Modified diet and eating better

Pic of me at 27 weeks:

The slowed down intestines and all the ramifications are driving me nuts, so I've gone on a rampage to have a better diet to help.

So last night, I cooked a wonderful pan seared salmon, in a honey balsamic glaze, served over spinach salad with red onions, garlic, artichoke hearts and sundried tomatoes. It looked a little minimal on a plate, so I thought Mark might scoff at it, but he LOVED it! He said that the salad was a perfect compliment to salmon since it's so rich and fatty on its own.

I ate a banana today (trying to help keep more potassium in me and maybe help the leg cramps some), am aiming to eat an apple or an orange a day. I bought some benefiber, soluble liquid fiber and (thanks Kenya) it's amazing. It's not all metamucil thick and disgusting, it really just disappears. I had it in some berry tea this morning and it was untraceable. Had a bran muffin (still yuck!) and some nuts and a boiled egg for breakfast. Boiled eggs are my morning staple. I have this rice steamer that does a great job of boiling eggs with no effort whatsoever and it's quick protein to start my day, which is important for the preggers.

I'm also going to try to have a salad a day, so I have 3 types of lettuce in the fridge and bought some slawish mix that I'm going to use today to have a chinese salad for lunch. Since I'm being so healthy and domestic today, I started dinner this morning in the crockpot - curry beef and vegetables. Mark's going to be shocked when he gets home and all the food's already cooked, house perfumed with the aroma of home cooked meal.

I already drink tons of water, and the fridge w/the auto water dispenser helps, but the growing belly makes you feel full like you don't have room for more water and the having to pee every 20 minutes is so annoying that it's tempting to do the wrong thing and not drink as much water. But hydration is SUPER important for the babe, so I've kept it up. I did yield to the temptation to stop taking iron temporarily. It sort of made me sick, I'd belch iron supplement for the next four hours and it definitely doesn't help with constipation. And when I learned that it's not hurting the baby (he's gonna get his, by any means necessary) it's just hurting me, I stopped for a couple of weeks. Then we got some other routine tests and my iron level went down to 10, so I sucked it up and now I take the iron, in addition to the iron already in the multivitamin which I've been great about taking. In general, the baby gets its nutrition - your body is dedicated to feeding it. It's you who suffers if you don't get enough of the right stuff. A lot of women half teeth problems or lose teeth during pregnancy because the baby takes all of their calcium and leaves none for the mommy. Needless to say, I make sure to get enough calcium!

But it takes a lot of discipline to eat well. And this trimester is all about the baby's brain growth (more Omega 3's and fish) and fattening him up. So I've got to be extra on top of it. It's funny, I don't eat a lot, am not hungry that much and haven't had cravings since the middle of the second trimester. So I'm not even that food motivated anymore. But, I have taken to Jack in the Box strawberry shakes and cherry Slurpee. I have a slight increase in the need for sugar, but other than that, same old me.

Xmas and Baby stats - 28 weeks - Pics added!

Baby presents from Mark's folks: onesies, stretch mark lotion and a Bob Marley inspired lullaby CD:

Xmas was good despite a couple of inconvenient mini-scares: I had crampy bad pain for the whole day and Max got inexplicably ill and wouldn't eat, drink or move and screamed bloody murder if you picked him up or touched his back half. I thought it might be a flare up of pancreatitis since we found him eating an avocado, dropped by a squirrel from the neighbors backyard into our yard.

But our vet wasn't open on Xmas. Normal. But she's not open until January 5th! Okay, I might need to find a new vet. I love her dearly, but she's very prone to closing for personal stuff for long periods of time and not only do you not have access to blood tests and records (meaning you'll have to pain someone AGAIN if the dog's sick while she's out of town) but we buy our dog food from her and can't get it when she's closed. It's not normal food you get from a pet store, so it's an issue.

After much grinding, I found a different vet on the 26th and he gave Max a steroid shot in his back and took x-rays and said he has a disk that is beginning to herniate. So out came the stairs for the sofa that Chantel gave me. We had to ferret them out of the garage, but after he got better (fairly immediate after the shot) he got overconfident and wanted to jump on the sofa. We did our best to block him and kept moving his dog bed into different spots, but every now and then he'd catch us off guard and hop up. Needless to say, he's feeling no pain. He's on oral steroids and is healing his back.

