Has it really been a week?

I am so mad at myself!  I can't believe it has been a friggin' week since I posted last.  I told myself I was going to be more diligent about this and I completely slacked off.  I suppose I shouldn't get too down.  Work has been an insane mad house this week and with the potential of a State government shut down looming over us on Friday, my stress is warranted.  Working for a nonprofit that receives state funding is a tough place to be in right now.  If the government shuts down on Friday, our money stops and we have to start eating through our reserves.... which is basically nil.  Send us Minnesotans some positive vibes!

Anyhey, enough about crazy politicians; how is everyone doing?

Things over here are right on track.  I have been feeling the first movements of the baby, which is pretty awesome.  I cried the first time.  We have our A/S on July 18th, and we are really excited to find out if it is gonna be blue or pink!  I have a gut feeling that Baby K is a girl, but we shall see.  The Zofran is still working wonders and I am so thankful to all of you out there that recommended it.  It is a lifesaver.
We also got the results of our blood work back and baby tested negative for Downs, Trisomy disorders and neural tube defects, etc.  It was just another milestone of relief.  Sometimes I still can't believe that we are now 18 weeks along and everything is going to smoothly.  I am thankful every day for that. 

It is pretty humid in my town today and Robert is going to have to lug the AC unit up to the bedroom tonight.  I am sick of being sticky and hot! 

I am feeling that pregnant lady glow thing and I think I am looking pretty smokin' hot lately.  I am rockin' the maxi dresses and sandals.  I haven't had any swelling, which rocks.  I have been making sure to drink lots of water and walking a lot.

I am lovin' life! 

16 week check up

Morning all!

Yesterday was allegedly the first day of summer, but here in Northern Minnesota, it was barely 45 degrees and raining cats and dogs. I am not in a very summery mood when the weather is so crappy. Andddddd we have an exact repeat of yesterday's weather today.  How depressing does this look:



I am in dire need of some sun!

I did have a little ray of sunshine on Monday when I had my quick 16 week check up.  I always get nervous before my appointments.  I know in my heart that everything is fine, but there is always that chance that it isn't and I just get nervous.

Robert couldn't leave work so Debbiemom came with me.  Dr. S was delivering babies so I had to see the nurse practitioner.  All my vitals were perfect.  My weight gain is right on schedule. Mom is one healthy sacred vessel!  

The NP put the Doppler on my stomach and I held my breath.  After a few seconds (which to me felt like hours) I heard that strong heartbeat coming through.  I got an instant lump in my throat and felt relieved.

She said the baby is right on schedule and everything was wonderful.  Next up:  Our 20 week appointment where we will learn if we have a baby girl or a baby boy!

We were going to try and schedule it for on or around July 14th (Robert's 30th birthday!) but sadly, Dr. S is booked until July 18th.  :-(  I was kind of bummed because we were gonna do this big surprise for his friends at his party, but we decided to take the morning off of work and sleep in and just relax before we go.  I am very excited to finally register and start buying all the things that this little one will need. 

It is finally my turn......

-Courtney

Does this make me a sellout?

I have seen other moms fill out these surveys online and I always told myself that surveys were dorky, and a waste of time.  You become very cynical when you are TTCAL and I didn't want to be "that pregnant lady" when it finally was my turn. 
Now that I am am with child, I am singing a different tune.  I want to do all the nerdy things that I told myself I wouldn't do.  This survey, is by far the nerdiest:

