Week 17/18

For Thanksgiving we went to Florida with my family. The event was pretty uneventful which was good compared to the last time we were there. I was pretty happy to be in nice weather but wow pregnancy makes it so much harder to run or workout in the heat. Luckily the weather was pretty mild most of the time but we still got some good time out on the new family boat. Which I’m pretty sure was bought for the growing family my parents have realized is coming quickly in the form of grandchildren. 

This trip I got to experience round ligament pain for the first time. That was just annoying more than anything. I also experienced movement for the first time. I felt it while we were on the boat. The baby either enjoyed the ride or wasn’t having it and wanted to let me know.

I was happily not showing quite yet at this point. I was able to rock the bikini with no one noticing except me of course that I had started a little tiny bump. In fact, my husband said unless anyone knew what I had looked like prior to getting pregnant the first or the second time they would have thought this was my normal body shape. Which was quite the compliment especially since I worked my butt off to lose as much weight as possible following my termination. I gained a quick 20 pounds in those short 16ish week from the beginning of fertility treatments to the termination. I was happy when I was able to lost about 8 pounds over the course of two months before we started to try again and now I had not yet gained more than a pound or so which for me and my self-conscious body image was a huge success which I contributed to exercising from day 1 and to eating healthier this time around even if it included some chocolate and french fries here and there! 

Week 15+

Ever since the appointment with the maternal and fetal medicine doctor I was debating as to whether I would actually go through with an amino if everything checked out okay on the ultrasound. The risk with getting an amnio done was relatively small (1 in 400) but I knew that I couldn’t live myself if we had a perfectly healthy baby and something from the amnio caused issues. My husband and I chatted about it and decided we would wait and see what the ultrasound showed before we made the hard decision.

Upon arrival we told the ultrasound tech we weren’t sure we were going to actually go through with the amnio although it was clear that all the equipment was sterile and ready for us if we decided to get it performed. The ultrasound tech looked around at the baby and didn’t see anything that was of a concern. She went to get the high risk doctor and she also took a look around. We knew we could trust her judgment and when she showed us five fingers on each hand and a face profile that appeared normal we felt very much better. She was also able to see the blood move in and out of the heart chambers which she said was surprisingly this early. She contributed it to the fact that I was thin which of course was a nice compliment.

We decided to forego the amino at point in time. We would be back for a 20 week ultrasound at the high risk center on a day when she was on duty there so we could see her as well.