14 Weeks

I’m going to be doing periodic updates on my pregnancy here on the blog, starting today :). I will not, however, begin posting “belly shots” until I look pregnant instead of just fat, lol.

I’m  now 14 weeks – only 26 weeks to go!

My “morning” sickness has mostly subsided. I haven’t mentioned it here, but I had a nasty bout with mild hyperemesis gravidarum in April. It was on our Canada trip, actually, and I’ll be writing some more about that later this week. I was at a point where I went nearly 4 days without keeping anything – food or drink – down, and when we got back from Canada, Will dropped me off at the ER while he and the boys went home to bed (we got back into town around 11pm). (Don’t worry – he woke up promptly with my phone call and came to pick me up around 2am when I was discharged from ER.) Anyway, that night, I ended up with with a dose of IV zofran (anti-nausea medication), a full bag of IV saline, and half a bag of IV electrolytes for dehydration. The ER doctor also gave me a prescription for zofran pills to help me. Now, almost six weeks later, I feel pretty good most of the time – about two weeks earlier than I was feeling good with any of the boys. (With them, the morning sickness was tolerable, though – one “throwing up” episode per day, and then good the rest of the day.) I’ve had severe nausea once or twice a week, and I take my zofran during those times, but I’m really glad it’s getting so that I don’t need the pills very often. My doctor (my regular doctor, not the ER doc) extended my zofran prescription to get as many refills as I need – that the insurance will pay for, anyway – for a full year. I haven’t needed to refill it at all yet, which is good.

I had a doctor’s appointment this morning, which was really encouraging. I got to hear baby’s heartbeat for the first time (we got to see it at my ultrasound at 10 weeks, but didn’t hear it) – a healthy 150 beats per minute. And I talked to my doctor about the possibility of having a “normal” birth, considering I’ve had 2 c-sections, and she said she thinks I’d be a good candidate. Yay! The only hangup is that my local hospital doesn’t do VBACs (vaginal birth after cesarean) at all, so I’ll have to deliver at a larger hospital that’s farther away to have my chance. I’ve talked to Will, and done a lot of thinking myself, and we’ve decided that it’s worth the drive to give it our (my) best shot. So the doctor is going to call the bigger hospital later today and gather information for me. If they’re amenable to a VBA2C, then she’ll let me know (well, I’m sure she’ll let me know either way), and she suggested that at that point, I schedule an appointment with one of the providers at that hospital to “start the process” of preparing for delivery there. She wasn’t sure whether the bigger hospital would request/require that I do the remainder of my prenatal appointments with them, or just start going to them for the later (third trimester) appointments, or neither and just show up when I’m in labor. So that’ll be something else to get figured out once I know for sure whether they’ll even have me. But my doctor said there’s really no difference between a VBA1C and a VBA2C as far as risk, so she’s confident it’ll be a go. I’m super excited about the possibility, and I’m glad I asked her about it today even though we’re still six months away from having a baby.

My mind has been pretty much “all baby all the time” the past couple of weeks. I’ve been reading a lot on baby forums, as well as thinking about making a registry. (Yes, this is our fourth child, but some people might still want to buy gifts, and I’d like to be prepared for that possibility. We didn’t have one with Munchkin or Small Fry, but people threw me a shower with both anyway, so if that happens again, I want to give people an idea of what we need for a new baby. Hence, the registry.) At my appointment today, I was able to schedule the next two appointments. One will be just a regular appointment, like today (my vital signs as well as listening to baby’s heart on the doppler). But on July 6th, we’ll have our next ultrasound! That gives us seven weeks to decide whether to find out the gender or not. Eek! I change my mind on that about every other day. Right now, I’m leaning heavily toward finding out, especially since doc thinks I’ll get my chance at a vaginal birth. If word comes back that the bigger hospital won’t let me try for a vaginal birth and we end up with another schedule cesarean, then we’ll probably opt out of finding out gender. With Small Fry, we had both – we knew the gender, and he had a scheduled birth via c-section – and the whole thing felt kind of anticlimactic by the end. I want something to be a surprise – either the birthday or the gender. So a more final decision on that will come down from me later.

Also, Will and I started discussing names a couple of days ago. We came up with a not-too-long list of both boy names and girl names (though the girl list is a lot longer – we’re kind of running out of boy names, lol), and we each definitely have our favorites. Baby names are one of those things that you just “know” when you’ve found the right one, though. While Will said (regarding my top girl name), “If you want that name, I’m fine with it. It flows well,” I could tell that he didn’t love it. So we’ll keep brainstorming. The boys have been offering suggestions here and there as well – some serious and some silly. Even though they won’t get a “real” say in it, we’ll definitely take their serious suggestions into account and put them on the list.

So, I guess that’s it for now. I’ll have another pregnancy post in four weeks after my next appointment!

Blessings,