How far along?  16 weeks, 2 days. Being in the double digits and in the second trimester, gives me a little stress relief.
Weight gain/loss: I lost almost 10 lbs in my first trimester and I am slowing working on getting that back.  I am about 3 lbs under my pre-pregnancy weight.  Obviously I am a bigger girl and I am not just gonna pork it on.
Maternity clothes?  Some.  Like I said, I am a bigger girl so my normal clothes are still going to fit.  I do have some maternity shirts and pants (Secret Agent pants... I love 'em) and I find them to be more flattering and comfortable.  I also had to invest in the maternity bras.  My tatas are GIGANTIC right now and I swear, they weigh 600lbs.
Stretch marks? Yep.  I have a big scar of my stomach from botched phyloricstenosis surgery when I was 12 days old and then I had the scar revised in 2007.  Since that is mostly scar tissue under there, it doesn't have a lot of give anymore.  The stretch marks have formed around the scar, almost making it look like an eye.  It is kinda creepy, but I am pregnant so it is kind of expected.
 Sleep?  I toss and turn sometimes and I wish I didn't have to get up at 5am every day for work. :-(  Maybe law firms should open at 11am...
Best moment this week?  I will be happiest after my appointment today and I can hear that heartbeat!Food cravings:  Steak burritos... we all know how I feel about them. :-)
Gender:  I am about 99% sure Baby is a girl... we will know in less than 4 weeks!
Belly button in or out?  In... thank goodness....
Movement?  I think I felt baby once last week, but it is still kinda early.  I can't wait to feel it all the time!What I miss?  The only thing I really miss is sleeping on my tummy.  I have this feeling that it would make my back ache less. :-)
What I’m looking forward to:  Being a mom.  Some people know exactly what they were put on earth to do, and I was put here to be a mother.
Milestones:  Every day that my pregnancy goes smoothly and healthily, is a milestone. I am thankful every single day for every day.

Ok, I suppose that wasn't too dorky.....

~Courtney

Sea Bands and Blue Oil

I bit the bullet yesterday.  I have a doctor's appointment on Monday afternoon, but I couldn't wait any longer.  This gagging thing was driving me nuts.  I called Dr. S's office and tried to see if they had any new ideas of what I can do for this.
Guess what?  They didn't.
This whole excessive gagging thing is wearing on me.  I find myself crying super easily (yes, I realize it is the hormones) and being almost depressed because of it.
Dan and I decided to go on a quest yesterday.  I left work at noon, since I could not stifle the gag, and Dan and I went in search of gag-stopping remedies. 
I had heard of Sea Bands from my doctor and in my baby guide book.  They are cloth bands with a little nodule on the on inside.  You are supposed to put the nodule side down on the inside of your wrist and the acupressure is supposed to help stop morning sickness and motion sickness.  I am not sure if they are working but they do make my hands tingle sometimes.
I also went to an Aveda salon and bought Blue Oil.  Peppermint is supposed to be calming and it allegedly  curbs nausea.  I put it behind my ears, on my wrists and under my nose.  I have only gagged three times this morning so I am going to call that a win.
I am hoping these work so I can get back to a little normalcy, and feeling like Courtney again.
The only thing keeping me going is that I have my 16 week appointment on Monday and I get to hear that beautiful heartbeat again. :-)
Happy Thursday!

~Courtney

Did you really just eat my burrito?

Steak Burritos.  Yummy, grilled steak burritos. 
I have literally craved those every second of this pregnancy.  They are really the only food that hasn't made me gag and turn up my nose.  When we make them at home, I can eat four of them; no problem.  And when we go down to the Cities this weekend to see my in laws, I am going to my favorite burrito place, Chipotle.  We don't have a Chipotle in Duluth and it really saddens me to my very core.  How am I supposed to satisfy my burrito craving without a Chipotle?!
I guess basically, I need to get the point across that I seriously love burritos.  That is a background for today's post.
This pregnancy has brought on all kinds of vivid dreams.  Usually they are nightmare/slasher dreams and I wake up SUPER scared and sweating.  I have always suffered from night terrors and vivid nightmares, but I couldn't imagine how much this pregnancy would intensify them.  Over the past two weeks, I have had a nightmare every night.  Usually, they are reoccurring dreams I have had before and it is like my body is playing them over and over, one by one.
Last night was a whole new kind of trauma.

