27 weeks

Can you believe it?  27 weeks.  Wow.

Ok, it's been a while since an official belly pic so here we go.  First the 10 week and then 27 weeks.

So apparently fat ladies CAN get a baby belly!

Yeah, I know, I've been a bit quiet lately.  Well, it's because I haven't been a happy camper and I feel like I'm nothing but gloom and doom all the time on this blog, so I was being a little shy about bitching and moaning.

So here's the gist.  I hate being pregnant.  The outcome is going to be awesome, but the process sucks.  I'm sorry to all my infertile friends who are hating my guts for saying that, but this has not been enjoyable for me.

The babies are kicking and wiggling.  I'm really grateful that they are, but each kick and wiggle makes me feel sick.  Asking me to be grateful for something that feels awful is like asking me to be grateful for every Gonal-F injection I had to endure to get pregnant.  I didn't enjoy those, and I'm not enjoying this either.  Again, the outcome will be great and it's totally worth it, but I'll be happy when I can move on to holding my babies instead of just cooking my babies.

It really sucks because I felt pretty good during my first pregnancy.  I actually liked my body and felt like we were working together to accomplish something.  But this time, I just feel like blech all the time.

And holy shit, the hormonal meltdowns!  I spent about 48 hours crying because I felt like I had restarted the cycle of grieving again.  Everything I would think about for the girls, I would mourn how MY girls won't ever get to do that, wear that, use that.  For some reason, it feels like the girls of my future aren't real, not really mine, because mine are dead.  I seem to be a bit better now.  But for those couple of days, the crying was just awful.

A couple of days ago, I started feeling some cramps and it freaked me out.  I went to the doctor and got an ultrasound and as usual, everything is fine.  My cervix is holding pretty strong, the girls are fine, it was a mental health appointment.  I seriously can't interpret what my body is doing.  Is that a contraction?  Is it gas?  Because I guessed gas last time and I was wrong, I just don't trust myself to diagnose anything at all.  The doctors and nurses are tolerating my insanity quite well.

No ultrasound pics at the moment though.  I didn't get a chance to scan the last ones we got because K took them to the theater to put on his mirror.  The girls keep him company backstage while he's waiting to go back on stage.

Ok, symptom breakdown -

• I can belch like a champ.  Don't even need soda or anything anymore, I can do a triple belch with a glass of milk.
• My feet are very prone to swelling.  The other day when they were swollen, I kind of pressed the top of my foot, and my finger left a dent in the swelling!  It was weird and awesome!  And gross.  And a little ouchie.  K is making me foot baths with epson salts and doing a lot of foot rubbing.
• If I don't fully tend to my feet when they swell, I am punished by my hands following suit.
• Whenever I eat a meal, I seem to get a stomach ache.  Almost a stomach cramp like feeling.
• Moving around of any kind is problematic.  Turning over in bed has become an event and I feel like I deserve a high five when I do finally accomplish such a feat.  Putting on socks and changing underwear should be considered Olympic sports at this point.  At some point I'm going to need to clip my toenails and I'm not looking forward to it.
• Babies seem to have 2 pretty consistent active periods each day.  About an hour after I get up, and as I'm going to bed.  There are some wiggles and kicks in between, but those are the 2 most active times of day.
• Still peeing all the time and pooing is still an effort.  I'm taking enough Metamucil and Colace that it's usually a daily effort, but an effort none-the-less.
• I used to have areolas the size of quarters in a nice lovely pink.  They are now about three times that size and fluctuate between light and dark brown.
• I always feel like my crotch is pushing itself inside out.
• Hormone mood swings as already talked about.
• The nausea is starting to come back.  Very mildly, but it's creeping back in there.
• I'm sweating a bit more than usual and getting hot.  I actually wore a dress out of the house without any kind of leggings or anything underneath it.  I think that's the first time in, oh, ever, that I've done that.

Ok, next blog post will report some of the fun stuff in life!