Shainupdate

It’s been at least a week or two since I last moaned—I mean updated—about this pregnancy, right? I have not been in the mood to write about it lately because I already feel so darn selfish in normal life, and a blog post about my newfound selfish ways seemed to be the pinnacle of self-ivity (made-up word alert). But I guess I should let you favorite few who actually read this blog know what’s going on every now and then. I promise I’ll try not to be too negative!

Caveat: this goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyways because I’m in charge of this blog and saying it makes me feel better about complaining. I am SO grateful to be pregnant. I know it is a huge blessing and I want this baby so badly. I love her already! None of that gratitude and love is marred by the discomforts of pregnancy. The baby-joy is in one mental box, and the preg-agony is in another. They do not interfere with each other. Just because I hate food, it doesn’t mean I hate babies! There, just in case you were wondering. Time for a little good-natured complaining…

Pregnancy makes me so self centered! Three examples:

1. I usually get mySELF food before my kids at mealtimes. I’m just too scared of what happens when I get too hungry (nausea, shakiness, and possible gagging). So I feed myself first and often feel like a slime ball while doing it. Then I deal with the two little mouths that circle around me begging for bites when I don’t get them food first. I have to remind myself multiple times every day that I’m not taking care of myself before my kids; I’m taking care of my baby before my older, less-helpless kids. I tell Jay and Rose that my third breakfast is for Amber, so no, they can’t have a third breakfast with me. It actually helps them understand why I have to eat when I do, thankfully, because normally if one of us eats, all of us have to eat. So I let Jay and Rose each have one snack between breakfast and lunch, and one snack between lunch and dinner. The rest of my in-between snacks are just for Amber.

2. I have to sit and rest in my chair before helping Jay with something in the basement. Normally if I felt tired or achy or ill, I’d quickly go help Jay and then relax, but I can’t even do that right now. It’s all about keeping my body as stable as possible, which requires the kids to wait for me a lot. A certain amount of begging, questioning, and badgering does result from all their waiting, but I’m getting rather adept at noncommittal responses, which allow me the time I need.

3. I choose to use what energy I am granted in a day to do housework instead of be sociable—there’s rarely energy enough for both. This is the first time since college that I’ve lived anywhere long enough to have friends, and I miss them! I do still go to our book club, but that’s only once a month, and not everyone comes. Church is a very limited social scene, especially for us Primary teachers. Ah well. It’s just weird to feel so disconnected. I use Facebook a lot to compensate. It’s not the same.

Other Pregnant Perceptions:

There are so many more positives than negatives right now! I just have to remember that when I start feeling yucky for the twelfth time in a day. Even my yucky spells are so much less yucky than they used to be! But feeling yucky is still yucky, no matter the magnitude of the yuck.

I have not puked since that Tuesday of Doom almost four weeks ago. My medicine is effective, and I’m not messing with it.

I feel baby swirls and twirls so often that I’m used to them now. When I do notice a particularly strong jab, I feel a mixture of “this is so weird!” and “yay! She’s alive!”

I like bread again. This is big. It was a long 4 months without the staple of my LIFE, but now we’ve been reunited and I can finally stomach toast with apricot jam once more. The word “yum” may not describe any food to me right now, but at least I can get it in and keep it there. Less and less of my private pre-meal prayers include the phrase “please let it stay down.” I count that as a victory.

Actually, fruit pizza is approaching yum-status, as is fresh corn on the cob. In fact, I’ve had just those two, with bread, for dinner a few nights recently. Progress. It about killed me to make this beauty of a pizza (it’s a lot of work), but for an almost-yum, it was worth my while.

I still hate chocolate. Well, Amber seems to dislike it. I don’t even feel the slightest bit tempted by anything chocolaty. Shudder.

I worked on this list--“Food that sounds good” --all day. Fail.

On a good week, I cook dinner two nights. Often less. We’ve been eating a lot of breakfast burritos and sandwiches for dinner. Jeff valiantly takes over mealtime when he sees a certain lost look on my face. But dinner variety is nonexistent in our house right now. I don’t like anything enough to spend the time cooking it, and the act of cooking often makes me end up despising whatever I made. The exception is sandwiches. I can do sandwiches. Usually.

In spite of my eating issues, I have managed to finally put on some weight and at my last doctor appointment a week ago, I was TWO POUNDS more than my starting pre-pregnancy weight! Woot. It’s amazing what a few weeks without barfing will do.

20 weeks!

My stomach is expanding. I’m at the stage now where I feel enormous but I know I’m nowhere near as big as I’m going to get by the end. That’s not the most encouraging thought, ha ha.

Wardrobe woes: I finally surrendered to maternity clothes this past week. How on earth do I only have 3 maternity shirts leftover from last time? And they aren’t even very cute! The rest of the clothes in my pregnancy box were ones that kind of worked but were pretty awful anyways. Blah. In the 4 years since I was pregnant with Rose, styles have changed a lot. I held my old maternity shirts up to my beloved, cheap size tall Old Navy t-shirts, and guess which one was longer by about 4 inches? Yep, the non-maternity shirt. Crazy. Thankfully, a select few new styles of baby-belly shirts are nice and lengthy for my long-bellied body, and I discovered them on an exhausting shopping trip over the weekend. I am trying to be frugal with my maternity clothing purchases, but it’s hard to feel frugal when maternity clothes are so expensive. I don’t mind investing in quality clothing, but I’m not going to ever need maternity clothes again after November. That makes it hard to justify many purchases.

I wonder why maternity shirts these days insist on having such deep plunging necklines. I am so not a layer-er! Just make the neck normal, please. Or not.

I got a maternity bathing suit this week, and eew.

I discovered the joys of made-for-bellies maternity waistbands, and I can hardly believe I survived two other pregnancies without them! I can never buy maternity pants because they are all too short, but this is my first summer pregnancy, so bring on the capris! It’s shocking how almost-comfortable I feel in the correct waistband. The LDS store has also come out with an incredibly comfortable option and I could sing every time I don’t feel restrictive waistbands squeezing Amber’s shoulder into my intestines.

20.5 week belly. Can you believe this dress came from Target of all places? I never fit the clothes there. I like it a lot except that at church today, Jay and Rose kept making it slide up to expose my thighs. Slips are slippery when kids’ elbows and knees are involved. It was rather stressful, and reminded me why I usually wear long skirts to church.

The BEST news of all: Baby Amber is halfway done!! The magical twenty week mark was this past Wednesday. I have started daydreaming about her regularly. Now I have less days left than I’ve already survived. That is an encouraging thought.