Baby White. Week 16

16 weeks & 6 days

My 35th birthday 

 

Ultrasound on 11/11/16 

 

My favorite pair of jeans

(only because I can still button them) 

 

Baby White's first book  

 

 

Baby: Baby White is as big as an avocado. Measuring 4.61 inches & 3.50 ounces. I bought a storybook this week to read to baby since his/her bones are forming in their ears and can now listen to my voice.

 

Symptoms: Feeling good! I am no longer constipated, which if you have ever experienced this than you know its a blessing. I'm not sure if it was a first trimester thing or its because I switched from decaf to half-caff coffee last week and that made a difference. Basically every time I blow my nose it bleeds a little thanks to the increased blood flow. It doesn't last too long and goes away after a few minutes. I have developed some red bumps on my cheeks that I'm sure are pregnancy related but you can't really see them with makeup on. Yes, I am still wearing makeup and still doing my hair (blow drying, straightening, curling etc.). Now it may not be as often as I usually do it (I've been using a lot of dry shampoo & tinted moisturizer) but I try. I'm going to share in a separate blog post a few products that I've been loving during pregnancy. My skin has started to itch here and there which I'm certain is from all of the stretching around my belly & hips. I've been using a belly salve and oil every single day since I was 8 weeks pregnant. I absolutely love them both and will share them soon.

 

Weight: I am up 8 lbs from my pre-pregnancy weight of 106 lbs.

 

Sleep: Still waking up a few times a night to pee but going right back to sleep. The weird dreams haven't stopped and I can remember most of them when I wake up.

 

Cravings: Anything sweet! I either have ice cream, a few cookies or a bowl of sugary cereal (Lucky Charms is my favorite right now) a day.

 

Doctor's appointments: We had an early morning appointment with my specialist on my birthday. I was so excited to get to see baby on the big screen as we call it. He/she was not being very cooperative at first though, haha. Baby was face down so my doctor had to do a little work to make him/her turn over. Once baby turned over my doctor said that she could tell right away the gender. I didn't think I was that far along to be able to tell right away but I guess so. She did a good job hiding the little girl or boy parts from us. All we could see was baby's head & belly and my huge placenta on the screen. His/her heart rate was 150 bpm and we even got a little wave from our baby. It was so neat to see all of his/her tiny bones already formed in their hands. This was also my first trans-vaginal ultrasound. I will now start having one every 2 weeks (until 24 weeks)  to measure my cervical length. My cervical length is about 5cm right now which my doctor said was great. About 8 years ago I had surgery to remove pre-cancerous cells from my cervix. Due to the increasing weight and pressure resting on my cervix my OB & specialist just want to keep a close eye on everything.  

 

Clothes: I'm still holding onto the rubber band trick & using my belly band to fit into my regular jeans. I have ONE pair that I can still button. They are my distressed boyfriend jeans and its starting to finally get cold outside so I don't see myself wearing them for long. I also have been wearing leggings a lot. My most comfortable ones are from Francesca's. The ones that aren't the basic cotton feel, they have more of a stretch. I love them! I definitely need to do some shopping for maternity clothes soon.

Baby White. Weeks 13-15

This is the last post that will seem like it is all over the place. After this post I will just be documenting one week at a time ;-)

 

 

 

 

Baby: Baby White is growing bigger and bigger every week as you can see. During week 15 he or she was 4 inches & 2.50 ounces. That may not seem like a lot of weight on your bladder but it is! This week I sneezed and peed on myself for the first time. How does that happen? How does one control that? You can't. It's been an ongoing problem for me :-D

 

During week 14 I used my Wusic (fetal doppler) and immediately found baby's heartbeat. It was beating super fast & I'm pretty sure baby had the hiccups, I had just ate. It was so cute!

 

Symptoms: The first day of my 15th week is when I brought caffeine back into my life. I switched to decaf coffee the day that I found out I was pregnant and it's been rough. From week 10 through 15 I basically had a headache every single day. I know that hormones played a role in these headaches of mine, but I also knew that cutting out my daily caffeine intake did not help. I felt much more at ease being out of my first trimester. So every morning I now have a cup of half-caff coffee and it is WONDERFUL. I am still morning sickness free, so by now I think I am out of the clear. I cannot believe it. I remember one of my first thoughts when I found out I was pregnant was I'm going to get morning sickness. There has been a few days where all I have wanted to do is sleep and of course the continuous headaches, but other than that I can't complain. I'm feeling good!

 

Weight: I'm up 6 lbs from my pre-pregnancy weight & it's all in my belly!

 

Exercising: I love walks! I try to walk for an hour every time. Mike comes along with me and so do the pups for the first mile. I am used to running 3 miles 5-6 days a week, but I had to give that up. That is a completely separate blog post! I do miss running, but that decision was for the best. I just want to stay healthy for baby.

