Pregnancy Ponderings, Week 18...

Good morning, Blogosphere!

It is Saturday, and the week is done, and oh, what a week it has been! In addition to helping present for three days straight for my job, our washing machine broke down (dread!). This, of course, turned into a shopping trip to a local appliance store to locate a new one, get it into the house, get familiar with it, and do lots of backed up laundry. Additionally, and moving on to pregnancy notes, I went through my closet and packed away all of my cold weather clothes that I will definitely be too big to wear when cold weather comes around again. Considering the heat index yesterday was 112 degrees F, I am sure cold weather won't occur again until my 8th or 9th month of pregnancy. This clean out allowed me to make room in my closet for new clothes (yay!), so I am sure I have a first trip to a maternity store in my very near future.

My wardrobe is not the only thing that has been experiencing changes. This week, I found myself experiencing a few new symptoms of pregnancy that until now were only known to me by the folklore shared by moms-past. (Sorry, didn't mean to get all Charles Dickens there...) Anyway, some of the things that have happened are things other people told me about, and some of them were things that people didn't say anything about until I asked about them and suddenly people were saying, "Oh yeah, that is totally normal." I hope I will and am trying to be very open with other women about my pregnancy. I know a few girls who are hoping to have babies within the year, and I want them to know what they might expect. Of course, every pregnancy is different, but nonetheless, I hope my sharing will help them out when their time to be God's vessel for His creation of a new little person comes. Here are some of my experiences in week 18:

First of all, I pee all of the time. I have always heard women say that they have to use the bathroom constantly, but I always assumed it was during the later months of pregnancy when the baby is bigger and using mom's bladder like a punching bag or trampoline. But, oh no, it is not only then. Yesterday, I literally went to the bathroom three times within an hour, and two of those times were seriously five minutes apart. When I am running errands, I try to make time to stop at places whose bathrooms I know won't totally gross me out because I am bound to need to use them. If you get pregnant, stock up on toilet paper!

Second, growing pains. I was having some strange feeling pains in my utero-abdomen area. (I have potentially made up that word.) It wasn't a sharp pain that made me worry anything was wrong, but more like a dull soreness that would tighten every now and then to be a little more intense. This would happen for various amounts of time. Come to find out, these are the totally normal aches that come from your belly stretching to accomodate the growing human inside of you. I don't ever remember anyone saying anything about this part hurting, but I suppose it does make sense. My body is growing in ways it never has before, and just like any muscles being stretched or worked out, there is bound to be some soreness. It isn't anything unbearable, so don't be afraid. And if you ever experience any pains that do cause you to worry, call your doctor right away! They are happy to help walk you through the amazing process your body is going through, and you aren't being a bother by asking questions. :) What is cool about these aches is that I can tell when the baby is experiencing a growth spurt because I can feel my belly experiencing one, too. I don't necessarily have these every day yet, but I am sure that is coming soon.

Third, I am sooooo itchy!! Particularly in the boob area, I find myself itching quite a lot. As your skin stretches, it gets itchy. While my belly is growing, it is still stretching at a fairly slow rate, so it has only itched off and on periodically. My future baby-feeders, however, have itched every day and for large chunks of the day. I recently started rubbing Palmer's Cocoa Butter Skin Therapy Oil on them at night, and it has helped immensely with the itching. For good measure, I am already rubbing it on my belly, too. I know I am only weeks away from it starting to grow at a rapid rate, so I may as well start to prepare, right?

Fourth, the heartburn and indigestion have begun. While it isn't the constant one that I will have in later pregnancy, which happens more because all of the muscles in your body, including your esophogus, relax late in pregnancy in preparation for child birth, it has been triggered by certain foods recently that haven't ever caused this to happen before. Yesterday, I ate a bowl of grits and drank some fruit juice for breakfast, and I almost instantly felt horrible heartburn. Being the good Southern girl that I am, I have had many a bowl of grits for breakfast without any problem, so this was new. I ended up eating maybe four or five TUMS to stop the pressure, and I didn't really have it the rest of the day, but this has been happening several times a week now.

Fifth, and probably the last big one, is poor sleeping at night. This is another one of those symptoms that I thought wouldn't happen until later in pregnancy, but it is already hitting me. I wake up at least two or three times per night whether it is needing to pee or just feeling uncomfortable in the position I am laying in. I have already started trying to sleep on my sides, and my body is just not used to that. When I lay on my back, I can see my belly pulse to the beat of my heart. My doctor says this is because Baby Dumpling is now big enough to lay on the main artery that runs behind my uterus, but not big enough yet to cut the flow. So, baby's coccoon just bumps along to my heartbeat. In a week or two, I won't be able to lay on my back at all because the baby will stop the flow of blood in this artery, so I am trying to go ahead and condition myself to sleep in other positions. One body pillow and several pillow configurations later, and I still cannot ease myself into a long, restful sleep. I happen to think this is maybe God's way of preparing me for the many times I will have to wake up in the night when the little one arrives, so I am not too upset by it. I do try to nap when I can if I feel tired, so that helps. (Thank God for summer breaks!)

So, that about sums up my physical experiences with week 18. Mentally, I am still thrilled with and loving being pregnant. It makes me smile at random times and pray almost continuously a prayer of thanksgiving. I know I have a long way to go and many things to experience, but I feel so blessed to be chosen to house God's weaving and spinning of a new life.

Left on our to do list: finishing the registry and everything to do with the nursery. :) I have decided to register through amazon.com to make sure my registry has everything we want or need on it. It will give our friends and family the option of shopping online or printing and taking the list to their local store to shop. I have done lots of blog hopping to try to make sense of what moms say are registry essentials, and I will make a post on that later with links to some of my favorite blog resources for that endeavor. Yesterday, walking through Target, I was so grateful that we aren't finding out what the sex of the baby is because I am pretty sure I would have dropped some serious dough on the adorable clothes and accessories they have out right now! ;)

Whew! I think that is plenty of blog for now. Sorry for the stream of consciousness, but pregnancy sure does give a girl a lot to think about and experience. I hope to blog with you again soon, and feel free to leave comments and suggestions. :)

Y'all Come Back Now, Ya Hear?
Brittney