Despite all the nonsense, we went to a friend's house for Xmas dinner and had a ball with their kids who range in age from 4 to 14 approximately. It was great. I didn't have to cook, which was really good considering I wasn't feeling great. We almost didn't go, but Max had appeared to perk up throughout the day and didn't deteriorate again until the next morning, so we felt okay leaving him. We didn't stay too long and when we came home, Max seemed a little better.

Xmas day was the day baby Miles decided to do a little descending into my lower uterus. My body wasn't really ready for this, so I had a lot of pain and cramping that day and the day after, but I think it was intestinal cramping, not uterine. I also had what seemed like Braxton Hicks contractions, but we can't really test since the front left of my belly is already hard from the fibroid, you can't tell if it's hardening because of a Braxton Hicks or if it's just the baby moving underneath the fibroid, pushing it up and making the stomach temporarily tighter. I got a little concerned, but finally felt better on Sunday and decided to call the OB on Monday morning to ask if this was normal.

When I called the OB this morning, the nurse didn't like my symptoms last week so they called me in. Everything checked out, but she told me if it happens again, I should go to the hospital! But today, my cervix was nice and tight and long, so those were both really GOOD things. I think was considering putting me on bed rest, but since I don't work a 9-5, she didn't think it necessary. I've only been teaching one day a week since I've been pregnant, so it's not strenuous at all, just a bit of driving to my students.

Baby's getting into position, lower and head down, but he's not too low, so it's all good. And he's been much kinder with the kicks since Sunday. He was merciless on Xmas Eve, Xmas Day and the day after. I mean, you could see his kicks and such from across the room with me wearing clothes. But now I'm getting gentler motions. Thank you baby. It's disturbing when you want to sleep, but I mostly like it because I know he's thriving with all that motion. You're supposed to do kick counts from week 28, which I'll be as of tomorrow, but so far, I don't need to count. He's moving so often all day, he's clearly above the 10 kicks in 2 hours range, which is the minimum recommended activity.

All the way around in terms of statistics, we are doing great. My belly is 40.5" around. The baby is a nice good heavy weight so far - probably between 2 and 2.5 pounds. I tested negative for gestational diabetes on the routine test, so he's thriving and so am I, but I realize that we are entering the third trimester and here's where the real stuff begins!

Here's a listing of what to expect from weeks 25 - 28 that I found on the web.

Pregnancy: 25-28 Weeks

Changes Your Body Will Experience

• Strong and more frequent fetal movements
• Lower abdominal achiness which is related to the stretching of ligaments
• Difficulty sleeping
• Braxton Hicks contractions
• Leg cramps
• Backache
• Constipation
• Heartburn
• Varicose veins and or hemorrhoids
• Mild swelling of ankles and feet
• Shortness of breath

I have all of the above except the last two, and I just got a lot of the newest symptoms last week in week 27.

Pam's visit this weekend - Pics of her and me and Mark

My sister zipped into town for a quick visit. She was traveling with a friend and we had the afternoon together today and then she zips off again tomorrow for DC and work on Monday. She wanted to go to our premier swap meetish type place, Santee Alley. It's the wholesale district and it's got everything and it's a lot of fun. You see everything from crap, to knock-offs to the exact same stuff they sell on Melrose, just at an extreme discount. It's arranged into sections - there is a street that's just accesories, several streets of women's wear, etc. I've never been in the men's section.

Here's the catch: it is a swap meet. It is craptastic. You're going to be among the unwashed masses. The streets burst with folks, lots of Latinos and Mexican food. There are a thousand little street vendors with teeny carts, selling hot dogs, or pupusas or ice cream. There are almost no bathrooms to speak off, you park a couple of blocks away and just walk through this virtual outdoor mallish area.

I developed a defensive stance, with both arms held rigidly out, so that anyone bumping into me would catch a fist first before catching my belly, but really only one man careened into me the whole time. Considering how many people were out there, that's amazing. Pam was usually walking ahead of me, running interference. It was funny, she was very protective and nurturing with me - always checking if I was tired, not making me walk far, leaving me sitting at the food court while she ran up and down the street, etc.

