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I’ve gone back and forth about how to share updates with you each month and if I wanted to share updates at all (of course I do), but I really loved tracking Sophie’s pregnancy with you (or the 75 of you were here for that) and since I started sharing at twelve weeks with her, I figured it was only fitting that I start this series during the twelfth week of pregnancy number three. Unlike Sophie’s updates, I won’t be spamming you with weekly updates. I’ll probably take weekly photos and then share them all in a single monthly post. Good? Good.
swing tank | maternity ponte pants
It’s kind of hard to believe we’re already at the twelve week mark. In some ways this pregnancy seems to be dragging on endlessly, but in reality — the weeks have flown past. We’ve all kind of settled into our new normal and talking about baby around the house has become the norm. We’ve almost settled back into a regular routine and we’re all looking forward to pregnancy/baby milestones and warmer weather and our last spring and summer as a family of four.
BODY + HEALTH
I still have days filled with nausea and vomiting, but they are getting farther and farther apart. I’ve been having two and three day stretches where I feel really great, so I’m trying not to complain too much when one rough day appears out of nowhere. After realizing my insurance wouldn’t cover a much needed prescription (hello, $400 monthly refills), I panicked and resolved myself to being sick for the foreseeable future. Thankfully, my sister had plenty of that same prescription leftover from her pregnancy with Vera (not even expired!) and it has been giving me life for the last several days. I’m currently taking Diclegis, Zantac, Baby Aspirin, and this prenatal vitamin — I swear I need an old lady pill box to keep them all straight!
I went to the doctor yesterday and I think I weighed 142. That’s up three or four pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight, which seems pretty normal. I’m not terribly hung up on my weight, in general, so I’m trying to keep the same low key attitude with it during pregnancy. Update: I weighed at the gym this morning and it said 139, so I’m actually only up a pound. This is closer to what I thought I had gained and since I paid zero attention to the scales at the doctor during my first visit, I’m going to use the gym scales to mark my progress.
I’m still sleeping pretty great, but I pray every night that I don’t have to get up for some reason. In the weeks past, if Scoop or I either got up to potty, I had the hardest time going back to sleep. Now, the Diclegis is helping with that immensely, but I still have a few restless hours here and there. My sister gave me a pregnancy pillow recently and while I haven’t had to rely on it yet, those days are coming.
My chest is still significantly larger than my belly, but it’s catching up. It’s crazy how much larger it is at night, than during the day. It’s getting rounder these days and I feel less like a frumpy thirty-eight year old than I did just a few weeks ago. I had to pick up several pairs of pants this week because I was over wearing a fitted waistband. Armed with new pajamas, dress pants (these and these), jeans and gym pants (these and these), I feel like I can conquer this maternity style a little bit easier!
EMOTIONS
Umm, I’m kind of a wreck. I have cried during commercials, Facebook videos, and Ella’s dress rehearsals, to name a few. I told Josh I would probably sob through every dance competition and recital this year — I just can’t control myself.
I’m feeling a little more like Kristin these days. The first several weeks after finding out were hard. I wouldn’t have said I was depressed, but there was just so much emotion and overwhelm and I was finding it all very difficult to deal with. As happy as we are, this is not how I anticipated spending the next eighteen years of my life. It was almost like dealing with the death of a one dream and the birth of something completely different. We had to completely shift the mindset of our family life, our finances, what we were anticipating after the girls were out of school. All of that is fine and wonderful and we are so looking forward to this new chapter, but it’s weird to encounter a complete 180 when you weren’t prepared for it.
There has also been a huge sense of awe and wonder and feelings of unworthiness. Knowing how we struggled to have our first two babies and then having this one show up out of nowhere has been really interesting to wrap our minds around. I’ve had a huge sense of peace about the health and longevity of this baby, simply because it was so unexpected. Not that Jesus can’t write an amazing story out of miscarriage or illness again, but I keep thinking what would be the point of this pregnancy if He weren’t about to bless our socks off?! I have no explanation for why we were able to get pregnant with no intervention or planning and why it somehow worked this time. Maybe being old and relaxed had something to do with it, maybe eating healthy and being active has completely changed my fertility outcome, maybe God just had a big story in mind for us — either way, we’re digging it.
