Out of the Puking Pan and Into the Flu-Like Fire

Whee! My Pooka is home from an almost three-week vacation on the West Coast (visiting grandparents, aunts and uncles). We picked her up at oh-dark-thirty on Sunday. I can't tell you folks how good it is to have my baby home again. Yeah, I know: She's not a baby. She's almost fourteen. But she's mine. I gave birth to her. Therefore she's my baby.

Monday I had to call in sick at work due to what I can only guess was food poisoning of some sort. It started Saturday night and lasted through Sunday; leaving me queasy and headachey on Monday. Of course I had forgotten that Hubs had to work the day shift that day, which left me to take Gytha (new car) in for scheduled maintenance.

Pooka and her long-time besty joined me in heading to the Queen City where we met up with Mum and Dad for lunch. By that point my tummy was feeling better enough to be hungry, so I had a light soup and salad. Mum and Dad found Pooka and her friend to be charming and funny (because they are), and we wound up late for our appointment because we lost track of time talking and enjoying ourselves.

We saw Dr. Colorful again (and have set up our appointments through our due date so that all but one is with him, because we all like him best). He started to revisit the Tdap (Tetanus, Diptheria and Pertussis) vaccination but Mum made it clear that she did indeed want me to get the booster. The nurse who administered it was VERY good. It felt like she prodded me with a finger and it was done.

Nugget also prodded his/her parents a bit while we waited for Dr. Colorful to come in. I laid down on the exam table and let Mum and Dad poke and press on my belly to try to get their silly baby to kick them properly. Well, Nugget seems to find his/her parents soothing, because while they did get to feel SOME movement, it was nowhere near the kicks I get when I'm trying to sleep or snuggle with Hubs. They did get to hear the heartbeat though, and the doctor declared it... Yeah, you guessed it: Perfect. My uterus is measuring at 31cm and Nugget is still in a “transverse lie” which means s/he is sideways. Not a big deal, really. Dr. Colorful mentioned that he'd like to see baby head-down by 34 weeks (2 visits from now) but I reassured him that all three of the babies I've birthed, including Pooka, were in the wrong position until about 36 weeks, at which point they went breech and then flipped into the right position; engaging at the last minute. He told Mum and Dad that at worst, we'll do an external cephalic version (where they turn the baby from the outside). I doubt it'll be necessary.

Of course, we absolutely didn't joke that perhaps the heartbeat might be a little irregular and therefore an ultrasound might be prudent. And Dr. Colorful completely refused to go ahead and fit us in for one just after I got my shot. It definitively never happened. Ever.

On the way home, my head started to pound like mad so the kiddos (who spent the duration of my OB appointment shopping in the Queen City) and I popped off at Hubs' work to have dinner while we waited for his shift to end, and I popped a Tylenol. It helped a little, and I figured that would be the end of my “Tdap side effects.” Ha ha ha ha! NO.

I woke up this morning with that telltale throbbing at the injection site; a headache the size of my hometown and joints that squealed and protested with every movement. I shouldn't have been surprised; it happens every single time. Ah well. It's temporary and fairly minor, all things considered. As of right now the headache is barely more than my head reminding me that it still exists and my joints are a little tender but I can move without cringing. The only thing that really still hurts is my arm. Piddly.

I did, however, have a brief moment of carpal tunnel-like symptoms after work today, but they seem to have abated for the time being. I'm grateful for that. I hate carpal tunnel.

Shoot? Don't Shoot?

Late post, but what can I say? Life gets in the way and sometimes blocks the brain while it’s at it.

Monday I went to the Little Hospital on the hill at 6:30 am for the usual glucose tolerance test to check me for gestational diabetes. Blech. They fed me a plastic cup full of sugary muck that tasted like over-sweetened orange soda and sent me out to the lobby to sit for an hour. Granted, the muck tastes better than it did when I had Pooka, but it still knocks me for a loop every time. Headaches, sugar buzz, then sugar crash… It’s not pleasant. I really need to get better at remembering to bring a protein-packed breakfast to eat right afterward.

I went to work for a couple hours after I finished the test – I don’t think I’ve touched on work yet this year. I was an auditor for 9+ years, and then my boss’ boss retired. Her last act regarding the auditing team was to fire my boss. Because we’re a state agency, that took long past the big boss’ retirement to actually put into action, but two months later, it did happen. Thank goodness. My boss was not a good candidate for her position. She wasn’t a good supervisor, and she just didn’t GET the process we used to audit.

