Road Trips and Doctor Visits

'Kay...

Tons of stuff to report.

First, we went on a road trip. Carted the Jellyfish all the way to sunny London, Ontario for a bridal shower. The Jelly greatly enjoyed it. The long drive was good. Jelly kicked and danced and shivered pretty much the whole way, but was good about staying off my bladder for most of the trip. We got there about half an hour late but I was still greeted with immediate directions to the bathroom and the most comfy chair in the room to sit in. Sometimes I truly enjoy this being pregnant thing.

sidenote: All this sympathy and special treatment is a touch embarrassing but hey, I'll take it where I can get it 'cause I imagine if there's a future Jellyfish the treatment won't be the same.

But a fun day was had by all and we enjoyed the trip home too. We even found some food at a Kelsey's somewhere along the way that may or may not have been somewhere near Kitchener.

How sad is that? Don't care where the restaurant was exactly. As long as they have that cracked peppercorn burger, we're good. In fact, we eat at Kelsey's so much we really need to start keeping a diary of it. As soon as we figure out where we were, we'll get started on that. There are many trips to the eastern end of Ontario in our future and there are many restuarants on the 401.

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Guess what?! We met the poor woman who is charged with the all-encompassing task of being my obstetrician for the remainder of the pregnancy! Honestly, I feel terribly sorry for her and her staff. They're going to get sick of me. I tried to tell them that, but I don't think they believe me. They'll learn.

So, the details: The OB/GYN herself is maybe two years older than me if that. I wish I could ask her. I mean, she knows how old I am, isn't it only fair? Ah, propriety.

Right, bonus number 2 - she's as crazy as I am. Her staff is great too. The girl who had to suffer the horror of telling me how much I weighed set the scales WAY low. I told her to start a bit higher than that and she'd spend less time fighting with them. Then she subtracted a whole pound for my shoes. I love her.

So, after the weighing, into the office we went. The doctor made it in and after the intros said, "So you're pregnant." I said, "That's what they tell me." She said, "There's a lot of that going around my office." Yep. She wins the prize for dang funny joke related to one's profession.

She kindly reassured me that though she may not be the OB on call the day I go into labour, all of her colleagues have the same methods for making a woman unpregnant. She said if she was on call that day, I was stuck with her. I corrected her and told her she would be stuck with me... and my mother. Poor thing really doesn't get it yet.

Oh - and we finally got to hear the heartbeat. It's about freakin' time. Sounds like the Jelly is happy and enjoying the free room and food.

I got to do the glucose tolerance test. I've heard that people get sick on the stuff. I guess they're not blessed with a Jellyfish with a monstrous sweet tooth like me. Yeah, it was a snap. I was lucky enough to get the stuff cold. I thought that was really nice of them. I thought it tasted like orange crush, but not as sweet. Apparently I have an odd sense of sweet.

The woman that took my blood after decided not to listen to me when I told her my veins were useless and she should draw from the left arm, inside vein. She said, "no, we'll use the right arm." She pumped the sucker dry. And it hurt like a sonofa&*$! the whole time. Later that day when my arm hurt and I figured I was reacting to the tape (again) I pulled tape off to find nothing but a slightly swollen inside of the elbow. So we went out to see a movie and I thought little of it. At the end of the movie I looked down and was pleased to see a giant purple (more lilac and mauve) bruise forming. Oh yeah, the next day it was bluish black with purple spots. It's great. See I figure if you're gonna' be hurt like that, you deserve a battle wound. I didn't bruise at all the last time I had blood drawn and it took them 8 tries (no exaggeration, honest) to find a vein. All I ended up with was the general feeling of being a human pincushion - but no physical evidence.

Anyhoo...

So, the updates - we get to have two more ultrasounds. One at 30 weeks and one at 36 weeks. We're at an increased risk of growing a rather large Jellyfish so we need to keep an eye on the squirt to make sure it doesn't run out of room.

Jelly's still keeping me sick pretty much all the time (yeah Jelly!). I've decided the only way I can feel generally okay is if I can wake up whenever I feel like it (after 8 preferably), then fall into the kitchen, have something resembling breakfast and then sit on my butt all day. That seems to keep the nausea and heartburn at bay. If I need to function in society at all, in any way, I'm gonna' be exhausted and generally feel like a big bag of poo. So it goes. With any luck I'll feel better sometime after I give birth. I can handle being tired all the time, I just wish it wasn't accompanied by a churning stomach.

*whine*

Right, so other symptoms:

Sciatic nerve pain: Not nearly as bad as it was. Either 'the contents' have shifted, or I've gotten used to it. I prefer the first explanation.

Intermittent hand tinglies: yeah, but not as freaky as it was.

Heartburn: getting worse.

Nausea/vomiting: Strong as it ever was. Stayin' on the Diclectin. Diclectin is my friend. It's a better friend than Tim Horton's Iced Capps. They work well, but Diclectin has fewer calories.

Headaches: nope.

Waistline: still have one. Sort of. I can still completely hide the fact I'm pregnant if I feel like it.

Weird craving of the week: Italian bread and peanut butter. Or any reasonable facsimile of Italian bread and peanut butter. Or M&Ms - peanuts. Basically there's a whole peanut thing going on here. Interesting really 'cause it was sometime in Feburary I believe when peanuts were the only thing that would calm the queasies. They worked a helluva lot better than crackers I'll tell ya' that. So we're back to the peanuts.

Perineal ache: starting. I've detected it and I'm not enjoying it. So the totally random couple of times it's happened, we'll just ignore them.

Clumsiness: Oh yes.

Swelling: Not really. The rings still fit, so that's good. They're a bit tighter, especially on humid days, but that used to happen to me anyway. Gotta' drink more water...

Interesting kicks: Jelly can tell when I'm nervous. I think it's kind of cute. I don't like thunderstorms. If I have a wave of 'freaked outedness', Jelly kicks. I've checked it with a couple of storms now. We seem to be tuned.

Absentminde... where was I going with that?

Yeah, that's about it. Coming up: we have a Stage and Doe to look forward too. I think I'll harass the couple with having planned their whole wedding badly for a few years... I can't drink at the Stag and Doe. I can't drink at the wedding. I can't dance unless I've been drinking. I mean really drinking. I'm too uptight. And now I'm not even on celexa... I'm not sure how this is gonna' work.
Also, the trip to Ottawa in July has been approved - with a gentle reminder to get out the car and stretch often.

So that's it for now. It's Grandma's birthday next week so I'm hoping the Jelly lets me eat some cake. That would be nice. Hopefully we'll have a bunch more stories next week. The kind that come with humour.

In the meantime, Jelly's telling me it's time to get up and wander around a bit. Kid's been sleeping all day, so it's about time really.

Ciao!

-HLC