Last night I had a dream that I was at an AWESOME burrito place, and I was entering a burrito eating contest.  This burrito is called the El Macho and weighed like 4lbs!  (I told you.. my dreams are crazy!)  At this point, I was hugely pregnant and a shoe in for the winner.  Then, out of nowhere, my husband decides to enter the competition; just to spite me!  As the contest starts, I take an easy lead and know that I will be victorious.  As we are about to finish, Robert eats the rest of his burrito, two freakin' bites ahead of me, making him the winner!  How could he do this to me?! I was beyond angry.  After the contest was over, he started taunting me about how he was the best burrito eater in the world, and how I didn't deserve to eat burritos.  WTF?!
When I woke up, part of me was actually angry with him! Haha.. I looked over at him, sleeping soundly, and I remember thinking, as I walked to the bathroom, "You burrito eating bastard!"

When I told him about the dream this morning, my loving Robert reassured me that he would never make fun of my burrito consumption, and that all burritos were mine for the taking. :-)  (Thank goodness!)

Hope my craziness gave you guys a chuckle this morning!
~Courtney

My heart may literally burst with happiness

Today started out really crappy for me today.  I was having some tough morning sickness, Robert kept making gross "hock-a-lougey" noises that made me gag, and my coworkers were driving me nuts.
Work was insanely busy and I couldn't wait until the end of the day when I could check in with all my blog ladies. 
The IF community is a tight knit one.  No one truly understands how this feels until they experience it themselves.  But don't get it wrong; I would not wish being part of this community on anyone.  It is a tough road and you have to be one tough lady to forage this terrain.
As I was checking in with my ladies, I was so happy to learn that one of the women is pregnant.  I couldn't help but cry out of excitement.  I am hoping and praying that this is the "sticky baby." :-)  If you looked up "Gonna be an Awesome Mom," in some sort of dictionary, this girl's picture would be there.  I am keeping every finger crossed for you girl!
There is another girl I follow, and after a lot of IF and heartache, she decided to take a break, and therefore, a break on her blog as well.  After she quit writing, I checked back for a few days, and when she hadn't posted, I figured I would wait a while.  I hadn't checked in on her for a few weeks and then I checked in on her today and I noticed she had been posting again.  The newest post was a picture of her staining a crib.  My heart literally jumped in my throat. 
I went back to the first post since the break and learned that she and her husband will be the proud parents of a baby girl via adoption in less than 3 weeks!  Once again, the tears were flowing.

I am so happy for these two and I hope that there is more and more happy endings for the wonderful IF moms out there!
You are both in my prayers ladies!!!

A quick hello

Hi everyone!  How are we doing today?

I realized I hadn't been around lately.   I am a slacker loser.  Anyhey, things are going well on the baby front.  I will be 15 weeks on Friday and chugging right along.  Unfortunately, my morning-noon-and-night sickness STILL has not passed.  I am praying that I am not one of those pregnant women that are on the verge of vomiting like every 30 seconds.  It is really hard to try and enjoy this magical time when I am constantly gagging and violently retching.  My appetite is really still not there.  I try to make the food I can eat count, though.  I am trying to eat lots of whole wheat, fruits, proteins, and veggies.  Sometimes and I do splurge and eat a bag of gummy worms.  I am still using the BNatal sickness suckers, but I have also found these things called Preggie Pop Drops and unlike the BNatals, which you can only use every 6 hours, Preggie Pop Drops can be used any time.  I find that these two things have really helped me. 
I have also noticed that my nose is ultra sensitive.  If something smells gross, or ripe, or stale, I am immediately gagging.  The other day, Robert had a left over hamburger in the fridge, and he didn't wrap it up all the way, and the smell made me wretch for a minute straight!  ICK!

I have my next doctor's appointment on the 20th.  I am excited for it.  I feel like I have been in there so much. At my 12 week appointment, we had the First Trimester Screening.  There is an opening at the back of the baby's neck that is called a Nuchal and during the ultrasound, they need to take measures of it.   It is a marker for certain birth defects.  This nuchal is only visible until 14 weeks.  At the 12 week appointment, the baby was moving around too much and they couldn't see it. And we tried everything!  Internal ultrasound, external ultrasound, full bladder, empty, bladder, the whole nine.  This baby just kept wanting to look at Mommy and Daddy.  :-)
The scheduled me to come back a week later to see if we could see it again. 
A week goes by, I go in.  Once again, I was carrying a full bladder.  We tried everything again, but my baby was too busy dancing!  Since we couldn't see the nuchal this time, I had to have a quad screening blood test at my 20th appointment.  For some reason, they need to take blood out of all four of my fingers.  Weird.
I will also get my first measure of the fundus.  Fun.  Robert can't come to this appointment so Debbiemom will tag along.  She is just dying to hear the baby's heartbeat.  And I have to admit, it is pretty magical.