Before my boss left, I sat with another coworker and talked over an idea I had regarding the whole team at large (beyond just the auditors). Basically, I wanted to restructure the whole team – combining the three major jobs and then dividing the work up by region, so that no one person was ever overwhelmed at one time, and that the work would be spread out better over the course of the year. We presented the idea to the big boss’ successor and she said we could talk about it once things slowed down a little.

Yet another team member gave her notice about a month after the idea was proposed. It wasn’t until then that my idea became truly feasible. New Big Boss got the restructuring process started with HR and proposed a raise. We’re still waiting to hear back on that part – hooray for bureaucracy – but the new job is SO much less dull than being an auditor. (I’m a Finance Analyst now, for the record.)  My old boss (not the big boss) was so far behind, even with all of my work and some of hers done, that I even ran out of stuff to make up to do. Now, with three major jobs, I’m actually busy just about every day.

Anyway; around 11:30 I headed over to the house to pick Hubs up to attend my OB appointment with me. Mum and Dad were back at the IVF Clinic for an egg retrieval cycle and monitoring, so they couldn’t make it. I got to see a doctor who’s been there since I started using the Big Hospital but whom I hadn’t yet seen due to varied schedules. We’ll call him Dr. Colorful, just because that’s what his last name makes me think.

Dr. Colorful brought a resident in with him, and we joked that Dr. Badass used to tell the other docs to bring interns and residents in to see me because I’m easy and know what they’re looking for, as far as information about the pregnancy goes. They declared me to be in good health, but I did get a stern glance for not having done the glucose tolerance test earlier. Ah well – nobody’s gonna die, and I’d know if I had gestational diabetes. Pooka’s father is diabetic, so I know what to look for (constant hunger and thirst, and constant need to use the loo beyond what’s normal even for pregnancy.)

We called Mum to let her listen to Nugget’s heartbeat over the phone, which put her over the moon. Nugget kept kicking the Doppler wand. S/he’s a pretty vehement mover. By this I mean that s/he’s still trying to break things in there, whenever s/he moves. No subtlety to this little one.

Dr. Colorful also recommended that I get a new TDAP (pertussis) vaccination. I had one back in May of last year, but the new guidance from the CDC is that women get the shot during every pregnancy as sort of a booster for the baby. Mum wasn’t excited about this – she says that vaccines during pregnancy make her nervous. She asked me to hold off until 36 weeks – all of this by text message, so I went out into the hall to find the nurse who was supposed to give me the shot. I had figured that Mum would be all for anything that ensured Nugget’s immune system, so I had told the doc to go ahead and order the shot for me that day. I went out into the hall to tell the nurse what Mum had asked, and she scurried off to find Dr. Colorful.

We called Mum again and he explained that waiting until 36 weeks was basically pointless, and that at that point we might as well not bother. His reasoning was that everyone who’s going to be dealing with Nugget regularly, postpartum, should be vaccinated. In the meantime, giving me the shot now would allow my body to begin to process the vaccine, thus developing antibodies that would be passed to Nugget through the placenta. This in turn would give Nugget a sort of immunity cushion until s/he was old enough to be given the vaccination him/herself.

The consensus became that I’ll wait until my next appointment when Mum can be there and have had some time to do her research, and we’ll revisit the vaccine discussion then. I did tell her that I got the vaccine two months before Tempest was born too, and that there were no adverse effects. We’ve had the “vax/anti-vax” discussion before, and I’m not under the impression that she’s “anti-vax” but I guess I can understand her wanting to know more before she gives the go-ahead. I did the reading last time so I’m not worried, but it’s good that she’s not just jumping forward “because the doctor said so.” I never vaccinated Pooka for chicken pox because the likelihood of contracting it again after you’ve had it is almost nil. Other than that, we all get our shots, like it or not.

I digress though. Our next appointment is July 21^st at 2:45 in the afternoon. That’ll be our 30-weeker. Welcome to the third trimester, peoples.