I wonder if it was the Indian Tikka Masala (yum) that led to my little dizzy spell I experienced later. We were in a store, hadn't been out long at all, and I all of a sudden felt like I might faint. Having never fainted, it took me a bit to even understand what the bad feeling meant. But I caught on and went to sit outside on a step. As soon as I did, the cold outdoor air made me feel better almost immediately. I took off my jacket and scarf and surmised that I had probably overheated. I don't know if the semi-spicy Indian food got my insides warm because I didn't consciously feel hot. I'm the queen of cold. But either the food helped me get hot, or it was simply not good-for-me food and made me sick. So we walked around cautiously to just a few more stores before we left. Didn't really make a difference, the bag of her purchases was SO big
that it was hard to navigate and she was getting sick of the crowd anyhow, so I didn't feel too guilty about being fragile and ruining the shopping. Good booty was gotten by all - we really got some bargain stuff that was great. She bought me a really cute purse and I bought a pair of earrings.

We went back to my house and I showed her around and she saw the house's promise with all the crap still hanging out. Okay, not all the crap, we're down to only about 5% of stuff that should be put away, still out. It's hard finding a proper home for everything, especially clothes with the lack of closet space having moved from an apt with two wall to wall closets in two separate rooms, into a normal, older home with 3 small closets. All the bedroom closets combined here, don't equal one at the apartment. It's going to take a little creativity, but there's lots of other storage space, just not so much for clothes. I have the baby's closet full already and he's not even born! And that's with all my non-pregnant clothes bussed out of the house, into boxes in the garage. Just coats and jackets alone take up a lot. I've got some strategies in my head that involve Ikea...

Pam took pictures of me and Mark in the yard, and Mark took some pics of me and Pam. I look like a stork standing next to her. I'm surprised I never felt for it when she told me I was adopted as a kid. I guess I look like my parents even though I don't look much like her. I don't how we're going to get the pictures to my dad - he's only mildly internet friendly, but way better than my mother was. Mark's mom is a little hipper than both of my. My dad's a business man, so he can always have his admin at work do stuff for him, so he only has to halfway get it.

Baby kicking video #1

Things are going well.

Today our new motion sensor lights were installed! Yippee! Gate was fixed, blinds in bedroom fixed, bathroom heater cleaned out, yaddah, yaddah. Found a new space heater that doesn't beep. We had a tower ceramic space heater that drives Max crazy. It beeps when you press any button to turn the temp up or down, turn it on or off. Max hates it so much, he runs away. So on the winner that I got today. It does about the same thing as the Lasko heater, but without the beeps.

Life is looking up. My sister's coming to visit for 1 day, but that's better than nothing and she'll get to see me pregnant in the flesh. Got a sofa slipcover to cover the godawful southwestern lodge themed sofa they left behind. Mark bought some throws to camouflage the jean/denim sectional other sofa they left as well.

Got some videos of the baby kicking. It takes a lot of luck to capture it because he somehow knows when Mark's around now, and stops. Or if I pick up the camera, he stops. There is some way that he knows, I don't know if my muscles tense, or my breathing changes, but whispering doesn't help fool him, neither does talking more - I've tried it all.

Computer still dead

I have lots more house photos I could post, but they are on my dead computer that's still at the mac store. It's been slow going - I haven't gotten my office up and running since I have no equipment to use out there and before that, had no internet. A time to reflect, huh?

The HMO problem is almost fixed. My cell phone bill this month is going to be exorbitant since all the utilities people are calling me on my cell. And my home phone, the temporary one at least, gets about 5 telemarketer calls a day. I haven't given the number out much, since I'm hoping my old number comes through this week, but I almost ignore the home phone since I know that no one real could be calling, and sure enough, it's always telespam. It's funny, Mark's really concerned now when he hears the phone ring and jumps up to answer it, now that it's telemarketers, whereas when we had a number that REAL family and friends called on, he never answered the phone and barely twitched when it rang! Maybe the placement on the phones in the house are more annoying and louder or something, it's just ironic.

