Two Months Already!

Sophia is 9 weeks, 6 days old!

Greetings!  I just have time for a quick update and a few pictures, so here goes:

* Sophia's reflux is still at war with us.  We've switched her meds from Zantac to Prilosec, 2mL twice a day.  Her gastroenterologist appointment is August 3rd, so hopefully we'll be closer to a solution.  She's doing better on the Prilosec, hopefully we get it licked soon!

* She's sleeping okay during the night, normally from 11pm to 4-6am, then up again around 7-9am.  This is great for us!

* Sophia had her 2 month shots last week, and it was pretty tough.  She did better than I did!  But all her labwork says that she's still perfectly healthy and well!

* As of last Thursday, Sophia is weighing in at 9 lbs, 14.5 oz (25th percentile), she is 23 inches long (75th percentile).  Both Shawn and I were small children, so her weight doesn't concern us or her doctor, as she is gaining on the correct curve.

* Sophia currently enjoys her vibrating seat, a ladybug that lights up and plays music (courtesy of Kim & Brian), being bounced on a giant yoga ball (thanks Meagan!), and being worn in the Moby Wrap around the house while I talk to her.  She still loves her naps on Mommy (thank goodness!) and sleeping in with Daddy on the weekends.

* Nursing is still going very well, for which I am thankful.  It really seems to bond Sophia and I, and late at night, or after a long day, it really calms Sophia down and relaxes her.  She doesn't really like bottles, but it's necessary for when Mommy wants to get out of the house.

All in all, she's the most beautiful baby I've ever seen, and to be honest, we get stopped and told so very often.  I feel so blessed every day (corny, I know) and Shawn and I still stop every day to marvel over our creation.  Time for pictures!

Daddy working from home with Sophia on his shoulder

Mommy and Sophia

Giving a little half smile... I can't seem to get a full one on film!

And doing what she does best...  making a cute and crazy face!

Whoops!

Sophia is 8 weeks, 1 day old!

Holy cannoli, I haven't updated in forever!  I guess I should get used to being so busy, I barely get a chance to get on my computer these days!  I'll try my best to catch you up on everything, so here goes:

1.  We've found out that Sophia has acid reflux all the way up to her mouth, with aspiration.  A couple of weeks ago, we had a normal pediatrician appointment, which turned into an all-day affair complete with an upper GI and a trip to a hippy pharmacy to get compounded meds.  The upper GI was absolute hell.  I had to dress Sophia in a tiny hospital gown, forcefeed her a bottle of a barium solution, then they had to velcro her onto a little table.  Oh my God I can't even begin to explain how hard that was for her and I.  It absolutely broke my heart.  She's now on a special form of Zantac (0.7 mL three times a day) so we're standing by to see how it works.  If the Zantac isn't effective enough, we go to Prevacid next, I believe.  Our pediatrician, Dr. William Caldwell, who is excellent, has a full line of treatment planned for Sophia, step by step.  Next month, Sophia has an appointment with a pediatric GI specialist to tackle this further.

2.  Sophia is social smiling now!  It's the cutest thing I've ever seen.  She mainly does it in the morning, during diaper changes, and when she's full and content.  She's surprised our neighbor, Auntie Meagan, with a few smiles, too!  Every time I try to capture a smile on camera, I fail miserably, but as soon as I do, I'll be sending it out.

3.  As of our last appointment, Sophia is 9lbs, 10oz.  So she's getting bigger!  And more beautiful!  She's sleeping in her bassinet (instead of in bed with us) and she's sleeping fairly consistently.  At night, she'll fall asleep on us while watching TV downstairs, and after her last dose of Zantac, we'll retire up to bed, change her diaper, then give her her final nighttime feeding.  She'll then sleep approximately 4-6 hours without waking, and then Shawn does the middle of the night diaper change, I will feed again, and she'll go down for another 2-3 hours, and so begins the cycle of the day.  It's not too bad for now, but I can't wait until she sleeps even longer during the night!

I should probably cut this short for now, as she's stirring from her nap right now.  I will post again soon and I'll try to put up some pictures.  But for now, here's a couple...

Here's her pretty face, close up!

***

Sophia's very first nap in her crib.  She napped for three hours!  I couldn't stop watching the baby monitor, though, go figure!

***

And here's an attempt at a nice picture, but as you can see, Sophia wasn't having it.  She was pretty fussy that night because it was sooo hot outside and she was pretty tired!

Tests I Don't Have to Study For

Today we are 27 weeks, 6 days pregnant!

Hi all!  I just wanted to do a quick little update since we had a doctor's appt this morning, so here goes!