Most Normal Visit To Date

What a weekend, ladies and gentlemen! Thursday night my friend BAMF’s maid of honor and I threw her bachelorette dinner, including a Zombie scavenger hunt (since BAMF and The Ginge’s wedding invitation said that they’re going to vow to survive the Zombie Apocalypse together). Friday we all drove out to the wedding site for the rehearsal and dinner, which were lovely and filled with laughter. Saturday was the wedding, of course. It was a warm, breezy, pleasant day in the back woods of the Green Mountain State, and the ceremony was short, sweet and just dorky enough to be fun. I looked like a blob of key lime pudding in my bridesmaid’s dress (which, sadly, I had picked out. Ah, maternity wear), but Hubs assured me I was the prettiest blob of key lime pudding ever.

We also got to spend time each day this weekend with our friend OtherWife who was back from California just for the wedding. We only get to see him a couple times a year, so this was a real treat!

Miss Pooka got to go on an adventure of her own this weekend – to Quebec City and Montreal with her school. They stayed in hotels with guards on each hallway (a school requirement), took a dinner dance cruise down the Hudson River, visited lots of historical sites and had dinner in a fancy Brazilian restaurant.

This morning Hubs and I got to sleep in a little bit, since I had an OB checkup at 9:15. Of course, OtherWife left this morning to go back to Cali too, so he came with. Pretty much everywhere he needed to go this weekend, we were going at the same time. Convenience for the win! He and Hubs dropped me off at The Big Hospital and sped off to enjoy some man-time in the Queen City for a while.

Mum and Dad arrived a few minutes before we were called in for our appointment, and I regaled them with some of the finer points from the weekend while we waited. I also gave them a crocheted giraffe that a very thoughtful coworker of mine had made for them. Apparently crochet is magic. To be fair, my crocheting skill is minimal at best, and I couldn’t hope to reproduce this adorable little plushie, but I get the basic concept of crochet. Ha!

My blood pressure was elevated a little, and I have gained an embarrassing ten pounds since my last appointment. I am choosing to the gain on water retention, as my feet are already swelling – perhaps from so much time on my feet this weekend, coupled with the heat and delicious, but salty dinner on Saturday night. The nurse took my blood pressure again a few minutes after the initial 120/80 “shock” and indeed, it had come down to 110/70. Much more acceptable.

Dr. Firstname saw us today, and while we waited for him to get the Doppler ready, Mum got to feel Nugget kick! It was a weak one because inevitably when you WANT them to move, they don’t. Then when the person who wants to feel the movement goes away, baby goes NUTS. Little bugger. Anyway, Nugget’s heart beat was at a steady 120, then the Doppler got kicked and his/her heartbeat went up to 140, as it should.

I got paperwork for the ghastly Glucose Tolerance Test, to be performed between June 23 – July 7, and we were told to schedule another appointment for July 7. After that we’re down to the “every two weeks” mark. Holy crap, ladies and gents! How the hell did this pregnancy go by so fast? Mum and Dad say it’s been slow, and I get why that might be the case for them, but for me it’s absolutely flying! Maybe it’s because I’m used to it by now? I dunno. I’m okay with this.

Hubs and I are toying with the idea of maybe applying for a home finance loan so we can actually buy a house. Nothing is set in stone; we don’t even know if we’d be eligible for a realistic-sized loan. But it’s something to think about, and if we can do it, it would be nice to be able to live in a place we own and can renovate and decorate however we want.

I guess that’s it for now, on the surrogacy end. Other stuff happens, but doesn’t belong on this blog. J

Panic at the Disco... Uh, I Mean, OB Clinic...

I got to sleep in this morning! Well, for half an hour anyway. In order to get ourselves back on the established Obstetrical Schedule of visits, we had to do one this week as well. Hubs got up with me and despite a screaming migraine, tagged along to the appointment (even though I told him he ought to stay home – it’s like he enjoys being around me or something. Weirdo.)

Mum and Dad drove four hours to attend the 8:45 am appointment – you do the math. They’re some dedicated parents, for sure! Mum said she slept the whole way, and Dad said it was a nice drive, with no traffic, so it was almost preferable to an end-of-day appointment.

