scary!

Well, the baby gave us a little scare last night. Yesterday, about 1:30 or 2:00, my belly started getting sharp, sharp shooting pains going through it. It was killing my back, too. I could hardly walk, and nothing was helping. It didn't go away. I went home after school and laid down on my side, and they went away, but then I had to get up and go to Encampment's athletic banquet and they started up again as soon as I got up. When we got dinner, I took 2 Tylenol and they went away for an hour, but then came back pretty strong again. I was almost in tears. And the baby wasn't moving anymore. Dr. Noton, our only doctor in town, and who loves Josh because of all his EMT stuff, was at the banquet so when it was over, Josh asked her if she'd come take a look at me. She asked some questions, poked me in some places, and said I need to go to the clinic. They had an intern this month, (none of us knew about him!) that is leaving on Friday to go back to Casper to finish his OB stuff and do that full-time, so that was handy, since our clinic doesn't normally do OB! She called him to see if he could meet us at the clinic.

So we got there about 8:45 last night, and he took my history, asked lots of questions, and thought he better find a heartbeat. The dopplar at the clinic HURTS! It has a tiny little poky end and he practically had to push all they way through my stomach to get a sound. Owie! But he found the baby's heartbeat, 156 bpm. Whew! He took a urine sample to rule out a UTI. It came back that I DON'T have a UTI (thank goodness), and he doesn't *think* I was having pre-term contractions, even though I was pretty dehydrated, he said most likely it's those three sets of muscles on each of my sides stretching and they all got pulled yesterday. That's why they hurt. I had done one dance with my kindergarteners, but it wasn't a strenuous dance, but it must have been enough to pull all my muscles. So he told me to go home, lay down (he liked that I felt better when I laid down, that showed more that it wasn't contractions), and drink water. He said he'd send me to the hospital to get hooked up to all the fancy machines, just to make sure they weren't contractions, but he had a feeling they'd just tell me the same thing he did and charge me a lot of money for the "fancy water" that I could get for free at home. :) He was really nice.

It was a pretty painful night, every time I rolled over, I woke up hurting real bad. But this morning I only ache on my right side and it's not nearly as bad as it was last night. Josh is pretty cute- he put restrictions on me. I cannot move around today, I have to drink LOTS of water, and tomorrow during clean-up day, I am NOT to walk with the kids, I am to ride in the pick-up with my co-class sponsor. :) He even told me if I don't drink enough water, he's calling his little EMT friends to come put an IV in me.

I joked to my family that now I'm catching up to my sister in Dr. visits- she now has to go 2 times a week, she had to do a 24-hour urine collection Monday and Tuesday, she's back on modified bed-rest, etc. Sheesh. She has about 5 weeks to go, but the dr. doesn't think she'll go more than 2-3.

Today is better- I only am sore sometimes. Nothing like yeserday's pain though, so that's good.

HALFWAY!

We're halfway there! I hit the 20 week mark today. I can't believe how fast time has flown. It seems like yesterday that we found out that we were finally pregnant, and now we're halfway through! The baby (who shall remain nameless- we HAVE a name, but you don't get to know it!!) was pretty active yesterday. Lots of partying going on down there. He did stop moving around and took a nap at one point, until Josh decided to see if he could wake him up by using his finger to push on my belly gently. Gently, but enough to wake him up, because it worked! He didn't stop moving for several more hours. I even got a kick hard enough to move my hand! He's a mover and a wiggler, that's for sure. (Maybe he'll be the next star kicker for his high school football team?) I made Josh promise that after the baby is born, when he is sleeping, there will be NO waking him up just to see him move. :)

I have now hit the 11 day mark for no throwing up! It's a wonderful feeling.

ultrasound!

Well, we're pretty sure my Grandma won't be getting her great-granddaughter she's been wanting. Dr. Keeler wouldn't confirm anything since we weren't totally positive we wanted to know what the baby is, but he knows we saw (as far as we know,) some boy parts, and at the end of the ultrasound, he said, "Well, you already have your suspicions", with a knowing smile on his face. So we're pretty sure we're having a little football player. We can get it confirmed on our next ultrasound if we want to, which I'll get to in a minute.

We got to the appt. at 2:00 yesterday, and there was NOBODY in the waiting room. I thought that was strange. The lady at the desk then told me that Dr. Keeler had to go do an emergency C-section, and could we come back at 3:00 and see if we needed to re-schedule? I said no problem to the coming back at 3:00, but we couldn't re-schedule because we came from so far away! So Josh and I went to Wal-mart to kill time and then came back at 2:45. Good thing we came back early- Dr. Keeler was on his way back from the hospital and we got in within 5 minutes! (And when we were done, there were no empty chairs in the waiting room- we would've been there all night!) My blood pressure was high though- need to watch that. It was 134/64, and it never gets that high. Josh took it later that night and it was pretty low- 104/something. Crazy. And I've gained a whole QUARTER of a pound since a month ago- I'm "up" to 123.25. A whole pound and a quarter heavier than where I started! :)