We had an ant invasion yesterday. Turns out the dog food is yummy and I come home to find the pantry with ants crawling all over and throughout the dog food. The bags have a ziploc enclosure, but it's not always tight and they were in one of the bags in particular. So I spent awhile rinsing the dog food and then rebaking it to dry it after I de-anted it. That's about $36 worth of food and I just bought new bags on Friday, so I refused to just throw it out. Now comes the war on ants.

I have this orange oil that kills them and doesn't poison people, kids or dogs, but I need something stronger to prevent them wanting to come in. A friend suggested something called Home Defense, so I'll have to try it. Whenever you live in a house vs. an apt, there is s much wildlife you interact with. We hear squirrels skittering on the trellis. One day I was a victim of a fly-by from some ridiculous big, badly behaved jay bird who starting squawking from behind me as I walked towards the house from the yard. He was behind him screaming, "incoming" but the feeling of it was more like, "get out of my way," and then he landed on the trellis roof. Most birds go out of their way to not deal with humans, yet this one was all aggressive and came up from behind, swooping way too close to comfort to tell me to get off of his turf. So I found a nice broom handle and went outside to way the bar of the trellis and he squawked and ran off. Haven't seen him since, which is good for him. I was considering a BB Gun! I don't know what to do about the squirrels.

We had squirrels in our attic in Hyattsville, but a) that was our house, b) it was indoors. This is just squirrels cutting through our roof as a shortcut to someplace else, so I don't think it's worth much effort. Just a little unsettling to hear random noises. And houses all have their own sounds that one must get used to. Like the ticking in the vent when the heater turns off, or the humming of something of other. And this house has wood floors and there is always some settling noises and wood expansion noises that happen. I'm getting used to them, but they haven't become so second hand to me that I don't even notice.

Baby boy in here is doing great. I practiced doing kick counts for fun and he does 10 kicks in about 10 minutes when he's up and moving. Very strong boy.

Hopefully my computer will come back soon. I'll keep y'all updated.

PS- the pregnancy nightmares have begun. I've had vivid dreams for months now, but never pertaining to pregnancy until two nights ago. I guess it was supposed to be like in vitro or something, where me and Mark had this premade seamonkey baby that we were supposed to defrost and reconstitute with water. So it was his idea to do it, and I think the deal was that you had to thaw the baby and once it was thawed, reinsert it into your hoo-ha for the next 6 months or so to let it finish growing. So although it was his idea, he went off someplace and I was left alone with these nebulous directions and I think I screwed up and didn't cover the baby with enough water, so I had to come back and keep refilling the sink. One time, I almost washed it down the drain and I was freaking out silently throughout the whole process.

Then it turned out that Mark was no longer Mark, he was now Charlie Sheen, and he was introducing me to all his preexisting kids. Most of them liked me, but the 2 yr old baby girl was scared of me, and I was sure that she could see through me and that she sensed how bad I was messing up with the sea-monkey baby in the sink And then I woke up. Welcome to the dream life of a pregnant woman...

Good news, bad news

Bad news:

• HMO hell - We switched to HMO to save money and it's screwed up from the get-go, can't use my OBGYN at the moment and worst case scenario couldn't see her or sign up to use her until JANUARY! HMOs suck. I've always been PPO in the past, for good reason. Mark's never sick, never goes to the doctor and doesn't understand the difference really since he doesn't use their services, so he wondered why we were paying so much more for PPO and wanted to switch. I was told HMO isn't so bad for pregnancy since you only need 1 referral and after that, it's 9 months with no red tape, but this one mistake signing up has caused me to have to spend about 1 1/2 hours on the phone Friday, 20 minutes Saturday and so far an hour on Monday.
• DirecTv - don't even ask. Talked to the one friend who likes it, didn't manage to hear from the other 3 who hate it before signing up and ending up with a contract that makes me feel like an elderly victim of a scam. Worst company ever, using a 1994 business model, lots of small print, varying degrees of idiots and non-idiots at customer support, and all this to hide a not-so-great product with less functionality than most plain ol' cable. If their product didn't suck, they wouldn't have to trick people into contracts and omit tons of things on their website beforehand.
  
