Bedrest, blogging and boredom!

I certainly have more time now to update this blog with my new bed rest status. From a pregnancy standpoint I feel really well, but from a sanity standpoint, I am dying of boredom! I know the bed rest is the best for me and the baby. There is only so much one can do day in and day out when stuck in bed/on the couch. Only a few more weeks to go. The Dr said he'd like to see me get up to 37 weeks. That's only 4 more weeks! I'm a little scared of the "unknown" of having a C-section, but couldn't be more excited to meet my little baby boy!
I am definitely not in that "get it out of me!" stage yet. Since I'm so tall he has plenty of room to fit in my tummy without causing me too much discomfort. I am so used to feeling him inside me I know there is a part of me that will miss the kicks and wiggles in my tummy when he is finally born. I have really enjoyed pregnancy and hope I will be blessed enough to experience it again in my lifetime.
My fingers are officially to chubby for my wedding bands - or any other rings. Don't worry - its not hypertension swelling, just normal excess fluids swelling. My blood pressure is fantastic every time I go to the doctor. The nurses are always impressed at how low it is.
My next appointment will be on January 8th. They will do another u/s to look at the placenta position and continue to monitor me and decide when the right time for this baby to be born will be. Maybe I'll be lucky enough at my next appointment to have the placenta move enough to at least get me to a 'modified' bed rest status.... Hey, a girl can dream, can't she?

More bed rest.. but got to see my baby today!

Yesterday I went to the doctor and I'm pretty much stuck on bedrest indefinitely. They don't think the placenta previa will improve enough to do a natural delivery, and in most cases previa patients have serious bleeding that leads to emergency C-section delivery. Not a pretty picture to have painted, but the doctor wanted to make sure I knew how serious my condition I was and to make sure I always go straight to the hospital with any bleeding. He also said if I have more bleeding, but they get it to stop, they still may choose to admit me to the hospital for bed rest there. So this baby will come by c-section no matter what it sounds like. He'll either come because I'm close enough to full term to schedule the C-sect, otherwishe he will come early via emergency C-sect. Its a little scary knowing that I should be on the lookout for this "serious bleed." Good thing I live close to the hospital.

I went and had my 3-D ultrasound today. It was so amazing to see the baby in 3-D. It reminds me that all this complicated stuff is WELL worth it!

Here are his chubby little cheeks! I can't believe how round his face is already. He looks so peaceful. I can even see a little dimple on the side of his face.


I love this picture. I can see a little smile on his face.

Here's another picture of him looking so peaceful.

And this is his profile - cute little button nose!

Needless to say I am now ready to meet this little guy! I think in the pictures he looks a little like Sean, but I know its hard to tell right now exactly who he looks like. All that matters is that he looks perfect!

And we take another trip to the hospital...

Well yesterday seemed like a normal day. I ran a few errands, went and had dinner with my friend Michelle, went with her and her kids to a Christmas train ride and then came back home. I suppose you could say I was standing up a little more than I usually do, but I certainly wasn't doing anything strenuous.


Well I get home around 10:30 and I am feeling a tad bit crampy and I go to the bathroom and see that I am bleeding. Not a super heavy bleed, but definitely enough to get me concerned and to the hospital. So once again I'm off to the hospital (why does this only happen at night?) and go to Labor and Delivery. They hook me up to the monitors and the baby is doing just fine and kicking me all over the place. I am having regular contractions again so I get an injection of tributeline (I had this once before at 20wks when I was contracting). The injection stops the contractions, and makes me feel like I just drank 10 cups of super-strength coffee. I hang around the hospital so they can monitor my bleeding and contractions. They both tapered off. I still had a few contractions here and there, but they were far apart and seemed more like regular braxton-hicks contractions than the kind I was having when I first got there. So I was released at about 2:30 a.m.


I am now on full bed rest until at least Wednesday when I have my regular appointment with my OB to do an u/s on my placenta to see if its still in a complete previa position (tho with the bleeding we're pretty sure it still is). I'm hoping I can at least talk my doctor into letting me go to my last childbirth class Monday night. I just sit there in class anyway so I wouldn't be on my feet. We'll see.


So today its just me and my laptop and a few Netfix. I'm sure keeping me in bed today won't be too difficult as I'm pretty wiped out from my long night last night.


I am at 31 weeks right now and the doctor said the baby could survive a delivery at this point, especially since I did the betamethasone injections, but he said he'd like me to go at least 4 more weeks - I would too! I'm doing much better today. Bleeding has stopped and I don't feel crampy anymore.


I am lucky enough to have the ability to work from home so I can at least stay in bed and still work. I would be bored to death otherwise.

Baby shower at work today

I had my baby shower at work today. I got LOTS of great gifts and am just blown away at the generosity of my coworkers. I got a video baby monitor, high chair, boppy pillow, changing pad, and a few other things that I was really wanting. I couldn't believe how many great things I got. I was like having a pre-Christmas! Here are some pictures of me and my "loot."

Here is my SUPER-cool activity center!!! I love this thing!!

Here is me and my cart of goodies from my shower. Look at all that stuff!!!

I just can't thank my teammates enough for throwing me such a wonderful shower. I am definitely ready for a baby now!

Today I scheduled my 3-D ultrasound appointment. I will be getting to see my baby in 3-D next FRIDAY! Yay!! I'm SO excited to see what he looks like .. his chubby cheeks, his cute little hands and feet. I can't wait to post the pictures of my baby boy!

The nursery is done!

