Round Two!

Hiya friends! As of today, I am 14 weeks along, and baby is scheduled to make their appearance in early February. These last few months have been a bit of a roller coaster, so without further delay, lets get into this pregnancy update!

The first trimester of this pregnancy was nothing like my first pregnancy. I barely noticed a difference the first time around. Around 7 weeks, I started getting tired and would have the occasional headache. This time around, beginning around 5.5 weeks, I felt bloated, nauseous, generally crappy, so tired I could barely keep my head up all day, and had spotting that scared the heck out of me. Then at about 8.5 weeks I started getting really bad nausea and headaches. I had several days of just being completely confined to the couch or the bed, when even the simplest tasks, like getting up to get a glass of water or empty the dishwasher were just too much. Laundry sat in baskets unfolded in the middle of the living room. So, its been different. I started reading Expecting Better, which hadn't come out yet in 2014. I'm really enjoying it. My sister told me about it when she was pregnant in 2016, but I forgot what it was called until someone mentioned it on the Birth Hour, and I immediately downloaded it onto my Kindle.

Here's the typical pregnancy stuff:

Cravings: I'm fresh out of the first trimester. I wouldn't say I have cravings. I would say I have "let's have X for dinner because it is the only thing I think I could tolerate right now" Usually, this means some kind of crunchy food - like hard shell tacos or big crunchy salad.

Aversions: Coffee. My usual morning latte just sounds repulsive at the moment. I was having iced chai in the mornings, mostly enjoying the flavor, but feeling yucky once it hits my stomach. So, I stopped having those. Most animal protein sounds disgusting. I've had a really hard time eating chicken and steak. I have to kind of disguise meat in other things - like (see above) big salads, burrito bowls, soups, etc. Around 10 weeks, my husband made his own parmesan chips. It stunk up the whole house and made me so sick.

Nausea: This comes and goes.Now that I'm clear of the first trimester, I'm *hoping* that means no more (or at least minimal) nausea. For a while there, I was nauseous and had some kind of headache every single day. I didn't throw up much - only once, I think, but we did have to stop the car a few times so I can get my land legs. The excess saliva is no joke. I just feel generally crappy and exhausted basically all the time. And bloated. So so bloated.

Gender: Don't know yet. Won't for a little while. We are going to find out though, so I'll post when we do.

Energy: What's that? I miss my workouts. I'm trying to workout more often, but I'm living my life with pretty much the bare minimum to get by.

Missing: I'd really like some sushi and eggs over easy on toast, and a freaking Jimmy Johns turkey sandwich. I feel like I could eat those things without getting sick.  I have been going a bit easy on myself with the restrictions, as Expecting Better helped lay out the medical evidence for all the things we avoid, but I still haven't taken the plunge on those most missed.

Sleep: Not terrible, but not great either. Falling asleep to begin with is the hard part, and even though the internet says Melatonin is OK to take, I'm not about to go and F with anybody's hormones.

Maternity clothes? Mostly no. I did put on one of my sisters big cozy maternity tops last week, but it didn't look very maternity-ish. I'm still wearing my pants, but I have resorted to the old rubber band trick until I'm ready to go full fledged maternity pants. Sundresses are a huge win at the moment.

Exercise? At the moment, I've been managing to get in about 2 workouts a week -  a steep drop from my usual 6-7, but I am hopeful that I'll work my way back up. I have had a couple of weeks when I managed 4 workouts, so I know that I can do it. I just hope it doesn't totally knock me back into feeling terrible.

I think that's it for now.

Currently; May 2018

Hi friends!!! I'm baaaack! (For now anyway) 

And I'm currently reading...

I went on an audiobook binge in April - I "read" Little Fires Everywhere, Ready Player One, The Language of Flowers, and Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine. They were all good. I enjoyed them tremendously, but the last one had something that the others did not. I can't quite explain it. I'm sure if Eleanor were real and I interacted with her in person I would not like her, but I felt very connected to her as I was reading the book. I started reading Kindred a little while back - actually reading it, not listening to it. I started it back up in Hawaii. Still enjoying it, but its hard to get down time with a little child around. Now that life has calmed down a bit (just a bit), I'd like to get back to it.

