3/31 doctor appointment

Today I had another doctor appointment. Even though the routine is the same every time, I always look forward to the appointments b/c I love to hear the baby's heart beat and see how the baby and I are progressing. Today I weighed in with a 4lb weight gain which my doc said was the "perfect amount" and asked me how I always manage to gain the perfect amount of weight each month. I blushed of course...lol. jk. I really have no idea. I don't really over eat and I'm pretty good at eating throughout the day so maybe that's it? Who knows. Either way I was happy to hear her say that. :) The downside to today's appointment was that I got there at 4:06 (that's when I signed in) and didn't get called in to be seen by the nurse till right around 5 and then after she took my stats and urine sample and all, it was another 40 minutes before I was seen by the doc herself. We didn't get out till 5:45. I have to say that's been the longest wait I've had so far at this doctor's office. I was starving by the time I got out! Anyways, back to the update of how the pregnancy is going...

Brooklyn was moving around and very active while I wait and then when doc was looking for the heart beat she found it pretty quick and the beat was good and strong. She measured my belly (I think that's called the fundal measurement but I could be wrong) with the little measuring tape. She measured it twice which made me wonder why at first until she told me my measurement. She said I measured 28 the first time which was already big for being at only 24 weeks and then measure again to make sure she was measuring correctly and the second time she got 30! I hope this doesn't mean I'm having a huge baby! I read a couple of places that you should be 1cm per week of pregnancy with a -2cm or +2cm variation. Even with the +2cm variation, I'm still measuring big for being 24 weeks. Everything else was looking normal. I went ahead and asked her what her policy was for inducing early. I know some docs are totally against it and want the baby to come only when it's ready and will only induce if there is a medical necesity. Others don't mind doing it within a reasonable amount of time if everything looks good and the baby is big enough and the cervix is "ripe". She asked me my reason for even thinking about getting induced early and I told her. As of right now, without me being out anymore days for the rest of this school year, which won't happen, and adding on the paid days off we get at the beginning of the next school year, I will only have 3 weeks of paid maternity leave. That would leave me with zero days to call in for the rest of the school year if I were to get sick or if baby were to get sick. If I have the baby later than my due date, July 16th, I'm looking at less that a month before school starts back, August 17th. That will leave me with very little time with her before having to head back to work. I told her my main concern was her coming late. If she came ON her due date I would still at least get a month and a half with her. She told me that her normal rule on inducing is only when medically necessary BUT she has dealt with a lot of teachers who have had the same issue with having babies close to the beginning of a school year and with families with a father in the military who would not be around for baby's birth where she made an exception ONLY if the cervix was "ripe and ready" and baby looked healthy and if she was sure that by inducing the baby would come that very day. She said until I'm 36 weeks she won't want to really consider it but that if I continue to measure big and the baby ends up being big that she doesn't think I would carry full term anyways and would end up having her a little early. For that I'm grateful to be measuring early! lol. So, here's hoping to a ripe cervix after 36 weeks, or a nice plump baby that wants to come a week or two early! :) Everything else was normal, I had some questions about braxton hicks contractions (I thought I might have had one but turns out I was just overworking myself and walking too much on Sunday) and some other stuff and all my questions were answered and I left feeling good. My next appointment will be April 30th and I will be having the blood glucose test (yuck). Three days later on May 2nd, I will have my 3D ultra sound at 9am. I'm VERY excited about that! I'll get to know for sure the gender of this baby and get a DVD and pictures. I'm inviting my parents and Waylon's parents to come see it since they said friends and family are welcome to be in the room. It feels like forever to wait again to find out for sure if we're having a girl but they really want you to be right around 28 weeks which I will just have completed at that point. I'll just have to be patient!

On a positive note to offset my last depressing blog: this week I've felt a lot better emotionally going into work and haven't had that huge dread in the mornings that I've been having. It's been good. I've been sleeping a little better even though Brooklyn is still very active and loves to move around when I'm lying down. We do need prayer for Waylon to find another job. He no longer has one as of Saturday morning. Long story, I'll spare the details. He already has several leads though and has applied at many places. The good thing is, I make enough money with my job for us to not be in distress right now over this and we just recently got our tax return and some money from Waylon's parents towards his car that they wanted to give as a gift so we're ok for now. We won't be going hungry, that's for sure. :) Just pray that he finds a job with flexible hours that will work with his school and church schedule. Until then, I'm lucky to have him home to do some cleaning around the house that I haven't been able to get to. He's very handy when he stays home and I leave him lists of things that need to get done...they are all done by the time I get home. The only thing I would not want him doing without me is grocery shopping...who knows what he would come home with; canned spinach and oatmeal cream pies - two things he likes a lot. I know, sounds a little wierd! Two opposite ends of the health spectrum. He's so thin he can eat whatever he wants though and not gain any weight. I wish I was like that.

Well, I'm going to leave you with a couple of pictures I took last night. You can see I'm getting quite big. I realize my outfit is not stylish in any way and I'm obviously not wearing makeup and my hair isn't fixed. It's a wonder why I'm even posting them but lately this has just been how I've looked all the time. If I waited till I looked "put together" no pictures would ever get posted so here you go: