Tough break

Dakota needs to get heart surgery and get an artificial pacemaker put in to get her heart back to pumping correctly and not skipping beats. I am having to take her to Colorado to get this done and I am just waiting to hear from the vet and from Colorado State University when this will be done. Poor baby!

Today, I have really bad cramping and some spotting (which I haven't ever had) so I am going to get an ultrasound done today at 4 pm. The MA at Dr. B's office said that they think it is a UTI and can be treated with antibiotics, but they want to be 100% sure everything is okay. I go for the ultrasound at Utah Vascular since they could get me in today and then I need to get a urine sample to Dr. B by the end of the day. I am hoping everything is okay and I am definitely hoping for the best for both of us. I am sure everything will be okay but it is good to check and I am glad that my doctor just didn't say that I am okay. I am excited to see my baby in there today!

Rough week trying to make up time at work so that I am not in the hole for PTO. My boss has been gone but I need to talk to him about going to Colorado and hoping to take a laptop and get work done so I can count some hours while away. Corey and I are going to drive her since that will be less stressful and safer for all of us. I found a hotel today that was pretty affordable, had fridge (for milk, etc) and will let me bring Dakota. Although she will be in the hospital it is good to go somewhere pet friendly in case we have to stay a night or two in the hospital before/after her surgery.

Everything happens for a reason and I know that Dakota will be okay. Just trying to stay positive about everything right now. I think my baby hates me with how sick I have been and all the little problems that have happened since the end of January! I actually haven't felt nauseous at all today, but starting to get that way now. It is probably from nerves. It will be great to start feeling better and hopefully I am fully better in a week or two.

Week 13 prenatal visit

Today's visit with Dr. B was pretty simple and boring. They got a new video system which is pretty cool and I watched a 2 minute video on what to expect (when ultrasounds will be). Doctor came in and went over all the blood work from my first visit and everything was good, negative, and in the right ranges. I found out my blood type, which I didn't know before. It is A+ which sounds like a great according to Anja (and it does). Listened to Baby's heartbeat which sounded so much louder this time then a month ago and asked about my appointment and when I get our ultrasound done. He said I will be back in four weeks and at that time we will schedule the ultrasound one to two weeks after. He said he didn't want to do it at 17 weeks (next appt) since they want to be 100% sure on the sex of Baby Paskett so we have to wait a week or so. I should know what we are having by mid-May and I can't wait!
I am still having pretty bad morning sickness but hopefully that lets up in the next few weeks. 13 weeks is technically tomorrow and baby is the size of a peach now!

Bread... it's what's for dinner

I feel certain that I could live off of bread, noodles, and any other horrible carb out there for you... like bagels! I probably go through a loaf of bread a week without Corey's help. I love toast and lately I like to sprinkle cinnamon sugar on it. I am really into plain bagels all the sudden and I love to make Rhodes rolls just to eat without a meal. No wonder why there is a tire forming around my belly! At this point, especially with still feeling sick I just eat what I want at the time. If bread sounds good I eat it, if a banana sounds good, that is what I will eat. It just depends on my mood at the time and I of course I judge food based on spice since I know it has a chance of making a comeback and I don't want it to burn. Yuck!

I weighed myself this morning at work and I am down two pounds from last Monday when I last weighed myself at the office. It probably has to do with being so sick last week and not eating. I finally started feeling better Friday and felt fully functional on Saturday. Saturday I took Dakota Ray to the vet and we found out she has a heart murmur and she is getting more tests run this Wednesday. She is my baby no matter how many human babies I have and she better be okay! After the vet appointment I went grocery shopping and then made home made soup and rolls for Anja. Anja and baby Ava got to go home on Saturday and I got to hold her for a long time and I was just gushing over her. She is so cute! It made it all more real that I will be holding my own baby that size before the end of the year. I can't wait!

Hospital at 12 weeks

Monday was such a fun day with my team at work! We took a half day and went to Fat Cats to bowl a few games. I bought a blue slushie since I was thirsty and I didn't see that they had lemonade. After about a 1/4 of the slushie I realized that it was way too much sugar for me and probably for the baby and headed back to get some carbs to help. All I could find that would work was nachos. They brought my nachos to the lane and the chips were spicy! They poured something on them that was freakin cayenne pepper. Well, I ate them anyway. The bowling was fun though... I lost the first game with bowling a 89 but the second game I won with a 150 or something. I went home, made Voila for dinner and didn't feel so good so I went to bed.

Fast forward to 8:30 that night and I was living in the bathroom. I was so sick! And the blue slushie came up first... gross I know! Then everything else I had eaten in about the last two days. My body hurt so bad and I could barely get up off the floor to crawl back into bed. I slept about two hours and then called my mom to take me to the hospital. I hadn't had one sip of water from 8:30 that night and it was now 7 in the morning. My mom picked me up at 8 am and we went to Alta View Hospital. I figured that I either had food poisoning (from the bowling alley) or the stomach flu. What I was concerned about though was dehydration.

Luckily I was the only one at the ER that early and I didn't have to wait. I went right back to a room and they started taking blood, giving me an IV, vitals, etc. I couldn't do the urine sample because I was so dehydrated so they gave me a quick cathedar just to get what they needed. They gave me Zofran (which I take now) in my IV as well as morphine since I was in so much pain from throwing up all night. I had a fever over 100. I got worse around 12:30 and they had to give me some different medicine that ended up knocking me out. When I woke up I was discharged and went home and went to sleep!

I stayed home from work on Tuesday (obviously), Wednesday, and Thursday. Today is Friday and I made it in to work but I still feel pretty crummy. I haven't had a fever since last night so I figured I was safe to come in.

I have another doctors appointment on Tuesday (13 weeks!) and will ask them to do an ultrasound to make sure that there is enough liquid in there for my baby. I still haven't been able to drink much or eat. I think I have lost about ten pounds in 3 days.

Baby Bump Watch: Week 10 (and a half)

I really am trying to get consistant but with feeling fat (and proof of that seen below) and not pregnant.... I am a little discouraged with taking pictures. I will start taking pictures when it is more like a baby bump and less like a fatty tire hanging onto my belly!

Did I just get punched in the face?

No? Oh that must be the migraine pain! I feel like I have been hit in the eye with a baseball though.

Yesterday was horrible! I ended up leaving work at 11:30 in the morning with a nightmare of a migraine and went home to try and sleep it off. If you haven't ever been pregnant before you will know that you can't just take any medicine and the only really "safe" medicine is Tylenol (which never works for me!). I tried sleeping, pushing fluids, and staying in our cold, dark room. I finally gave in at 8 PM and called my doctors office to reach the doctor on call. The doctor said that I could take Excedrin in my first two trimesters, but no the last. I gave in and took some and within an hour it was getting a lot better so I could finally go to sleep. I hate taking medicine, especially since I am trying to be more aware of my body and what is good and bad.

Oh and to top off the horrible afternoon yesterday, you ask? Well, I woke up from a horrible nightmare in a cold sweat! I dreamed (again!) that I had miscarried and that blood was every where! So gross, I know, but I have no idea why I keep having these nightmares. I feel like I am in the safe zone now and I haven't had a thought about miscarriages in about 3 weeks. I of course told Corey and he said that it is probably still in my thoughts and that I need to relax. I was relaxing - so much that I was sleeping! Haha! Hopefully those nightmares go away soon!

Week 11

I am finally approaching the end of the first trimester and I hope that when it is over I will feel better. I started getting worse at 9 weeks and it has stayed pretty bad since then. I hoping that at week 13 or 14 I will be feeling a lot better. I actually get worse in the afternoon/evening...go figure.

I started eating a little better! I was eating out a lot, but realized that just because I do not want to cook chicken or meat does not mean I shouldn't cook at all. I have made a few things including home made broccoli cheese soup and rolls and I also made a chicken meal with frozen breaded chicken. I also have been trying to eat fish (Tilapia) with rice about once a week. It is really healthy for pregnant women to eat 12 oz of fish a week. They say that you can eat tuna, but only eat 6 oz of it a week. I figured I only eat about a total of 6 oz a week including the tuna and tilapia, but some is better than none. Hopefully once the sickness phase passes I will eat even better.

I have been getting pretty bad headaches lately. I know the doctor warned me that deli meat can cause migraines, so I have been staying away from it the past week while my head hurts. It seems that my headache starts around 1 or 2 every day and lasts all night. I thought it also may be due to dehydration since I hate drinking water and have a hard time keeping it down.

I do not have a doctors appointment until March 29th (two weeks from yesterday) and hopefully all is well still. I also hope they will an in-room ultrasound again and print off a few pictures. I love seeing my little jelly bean. Maybe I will just ask for it anyway! I am thinking that my appointment at the end of April will be when I can find out the sex. Baby will be 17 weeks then!