Cloth Diapers; Our Hybrid (AI2) System

I started writing this post over a year ago... when my kiddo was still in diapers. Umm... because he's been potty trained since last summer. I even had it mostly written, but then life blew up - as it does - and I left my blog alone for a good long while. Part of me is still surprised sometimes that it's here.

So, here goes, eh?...

toddler smoothies

 As is tradition with many toddlers, mine refuses most green vegetables. This has required a touch of creativity on my part, as the preparer of most of his food. Seriously, though, hooray for daycare providing meals when he's there. We'd probably both lose it if I had to make him these smoothies for every meal.

For now though, he ABSOLUTELY LOVES these dang smoothies. See that grubby little toddler hand trying to get his smoothie off the counter?
He gets healthy nutrients and slurps those things down in mere minutes. I kid you not. As long as there are no chunks to clog the straw, he doesn't even take breaks. His smoothie is gone before I've made my own. I even step it up a notch and use my homemade coconut milk.

breastfeeding is hard; part 2

(Want to read part 1 first? Click here.)

Our first full day at home is kind of a blur. As I write this, over a year later, I recall this was the day my grandparents came to visit.

Breastfeeding barely registers on my memory. Pillows stacked high. Trying all different positions in vain. I remember more how much I loved staring at my baby's face, and how much my whole body ached.

The nights though - the heat on high because of that terrible woman telling us "baby boys born in the winter were most likely to die of SIDS". My hands and feet were hot and puffy so I don't know how much I would have slept anyway.

The tiny one would fall asleep nursing. I could easily put him down, but would wake 15 minutes later without fail. I don't remember sleeping. I remember Tim telling me "he's hungry" and snapping at him because I didn't understand how the baby could be hungry.

breastfeeding is hard; part 1

I was around 37 weeks pregnant when I went back in for a second complete anatomy scan. The midwife was concerned that my belly was too small, which turned out to be unnecessary because baby was absofuckinglutely perfect, but before we knew that, at the end of the scan, the tech hovered the wand over his face for a few extra moments to show us our baby was already practicing suckling. We watched him there on the screen, sucking on his tongue. That image is burned into my mind. My baby was practicing eating. He was real and ready to be out on his own.

When we left the hospital on Sunday, December 14, 2014 with a 36 hour old baby in tow, he had still not properly latched. Turns out, that whole sucking on his tongue thing was actually a problem.

In the delivery room the Friday before, midnight approaching, the room was dark when I came out of my first assisted trip to the bathroom and my kick-ass no-BS labor & delivery nurse, Krystle, helped me try to breastfeed my baby for the first time. I was already in my wheelchair, ready to transfer to postnatal, and she wasn't concerned when we couldn't quite figure it out. It wasn't her specialty and she knew that the lactation consultant would come by my room in the morning to help. It was already practically morning anyway.

spinach & cottage cheese pancakes

Finding nutritious foods that a toddler likes has been a bit of a challenge for me. For the most part, he loves food in general, but certain green foods - broccoli, green beans, spinach, etc - he will taste and then reject. Every. Single. Time.
So, I've been finding ways to slip green food into my (as it turns out) picky todder's diet. He already downs homemade pouches every day, which is where he gets most of his green food, but I was looking for something different.

A girl from our Mommy & Me recommended a pancake recipe she makes for her son. Hers included blueberries and had no cottage cheese. It almost felt like a waste to blend blueberries up into pancakes when they're one of the few foods I can reliably count on him to eat raw every time he's handed some, so I opted for spinach only, and maybe I'd add a nut butter for flavor?

I ended up keeping it super simple. This recipe makes about 12 sand dollar size pancakes.

1/2 c. 4% milk fat cottage cheese
1/2 c. rolled oats
3 eggs
1 large handful of fresh (washed) spinach

Blend. I used a Nutribullet.
Pour a few dollops into the skillet of your choice on medium heat, wait until it starts to bubble, flip, give it another minute. Done.

The batter is on the thin side, so be careful pouring.

I ate these for breakfast too. They're pretty good. :)