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Even though I’m 5′5″, I am what one might call a short-waisted girl. I remember, several years ago, when low-rise jeans first became available in stores. I still praise that day because it was the first time in my life that I was able to buy jeans and wear them off the rack.

Before that sacred, blessed day, every time I bought a pair of “regular” jeans, I had to get my mom to alter them, because either: (a) the waist of the jeans came up to about 2 inches below my bra line (sexay!), or (b) if I pushed them down so they were actually on my waist, it created this weird bulge in the crotch that made me look like I had a package. Not a good look, to say the least.

Because of that, I knew before I got pregnant that I would probably start to show a little earlier than some people. When there isn’t much up-and-down room for the baby to grow, it tends to go straight out in front of you. I know that’s something that my cousin is dealing with right now. Also, when I was in college, I worked with a woman who was about 5 feet tall, and by the time she was 4 months along, people were looking at her sideways, going, “Um…. are you sure you aren’t having twins?” (And even though I thought I understood at the time, I really understand now why those sorts of questions infuriated her.)

But still, I had this delusion that I wouldn’t start to show until my third or fourth month. I don’t know where I came up with that. I think I was basing it on the fact that Madonna was something like 3 months pregnant when she was filming “Evita,” and you couldn’t really tell except for that one scene where she danced with Antonio Banderas. Remember? She was wearing that white satin-y dress and if you looked closely, you could see that she had a little bit of a tummy.

Um, yeah. Comparing my pregnancy to Madonna’s. I’m clearly totally sane.

The point of all this is that I feel like I’m already starting to show, and I’m not even 9 weeks along. Is it possible for me to be showing this early? Or have I just taken up temporary residence in Bloatville? Because I don’t feel like I have a “baby bump,” I feel like I’m just carrying an extra spare tire around my middle. But I’ve actually lost two pounds since I found out I was pregnant a month ago. (Hooray for being too nauseated to eat, although I don’t think that’s a diet plan that I want to stick to.)

My mom keeps insisting that she was in maternity clothes by the time she was ten weeks along. She also has a memory like swiss cheese, so I don’t know how much I believe that. I’m not at the point of wearing maternity clothes yet, but I keep eyeing the few maternity tops that I’ve bought, and thinking that they look really comfortable right about now. My choice of summer clothes is pretty slim since I’ll only wear shirts that are loose around my waist. And my jeans (even my baggy ones that I always had to wear a belt with) are so tight that they’re starting to leave little denim imprints on my flesh, which isn’t too comfortable. Getting dressed for work the past few mornings has not been fun for me.

So, any of you who read this who either are pregnant, have been pregnant, or are close to someone who’s been through it - when is it “normal” to start to show? Is this what the early stages are supposed to feel like, or do I just need to pop a Gas-X and chill out?

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Apologies for the last two posts being flashbacks, I think we can bring things up to present day now.

I had my first doctor’s appointment yesterday, complete with ultrasound. Dave came with me, although I made him scoot the chair around so that he was up by my head. As it is, he’ll witness my body enduring numerous indignities over the next year; I figured that he really didn’t need to see how the business end of a speculum works. At least not this early in the game.

Although it was sort of strange to have Dave in the room during my physical, I just reminded myself that my cat once witnessed one of my pelvic exams, and then it didn’t seem so weird. That’s actually a true story: it was back when Dave and I were first dating and I was flying out (for work) the next day, so I was bringing Teenie to his house while I went out of town. It was one of those situations where I either had to spend an extra 2 hours in traffic or bring the cat with me to the doctor’s office (on my way to Dave’s). And it was like 90 degrees outside, so I couldn’t leave her in the car. So, Teenie sat in her kitty carrier on the floor of the exam room while I had my physical. Luckily, my doctor thought it was hilarious.

Ok, back to current day. Here’s something I didn’t know: eight-week ultrasounds? That is not the kind that they do on your belly. Oh no, it’s an “internal ultrasound” - aka the DildoCam. I kind of had a suspicion about that, but I really wish someone had warned me. It isn’t exactly the most comfortable way to experience the first glimpse of your unborn child, but hey, whatever.

See how cute it is? I don’t think either Dave or I have ever gotten that excited about a fuzzy gray blob.

(Oh, as for my use of the word DildoCam: hi, Google perverts! This is not the site you’re looking for. Move along.)

I also managed to resist the urge to make a joke about whether or not the internal ultrasound had a “vibrate” switch. I think my doctor probably would’ve laughed, but I knew Dave would be mortified, so I behaved myself. (Instead, I just shared my internal-monologue joke with the Internet. Hooray for my lack of a censor button!)