• My imac is dead, I don't have access to several of my email accounts, addresses, old emails,etc.
• Haven't found my answering machine, which I actually need now that I have POTS phone service again. Vonage still hasn't transferred my old number yet - might take weeks.
  

Good news:

• House is starting to look like humans live here and not Katrina victims.
• Baby kick count - you don't have to do it until week 28, but so far, it takes my baby less than 10 minutes to give me 10 kicks (their aim is 10 in less than 2 hours) at his most active time. I think it's supposed to slow down as he has less room to move, but for right now, he's kicking my butt, and I don't mind. I love it!
• Imac is under applecare warranty!
• House phone is now routed to the correct phone jacks - AT&T took a week, but came out and fixed it, probably for free.
• Owners of house have agreed to add lighting to the back office and garage so that I won't trip trying to get to my office after dark which starts as early as 4:45 now.
• Can cook in the kitchen and dishwasher works VERY well.
• LA weather is going back to normal - I can enjoy my patio now and Max can get back to sunbathing in the yard.
  

Pictoral proof that I am not just a walking belly

My friend Kenya rightfully complained that I never include pictures of my face, that it's always just a belly and she personally asked Mark to take more candids. So here goes some pics of me last night right before Mark and I went to a bday party for one of his new coworkers and 1 of me and Mark together at the party.

24 weeks pics

First day of grocery shopping in the new place. Found a closer store (than I'd thought from looking at Google Maps before) and went. Was a little disappointed when they didn't ask if I needed help out to my car. I guess that's why Pavilions costs more than Ralph's, huh? But driving around, I was pleasantly surprised that the neighborhood has more to offer than I'd thought. I'd been west, east and to the glorious south of us, but never due north. North generally takes us to Panorama City aka Mexico, but apparently there's some nice stuff on the border. And Mark and I drove around this weekend and found that in Panorama City, there's actually a lot of fun 'crut shopping' as my mom and dad used to call it. You know, cheap stores with bargains. Yes they look cheap, and smell cheap, but they sell okay stuff.

The tide has finally turned and now it's an adventure getting to learn a new neighborhood and finding shortcuts and highway exits I didn't know existed.

I don't know if the pictures above accurately show how big I'm getting. I think I look smaller front to back in the photo than I do in real life. The baby seems to be just going longer from the front to the back. I'm not getting any wide or higher, just longer. His weight is excellent and I have to take the standard gestational diabetes test in a week or so. So many tests, right? I think this might be the last standard one left...

4th Day at the New House

Doggies are sleeping in their crates, not in our bedroom, just like real kids. They are adjusting to the house well although there is a bit of separation anxiety from when we left them here alone to get stuff at the apartment this weekend. The result is unusually clingy dogs following me around every turn, making sure I wasn't escaping through some unknown door. Today I was home all day and they relaxed and bit and cut back on following me - even went outside a couple of times on their own. They still are unaccustomed to the yard. They are prissy and don't want to get their feet wet on the grass, so I've got to shoo them into the yard or walk out there with them to get them to go. But it gets better each day.

And so does the homeyness of this house. I cleared out several boxes today and the difference really helped. I think a lot of stuff will get put away this weekend and it'll look even more like a house. The first couple of days it felt like we were staying at a lodge or vacation property. But as all our crap entered, then it just felt like some random weird place, not yet home. Even the dogs wouldn't eat because they were scared of where I put their dishes. After a day that I heard Max's stomach growl twice in quick succession, I had to resort to giving them a hot meal (dry dog food microwaved with a bit of chicken broth) that they couldn't resist to make sure they'd eat at least once a day and get used to where they are eating. There's proof that they are getting a lot more acclimated: Max likes to drink water before going for a walk. I told him that we were going outside to go potty and he disappeared around the corner first to get a drink of water. He remembered exactly where everything was and put 2 and 2 together that it's just a slight deviation from him normal nightly regimen, and adjusted accordingly.

The house is really starting to feel like a home now to me as well. The trek to the bathroom at night is automatic mostly, and I remember that I have to wear slippers for the cold bathroom floor, even while only mildly awake.