irrationally relieved...and SO in love!

Cooter, me and Tyler

Over the past couple of weeks, I have developed some rather irrational fears about the baby. My life was plagued with such fears the first 16 weeks of this pregnancy, understandably so. For the most part, I have lived the past 10ish weeks in pure pregnant bliss. With his movements becoming more frequent and predictable (and strong!), I am constantly reassured of his thriving existence. Then about a week ago, I suddenly found the most random things to worry about. Mostly premature birth. I got excited a few weeks ago when my baby bible (What to Expect) said that the baby was potentially viable if it was delivered at that point. Not that I would ever wish a preemie into this world, but to know that we had finally made it far enough that our baby could survive was a huge mental relief. Skip a few weeks ahead and that's the focus of my worries now. It doesn't help that several of the girls on my What to Expect message boards have been admitted to labor & delivery, 4 have had stillborns in the last few weeks (which seems alarmingly huge), and one had her baby last week at 24wks (a surprisingly stable, beautiful baby girl). Well get off the message boards, right? I can't, its addicting. Plus its really a great source of information. Other moms share great advice on everything from pains we're feeling to what brand of bottle they like best.

So then the what-ifs started to scare me. Which is incredibly irresponsible to even let my mind wander there. A pregnant brain is so scattered, its ridiculous, but when you want to erase something out of your mind, it seems like its the first thing you focus on. From the fear of a stillborn, I started worrying every time I realized he wasn't moving, especially if it was during a time he's usually active (like when I lay down in bed). Then to top things off, as if I wasn't irrationally worried enough, I had a dream (oh and let me tell you, pregnancy dreams are surreal!) that my water broke. Oddly enough, they gave me 200 hours to safely deliver the baby LOL. We were ecstatic that he was finally coming. Hours later I realized I was only 26 weeks pregnant, its probably not a good thing if he's coming already. So all of this combined with the fact that the doctor was worried that baby was getting too big too fast caused unnecessary stress and wiped out my pregnant bliss this past week. It kind of makes me laugh now...

Here's me at 25w2d. I am WAY bigger by the evening. And that obviously isn't a maternity shirt...

26w1d belly

All fears erased (for now) and irrationally relieved, we have returned with smiles on our faces from today's appointment. I couldn't sleep last night. Cooter has been traveling a lot lately. Even his day trips have him coming home late. So about 11:30 he finally gets home from Corpus Christi, and I'm trying to stay asleep, but little man was just so excited. Think he could hear Cooter's voice? So I'm laying there until almost 1:30am feeling Ty do gymnastics in my uterus. Nothing painful, but definitely entertaining. He's been scooting around a lot lately...which I learned today is a foot dragging across the top of my belly. Freaky feeling, let me tell you, but so neat! Then he stuck his foot straight out just over my belly button so I had this knot sticking out for a while. Seriously, how do I sleep through all of that? Even if I could, I wouldn't want to miss it. Ask me again in 10 weeks how I feel about being woken up by kicks... As he finally settled down and I drifted to sleep, my appointment apprehensions floated right out the door.

I had the privilege of consuming glucola at 9am this morning. That's the glucose drink you have 5 minutes to chug in preparation to test your blood sugar. I have heard horror stories of this terrible drink. How nasty it is, how sick it makes you feel, etc. They gave me fruit punch flavor (although the orange was recommended to me by others, but I didn't have a choice). I was pleasantly surprised, however. Not that I would choose it for Sonic happy hour, but it most definitely wasn't awful. Kind of tasted like a sweet fruit punch flavored Hi-C. I finished it in about 2 and a half minutes, it wasn't near as big as I expected. Blame it on hunger (I hadn't eaten this morning so my levels wouldn't be high, and I'm always hungry in the morning), but it was do-able. Funny thing was I had to drink it in the LabCorp room with the nurse, as if I would pour it into a plant in the waiting room if they didn't supervise me. Good thing I didn't burp at the end or something. LOL.

Next, we had our ultrasound. The tech asked me if I knew why my doctor requested it and I just told her about the "hmmm, a little big" comment from my 24wk appointment. I always watch the measurements, and of course the baby, during the ultrasound. After having so many ultrasounds early on, I learned what to look for. She measured his head several times, and almost every time it measured about 29wks...I'm 26w5d by the way. His little body length measured about 28w6 days. His heart was ticking away at 138bpm. She measured his leg bones too and I kept trying to peek in between since we've already gone boy crazy. She asked if we already knew what we were having and I said, "is it still a boy?" That it most definitely is! I just needed to know if we need to change Tyler to Tyra or anything silly like that.

Little man is getting harder to see via ultrasound since he's getting bigger. At the end of the measurements, the tech let us watch his face for a little bit. He opened and closed his mouth and at one point his cheeks moved and it sure looked like a smile! Melted my heart!!! His right hand has been up by his face every time we've seen him, but not this time. This time it was his feet! He was holding his legs and his piggies were up by his face. Probably learned that from all the yoga I've been doing... He's head down. So at least now I know when I'm feeling punches or kicks. See the foot up above his nose?!? =)

The rest of the appointment was as routine as you get, which is so reassuring at this point. Weight...good! Oh, Cooter weighed himself when I went to do my urine sample in the bathroom and conveniently left the scale on 208, so when I stepped on it, he said, "208 wow!" Not that anyone would fall for it, but I blushed all the same. Blood pressure...good! No protein my urine! Belly is still measuring a little big for my dates, but in accordance to the baby's size, so its just something they will watch from here on out. That could all change once we know the results of my bloodwork. My weight gain was steady, but normal, so she knows I'm not just eating too much. He's just a growing boy! As Jeremy put it, "he's gonna be a beast!"

Next appointment...March 31. I go every 2 weeks now!

Cooter's parents moved into their new house this past weekend. We went up to LaGrange to help (well Cooter helped, I did very little). It was a nice trip though because the whole family was there. Laila ended up having a couple tumors removed Saturday morning (her vet is in LaGrange), so I spent most of the day taking care of her. She is our baby right now! We got some good family pics on moving day. Its hard to get everyone in the same place at the same time!

The Maxwell/Gonzalez Family

Justin & Emily with Aunt Cooter and Uncle Tip

When you point to my belly and ask Justin who that is...he says, "that's my cousin in there!"

Sis, Cooter, and Lindsey

Here's a couple cute ones of the kids. They are getting SO big now!

Emi LOVES horsies!

Holding hands...SO sweet. They did this on their own!

Sweet boy

Refrigerator! That's sign language for the refrigerator.