It was sort of weird that I didn’t get emotional or weepy at all during the ultrasound. It was more like a “whew, alright, everything’s ok” relief sort of feeling, not an “oh my gawd, that’s our BAAAYYYBEEE!!!” thing.

But, getting to see the heartbeat was pretty awesome.

So, it looks like everything is ok so far with the baby. As for me, symptom-wise, the fatigue is the worst. The nausea comes and goes, although I still haven’t thrown up yet (I’ve just had a few moments where I really wished that I could have). Other than that, my skin is breaking out and I keep having crazy hormone-induced technicolor nightmares. Oh, and I feel like I’m starting to show, although I’m pretty sure it’s just bloat. Whee! Pregnancy is super-fun!

Whatever. If this is the worst of it, I can take it. As long as this baby comes out healthy, I can deal with a lot worse than this.

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So, when I wrote the New Orleans recap there were a few things I left out. It’s kind of funny that I had so convinced myself that I wouldn’t be pregnant because I didn’t want to be disappointed again, that I had gotten myself all psyched up for this trip to New Orleans, where I could eat oysters and drink hurricanes from Pat O’Brien’s. Since I found out I was pregnant about a week before we left, obviously my dreams of alcohol and raw shellfish were dashed, but I didn’t really care when I considered the trade-off.

That whole first week when I knew I was pregnant? I didn’t have a single symptom. I mean, ok, I was a little more tired than usual, and my boobs were sore, but it wasn’t anything bad. Friday, the day we flew out, is when all of this morning sickness stuff decided to rear its ugly head for the first time. I hate to fly, and I would normally have a drink or take a Dramamine before getting on a plane so I could sleep most of the way. Neither of those are an option for me right now, so instead I learned the hard way that:

motion sickness + morning sickness + one layover + 6 hours of actual flight time + the middle seat (because I’m short, so I always give Dave the aisle) = absolute, pure hell.

Seriously, when we were taking off from Dallas (the location of our layover), I thought I was going to have to make use of the barf bags that they put in the seat backs. I’ve never been that sick on a plane before. (Well, except for the time I flew from Atlanta to Seattle with quite possibly the worst hangover of my life. But at least on that trip, the airline accidentally upgraded me to first class, so I suffered quite comfortably.)

I had made it very clear to my immediate family beforehand that I didn’t want the news of my pregnancy to be announced. This weekend was for my cousin and his fiancee, I didn’t want them to feel like I was stealing their thunder by showing up and being all, “hey everybody, guess what?” Plus the fact that it was still so early that I just didn’t want to talk about it yet. (For the record, I’m still terrified about the risk of miscarriage. I think I’ll feel safer about that when I’m in my second trimester.)

The trip started off ok. My uncle Stanton and aunt Susie (Cat’s folks) went with us when we toured the city on Saturday, and I’m sure they might’ve wondered what was up with me when I was the only one crying over all of the devastation. Or, when we stopped at a gas station to use the restroom, and all they had was one un-air-conditioned porta-potty outside, and it was well over 100 degrees in there, and I seriously almost fainted. Which, ew. Can you think of a grosser place to pass out? I kept thinking that I just needed to get my pants up so I could open the door - that way, if I needed to faint, I could fall forward, land on my aunt (who was next in line) and that would cushion my fall somewhat. (Sorry, Susie!) I made it out of there ok, but then I was all, “Um, could someone please get me a bottle of water and an apple juice, like, oh, NOW?!?!!” (My sister came to my rescue on that one.)

The wedding was that night. And I did ok at first. Then, you know the part of the Catholic service where everyone kneels on the little prayer benches? While I was kneeling, I started to shake and sweat (even though the church was probably 65 degrees), and I thought I was going to pass out. I tried to hold it together, I really did. Dave got me to sit on the pew rather than kneeling, and that was ok. I was still sweating and feeling sort of cotton-mouthed, but the shakiness wasn’t as noticeable as it had been when I was kneeling. The next part of the service was where everyone stood up - everyone except for me, that is, and Dave, who was holding my hand and looking at me really intently because he was waiting for me to keel over any second. I lasted about about another minute like that before I said, “ok, I need to get out of here.”

Both Dave and my mom helped me out - it was mortifying because it was one of those really old cathedrals that doesn’t have a restroom inside. Instead, we had to go out the huge 20-foot door on the side of the sanctuary, and when it opens you can suddenly hear all of the street traffic outside, so it’s really, really noticeable. I think only - oh, everyone - saw me leave in this very non-discreet fashion.

