You Would Think It Was Me!

Oh my goodness - I got NO sleep last night. Yes, I still need to update my blog with my last ultrasound. Yes, I still need to update my blog with my last doctor's appointment. Yes, I still need to update my blog with my latest pregnancy symptoms. Yes, I still need to update my blog with the progress that we are making in getting ready for our precious little girl. But, all of this seems so unimportant when overshadowed by my latest news...

Carissa had her baby girl last night!!! Yes! It was her actual due date and she is the second friend this year that has given birth ON her due date. I could not sleep a wink last night! I am so excited - you would think it was me that just had this baby!!

We went to dinner with Carissa and Adam on Monday night after our weekly run/walk around the trail at Rice University. We knew it could possibly be the last time that we saw Carissa pregnant with this baby. Adam said he would call us as soon as anything happened. Sure enough when I saw his number on the caller ID around 7:30 last night, my heart skipped a beat! I usually HATE answering the phone but, I was happy to pick this one up. He said that her contractions had been coming regularly at 5 minute intervals for about an hour. She had her first non-Braxton Hicks contraction about 3.5 hours earlier but, they had been mostly sporadic up until this last hour. Their labor coach was on the way to their house and he wanted to call and let us know that it was happening and he would keep in touch. He called again around 10:30 to say that they were on the way to the hospital. Her contractions were less than 3 minutes apart!!! He gave us a few people to call and spread the news to, which we did.

Then, he called again at 12:15am to say that she had the baby!! It all seemed so quick! My husband answered the 12:15am call and got no details for me so, I did not sleep at all!! I wanted to know the DETAILS, of course! Luckily, he did find out that the baby is a girl (they didn't find out earlier). But, what time was she born? This was important because I wanted to know if she was born on May 25 (her due date) or May 26! How big was she? Did Carissa do it without an epidural? What was her name? And the rest of the night, I thought, "I can't believe Carissa's a mommy!". These thoughts kept me up ALL NIGHT LONG. So, this morning, on the way to work, I called Adam to find out the details:

Lillian May was born on May 25, 2005 @ 11:29pm - just one hour after they arrived at the hospital! Carissa was dialated to a 9.5 when they got there. She did not use any pain medication. Lily weighed 8 pounds, 5 ounces and was 20.5 inches long. She has bright red hair - which no one expected...and our daughters are going to be best friends for life!!! :)

Now that I got that all out, let's see if I can buckle down and get some work done in hopes of leaving early this afternoon to make a visit to the hospital!!

Not Worrying

I can’t believe it has taken me this long to update on my doctor’s appointment last week. Things have been busy with working, doing things around the house, and going to NC over the weekend. But, I must talk about what happened at the appointment last week. First, my blood pressure was back down to 128/74, the baby’s heartbeat was at 152 bpm, and my fundal height was 20 cm (the appointment was at 20 weeks). It also turned out that I had lost ½ pound since the appointment at 16 weeks. I could attribute that to a few things: being a lot more aggressive about keeping a good workout schedule and being more cognizant about what and how much I was eating. I also find that I don’t always eat when I’m hungry if it happens to be inconvenient at the time (i.e. in a meeting at work, etc.).

It turns out that I have to have a follow-up ultrasound in two weeks. Apparently, the radiologist is a little concerned that the baby’s abdomen measurements may be lagging behind the head and the leg measurements. Now, the doctor didn’t seem worried at all and it doesn’t make too much sense to me either. The measurements from my first ultrasound were as follows: head = 17.3 weeks, abdomen = 17.1 weeks, and legs = 17.6 weeks. I asked the doctor if everything was as it should be. She said all her anatomy looked good and my placenta is in the “back” which is perfect. Since the doctor didn’t seem concerned, I didn’t think a lot of it and just took my form to order the ultrasound and left the office.

On the way back to work, I started thinking about what I had been told. Of course, I unloaded on the Internet once I was here. I started researching to find out what the big deal was. It turned out that a high head/abdomen ratio could mean that she is experiencing “nutritional growth retardation”. So, combine that with the ½ pound weight loss over 4 weeks and a first time mother-to-be starts to worry just a little bit. Am I not eating enough? Am I exercising too hard? Am I not getting enough rest? Several people have worked to convince me that I should wait until the ultrasound before I try to adjust anything. I read that one of the treatments for this type of retarded growth is bed rest so, I admit that I have been trying to get a little more sleep – back to the daily nap of the first trimester.