We met a new doctor today – She’s got GORGEOUS silver hair, so that’s her name – Dr. Silvertresses. We chatted for a bit to make sure everything looked good on my end – it does. Nugget is a wiggly little bugger. Much like the previous two occupants of the Über-Ute, this one seems fond of kicking Hubs while we’re snuggling. S/he has also taken a shine to my new laptop. I don’t know if it’s the vibrations or what (it doesn’t heat up) – but Nugget rubs what I must presume is some appendage up against my belly where it meets the laptop, very deliberately. Anyway, we told Dr. Silvertresses all of this, and she let us know that the next 8-10 weeks are super-dull doctor’s visits.

I think she spoke too soon. I flopped back on the exam table, as I do at every visit, and lifted my shirt so that the doc could use the Doppler on my belly and let Mum and Dad hear Nugget’s heartbeat. Well, the placenta is right at the front of my uterus, so that’s a pain in the butt. And Nugget decided to hide today. Mum did not take this well. This is 1,000% understandable, of course. She’s been through hell AND the wringer to get to this point, and is so used to getting bad news that any time something looks off, her brain goes into worst-case-scenario.

Dr. Silvertresses was, much like Dr. Goggles, very accommodating. We were hurried into an ultrasound room where Nugget made some sucking motions for us, and registered a heart rate of 149. Perfect. This put Mum at ease, and we joked that if ever Nugget decides to hide again, we know that s/he’s probably just being a diva and wants to be on-screen again.

We were going to head into downtown of the Queen City for brunch, but Hubs’ migraine made him decide to wait for us in the car. Mum and Dad being the sweet, lovely humans they are, told us to go home and get Hubs tucked into a dark, quiet room where he could ride out the migraine in peace. We did so, after handing them a bottle of Little Piggy Pink (a rosé wine from Fresh Tracks Farm – a local winery), gave out hugs and headed home.

We’ve got another appointment on June 9^th at 9:15am. As it turns out, this piggybacks on a trip to The Big Apple for Mum and Dad, so I suggested that they pop up here rather than going home first. Of course it’s up to them, so whatever they choose to do will be what’s best for them, but if they HAPPEN to get here at an earlyish hour of the evening, they might let us take them out to dinner the night before their appointment. MUAHAHA! What? They did say they’ve never had a bad meal in Vermont…

Legalese

I got a HUGE packet of court documents from The Agency in my email yesterday. It was for me and Mum and Dad to all review and make sure everything looked accurate for pre-birth order stuff. Basically The Agency is submitting a bunch of paperwork with our signatures all over it saying that Mum and Dad are the rightful and biological parents of Nugget. Hubs and I obviously aren't contesting it, cause... Well, we're not Nugget's parents. Duh.

Most of it looked good. Mum caught a misspelling of my name in one part - There's only one "E" in my first name. And apparently The Agency was under the impression that:
1.) My lawyer actually spoke with me regarding this contract, and therefore advised me that this paperwork would be forthcoming and
2.) That I had been through this part of the process before.

Firstly, my lawyer emailed me once. Other than that, I emailed with his secretary. He was useless. I'm never using him again. In fact, I have disrecommended him to Sister Surrogate. Secondly, I'm still listed on Tempest's and Wiggle-Worm's birth certificates as their mother. I.F. hasn't gone to court to have my name removed yet. So no, I haven't been through this part of the process before.

Thankfully, I'm a smart human bean and can read and understand legalese. So I expected this, and I know what I'm doing despite  having a lump of an attorney. (I was gonna go for alliteration there, but decided against it.) I did have a moment of "Aww, come on," when I read the documentation listing Mum and Dad as Plaintiffs and me and Hubs as Defendants. I know that's how the courts work, but we're not defending against anything, so my brain kind of went, "Harumph" for a second. I'm over it now.

I've discovered a new breakfast! I'm not sure if it's just me being pregnant or if it's actually something good, but holy crap: Ezekiel english muffins with butter and smashed banana on top. OM NOM NOM! On the downside, eating in the evening (no matter WHAT I eat) seems to cause an excess of indigestion and burping when I go to bed. TUMS is not helping. I'm not sure what to do except maybe try buying a recliner and sleeping in that. But I hate not sleeping next to Hubs, so I'm at a loss. I could ask my OB to prescribe me Ranitidine again but I don't know if that will help, since antacids aren't doing anything. Hmm...

Boy? Girl? Girl? Boy? I'm Not Telling.