I had my Glucose Tolerance Test (to see if I have Gestational Diabetes - a routine test) this morning at 8am, which means I had to fast since midnight last night. And yes, that was a struggle for me.  ;)  If you tell me I can't eat anything, I'm insta-hungry.  And of course I woke up starving, but oh well...  Thank goodness I had a huge Mexican dinner last night!  Anywho, for those who don't know what the test entails, I had to drink about 10-12 oz of orange flavored glucose rich juice.  Basically, it tasted like the "orange drink" they sell at McDonalds.  (Ooh, McD's sounds good right now...)  Then you wait, but thankfully we had a short visit with the doctor to pass some time.  I didn't get to see Dr. Hart because she had been called to deliver (the nerve!) so we saw her assistant.  We're measuring right on time, at 28 weeks, so that's great news!  We heard our little girl's heartbeat strong and steady in the 140's as well.  She let us know that full term is considered 37 to 41 weeks, so that puts us anywhere from April 24th to May 22nd.  Also, our OB visits will now increase in frequency to every two weeks, and then starting our 35th week, we go to every week.  So basically, we'll go in again on our 30th week (March 5th), then our 32nd (around 3/19), our 34th (around 4/2), then start our weekly visits at our 35th week (around April 9th).  That's a lot of visits!

We also signed up for our classes!  We've got our Childbirth class, our Breastfeeding class, and our Baby Care class, so we're excited for those!  So hopefully we'll be baby experts and pass Baby 101 with flying colors...

Anywho, there's our healthy update and a few notes on upcoming doctor dates, and we hope this finds you well!  I'll post my 28 week check-in, hopefully complete with belly pic tomorrow!  Also, I will let you know my GTT results within two weeks!

Blah.

Today we are 22 weeks, 4 days pregnant!

Sooo I suppose every blog has to have a grumpy post, and, well, here is mine.  I've been having a somewhat painful week and here's how it started:

Last Thursday, at approximately 9pm, I was sitting at my neighbor's watching the (terrible) UT vs Alabama game when all of a sudden, I felt this sharp pain in my uterine area.  So I quietly got up and mumbled some excuse as to why I had to leave and limped home.  At that point, the pain was so severe, it took my breath away.  Shawn got me to lay down and relax and he asked me what I wanted to do.  Not wanting to freak out, I told him we'd go to bed and see if I still had this pain in the morning, as I was hoping it was just something simple as gas.  The next morning, pain still there, we made an appointment for that day to go in. At the OB's, they (a physician's assistant, all doctors were busy) checked me out, my cervix, etc.  I was not in early labor and my test for being in labor any time in the next two weeks came back negative, and the baby vitals were all normal, so that's good.  However, I was given basically no answers other than increase fiber and water and rest as it could be anything from constipation to a torn ligament.  So fast forward to today, still having this pain.  I'm frustrated because I really feel as if this pain was never taken seriously by any medical professional.  Am I a doctor?  No, clearly I am not, but I am a first-time pregnant 30 year old woman who knows her body.  And quite honestly, I prefer to be treated as such and to be listened to.

So all my frustrations had culminated to me taking some action today.  I called my OB's office (I won't even cover the 23 minutes I had to wait on hold, being disconnected, etc...) and finally spoke to my Dr.'s assistant (my doc is on vacay this week) and talked to her for 30 minutes.  I assured her I don't think this is normal round ligament pain, and that I would appreciate an offer of an ultrasound to rule everything out.  Forty-five minutes later, I got a call-back after she spoke to the doctor on call, and abracadabra, we have an appointment for an ultrasound Friday morning.  Thank God.

Now I'm not saying that there is something hugely wrong with me, I'm just a little scared.  Well, I'm a lot scared, to be honest.  Shawn and I are already so in love with this little baby girl growing inside of me, and I don't know what I would do if I found out that something were wrong, especially if my quick action could have possibly helped.  I just can't wait until we get to hold this little beauty in our arms!

So I will update once we get any word.  Again, I don't anticipate any big news, rather I'm hoping to just say that it was something little.  Also, our next normal visit with our doctor is Friday, January 22nd.  That is also our 24 week mark, which they call our viability date, so we're looking forward to that!  We hope this finds you all well and will update you when we have results.  :)  

Today's Visit

Today we are 16 weeks, 5 days pregnant!

We had an OB visit today and Shawn got to hear the heartbeat for the first time!!!  The heart rate was 148 bpm, still above the Old Wives Tale of 140...  We also got another screening test, the Quad Screen, which is done for women between 16 and 18 weeks of pregnancy.  It tests for certain substances that can indicate Spina Bifida, Downs, and some other abnormalities.  It is a blood test, so no amniotic fluid needed.  For more information, you can look here at the Quad Screen info page if you like.  Hopefully we shall get the great results soon!

So for the past four weeks, I have been fearing my OB/GYN, Dr. Chris Hart (info here) would yell at me if I didn't reach her target weight gain of 2 lbs per week, for a total of 8 lbs.  Aaaand I didn't reach it.  But she told me that since we shot for 2/week and got about 1/week, she'll take it.  So I'm up to 105.4 lbs!  Anywho, we're in the two week stretch for the big ultrasound, so I'm counting down!!!