I have already been dreaming of Baby's nursery and looking up furniture, gliders, and strollers. I want a lot of it to be gender neutral in case we end up with baby #2 one day. All of the big items are so expensive that I can't imagine having to pay for all of it twice! I want the furniture set to be convertible so that Baby #1 will be able to keep it until it transitions into a full size bed. The other items I would want to keep for baby #2 though. I already went to Babies R Us with my mom this past Sunday and I think I found some crib styles that I like, but I am going to look at other places and other brands. I also found the glider I want, which is the one Anja has. I plan on getting it in dark wood to match the furniture and then get a light pad - like cream or tan. Those gliders are so comfortable and once I sit in it at the store I can't get out! I love those!

Back to work! I took belly pictures myself over the weekend (so at about 10.5 weeks) and will post them soon.

Crying

Okay so let's start off by saying that the emotional roller coaster was one thing I felt prepared for. I figured I would cry all the time because I can be a pretty sensative person and I would rather cry than yell.

Now, let's jump to about a week and a half ago... I am crying for everything that makes me super happy. I cried while watching Ellen and someone won money and a car who has gone through hard times. Now jump to today. I cried on my way to work listening to Bruno Mar's Just The Way You Are song. Boy am I pathetic?? I can't believe I cried to a song! If you have heard that song and you are emotional I guess it will do the trick.

I have to say that I would definitely rather cry then go crazy someone or unleash the beast that is hidden somewhere inside of me. Maybe that is just waiting to come out on a day that I don't want to cry! Haha!

9 weeks

I am about 9.5 weeks along and I was really hoping that I would start feeling better. I guess my body is just not ready to be better yet. A woman at work told me that through all of her pregnancies she never once felt sick. Damn her! Haha! I explained to her that it feels a lot like the stomach flu that lasts 3 months! That is exactly how it feels! You throw up a lot, you feel constantly sick your stomach and the only thing I was is bread most of the time. I have a hard time drinking water but I hear that water is actually one of the hardest things to drink when you are sick. I have been trying to put lemon in it or Crystal Lite to help it go down, but now I am getting sick of my options.

I have to say at this point of being so sick that I am grateful that baby is doing well and that I have a huge support system. It is really hard to be this sick and to go to work and go home and do school almost every night. My parents are motivating and help me in any way they can and of course my husband has been bending over backwards to help me. Corey cleans, helps with meals, and does anything else I need or ask of him. A lot of the time I don't even have to ask, which is really nice. My work is also really super supportive and very understanding. I have already missed a lot of work and my boss is awesome about it. I don't think I would make it through these first few months if I didn't have all of these people in my life.

I read that my sickness may be worse this week and next because the babies life line (placenta) is forming and it is causing another crazy rush of hormones that my body is not use to. They said that hormones should level out by week 12 or 13 which is why most woman feel better in the second trimester. Let's hope I start feeling better in the next few weeks!

Baby Berry looks like an alien!

The first appointment for Baby today went amazing! I had to pee in the cup, get my blood drawn, have my blood pressure taken and have my weight taken. After all of that, the doctor (who I love by the way) took Corey and I into his office and went over some questions, genetics and our background and talked about some of the basics... including fish and sushi. He said that I can eat sushi! WOO HOO! I am in need a sushi date pronto!

I then went into the exam room and he done a basic physicial first (which is never fun), but said that he will only do that the first time. Glad to say that will not be happening again for some time. Then he brought in the portable ultrasound machine and Corey and I saw our little Baby! It was amazing! It was so so tiny and you could see this little flicker in the middle that was the heartbeat. I even got a few pictures of the Baby. Then he turned it off and turned on another little handheld machine that would dedict the heartbeat. He said that at 9 weeks the heartbeat is clearly there, but can be difficult to hear. Well, two seconds later we could hear our baby's strong heartbeat. I don't think words could ever express the feeling I got at that moment. It was truly amazing and overpowering. We created life and I get carry it and nurture it and make it strong before we even get to meet.

Baby is on track in size and should be here around October 5th. Woo hoo!

Next appointment is on March 29th and I will be 13 weeks. I am sure I will be feeling better by then and time will go much quicker.

Corey said that my stomach was no longer a food baby, but a baby-baby. That is very true! I felt horrible about how much weight I seem to be putting on and how big my stomach looks. My doctor is really nice and told me that it has a lot to do the placenta's hormone called Relaxin and getting that 'fatty protective layer'.

Until next time...