I finally got the nursery all put together. I think it all looks great. I love my fishy room - sometimes I just go in there and enjoy the atmosphere of the room. Thanks to all that contributed to my nursery items!! It looks fabulous!

In addition I have a stroller/carseat and also a cradle for the family room. I think all I need now is a baby!

I'm feeling pretty good for the most part. I definitely have my moments of discomfort and am also fatigued a lot. My acid reflux has by far been the most undesirable pregnancy symptom of the lot and will be happy to be rid of it once the baby is born. For the most part I still feel pretty normal. I don't feel as "heavy" as I thought I would with all this extra baby weight in the front. Its amazing what the body does to compensate to the changes.

I started childbirth class a few weeks ago. So far its been interesting. Its funny, most of the women seem to already be up to speed on the birth process, but the men in the class are seeming a little freaked out by all the things that will happen to the wife and the baby during childbirth. It just surprises me that so many of the men are oblivious to the birthing process at this late in the game, Sean's been reading a pregnancy book for fathers so he's done a good job of keeping on top of the whole process.

29 weeks and counting...

Well I've hit the 29 week marker today. Hard to believe I'm that far along! These past few months have just flown by. I'm sure December will do the same.

I had my regular checkup yesterday. I did my 1-hour glucose test, but still haven't gotten any results back. I'm of the mindset "no news is good news" - I figure if I failed the test they'd be calling me back in immediately. I also got my first flu shot ever. Other than that everything looks good. My weight gain is normal and my blood pressure looks good. We heard a nice strong heartbeat, although with all of his moving now there's no doubts in my mind that his heart is pumping away.

My next u/s will be December 19th where they'll check the placenta position once again. Hopefully we se some improvement and he doesn't have to come early! I'm eager to meet him, but would prefer he come out healthy and strong!

Naughty Placenta!

Well I had my follow-up ultrasound today to check the position of my placenta and so far its a complete placenta previa still :( The placenta definitely sits more to one side of my cervix than the other, so there is still the slight hope that it will move, but at this point they are going to start treating me as if it isn't going to move just in case. If they placenta doesn't move they will have to deliver my baby at around 35 weeks instead of the normal 40 weeks a baby should be in gestation. To prepare my baby for a possible early delivery, I received an injection of betamethazone today. This is a sterroid that will help speed up the baby's lung development. I will get another shot tomorrow and that will be all he needs until his due date. I can't believe he could be here in less than 10 weeks. Guess I need to start wrapping up the nursery soon!

The dr. said she was actually surprised that I haven't had any more bleeding since the last time. So I guess that means I have been doing a good job with keeping my activity levels down like I should. Sometimes I feel guilty for being such a slug, but I guess its paying off. I have been restricted from all holiday travel - or any long travel at all at this point. I'm disappointed I have to skip the annual McGowan Thanksgiving feast, but I understand that a placenta rupture is very serious for both me and the baby so I will just have to do without this year.

I didn't get to see the baby during the ultrasound :( I was hoping to, but the type of u/s they do restricts their view to just the bottom of my uterus so all I got to see was the top of his head and the naughty placenta. He is head-down now which explains why I feel like there's a bowling ball on my bladder now!

I will do a follow-up u/s mid-December to see the placenta one last time before the decision to deliver early is finalized. Lets hope it moves between now and then!!

the belly...

Okay - so many of you ask - where are the belly pictures?? So here they are!!

This is my 5 month belly picture

This is my 6 month belly picture - can we say "growth spurt??!"

This is around 5 and a half months. The belly looks better when its covered up ;)

Nursery mural

Okay.. I started painting this room back in September I believe. I worked on it a lot here and there, but couldn't work on it every weekend or every night. Sometimes I was busy/tired/etc. Its definitely many hours of labor but hopefully little baby Pray will appreciate my hard work. The crib will go on this wall in between the coral reefs on either side. Hopefully it all looks good when its furnished.

Here are a few other views of the wall:

Starting up my blog

Well - as much as I tried to fight the pressure to maintain yet another internet personal account (myspace, message boards, email addresses, IM, etc) I am finally creating a blog page. Don't get me wrong - I have nothing against the Blogspot thing - I've been blogging in myspace for a while. It just gets tough working a full-time computer related job, and coming home to spend MORE time chained to the computer keeping up with all of my communication venues.

BUT - that being said I love reading other blogs, and the time was coming for me to create an account just to be able to read other blogs, and I love having a quick/easy place to give my updates on whats going on with my life, so here I am - a blogger :)

I am currently 6 months pregnant with my son (I love saying that - "my son"). He is the product of 2 and a half years of infertility struggles ending with In-vitro fertilization. I am thankful every day that I get the opportunity at all to experience motherhood. Pregnancy has been an amazing experience and I get all teary-eyed just thinking of how much more wonderful it will be when I become a mother. I feel like I have spent my whole life preparing for this moment and its finally here!

Sean and I have decided to keep his name a surprise for his "birth day." There are many reasons behind this 1) Keeping a surprise is fun 2) We want the baby to be the first one to hear his name and 3) it took us too long to agree on a name, so we don't want anybody to say something that might make us doubt our decision! Rest assured - he does have a name and I can't wait to tell everyone when he arrives!

I'm hardly prepared for baby Pray's arrival. I have been painting a mural in his room for quite some time. I'm being a bit of a perfectionist and going a little overboard with the detail, but hey, my son deserves the best. I can't wait to post pictures when I'm done (hopefully soon!)