Yesterday was our 18-week ultrasound and OB appointment. Uneventful, routine stuff for me; so much so that I forget sometimes how much it means to Mum and Dad. I hope that my old-hat way of going about things helps to put them at ease rather than making them feel that their experience is being minimized. Maybe I’ll ask.

My cravings this trimester have gone from jalapeno poppers (with no heartburn, believe it or not) to bananas. So of course Mum made me a huge batch of banana bread. She and Dad brought it to our appointment yesterday, and I’m not going to say I didn’t devour a healthy portion of it on my way home afterward. I shared a little bit with Hubs and Pooka, but it’s MINE!

Our nurse weighed me and brought us to our exam room where I chattered right through her taking my blood pressure and she very politely told me to shut up so she could get an accurate reading. The first one was kind of scary high. The second was actually a little below my usual, but still within the healthy range. While we waited for the doctor to come in and chat with us, Mum divulged that our previous visit turned out nicely, but that the doctor’s repeated references to friends of his who had undergone IVF and had twins was not well-received.

Dr. Firstname attended us this time and was just that – attentive. He’s more laid-back than most of the doctors with whom I’ve dealt at The Big Hospital except for perhaps Dr. Badass. He had no trouble finding Nugget’s heart beat with the Doppler, which seemed to please Mum greatly. He said my weight gain looks good, fundal height looks good, and Nugget’s heart rate was 144 beats per minute: well into the normal range. The normal range, for those of you who want to know, is 110-160 beats per minute. He told us that one of the next two visits was going to need to be two weeks from another, rather than four between each. We waffled a bit and decided to visit again two weeks from yesterday. Of course, we forgot to set up the appointment when we checked out, but I called this morning.

We got shuffled back out to the waiting room to cool our heels until we were called in for our ultrasound. We had a pleasant chat about my nerding habits, and discovered that we all share a fondness for the Game of Thrones TV show.  Mum made some comment about not letting me ask the ultrasound tech about the baby’s gender, and I couldn’t help myself. Dr. Goggles had VERY surreptitiously snuck it into our last visit, so I told her I know. I also told her that I wasn’t going to give it away. She started trying to reason it out but Dad and I both had to stop her, because her logic was moving in weird directions that weren’t making sense to us. So until Nugget is born, I’ll be dangling “he’s” and “she’s” and the occasional “it’s” in conversations, just to be a pain in the butt and make them laugh. Did I mention that I love their sense of humor? I think I may have, but I do.

According to the ultrasound Nugget is measuring a day ahead of her/his gestational age, and all of his/her bits look perfectly healthy. Mum and Dad got some great pictures AND a DVD of the whole shebang to take home with them. The ultrasound doctor came out to double check on the membranous septum in Nugget’s heart to make sure there weren’t any holes in it, and to check her/his upper lip to make sure it wasn’t cleft. Given that the last time this doctor came in to chat after an ultrasound it was to tell I.F. that Tempest had a slight abnormality in his brain, this visit was much more welcome.

We weren’t able to go grab lunch this visit because Mum had some work due for her job yesterday afternoon and it wasn’t stuff that could be done remotely. This worked out pretty well for me, as I had to pop off at Best Buy to pick up a Playstation 4 for Hubs’ birthday (which is today, by the way! Happy Birthday, Precious!). I dropped it off to him on my way back to the office, since he has to work through tomorrow and I wanted him to have some play time on it this week.

Except that there was a hardware fault with the power source. Hubs got this information after the PS4 crapped out and he called Sony support. They were able to diagnose the problem pretty quickly I guess, and Best Buy was marvelous about exchanging the bad unit for a new one. The guy at the customer service desk even tested it out for me to make sure that he didn’t send me home with another busted console.

And I got to have dinner with Pooka and an old friend of mine. We parted company quickly at the end of the night; my friend having decided to buy himself a Playstation 3 at the very, very last minute before Best Buy closed. Ha! Boys and their toys.

A Real Hair-Puller

Today started out as a real hair-puller. No joke. I woke up and had to remind Hubs that I needed him to drive me to work, then come back and pick up Pooka and drop her off at school (she broke the growth plate in her right ankle, having been instructed by the director of “Willy Wonka Junior” to jump off a five-foot-high stage in HEELS), then drive himself to a medical appointment at 8:30. After that, he had to pick me up at work for 12:30 so that I could drop him off at home and make it to the Big Hospital for a 2:00 OB appointment.