The baby looks great- everything is measuring as it is supposed to, and there's no thickening of the neck, which could indicate Down Syndrome, no extra vertebrae, we saw the footprint, meaning no club feet, no cleft palate, etc. He has a good beating 4-chamber heart, too. :) It was beating at 150 bpm. He pushed the "camera" away at one point, we saw him turn towards it, then put his hands up and his hands got bigger while his face got smaller- he was pushing away! He was awful squirmy, too, Dr. Keeler had a hard time looking at things at times!! He flipped around since the night before, too- Josh felt him kick on my right side Tues. night, and yesterday, his feet were on my left side. But then when we went to bed, he was kicking on my right again! Dr. Keeler said they flip a lot when they have this much room. Yesterday was the first day I've felt distinct kicks- and they're coming pretty often now! Josh felt them last night and giggled each time it happened. It was pretty cute. :)

The good news is, I get a 3rd ultrasound. (They usually only give you 2- once at the beginning, once around 20 weeks.) The bad news is, it's because my placenta is really low, which could indicate placenta previa. That's when the placenta is really, really low and covers the cervix, meaning I can't deliver "normally", I would have to have a c-section. We'll check it again in an ultrasound in July and see if it's moved up any. The next ultrasound will probably be a 3-D one, so we'd really get to see what the baby looks like!!

moving

Josh got to feel the baby last night! We were laying in bed watching
teh 10:00 news and I felt the baby get all wiggly. He put his hand
there and a minute later, BAM! He felt him move! Just once though,
then the baby must have decided to go to sleep because he quit being
wiggly. I'm beginning to be able to feel him move a little more often
now too.

kids say the darndest things.

I've had quite a few humorous things said to me by my elementary students as they figure out I'm pregnant. Most classes know now, I think it's only the kindergarten that hasn't figured it out. A few of those kids know, but not all of them. (Don't know how they could miss it the past couple days- I've gotten pretty big this week!) Anyway, here's some of the highlights of what has been said:

2nd grade found out first, since our principal's son is in that class. They came to music one day and Guy said, very accusingly, "I know about you." He then told the rest of the class and they all looked straight at my belly and said, "You don't look like you are." (This was very early in my pregnancy.) I told them to wait until we got back from summer vacation, and I was going to be super fat! A few days later, I was wearing an empire-waisted dress shirt that I love and Hunter said, "You're right, Mrs. Sandlian! You ARE getting fat!"

An aide in our school has a kindergartener who was VERY upset one day because she had to share her birthday party at school with a boy in her class who has the same birthday. This little girl, Micaiah, cried the night before, because the little boy was bringing the cupcakes and Micaiah was bringing the punch. "Mrs. Sandlian is having a baby and the baby NEEDS a cupcake! And Mrs. Sandlian LOVES cupcakes! Can't we cut into my birthday cake early so I can bring a piece to Mrs. Sandlian?" That story just about made me cry. How sweet that she was so worried that I wasn't getting a cupcake!

5th and 6th grade found out next. They were all just very worried that I wasn't coming back next year. Coming from a class that is a continuous struggle to get them to do anything, that was a nice compliment.

1st grade came in about a month later and one of the girls said, "I heard on the playground that you are having a baby." I told them that was true, I was having a baby! Mollie, our secretary's daughter, said, "OH! Are you getting married now?" HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Still laughing about that one. Her mom was so embarrassed when I told her that. It's still the joke in our faculty- they want to know if I've found a husband now that I'm "in the family way". I'm telling them I'm still looking. :)

3rd and 4th grade were the latest to find out. WAY later than the other classes! They figured it out when I was about 16 weeks along! One kid said in class, "I can't wait to see your baby!" The rest of the kids gasped at the same time and I heard a big, "YOU'RE HAVING A BABY!??!!" Keona told me, "No offense, Mrs. Sandlian, but I wondered why you were gaining weight in your stomach." Still laughing about that one, too. :)

Oh, kids say the darndest things...

This is cool!!

Every once in a while, we get out the stethescope to see if we can hear the baby's heartbeat. We haven't been able to yet, but last night I got it out and could hear the baby moving around for the first time! I gave it to Josh to listen, and he found the baby kicking!! It was so cool! I listened and heard the baby kick 4 times. Sounded like a thump in there. Then I had Josh check my blood pressure, just to check, and then listened again but either I couldn't find him kicking, or he got bored and stopped. I could still hear him moving though. I've felt movements that feel like little twitches for the past week or so, but nothing too strong and no kicks yet. Soon, maybe!

Busy week this week- I have my photoshop class tonight, and Josh has a fire meeting. Tomorrow, all 3 animals go for their shots at 4:30. I'm making Josh come with to help. Last time I did it by myself and it was a disaster. Birdie is nervous and whines and cowers, Hogan is all excited and wants to run and play with everyone, and Charlie sits and howls and hisses in her cage. So much fun. Then, we have to hurry and get to Encampment for Josh's football meeting at 6, then my elementary program at 7. Each grade is doing a couple songs on their own, instead of like the Christmas concert where everyone did all the songs together. That's nice so I don't have to rehearse them all together, but I have a lot more stuff to get organized, like the 2nd graders' kazoos, the 1st graders' rhythm instruments, etc. One more concert after tomorrow's- on teh 16th. Then I'm "done" for the year!! No more concerts until after the baby's born. That's kind of a weird feeling!