Our next visit to Dr. Hart (gender scan done at different office 12/17) will be January 19, 2010 at 3:50pm central time.

Normal Results!

Today we are 13 weeks and 2 days pregnant!

Hi all!  Just a couple things today, first of all, I've started my SECOND TRIMESTER!  This means a couple things, such as, had I not blabbed so early because I couldn't keep it from any of you :), you would all be finding out right about now.  But we all know that I have a hard time keeping any happy news in!  Second, it means that hopefully I will start feeling better soon.  I've chosen not to take any medications for nausea, regardless of my OB/GYN's gentle suggestion, because quite honestly, no amount of happy images will ever take the pictures I have seen of children of thalidomide out of my head.  So I'll deal with the sick feelings with the great and helpful suggestions I've gotten from my family and my friends.  Without all of you, I would have gone crazy in the last three months!

Second, I got some good news today!  The genetic counselor from the office we got our NT scan done at called me today with my results.  Our results are normal!  What she told me is that we started out our pregnancy with a 1 in 400 something chance of having a child with a genetic disorder, due to age and other information as well.  And now, after my blood screen and ultrasound, our chances have dropped down to 1 in 4000 something.  So this is good news!

One last thing - this is kinda silly and may be TMI - but I can actually feel my uterus now!  It's this little hard bump between my hips and belly and its so exciting!  :)

Love you all!

Some Upcoming Dates

Today we are 12 weeks, 5 days pregnant!

Hi all!  Just got back from a little visit to my OB/GYN, just routine (except for the FOUR VIALS of blood they had to take).  But I did get to hear the heartbeat for the FIRST TIME!!!  I didn't know this was going to happen, so since I thought this was going to be purely a "womanly visit" I told Shawn he didn't have to go.  So he is really bummed that he didn't get to hear the little wawawawawawa of the heartbeat, so I feel really bad :(.  But the heart is till a healthy rate of 150bpm, so it's a tad bit slower, but still in the normal range and over the old wive's tale girly limit of 140bpm.  So we'll seeeee!  Actually we'll see on the afternoon of Thursday, December 17th so mark your calendars!  I will be just two days short of 19 weeks then, so hopefully we have a cooperative baby and get to see his or her nether regions!  Other than that, my next OB/GYN visit (the gender visit will be at a different office) will be Thursday, December 3rd.  Should be another opportunity to hear the heart, so Shawn's definitely coming to this one!  Anywho, just that I'd put those dates out there for anyone who wants to keep track.  I'm just really happy we've got a really happy pregnancy going on here!  :)

Another View

Just another view of our beautiful baby.  The doctor showed us the nasal plate, which was very comforting since 70% of babies born with Downs Syndrome don't have this nasal plate.  The NT measurement (fluid in back of the neck) was 2.1 which he said was 'very normal and a very popular number.'  This is also used to predict if the baby has DS.  We are awaiting the results of a blood test to accompany the scans, but I feel much better now!  :)  By the way, the baby now measures 5.9 centimeters crown to rump!

Oops - I Gave Y'all the Wrong Date...

Today we're 12 weeks, 2 days pregnant!

So sorry, I gave you all the wrong date for my NT scan, it's tomorrow, not today.  And truth be told, I'm so excited!  I can't wait to see our little buggie again on the big screen, and I'm secretly hoping that they'll be able to tell me the gender.  I know, I know, its a little early, but the almighty internet has provided me with stories of some finding out this early.  And we all know if it's on the internet, it must be true!  Haha!  Well, I will definitely keep everyone updated on our progress tomorrow and will get the scans up as soon as I can.  Til then!

Long Time No Write...

Today we're 11 weeks, 5 days pregnant!

I just had a great week-long visit with my family in San Diego, and though I'm very happy to be home with Shawn and the puppies again, I always miss being back home with my parents and sisters.  It was a great week, and along with all the visiting I got to do, I had a breakthrough with my morning sickness!  No more do I have it every day, only sporadically, so I'm hoping that this is the beginning of the end with the vomiting!  Yay!  I've put on a few pounds since my last ultrasound, much to my Dad's delight.  He kept telling me to eat and eat, and with his cooking, it's not that hard to do!

I also got to visit with Kim and Brian, my sis- & brother-in-law and their two beautiful babies.  I got to meet my nephew for the very first time, before Shawn, too!  We got to talk baby for hours and hours and with every passing word, I get more excited.

For the upcoming plans, we've got an ultrasound on November 2, which is at a different office since it is the Nuchal Translucency test (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuchal_translucency) which will be the only scheduled round of tests we're planning on going through.  So we're excited to have our second ultrasound which we will post as soon as we can, provided that we get copies!  :)  So I'd say check back by the 4th of November for those...

Anywho, I've got some stuff to plan and stuff to do, so feel free to comment with any questions or anything!   I'll write again soon!  :)