TheBeanBlog

Monday was a very difficult day for me worrying about Malc in surgery.  When I picked him up, the poor little guy looked like Franken-cat.  He has something like 20+ stitches all over his body.  The vet gave me morphine to help with his pain and antibiotics to ward off infection.  Joe and I gave him his meds that night thinking that the morphine would help him (and us) get a restful, recupertive night’s sleep.  Hmmm not-so-much.

Poor Malc couldn’t get comfortable (he has to wear a cone for the next two weeks) so he kept moving around/trying to snuggle closer/find a way out of our bedroom/find a place to hide/snuggle again/etc.  I didn’t mind him wanting to be close to me, honestly it was wonderful after all the horrible worries I had, but my little guy’s face was draining from where they cut out the tumor and I guess it kept tickling his nose.  So every 5-10 minutes he would sneeze on me.  Between the sneezing, making sure he was comfortable and had everything he needed I think I clocked in about 2 hours of sleep.  Add that to the night before (when I couldn’t sleep for all the worrying/nightmares/etc) and I think I totalled about 5 hours. 

Sleep deprivation is not easy, but the concerns I had had about being able to get up all night for feedings etc are no longer around, because I didn’t have an issue.  The slightest squeak that Malc made woke me up so I could ensure he was ok.  Granted this was only a few nights of sleep deprivation, but let me continue the fantasy for now.

In other news my job is reaching all new levels of suckdom, but we’ll save that for another day…
26 weeks 3 days

Malcolm is going in tomorrow for surgery to remove three tumors (one is suspect the others are benign) and have his teeth cleaned. I’m freaking out because he is so dear to me and he’s no spring chicken anymore (13 yrs old). That and the doc said it’s going to be a tough surgery to reconstruct his little lip, where the suspect tumor is.

I’ve been on an emotional rollercoaster the past few weeks thanks to pregnancy hormones.  But pregnancy hormones can be blamed completely for my neurotic tendencies…when it comes to the ones I love, I always have been a world-class worrier. 

At times I have this deep-rooted fear that something awful will happen to those that mean the world to me.  My rational mind tells me it’s not worth the expense of energy to worry about such things I have no control over, but the crazier side of me feels as though if I don’t worry something really bad could happen. So, in a way it can be a comfort to worry- yeah I’ve got issues. 

I think it would be easier if I could communicate with Malcolm and tell him everything is going to be ok, that the doctors are going to help him and then he can come back home and rest in his little bed under the warmth of the sun.  But I can’t and I just think of the pure terror and loneliness he must feel when he is dropped off and left there in a scary, unfamiliar place.  I’m sure some people would say he’s just a cat, you idiot.  But this cat is always there to comfort me even if he may not understand why I’m upset.  God please let everything go ok for my little baby…

I’m going to make this one short and sweet, because I don’t want to remember my pregnancy for all the complaints, but alas, I need to chronicle reality as it is, right?

The trifecta, as I’ve named it, is a trio of “symptoms” that, who knew, could be experienced concurrently: nausea, hunger, and blazing reflux.  Not-so-fun, but luckily it is not a constant.  Tonight I’m being punished because I had a huge, delicious lunch of Italian food and more than 6 hours later the bean still ‘doth protest’. 

Perhaps some ice cream will appease the little monster in my belly ;o)

Seems like I can add a new type of post to this blog- the “inappropriate comment of the week.” Previously it’s been co-workers that do not honor the personal bubble rule with space and need to rub, talk and sing to my belly when the bean was just about the size of a raspberry.

Then there were the comments about my food choices at work (isn’t fish a no-no? yeah I was just hoping for a bean with scales…)

Here’s the latest and greatest- I have an IT guy that has been helping me develop some pages for my company’s website. He comes up to pick up something from me for another reason and says he didn’t know I was pregnant and congratulated me.

He asked my due date and when I told him he said “Wow you’re that big already, you’re gonna be huge!” I told him he could take his paperwork and leave. He must have thought the red lazers coming out of my eyes were in jest and then proceeds to ask me if I am having twins. Then he clues me in on how his wife’s butt needed a minivan for itself when she was nearing the end of her last pregnancy. Somebody give this guy the husband-of-the-year award.

The wonderful thing is that my husband is so far from this guy, he is in a different solar system. That same morning dear Joe took a look at the new maternity dress I had on and said I looked pretty in it , so pretty in fact that he wanted to take a picture of me in it. ;o) 25 1/2 weeks…

Just thought I would share that.  As I watch my waistline growing as each week passes I worry if I’ll ever end up looking like I did before the bean.  That and I don’t want to forget about taking care of me- I’ve seen a lot of women that just “give up” and end up not even putting any effort into their appearance.  It’s sad and I don’t want to get stuck in “frumpdom.” 

Lately the bean has been forcing me to eat all sorts of candy.  I’ve had more sweet stuff in shiny wrappers this past week then probably in 3 years combined.  Three musketeers, twix, and sour patch kids have been on regular rotation.  I gotta cut back, but only after I finish that twix in the kitchen….

This week has been a crazy one, both with tons going on at work and at home. I’ve been working late every night and really am now feeling as though all the energy has been sucked out of me.

