Around 15/16 weeks I started feeling little flutterings. Anyone who has been pregnant knows what I'm referring to. But when you haven't felt it before, it's hard to understand what I mean. It wasn't very often, and was so light and quick that I wasn't even sure I'd felt anything, or that it was the baby. After it kept happening, I just assumed it was the baby. It was so cool to finally feel something, and made the pregnancy more real.
We had a doctor appointment around 17 weeks. They did an ultrasound at this appointment to check for gender. We were so excited to find out. All of my family had predicted that it was going to be a girl, and I thought it was going to be a girl too. My Dad was the only one that said boy. Brian kept going back and forth, and finally just said "as long as it's healthy I'm happy with either one." Of course, I felt the same that same way too. During the ultrasound, the doctor couldn't tell the gender, because the baby had his hands down between his legs the whole time. After pushing and wiggling my belly to try to get the baby to move, he still couldn't tell. The little guy wasn't cooperating. However, the doctor got a quick glimpse here and there and said he though it was a boy. But that was a boy with a big question mark. I was really surprised because I was so sure it was a girl. I had to completely rewire my brain around the fact that it probably was a boy. It took a few days to start thinking of our baby as a him instead of a her, but I transitioned quickly. Brian was a bit surprised as well, but immediately excited. Everyone was surprised to learn that we were having a boy, except my Dad. He's quite proud of the fact that he was the only one that was right. Haha!
Around this time, maybe a week or two earlier, I realized it was time to find some maternity clothes...especially pants. My regular pants were starting to get a little tight. One Saturday, we went shopping for maternity clothes, and it was such a pain. We quickly learned that most stores didn't carry maternity clothes in-store anymore. Everything was online. Gah! It was a frustrating day. I found a single pair of maternity shorts that would work at Target. A lot of running around for one pair of shorts. I was able to order some pants online later that week. Switching to the maternity pants was so great--I felt comfortable again. I was able to get away with wearing my regular shirts for a little while longer, but soon had to switch to maternity shirts. I have a few that have worked great for the entire second trimester. I'm getting close to needing to get some larger ones, but I'm hoping I won't need them for another few weeks. I want to get some that will work for fall/winter, and the weather is still too warm for that yet. Who knows, maybe I won't need warmer clothes. I feel so hot all the time now that short sleeves in the cooler weather may be perfect.
At 18 weeks our little guy was moving all the time, and his movements were much more pronounced. I could definitely tell it was him moving around in there. It's such a neat thing to feel your baby moving around inside. Definitely a unique experience. One night, the baby was moving around a lot. I told Brian, and he put his hand on my stomach to try and feel it. He was able to feel the baby moving once. It was so fun to watch Brian's face. I could tell the moment he felt the baby because his eyes got really big and he started to smile. It was great.
At our 21 week appointment, we got the in depth ultrasound, where they look at and measure all of the baby's parts. We were really nervous before this appointment, because although everything looked good up to this point, this was the ultrasound that could show defects or problems. The doctor checked the gender first thing to confirm if it was a boy, and indeed it was. A little boy! He was moving around a lot, but wasn't being very cooperative. The ultrasound tech would try to measure his legs and he would be in the wrong position so she would switch to measure his heart instead. She had to jump around a lot to find everything, but in the end she was able to see everything clearly. And everything looked perfect!. She didn't find anything wrong. He was developing perfectly. It was really an amazing ultrasound. We got to see all of his parts: head, brain, heart, abdomen, stomach, kidneys, spine, legs, feet, arms, hands, nose, lips, umbilical cord, etc. It was fascinating. We also got to see his profile for the first time. I teared up when I saw his little nose. We were seeing the shape of our son's face for the first time. He was beautiful. It was a pretty special moment.
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| Cutest baby in the world. |
They put the recording of the whole ultrasound on a DVD for us. We've had fun showing it to family members. Brian calls it his favorite video, and loves to watch it.
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| Most adorable right leg! |
At 22 weeks we realized we hadn't taken any photos of my baby bump yet. Brian snapped a couple one day. It was quickly becoming apparent that I was expecting. Also, the little guys movements were the strongest yet. I started to experience the joy of him kicking my bladder. Not a fan of that little move. He always seemed to do it when we were in the car, headed somewhere so that was fun.
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| 22 weeks |
As soon as our baby's gender was confirmed, we started thinking about names. We looked up lists online and assembled our own list of names we liked. We ended up with a list of 20-25 names. From there we've been narrowing it down, and sometimes adding more. Brian checked out a couple of baby name books from the library, which were not helpful at all. Although out of the two we got, the rockstar baby name book was far more helpful than the one pictured below. I don't think this one is a baby name book so much as it is a dictionary/thesaurus. There were names, but there were also a lot of random words thrown in between. Maybe he ran out of real names before he met the 21,400 quota. Some of our favorite "name" suggestions from it were lunchbox, caterpillar, itchy, and inkydinkydo, It was entertaining at least.
Like I said earlier, this trimester has been awesome. The only things that have bugged me are heartburn, reflux, and a stuffy/runny nose. The nose thing has gotten better over the last month, but the reflux and heartburn have been consistent if not worse. He's either sitting on my bladder making me have to pee or up squishing my stomach giving me reflux. Usually the heartburn/reflux only happens at night...which is both good and bad. I usually just eat a Tums and that does the trick. So I really can't complain. I've only really started feeling uncomfortable since week 26.
I haven't really had any cravings at all. Except for fruit. I could eat fruit all day long. At first it was watermelon, then strawberries, then cherries, then grapes, then cantaloupe, then apples. At the moment I'm loving grapes, apples, and peaches. But really it all sounds good all the time. The one weird craving I did have once, was for beef jerky and chocolate pudding. One night, those two foods just sounded so good to me. I wanted to dip the jerky in the pudding and eat it. I did end up picking both those items up the next time we went grocery shopping. And I ate them and enjoyed them, but I didn't end up dipping the jerky in the pudding. By the time I bought them, that thought had passed.
That pretty much sums up everything that has happened the last three months. As of yesterday, September 9th, I am 28 weeks along and into my third trimester. The last stretch. I feel excited and nervous.
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