wishin' and prayin' and hopin'

It's been a crazy month. I know I've been hugely slack on blogging, but now that I've left the first trimester behind and I'm hoping entering better weeks ahead, I'm hoping to get back onto my feet. I've been in a daze of doctors visits, speech therapy with G, toddler-raising, teaching, and taking classes.

I'm about to finish my seventh week of Lovenox shots to counteract my three clotting factors. To put it mildly, the experience has given me a whole lot of respect for people with diabetes. I don't know how they go through that may shots a day with no end in sight. At least I know my shots won't last forever. But it's amazing what you'll go through when you have no choice, when you have to do it, and especially when you have to do it for the health and life of your child.

So every time I stick the needle in, I think about the baby and how I'm one shot closer to holding him or her in my arms.

There are some things I've learned about taking Lovenox that I wish I'd known ahead of time.

1. Put the needle in slowly. You don't want to jab that half-inch thing in there. It seems terribly in theory to do it this way but trust me, you'll feel like you have more control. And don't worry about that weird bendy thing your skin will do before the needle finally breaks through your skin - no, it won't be difficult to puncture your skin.
2. Ice liberally before and after. Like at least ten minutes before and after. If you don't want it to sting like a mofo afterward, you'd better ice.
3. Oh yeah, the medicine will sting. It stings much worse than the needle going in (most of the time). The stinging will take your breath away, but don't forget to keep breathing and stay calm. When it hurts too much, stop putting the medicine in and wait a moment. It doesn't hurt to keep the needle in, so take your time when pressing the plunger. The first time, it stung for over 30 minutes. After that, I injected much more slowly and the stinging time has decreased.
4. You'll bleed so be prepared. Keep tissues handy and tiny bandaids if you get a bleeder.
5. Do the shots yourself. The hubs did mine for the first two weeks because I was a big chicken, but I swear, it's less traumatic to do it yourself. My hands were shaking so badly when I did my first one, but I feel like a pro by now.
6. It hurts, but it doesn't hurt forever. The stinging eventually fades and you'll get a reprieve until you have to do it again the next day.

Also, the experience of giving yourself a Lovenox shot changes each time.

Sometimes it's a bleeder. When you take the needle out, a big bubble of blood follows. Don't put too much pressure on it as the bleeding will eventually stop on its own and you don't want to cause too much bruising.

Sometimes it's a bruiser. Luckily, I haven't gotten many of these, and only one has given me a huge bruise.

Sometimes it stings so badly you think you can't stand it. Along with the stinger can come the oh-my-god-this-needle-is-huge moment when that baby burns all the way in.

And then, every once in a while, you'll get the easy. The injection that you barely feeling going in, that hardly burns at all, and the only way you can identify the injection sight is by the tiny red dot.

But I'll take stingers and bruises every time if it means a healthy baby at the end of the journey. I know these shots will be like labor, and the memories of pain will fade with time. I can't feel the baby yet, but I know it's in there, bouncing around on my uterus and wiggling those skinny limbs like a crazy monkey.

So I let out a long breath as I slide the needle in. And I make a wish.

fall days

I've spent most of the past few weeks hibernating. If I can be laying in bed and/or asleep, I take the opportunity. This pregnancy is totally kicking my butt, and I have the worst nausea I've ever had. That said, when the Zofran does its job, I do my best to get out and about with G. We've had a terrific fall so far.

Have I mentioned lately that my baby is huge? It feels weird to still call him my baby, especially since we have an actual baby on the way, but I guess he'll always be a baby to me.

I like how he looks like he's fishing with this stick. I couldn't get him to really smile for the camera, but at least he was willing to stand around for a while.

Kiddo even threw some leaves in the air for me.

I love this one.

Toward the end, he got tired of walking around and came to sit in my lap for a while. He took this photo of us, hence the fierce look of concentration on his face.

I hope I only have another month or so before my energy level goes back up and the nausea eases off. I'm 9 1/2 weeks, but since the symptoms kicked in high gear at 5 1/2 weeks, I feel like I've been at it forever.

More to come about this pregnancy, but I thought you might enjoy some cute pics of the kid.

guest post: 10 Things I Think I Thought I Thunk

Since I'm spending most of my days 1) throwing up, 2) trying not to throw up, or 3) asleep so I'm not throwing, the husband is blogging for me today. I'm sorry for unleashing him on you yet again. ~Alicia

Hi everybody, the husband here again, blogging again as the wife tries not to throw up (and often fails). Failing having anything interesting to talk about (maybe next time), I thought I would share a few of the random items that bounce within my head.

So, with apologies to my wife, here’s my “10 Things I Think I Thought I Thunk.”

Stop laughing. Thunk is a word. Just like Squozen. After you squeeze something, it is squozen. Just sayin’.

Buckle up people, here we go!

1. – I’m finding it far too amusing that the best shows we’re watching right now are cartoons. I’m not sure what that says about us or the current state of television, but I feel like it’s been this way for a while now.

Transformers Prime, Bob’s Burgers, the new Turtles. All quality. What else are we going to watch - Honey Boo Boo?

Heck, even some of Grayson’s shows beat the pants off of 95% of the drivel on TV right now. I’ll take Phineas and Ferb over just about every network’s prime-time line up any day.

2. – My child falls for the Bugs Bunny argument trick. I’m not sure if I’m proud or sad.

Me: “Come here.”

G: “No.”

Me: “Yes.”

G: “No.”

Me: “Yes.”

G: “No.”

Me: “No.”

G: *pause* *nods enthusiastically* *comes over*

I can’t wait until he’s older and we can have the “Wabbit season / Duck season” debate.