 

Sleep: I sleep great, other than waking up 4-5 times a night to pee. Luckily, I can go right back to sleep. I sometimes sneak into the kitchen for a glass of milk. I've always been a left side sleeper (which is good for pregnancy) and Ella sleeps curled up right next to my belly. I think she senses something for sure.

 

Cravings: FOOD. I have always loved to eat, a lot! I feel like I have been eating for two my entire life. I eat the same amount of food as I always have, but I definitely indulge in whatever snacks I'm craving. I crave both sweet & salty foods! Ice cream, cookies, french fries & fruit are my favorite snacks right now.

 

I am so excited to be in my SECOND trimester!



Baby White's Announcement. Week 12

So excited this week had finally come! We were so excited to announce Baby White to the world. What better place to celebrate our one year wedding anniversary than where we got married in Destin, Florida.

 

Friday morning at the airport

 

 We could not have asked for better weather & I was feeling great. One of my favorite things about being pregnant is eating for two. I love food. Everywhere we ate had the tastiest & freshest seafood. Crab is my absolute favorite. We went to AJ's on the harbor and I ordered fried Mahi Mahi strips with steamed potatoes & corn on the cob, it was heavenly! Wish I had taken a picture of it. I did get a picture of me enjoying a virgin strawberry daiquiri though...

 



 

 Sunday was the start of my 12th week. I woke up incredibly sore from my run on the beach the day before. I love Sunday mornings. I wake up to a notification on my phone from The Bump app. It tells me what size fruit my baby is and I think it's the best thing. Week 12 Baby White was the size of a plum. PS, I've never cheated and looked ahead. So much more exciting that way!

 

We met our best friends Chris & Diana at their house that morning and headed to the beach to take our announcement picture. Diana is 6 weeks ahead of me in her pregnancy. It's such a blessing to be able to go through this journey with one of my best friends. I was so thankful I had her there to take our pictures & it made it that much more special.

 

 We went to the same spot on the beach where we said "I do" almost exactly a year to the day...

 





 

 Thank you to my sister Traci for making Baby White's banner. It was perfect.

 

 

 

 

 Pictures were done (thank you Diana), now it was time for brunch. These mamas were hungry!

 

 

 This day was so perfect. It didn't even seem real. Mike made this trip so special for me. We went to all of my favorite spots on the beach, ate at all of my favorite restaurants, and he even went shopping with me at Destin Commons (a beautiful outdoor shopping mall). We went into Victoria Secret & he told me to pick out new bras, since none of my bras fit comfortably anymore. I have just been wearing bralettes with not much support. It's the little things and those new bras made a big difference. It was also a big football weekend (including the Texas vs OU game) & he was a good sport through it all. If you know my husband then you know his love for football. He even went to 4 different places trying to find me an A&W root beer, of course at the fourth stop he found it.

 

Monday was our official one year anniversary. We had an early lunch at Pompano Joe's, laid out on the beach and spent the rest of the afternoon driving around looking at real estate properties.

 

 

 Anniversary dinner at PF Changs

 

 

It was a bittersweet goodbye driving over the Destin bridge to head to the airport. I can't believe the next time we visit Destin we will have our sweet baby with us and will be a family of 3. What an amazing first year of marriage this has been!

 

 



Baby White. Weeks 0-11

I just want to start off by saying thank you to everyone who has already shown Baby White so much love! We have received so many calls, texts, emails & comments... it really means a lot to us and it has been more than we could have ever expected!

Week 5
To say I was surprised would be an understatement. I can honestly say I had no idea I was pregnant. Just a few days before I had thought I started my period, which was implantation bleeding. I sometimes start off with light spotting so I didn't think much of it. Until now it had been a few days and still nothing. So I picked up a pregnancy test on my usual Saturday morning Target run. We were having friends over that evening for a UFC fight card and I knew I would be having wine or moscow mules so I decided to take the test as soon as I got back home. Knowing it takes a few minutes to read I thought I would take the test and let it "cook" as I put up groceries. Well it didn't take long for the test to cook. After flushing the toilet, I turned around and looked down at the counter and there it was... a positive pregnancy test. I starred at the test and then back at the box to assure myself it was positive at least 5 times before coming out of the bathroom. We had been trying off and on since we got married in October. I imagined doing something cute with Miller & Ella (our fur babies), like putting them in matching shirts that said "big sis" to announce the news to Mike or writing "Dad" on his Starbucks coffee cup. That did not happen. I could not contain my excitement for that long to put something together. He was sitting on his side of the couch as I came out into the living room and just blurted out, "it was positive" holding the test with my shaky hand. Of course he was just as excited as I was and jumped up and gave me a hug and said he knew it! I called my mom right away to share our news, she was BEYOND excited as well.