Then, my aunt Michele came chasing after us to make sure we could find the bathroom, because it was sort of confusing - you had to go around the back of the church and through a fence to enter the rectory, and somewhere hidden back there was a bathroom. With no air-conditioning. Again. And no lights, either. Lovely. I drank some (disgustingly warm) tap water out of the sink, splashed a bit on my face, and my mom flipped the lid of the toilet seat down and made me sit on it. After a minute or so, it started to occur to me just how big a spectacle we were, leaving the church like that. I said to my mom, “I guess I’m busted now, huh?” She said, “Well, unless you want people coming up to you all night asking if you’re sick…”

So. We snuck back into the church just as the Communion part was wrapping up. We sat in the back while the ceremony finished, and then we went forward to catch up with the rest of the family. Everyone was sort of milling around the church and chatting, so I went ahead and told everyone then about being pregnant. It wasn’t quite the way that I wanted to handle it, but it was pretty cool. Everyone was really excited for us. And throughout the reception, people kept coming up to Dave and me to congratulate us - all people we hadn’t told, of course, that’s just how fast word spreads in our family. But that’s fine.

Also, when I said to one of my great aunts that I wasn’t planning to talk about it yet because it’s so early, she said, “You told people in church, honey. It’ll be fine.”

Let’s hope so.

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Flashback to three weeks ago.

Thursday, June 1st: I was supposed to start my period. Or so I thought. I was confused (and this will make sense to those of you who chart your cycles) because I knew exactly when I ovulated, but my morning body temperature didn’t go up until four days later. I started counting from the day my temperature went up, not from the day I ovulated. I thought it was strange when I didn’t start my period on Thursday, and referenced my little book for some guidance.

It turns out, I was supposed to count those four days when my temperature was still low. So I realized on that particular Thursday that I actually should’ve started my period on Sunday, May 28th. (Did you catch that I realized this on June 1st? Four days after I should have started my period?)

“Huh,” I thought, “Then that means that I’m most likely…. Noooo, surely not!”

I was sure that I had just miscalculated or misunderstood something in the book, mostly because I didn’t want to be disappointed again. I decided that I would wait until Friday morning before I took a home pregnancy test.

I didn’t even really tell Dave what was going on. Or rather, I kinda-sorta gave him the “I think I might be late” hint, but he ignored it because he thought I was over-reacting (as I tend to do with a lot of things in life).

Friday, June 2nd: My alarm went off at 6 a.m. Normally I hit snooze for at least a half-hour, but there was no way I was going to be able to go back to sleep. I rocketed out of bed and did the whole peeing-upon-the-stick thing. And even though my cat followed me into the bathroom, like she always does, I managed to avoid hitting her in the face this time.

The instructions say that it takes three minutes for the results to show up. Mine showed up in a few seconds.

When I saw the word “Pregnant” in the little digital read-out screen, my hands started to shake and I started to cry. I didn’t know what to do because Dave doesn’t usually wake up until after 8:00, and it wasn’t even 6:05 yet. I paced back and forth around the bathroom for a couple of minutes trying to decide what to do. (And even though our bathroom might be bigger than some, pacing is still awfully silly in that small a space.)

“If I wake him up now, he’ll just be grumpy, and he might not be as excited about it as I want him to be,” I thought, “and that might set a whole negative precedent for the rest of this pregnancy, and then our child’s entire life, and I don’t want something this important to start off on a bad note. Maybe I should let him sleep. But then if I do, he might wonder why I didn’t wake him up for something this big.”

Finally, I decided to hell with it. I ran into the bedroom and jumped on the bed.

Me: (poke) Honeyhoneyhoneyhoney??? (pokepokepoke) Wakeupwakeupwakeupwakeup!!! (pokepoke)
Dave: (snoring…) Mmmph?
Me: I know it’s really early but you have to WAKE UP right now!!!
Dave: (much unhappy groaning)… why?
Me: I have a late anniversary gift for you, but you have to open your eyes.

[Aside: the anniversary comment seemed appropriate, since it's most likely that we made this baby on the night we celebrated our anniversary.]

We went back and forth like that for a bit, then finally Dave woke up and opened his eyes. I showed him the home pregnancy test. His eyes were all blurry and he was completely confused at first, wondering what this little stick thing was that I had shoved into his hand. Finally, he was like, “Wait, does that say… PREGNANT??” Yeah, it sure does! He did the happy dance - while still lying in bed, which was pretty hilarious. I cried some more.