Several hiccups made themselves apparent very quickly. When I went in to kiss Pooka, as I do every day before I leave for work, she informed me that she had been selected to perform in the State Middle School Music Festival.  Today. This meant that she would be in rehearsals all day, rather than school, and that Hubs would have to drop her off at the high school, and be sure to acquire lunch for her and drop it off in time for her to eat it before coming to pick me up at 12:30. It also meant that I had to cancel the late lunch I was planning to have with Mum and Dad after our appointment, so that I could make sure that Hubs got to work on time and that Pooka had dinner delivered before the performance.

I had also planned to have tea with my local Sister-Surrogate (mentioned previously) at 6:30, which would have been scuppered, except that the choral portion of the Music Festival wasn’t to begin until close to 7:30.

Halfway through the day Miss Pooka contacted me to inform me that she couldn’t keep standing all day, with her broken ankle (understandably) and that she was feeling sick. At my instruction she went and spoke to the choral director who excused her, thus negating the possibility of her being excluded from future opportunities. Thankfully her besty’s mom was willing to pick her up early and give her a ride home.

 It also turned out that my Microsoft Outlook (work) calendar is syncing with my phone/Google calendars so that all of my appointments in the work calendar are showing the times an hour earlier than the events are actually scheduled to happen. So what I thought was a 2:00 appointment was actually 3:00. This particular hiccup worked out to my advantage, as it allowed me to escape an exceptionally frustrating work day early, and gave me the better part of an hour to snuggle with Hubs before taking off to the Big Hospital.

I arrived at the hospital, I thought, ahead of Mum and Dad. Turned out they had gone to wait in the GYN waiting room rather than the OB reception area. Big hugs were exchanged (I love that) and a few amusing anecdotes were shared until My Favorite Nurse came out to get us. Not much happened; she took my blood pressure and asked how I was feeling, and Dr. Goggles came in. We chatted for a few minutes – nothing major – and I told him that Mum and Dad were particularly anxious to hear Nugget’s heartbeat.

Much to everyone’s chagrin, Nugget would not make him/herself known via Doppler, so Dr. Goggles generously suggested an ultrasound. Poor Mum had been waiting on baited breath for this one appointment, and he was not about to let her down. I cannot say how much I appreciated this. Not only did he offer an ultrasound, but when the nurses told him it would be at least half an hour’s wait, he ordered us into an empty ultrasound room and did the scan right there, himself.

Mum was beside herself to finally see her baby moving, with a solid, healthy heartbeat. I’m not gonna lie: it was wholly satisfying to be able to be the method by which she’s really going to be a Mommy. So Nugget is healthy and growing and all is well.

I managed to get back into town and pick Hubs up in time to bring him to work, then hit the local co-op for healthy dinner things for Pooka, and rushed off to the local créperie to get tea with Surro-Sister. She’s a marvelous, intelligent, strong woman who I must admit I admire to no end, and am so excited for her to begin her first surrogacy journey! We shared birthing stories, of course, and hers were some of the most interesting I’ve heard!

If you remember, dear reader: I posted that Surro-Sister’s Intended Father #1 had accidentally called me, meaning to call her instead, and then I wound up sitting behind them at the same créperie, listening to them talk about how sweet and helpful I am.

Well.

Further to that story, it turns out that Surro-Sister’s Intended Parents had viewed my profile back when I was being matched two-and-a-half years ago, and were the couple who had decided I lived too far away. How weird is that? Honestly, I’m starting to wonder if we SHOULD all sit down and have lunch or something. Too funny.

I’m home now, trying to relax after several grueling weeks. I’ve taken four teenagers to an anime convention in Boston; cared for a poor Pooka with a broken ankle; made a hell of a stink to Pooka’s principal and the irresponsible director who instructed her to jump off the stage and didn’t think that perhaps doing so in heels might cause problems; attended Pooka’s play and was as ever, impressed by her prowess on stage, even in a wheelchair; finished an audit at work in just over a week; accompanied Desert Rose to a late night OB appointment to make sure that her contractions were not actually causing her baby to come out yet; consulted with the best glamour consultant I’ve ever met about a portrait session, and attended an OB appointment that made Mum happier than she’s been since we started this cycle.

Let’s hope the rest goes as smoothly. I don’t have all that much hair to pull.