8/20/16

 



Week 6 & 7
Weeks 6 and 7 went by incredibly slow. I kept waiting to feel pregnant. I wanted morning sickness just to reassure myself everything was ok in there. My first OB appointment wasn't scheduled until I would be 8.5 weeks and as you can imagine that seemed like an eternity. During week 6 is when I had my first pregnancy symptom... constipation. Thanks to oatmeal, which I have everyday for breakfast, that problem is gone.

Week 8
Finally the week of my first doctors appointment. I could not sleep on Tuesday night, I was so excited! I literally jumped out of bed on Wednesday morning when my alarm went off. As we were driving to the doctor I had a million thoughts going through my head. I walked into my doctors office (trying to stick out my belly as much as I could) and they immediately sent us across the hall to the ultrasound suite. I was so nervous as the ultrasound tech was getting me prepped for the sonogram. All I wanted at that very moment was to see a strong heartbeat. The second I saw Baby White's little heart beating I was completely at ease. Mike gave me a tight hand squeeze and we sat there in awe just watching our little baby squirm around on the screen. It was very surreal. He or she had a strong heart rate of 170 bpm. After the ultrasound we went back to the office and met with my OB. He said because of my age and cervical history (more on that later) he was sending me to a specialist down the hall to be seen on a regular basis as well. Apparently any mom-to-be that is 35 or over (I'll be 35 on November 11th) is seen there as well.

Baby White's first ultrasound

 

 

Can you see my little bump starting to grow?

 

 



 

Week 9 & 10

The first and last time I took my vitamins on an empty stomach. OMG. I've been taking prenatal vitamins and an additional supplement of vitamin C & folic acid daily for well over a year now. I used to take them on an empty stomach all the time & even in the morning with just water before a workout. Well I took them on an empty stomach for the first time during week 9 and within minutes the room was spinning fast. This was the first time I've felt nauseous during my pregnancy. I never vomited but it took awhile for that feeling to go away.

 

During week 10 the headaches really set in. I went several days of having a non-stop headache before I finally gave in and took Tylenol. I know Tylenol is safe, but I was stubborn and I felt like giving into meds was a sign of weakness. Sounds crazy. The day I found out I was pregnant I quit drinking caffeine. I've read (& even my doctor said it was ok) to have 200mg of caffeine a day. I just didn't want it. I'm pretty sure that cutting out caffeine cold turkey like that was another reason why my headaches were so bad. *Fast forward to my second trimester and I am now drinking a cup of half-caff coffee a day, game changer.*

 

This was also the time when I first started to feel tired. Like reallyyyyy tired. I remember being at the grocery store and seriously contemplating taking a nap in my backseat before driving home. I could barely keep my eyes open, had it not been for the cold groceries I had in my car I probably would have. I rolled down the windows and turned up my radio really loud for the drive home As soon as I got home the groceries got put away and I was in bed. Those first trimester naps were the best. I would be dreaming within minutes, but I think we can all agree that pregnancy dreams are WEIRD. I kept having a repetitive dream that me and my baby were walking in the park being attacked by a giant chameleon and no one would help us.

 

 

 

 

Week 11

This week was a really fun for me. It went by really fast since we were getting ready for our trip to Destin that weekend (more on that trip in the next post). We had an appointment with the specialist the day before we left for our trip, which meant we got to see our little babe in an ultrasound. The appointment started off not as I was expecting. I knew that in the coming weeks I would be given the option to do genetic defect testing, I just didn't expect for it to be that day. We went into this small office and sat down to speak with a genetic counselor. She went over information about testing for chromosomal abnormalities, birth defects, etc. I could tell Mike wanted out of that room stat and so did I. We had never discussed anything more than not finding out the gender. At the end we both separately declined any genetic testing to be done on us or our baby, including the CVS test. What difference was it going to make? It's not going to change anything so why do it. I can fully understand though why some parents would want to know at that time and do it. This decision was just my personal choice.

 I loved my new doctor. She was great. She did the ultrasound herself and took the time to answer all of my questions. We were able to actually hear the heartbeat for the first time that day too, it was so exciting. I'm so thankful that was the way we ended our appointment. Now we were off  to finish packing for our Destin trip, where we would be celebrating our one year wedding anniversary and sharing Baby White's announcement!

 

Baby White's second ultrasound

 

 

 

 

"I prayed for this child, and the Lord has granted me what I asked of Him."

I Samuel 1:27

 

Tomorrow I'll be 16 weeks, so I have a lot of posts to catch up on but I'm hoping to be all caught up by early next week so stay tuned.