Hmmm.. I have just completely lost my train of thought, and can't remember what else I was going to post.  Perhaps that is a sign that I should get back to work huh?  I hope everyone is doing well! 

-Courtney

I'll bear that cross with honor, because freedom don't come free

I sat at my computer for a long time and fought back the tears before I wrote this post.  This post has nothing to do with IF or babies, or pregnancy, but it has to do with me.

We had my brother Nick's deployment this past weekend.  I can tell you that it was absolutely heartbreaking.  Nick is my little brother, my Bear Cub, and my friend. Knowing that it would be 365 days until I see him again, ripped my heart out.  I knew I wanted to hold it together for Sandymom.  I am usually the emotional one, and the preggo hormones aren't helping.
I put on my "Proud Sister of a US Solider" t-shirt and we all caravaned to Pine City.  The weather was sunny and warm but you could feel that the air was thick.  There was kids saying goodbye to their moms and dads, wives saying goodbye to their husbands, mothers and fathers saying good bye to their children; it was so rough.
There was a giant group consisting of me, Zack, Joel, Joel's girlfriend Brooke, Robert, Dad, Sandymom, Nick's girlfriend Kristina, and tons of extended family.  We all put on our tough faces and hid behind our sun glasses.  The soldiers sat in the arena area and family took our seats in the bleachers.  Politicians, city officials, and commanding officers took their turns making speeches.  At this point, I was doing OK.  I was keeping myself calm, not letting the tears come, and then the color guard leader came up to speak.  There is a group of veterans that all ride big Harley motorcycles and they are HUGE supporters of our deployed troops.  They make sure that families of the deployed soldiers are taken care of and they do a hell of a good job.
Now keep in mind; the man making the speech was a big biker guy.  I am talking like black leather, mutton chops and a handle bar 'stache.  He was looking tough.  He started making his speech about how he is sending a flag with this group and how it is signed by everyone is his club.  This big, tough biker then looked at all the troops and said, "If there comes a time when the day is rough, and you feel like no one cares; look at this, and you will know that we are here for you." 

And then his voice cracked.

Here was this hardened war veteran, a motorcycle riding badass, and he was tearing up. He was so proud of our troops and felt such a sense of honor, it was beautiful to see.  Not that I actually saw it though; the minute his voice cracked, I was a crying mess.

The rest of the ceremony was just as touching and I made it through the rest without much more tears.  My family decided to skip the lunch at the armory and go get lunch on our own.  There was lots of laughs, stories, and hugs. 
When it was time to go, I could feel my stomach balling up, and my throat getting tight.  I have never walked so slow in my life.  I was trying to get every second I could with him.  I tried to hang in there for Sandymom, but when I gave him his hug goodbye, I let the flood gates open.  I could hear Nick tell me, "Please don't cry.  Everything will be just fine."
I let him go and started walking towards my car.  I could barely look back at him when I heard him yell, "Love you Mama Bear!"  I sat in my car and just bawled.  I cried for a good part of the way home.  I missed him already.  I am so proud of you, Nick.

Nick and his 94th Infantry Cavalry Scouts will be the final soldiers deployed in this war.  Nick and his troops are part of Operation: New Dawn.  They will be responsible for helping to pull all the soldiers and equipment out of Iraq and Afghanistan and bring them all back to the base in Kuwait.  Those guys and girls will be "turning out the lights" as they say.  They will pull the Americans out so the Iraqi and Afghan leaders can take responsibility for their own countries.  After they are successful, Nick will come home to all of us.

Only 357 days to go. :-)

Here are some pictures from that day:



94th Infantry Cavalry Scouts

Nick, Sandymom, and Zack

My own hero!