JOSH
Josh is still thrilled. He was pretty quiet and stoic about everything for the first few weeks, but now that we’ve seen and heard our baby multiple times and I’ve finally passed the twelve week mark, he’s feeling much more comfortable.
I hate that I couldn’t share how amazing he was in those first few weeks. We joked that I should be writing daily odes to him on Facebook for all the ways he’s taken care of me, but we hadn’t shared our pregnancy quite yet. He’s given endless back rubs, been the family chauffer, picked up Chick-fil-A and Zaxby’s so many times, and hasn’t complained about my sleeping habits a single time. Every time I start to feel bad about neglecting him, he is quick to remind me that it’s only a season and that we get the biggest reward when it’s all over. He has been so good to me and has been the biggest cheerleader ever.
I wasn’t sure how I felt about genetic counseling and chromosomal screening — even though it is strongly recommend at my age — but Josh insisted. He thinks we’ll be in better shape with the knowledge of what is waiting for us, come delivery. So while we won’t be finding out what we’re having, we’re hoping that is the only surprise we get in the operating room. We’ll go for a combined ultrasound and bloodwork panel on Tuesday and get those results in the next several weeks. It won’t be a diagnosis, but a set of markers to indicate the likelihood of certain chromosomal disorders. We’ll have another round of testing over the summer and those tests together will help us make a decision about further testing. I don’t want to pursue anything invasive or potentially dangerous to the baby, but we’ll make those decisions once we have a little more information. For now, I’m enjoying the oblivion of not knowing and praying for peace in the coming days.
THE GIRLS
Sophie and Ella have handled this transition with remarkable grace. It took Ella a few more days to get use to the idea than it did Sophie, but they are both so excited. Sophie mostly wants to talk about what it will be like when the baby is here and how wonderful everything will be (I think she’s in for a rude awakening!) and Ella is more concerned with how I’m feeling, what I’m eating, and if I’m taking care of myself. We’re planning to invite them along for our 20 week ultrasound and can’t wait to share in their excitement over the coming months.
ALL THE OTHER THINGS
I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it on the blog, but we had just scheduled our Disney vacation a few days before the positive pregnancy test. As it turns out, our trip dates were right in the middle of our final month of pregnancy, so we won’t be heading to Orlando in September after all. The girls were a little disappointed, but we just received word that we were able to reschedule for Thanksgiving week, so we are all smiles again. Yes, it means we’ll be enjoying Disney with an eight week old, but since Josh doesn’t ride many rides anyway, we think it will be perfect. My philosophy is that it will be much easier with an 8 week old than and 8 month old. Right? We’ll also be there on mine and Vera’s birthday, so I’m thinking we need a princess breakfast in our lives that day.
We are tossing names around left and right and it is so much fun! We probably won’t share them here until the big day, but we are certainly open to any of your wonderful suggestions — particularly if they are quirky or vintage sounding. Since we’re not planning to find out the gender (YAY!), we think it will be super fun to share all of that at one time. So far, our favorite names have not been dethroned, but we’re still in the very early stages of nailing things down.
I loved sharing weekly photos during Sophie’s pregnancy, so we’re going to continue doing something very similar this time around. I’ve set up a white, seamless backdrop in our sunroom and I’m taking weekly photos, using a handy remote control shutter release. They won’t be perfect, but I think it’s fun to document what I look like, how I’m changing and what I’m wearing! I’ll likely share different pieces of information each week — whether silly or serious — and then share more details in our monthly updates. And just for comparison’s sake, here is how twelve weeks with Sophie and Baby #3 stack up!
