Wearing Thin.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are no longer denizens of the Capitol City. I’ve finally decided, after living there for 31 out of 35 years, that it’s time to try something else. Our new place is quite a lot bigger than the old one, and much nicer.

On Friday the state observed Bennington Battle Day (which is actually August 16^th) and Husbeast didn’t have to work so we rented a truck, loaded it up with the help of three marvelous friends and headed to the new place. It took us another five car-loads total, but by 3:30 pm on Sunday, the old place was empty and immaculate, and the keys were locked properly inside. Thanks, once again to Mama, Mama’s Youngest, BAMF and Mr. Sama; as well as Husbeast and Pooka, of course.

Sunday afternoon Pooka and I got to attend a concert given by the lovely and talented wife of one of my favorite uncles in a very old local church. She only does it once a year and it’s a major highlight of my summers. We also got to see my fantastic cousin, her magnificent wife and their adorable son. Pooka joined him in checking out the cows behind the church, and found a tiny toad for him to look at, which seemed to please him greatly.

Monday I worked a little more than half a day and scooted homeward for my OB appointment. Mum and Dad got to feel Nugget kick for real this time, and Dr. Colorful seemed pleased with our progress. It does sound like I’ll probably go into labor a week or two, maybe even three weeks early (based on my most recent experience). Mum’s voting for three. Ha! She’s so excited to meet her baby. Not that I blame her, of course, but her enthusiastic impatience is pretty funny.

Yesterday I took the day off to sleep in. I’ve been pushing myself way too hard lately, and just needed to rest a little longer than usual. That’s not to say I’ve been doing a ton of heavy lifting or anything (that’s absolutely forbidden anyway). I’ve just been waking up early every morning and “going” nonstop until 11:00 or midnight every night; then getting back up and doing it over again. So yesterday I slept till 11:30.

I did make a ridiculous amount of progress on the new apartment, but I took a bunch of little breaks between, and sometimes in the middle of, tasks. So as of now, we have a working kitchen, fully arranged dining room and a working living room. I’ve got a couple projects to do, but otherwise my house is, by-and-large, presentable.

Happy Tummies and Big News

Seltzer - particularly lime-flavored seltzer - is the most wonderful thing human beings ever created. It’s fizzy and makes me burp (but then again, breathing makes me burp these days), but it’s not the unpleasant kind of “oh my god, PREGNANCY” burps, and even the first sip settles my angry stomach.

I can’t eat within three hours of going to bed or I wake up with screaming acid reflux and have to sit up every fifteen to thirty minutes to belch. I can’t eat large portions unless I plan to be on my feet and walking for twenty minutes at a minimum. I could eat an egg, cheese and bacon breakfast sandwich or a mixed green salad with fruit in it and some light vinaigrette dressing – its’ all the same to my body right now. The only thing that seems to “do it” for me, is sipping seltzer between bites.

Nugget has also concluded that somersaults are super fun and must be performed at the most awkward moments for his/her incubator. S/he’s taken to doing it while I lay on my side, as if using the mattress as a springboard. Catbutt seems to find these abdominal acrobatics exceptionally amusing, and like to flick my belly with his tail, hard enough to get a reaction out of Nugget… While I’m trying to sleep. This game generally takes place around 4:00 am, daily.

Last Monday’s OB appointment was par for the course. Nugget’s heartbeat is normal, and Mum got to hear it over the phone. She and Dad decided to skip the appointment due to illness on Mum’s part. She didn’t want to get me and Nugget sick too. I appreciated that. Dr. Colorful threw me a curve-ball on Nugget’s gender too, so now I have no theories at all as to his/her sex! Blargh! Oh well; we’ll find out in seven weeks, give or take.

In other news: We’re moving to the greater Queen City area next weekend. We put the deposit and first month’s rent down on our new place right before our OB appointment. The new place has two floors and is quite a bit larger than our current place, with much more storage; one and a half baths; in-apartment laundry facilities and a DISHWASHER! I cannot tell you how much those last two please me. We actually have our own tiny little laundry room with full-sized washer and dryer.

There are a couple very minor cosmetic issues, but I can fix those easily and cheaply. The tension rod in the upstairs (full) bathroom is rusty and needs replacing, but I have two of those already, so I don’t even need to spend money on that repair; and the vanity light covers in both bathrooms need either a good scrub or replacing. No big deal; I suspect that a short soak in hot water with a little bit of “Barkeeper’s Friend” and some elbow grease will brighten those babies right up. There’s also a tiny chip in the laminate counter top in the kitchen, but we have a marble cutting board that will probably live on top of it anyway, so no harm done.

Anyway, we still have our current kitchen and a few loose items to pack, but by Friday we should be good to go. I’ll report more once our stuff is all safely ensconced in the new apartment! Whee!

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...