even though I turned my life upside down to pump for Fletcher until his first birthday.

A Significant Day

Today is a very special day for two reasons (the second reason just dawned on me as I noted the date of this blog post). Fletcher was born at 25 weeks 2 days gestation, and, absent anything completely crazy happening in the next handful of hours, this pregnancy is officially of longer duration. So, I am happy to admit there is something my little sister does better than me... and that is gestate babies (even my own baby). See Angie, I am freely admitting you are better than me at something, but don't get used to it.

I am excited beyond words about this milestone. Every day baby girl is in there is an extra day of doing nothing but growing and developing of which Fletcher was deprived. As a mother, I can't even explain how difficult it is to watch your child literally fighting for his life--every single one of his organs, from skin, to lungs, to brain, shocked and taxed from being asked to perform long before they are fully developed--when what he is supposed to be doing is floating around in a cozy uterus without a care in the world. Please join me in praying that baby sis has many more days of floating ahead.

The second reason this is a special day is that today, March 1st, marks the second anniversary of Fletcher's homecoming from the NICU. I guess I should really post about this milestone on his blog, but I think the fact that both of these things are happening on the same day is pretty darn cool.

First Milestone Passed

I am not really sure that milestone is the proper term, but today Angie is 23 weeks 6 days pregnant. I was first put on modified at-home bed rest when I was 23 weeks 5 days pregnant with Fletcher.