Pregnancy 1: Week 35

35 Weeks:

Symptoms: Right side body pain (upper right abdomen, right side, right portion of back, right hip), heartburn, gas, breast soreness, leg cramps (usually just after a nap or waking up in the morning), anxiety (discussed below)

Weight: Like last week I have gained just under 2 lbs and so I am at nearly 16lbs gained. It is getting nerve wrecking to me that I am gaining more now, but with Patrick gaining 0.5 a lb a day and his current weight (read below) it isn’t that surprising. I know I will stay under the 25lb goal my OB has and she expresses no worry, she is happy with my weight gain progression but I was hoping to keep it under 20lbs and I don’t know if that will happen in the end now.

Natural Labor Class: So to start this week off we had our last class!! YAY! Tomek was happy. We partook in a natural labor class which was quite interesting to ensure our birth plan was on track with what the hospital can do. It also created key thoughts like why we want natural, are we all in on it, etc. That I enjoyed discussing with Tomek and included in our birth plan blog: https://www.brandiheil.com/blog/writing-a-birth-plan

Maternity Photo Shoot: On Sunday Tomek and I had a great time with my friend Carly (the amazing photographer in my life) as we got started early in the morning and hit sunrise at a local park and then drove to a state park and took the rest of our maternity pictures there. We can’t wait to see them in about a week. Beyond just taking the pictures while we were in the water we had so much fun goofing off in the water. Carly & Tomek taught me (sort of) how to skip rocks as I never had done it before. I think I managed 2 skips but it was fun nonetheless. Check out her photographer squat! Lol She is such a hoot. We had so much fun, she even felt Patrick kick once, I’m not sure she enjoyed it much though. haha

OB Ultrasound: Monday we went in for our final ultrasound appointment! We were so excited to get an update on little Patrick. We got to see so many cute moments of him (below are a few) and after doing some measuring the estimate is that Patrick currently weighs 6lbs 9oz. This is about a week and a half ahead of the “standard” weight. If he continues to gain 0.5lb a week then we are looking at around an 8lb baby….we will see what he actually weighs at birth though as they can be off by 1-2lbs. She also showed me where he was in my belly which I should really say my side! He doesn’t seem to use the left side of my womb at all and keeps his head right in my pelvic area on the right which is where his hand and arm movements can be felt, and his butt/legs/feet are all in my right rib cage right under my breast which is where he has managed to cause a muscle to strain and hurt even more. When she was trying to get pictures she wanted him to move his hand from his face so she shoved him a bit (actually pretty aggressively but it didn’t hurt) and we got to see such a funny look of disgust on his face and in retaliation he put his feet up by his face, and started kicking, she was even shocked by how much he was moving.

OB Appointment: Following our ultrasound we had a regular appointment where we were told my BP was 116/64 which again was very good, Patrick is measuring length wise right on track, his bpm was 150, I was tested for strep b and will get the results next week, and my weight is right where she wants it to be. We had finished our birth plan and took it in to her and had her agree to it and put it in my chart (she liked the visual aids too). She really thought everything in my plan was easy and not a problem and just expressed that we understand if a situation arises they may have to do something differently, which we both acknowledged and said we would just want to be talked with about it first. We also told her about our Monday experience in L&D and how I couldn’t handle the male that just walked into the room to transport me to ultrasound without a nurse while I was exposed. I was very upset and it just made it more clear that I couldn’t deal with males. She apologized for the experience and said he shouldn’t have come in anyway male or not, and she said the only way we would potentially have to worry about a male is the anesthesiologist during a c-section (which she will give me ear plugs and an eye mask so I don’t have to see or hear him) but my doula, hubby, and I are really praying it doesn’t come to that anyway!

Photo Fun: This week Carly also came over to my house and used some of my crochet and baby stuff to take some more work pictures. It’s fun to help her out with her pictures, though they do mostly consist of me letting her use stuff or helping setup, then I just stand there and watch the magic unfold. But it went well (even though I fell asleep on the couch when she was meant to come over) and despite the dogs getting a little too excited when she came in everything went without a hitch. :)

Anxiety: Lately I have been experiencing a lot of anxiety and emotions related to baby in different ways. I have been pretty anxious about his delivery and just hope everything works out as Monday was hard enough on me and I don’t want to go through that when I am delivering our baby as well. I have been anxious about after he is born and people expecting to be able to take him and be with him all the time. I mean at the moment we can’t even let him be at my husband’s parents house until he is 3 months old, and I am sure there will be some hurt feelings there but the truth is he will be spending all of his time in our house really anyway during those first couple months! I have also been anxious about his arrival. Initially not so much but after the Monday scare Tomek and I are both realizing the need to get the carseat in the car and finish up our main packing for the hospital because we truly have no idea when but anytime now could be accurate. For someone like me who plans everything in life this part is scary. I think it has hit me hard too because I actually had a nightmare that I woke up felt wet (like a water break) and moved the blanket and could see the top of his head poking out!

Sadness: Speaking of emotions I also experienced some sadness when we were looking at our baby boy’s ultrasound with my MIL and she said “that is definitely my son” referring to how much he looks like my husband. She brought out his baby books and went through some of them with me and we took them to our house. I kept going through them and it made me happy for him but also really sad. I was sad feeling like my child wouldn’t even look like me but even more so sad that my “earliest” picture as a child (other than the Riley hospital picture) is from when I was 4 years old. So I made this photo comparison of us with our baby and realized he actually will likely look a lot like both of us as we have very similar features to begin with. And I love how his daddy looks so I will be happy to have him look like his daddy or his mommy!

Slight Accident: So I spent the last 2 days of this week stuck mostly just laying in bed. This is because Patrick is very intensely burrowing into my right side which was causing general pain. However, I went to get out of bed one day and Ruby (who has been forced to not be playful for 8 days with a cone on because of being spayed) knocked me over, pushing me (and of course my right side) into the wooden hope chest. Ever since that event my right hip and nerve are hurting even more and I can’t sit without a lot of pain. So I am heating and icing it while laying in bed. I am hoping that gets better very soon. So laying around feeling a little useless is a pretty good summary of how we ended this week.