3. – It’s about time that someone else in our household gets an introduction. Meet Teddy:

Teddy is G’s best friend. Teddy joined our family on G’s 2^nd birthday and G loved him instantly, carrying him through the mall after we made the little bear. 

Teddy was G’s first bedtime companion, and still keeps him company every night. He’s never thrown him out and has often used him as a pillow… but who hasn’t used their best friend for a pillow from time to time, right?

Teddy is far from a security blanket, and G tends to largely ignore him (and all his stuffed animals, to be fair) unless he’s actively playing a game with them, but still, he’s the best friend that the boy’s got.

Teddy is also occasionally a projectile. But, again… who hasn’t occasionally chucked their friend at their parents? 

Behold the cuteness!

4. – Toodee stares at me every day. Toodee, from Yo Gabba Gabba. Yup, that Toodee. Every day I open the shower curtain and BAM.

It’s like some sort of weird Hitchcock movie in reverse. Staring children’s stars in giant costumes. Next one is Barney in reverse “Rear Window,” where Barney sings as he slowly crawls back home from a neighbor’s house and gets a cast taken off.

I don’t really know where I was going with that. Pretend it was funny.

END TANGENT

So there Toodee is, in the shower, every day for over a year now. But hey, at least that one’s at eye level. The other Toodee is at a very unfortunate level, as you can tell by her shocked expression.

 

5. – Serious alert. 

I hate the fact that I haven’t really enjoyed us being pregnant since baby 2 (our first loss). I hate that I feel like I’m just waiting for things to go wrong again. I hate that I did that with baby 3, and then we lost it. I wish I could enjoy every minute, every nauseous, vomity, tiring minute. 

I try to enjoy it when I can. When she complains about feeling horrible, I give sympathy while also being extremely happy at the nice strong symptoms. I try to gently remind her (and myself) that all her problems are because BABY, but that only goes so far.

Oop, and I’m being sent out for a McDonald’s double cheeseburger (pickles only) at 11pm. Be right back.

…

6. – I’m back. Ok, so on a less serious note, I write most of this post as I watch a football game. The Tennessee Titans are miserable this year. Amazingly, I don’t really care, and I watch every game to the end. People ask me how I can do that, and I just respond with the fact that I’m also a Cubs fan… so I’m completely used to rooting for losing teams. 

And drinking. Drinking during the games helps quite a lot too. 

(the Titans went on to win, which only made me all the happier)

7. – Every once in a while I wonder if I’m confusing my child because I tend to do voices and accents when I read to him. Everyone in The Hobbit talks in an English or Scottish accent (Hobbits and wizards = English, Dwarves = Scottish. Really. I shouldn’t even have to explain this to people). Tom O’Malley (the alley cat in Disney’s “Aristocats’) talks in an Irish accent (because: O’Malley). Everyone in Anastasia talks with Russian ones, for some reason Tinker Bell is Swedish… you get the point. 

I can’t help it. I like to do voices. Someday he’ll really appreciate it. Or beg me to stop. Either way.

8. – Every night during my goodnights to G I paraphrase ‘Blazing Saddles.’ Some day he’ll realize this. Someday I hope it will amuse him as much as it amuses me. Some day he’ll properly squeak back at me, and I will die from pride. 

9. – It’s starting to seem like every day G is saying (ok, telling) a new word. Today we were driving to the mall (one of his favorite places because of the play area). As it came into view, G pointed with excitement and yelled, “Mall! Mall!” It’s more than kinda awesome.  

10. – I feel like I haven’t been funny enough in this post. So here’s my absolute favorite joke ever:

A small town in the middle of nowhere is in crisis. It seems that whenever anyone enters a local flower shop, they never come back out. Suspicion is that the pair of monks that run the shop are killing all their customers.

The police chief is frazzled, and is about to quit his job when a man walks into his office.

“Chief,” says the man, “I am here to help.”

“And just who the hell are you?” asks the chief.

“My name is Hugh, and I will put an end to this town’s nightmare.”

“We’ve lost over a dozen police and an entire SWAT team, what makes you think you’ll fare any differently?” asks the chief.

“Chief, you’ll just have to trust me,” replies Hugh, “I can handle these monks.”

For some reason the chief believes the man, and he takes him to the flower shop immediately. Hugh takes a long look and strides purposely towards the shop. The police beg him to stop, but he waves them off, and with a final wink, he pushes open the door and disappears inside.

Minutes pass and the police get worried, but finally the door swings open again and out steps Hugh, carrying the unconscious bodies of the two monks.

Hugh drops them at the chief’s feet, and without a word, he walks away… never to be heard from again.

The moral of this story?

Only Hugh can prevent florist friars.

Yup. Ending it with a pun. A grand pun. A glorious pun.

I’m amazed that my wife let me post it.

so my reason is...

Okay, I promise there's an awesome reason for my absence the past couple of weeks.

It starts with "preg" and ends with "nant."

I'm pregnant!

I'm 7 weeks, to be more specific. We had our first ultrasound a couple days ago and everything looks great! Baby's heartbeat was perfect and we're so excited. Dave might have cried when we saw the heartbeat. Don't tell him I told you.

We weren't able to get any of our ultrasound pics, but we have another one this coming Wednesday. Maybe I'll have something to post then! I've also got a post in the works concerning my daily Lovenox shots, of which I've had three so far.

Mostly, I've been extremely tired and nauseous 24/7. That's mostly why I haven't been on. I spend most of my time trying to 1) not throw up, and 2) stay awake. I got some Zofran today, so I hope I'll be more coherent now.

But anyway, welcome to baby #5!