Tuesday afternoon I went out to lunch with a few close friends from work and right afterwards I started feeling painful cramping and tighteningin my abdomen. After about two hours I started to feel a little nervous and called my doctor. They wanted to see me just to make sure all was well with the bean and I. All did turn out to be well thankfully- either I was experiencing pain from my bean pinching a nerve or it could have possibly been uterine contractions (not labor related) from the bean being very active bouncing around in my belly.

As soon as Joe and I got home from the doctor’s Joe had some wonderful news to share with me. His VP and boss had hand picked him for a promotion. This is a wonderful blessing because my husband is such a hard worker and always goes the extra mile- and now he’s being recognized for that. The only hiccup to this is there will be more travel involved. Dear Joe is a homebody to begin with and I am a self-professed wus when it comes to him being 3,000 miles away. I also have a tendency to think that every creak and bump in the house at night is either a serial killer come to get me or a ghost come to get me…anyways I digress…

Last night a few of our friends came over to help move furniture around to get the baby’s room closer to being ready (we are still far from being there but at least it’s not keeping me up at night ha, ha). Afterwards I laid in bed thinking, and thinking some more. Thinking of how our lives are about to change, how our marriage will change and also thinking about my life as a new mom.

I worry (not a crazy amount) about not feeling a strong connection with the bean at this point in my pregnancy. I feel the baby kicking often throughout the day and love that reassurance but honestly I (and Joe) am still in this state of dazed-half-reality that yes there will be a baby in a few months, but we have no idea what that really means. So I laid in bed thinking about that as my husband and cat peacefully slept and all of a sudden the bean decided to start it’s callisthenics class for the evening. It was bouncing around and kicked a couple of times right where my hand was resting on my stomach. I fell asleep a little while after that and had a truly reassuring dream.

In the dream I was breastfeeding the baby and the baby and I were looking at each other. I put my finger out and the baby grabbed hold with it’s tiny little hand. I felt completely connected and completely in love, like I had never felt before. It was a peaceful lovely dream and it’s calmed my nerves for the time being.

My poor husband. He really tries. I decided I wanted to jump in the shower tonight so it would be one less thing to do in the morning (we have a busy one planned tomorrow).

I had put some brownies in the oven, oh about 30 minutes before, and I asked Joe to check them for doneness with a toothpick once the timer went off. I step into the shower feeling as though everything is under control. As I turn off the water Joe shouts from the kitchen “We had a little accident.” Hmmm.

Joe grabbed the glass container that holds… err correction…held the toothpicks and dropped it on the granite countertop where it shattered into a million pieces and now there is glass shrapnel laced all over the kitchen, including in Malcolm’s food bowls. Joe sweeps, and vaccums everything up, feeling like a heel all the while. I just tried to keep my mouth shut and not laugh in his face.

I feel bad for the guy, but this pregnant woman would not allow her husband to throw out the brownies- Pregnancy Rule #29: You do not get between a woman and her chocolate….

This weekend as I was running about doing usual errands I bumped my arm into my belly. Apparently the bean was not so appreciative of the contact, because it gave me a quick, hard kick back in the same spot. Uh-oh…

Oh and note to self: Do not eat hard-boiled eggs unless for the next 36 hours you plan to be alone on a deserted island where you can toot freely at will.

Today I was looking forward to my doctor visit, but with a bit of trepidation. The past few weeks I’ve really popped and well, with the holidays just passing, I was a bit weary of getting on the scale. I know I’m a wackjob and I’m supposed to gain weight to have a healthy baby, but relinquishing all control of your weight to nature is easier said than done!

So the first thing the lovely nurse wanted me to do besides pee in a cup was check my weight. I watch as she continues to push the little bar further up…11 pounds of weight gain in a month yowza! Ok now I enjoyed the holidays, but I really didn’t go crazy insane and use the pregnancy as a license to eat non-stop! The bean must be sending signals to my body to hold onto every last calorie. Some of that weight gain is in the boobs because I think I’ll soon be making my way into a D cup, but we’ll save that for another post.

Anyways I sit there and wait for the doctor to come in and what do I do? I repeat in my mind the topics I want to discuss over and over in my head, because I don’t want to forget anything. I get so OCD about it that I need to look at the piece of paper that I wrote the “topics” just in case I get a temporary bout of amnesia. Then I shorten each topic to one word that I chant with the other ‘one-word-topics’ so I dont forget anything. Yeah I’m certifiable…The topics of today’s conversation were Reflux-Acne-Pediatricians-Classes…

My doctor comes in and we have a great visit and I’m able to get all my questions out coherently. He measures my belly for the first time and listens to the heartbeat, a healthy 148 bpm. It’s so funny because the bean is not fond of the doppler. Everytime I have had someone check the heartbeat, the bean kicks right where the wand is. This time the baby was especially miffed and kicked really hard 5 times in a row and the doctor had to move around the wand, but he still got a couple more kicks from the bean after that. Already ornery in the womb=look out mama!

Because yesterday I had my first chance pregnancy encounter with a stranger in Kohls. I was there to return a frame and waiting in the customer service line. The woman in front of me must have turned around to look right at my stomach three times. She then outright asked me “When are you due?”

She said I must be having a boy because I am carrying right in front and “very compact”. Her little daughter added that girl babies make you look puffy and I didn’t look “puffy”. How funny!

I swear some days I look 8 months pregnant and others 4. It must be the position of the bean, but I save my theories for another post.