[Second aside: when I was trying to wake Dave up and having such a hard time with it? He told me later that he thought I was just waking him up to remind him that it was trash day. Ha!]

That was one of the hardest days ever to prepare for work, because I was so distracted all morning. And when I finally got to work (late, of course), I had to fight the urge to scream, “I’m pregnant!” down the halls like some sort of modern day town crier. (I managed. Barely.)

We told our immediate families that day. I called my sister first, because she’s three hours ahead and I knew she’d be awake and already at work. I didn’t get to talk to my dad until that afternoon, because he had been at the golf course all day and he doesn’t have a cell phone. That was kind of fun:

Me: Hey Dad, what are you doing next February?
Him: Um… No idea. Why?
Me: Because that’s when you’re gonna be a grandpa!

He was completely shocked. I found that hilarious, because he knew we were trying, so I don’t know why it surprised him as much as it did. I suppose he hadn’t considered it because he didn’t want to think about his precious little daughter having sex. And now he has to acknowledge that I’m really not a virgin anymore. Poor guy.

So, that’s how this whole little journey got its start. Next: how my entire freakin’ extended family found out even though I had insisted that I wasn’t going to tell anyone until my second trimester. (HA!)

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So, there’s this thing. Which I haven’t written about, and which I’m dying to write about, because it’s pretty much all that’s on my mind these days. And I’ve been all, “Noooo, no one can know about it, because if we speak of it out loud, then that makes it real, and then the Jinx Fairy will rain sorrow and misfortune down upon our heads. And lo, the many tears we will shed.”

Instead, I’ve been writing about nothing - like a trip to Target or working in the yard - just to fill in the space so that no one would think that I fell off the planet.

Then it occurred to me that the people who read this blog, who also know me in real life? I think nearly all of them already know about this. So really, when I say that I can’t talk about it, I’m totally full of crap.

So in light of this whole “ah hell, even my dad’s golf buddies know about it now” development, I’ve decided that I might as well go ahead and make the official announcement.

Here it is.

The big announcement.

I was going to suggest that you sit down first, but if you’re reading this online, I think the odds are pretty high that you’re already seated.

But seriously, if you’re standing, find a soft place to land just in case this bit of news shocks the knees right out from under you.

It’s ok. I’ll wait.

You ready?
continue reading

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You know how when you have a weekend trip, and then you go back to work on Monday, it feels like you didn’t get a weekend at all? So then the following weekend, you take full advantage of the whole “sleeping late and doing nothing” thing? I think that’s the only way to explain how lazy we were this weekend. To recap:

a) Friday night, I went to dinner (Thai food) and Target with Kris. She bought detergent and dog food. I got a new laundry basket because ours broke. I was home before 10:00 p.m.

b) Saturday, Kris moved the stuff she borrowed back to our house, because her furniture from Memphis finally showed up. (Aside: I think she hired the slowest movers in history, because it took them 4 weeks and 1 day to get her stuff from Memphis to Seattle. Seriously, 29 days to go 2400 miles? The hell?) So, we have a non-empty guest room now. Hooray. Helping her unload the van took all of about 10 minutes. That night, we got take-’n-bake pizza and watched “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.” It was good.

c) Sunday, I mowed part of the lawn. I just did the little side areas where the riding mower can’t go because it’s too bumpy and/or close to the edges of the lawn. I did that for about an hour, until the mower ran out of gas. Rather than refill it, I just decided it was a sign that I had done enough, so I stopped. (I kind of like thinking of yardwork that way: God doesn’t want me to mow anymore.) Dave didn’t do anything in the yard because he was having some kind of weird hay fever flare-up, so he took a couple of Sudafed, which knocked him right the hell out for a few hours. Later in the afternoon, I went to the grocery store. And that’s all.

I’m attributing all of this laziness to the fact that we were still recovering from last weekend’s trip to New Orleans. Because there is seriously no other justifiable reason as to why we were so damn lazy. But man, it was really nice.

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You Were a Koala

You value living life at a slow, peaceful, meditative pace. You give insightful advice, helping others to overcome obstacles.

Gummy Bears

You may be smooshie and taste unnatural, but you’re so darn cute.

Your Blogging Type is Kind and Harmonious

You’re an approachable blogger who tends to have many online friends. People new to your blogging circle know they can count on you for support. You tend to mediate fighting and drama. You set a cooperative tone. You have a great eye for design - and your blog tends to be the best looking on the block!

Thanks for the inspiration, Cat.

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