It's a boy!

We had our 22 week ultrasound this morning and the first image we saw on the screen didn't leave any mistake: we're expecting another boy! (I considered posting the pic, but I know some people might be offended, so I decided not to - below are two 'safer' ones).

I already had a feeling it would be a boy, but it's nice to have the confirmation now. The little man was moving around a lot, even stuck his tongue out! All organs and bones looked and measured great, and he's a bit above the curve with everything, but I think we had the same with our first one and when he was born he wasn't any bigger than an average (French) baby. She also measured the cervix, which was long and closed at about 5 cm. Placenta is fare enough away from the cervix, so that's good to know too.

After the ultrasound I had my 5-month check-up with my OBGYN. Of course I already knew everything was fine, but it's always nice to see my doctor pleased and enthusiastic. I still didn't get my blood pressure reading (I think this time she said 110 over 60), but she said it was good. Fundal height at 22 cm so right on target, very supple/soft uterus, tonic cervix. Baby's heartrate was fine too (didn't get the exact measurements either).

I'll have to make an appointment with the lab for later this week for the routine checks and then next month it will be fun with the glucose tolerance test and some additional blood tests. My next OB check-up  is only three instead of four weeks away due to scheduling of appointments with the hospital for the last three months (still with the same OBGYN, but next month will be the last checkup at her private practice, and for month 7-9 it will be at the hospital. Since my due date is at the end of January, appointments at the hospital have to be made for the beginning of the month, and until now my appointments were more towards the middle/end of the month).

A weekend away

Just a quick update from the airport, where I'm about to board a flight to London, sans hubby and toddler. Going to attend a conference tomorrow with a colleague/friend and then be back home on Sunday afternoon.

Left our toddler with the sitter this morning with a 38.7 degree fever (celsius obviously, which equals about 101.7 Fahrenheit), other than that he was a happy camper, so no idea what the problem is. Hopefully he won't get really sick and will still be able to go with hubby to the toddler swimming session tomorrow morning.

Went to prenatal swimming session this morning myself, which was really nice. But somehow looking at the other pregnant women I didn't feel pregnant myself! Weird...


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I take that back...

...regarding the leg cramps.

Woke up this morning with a horrible cramp in my left leg - but not the back, but on the side - horrible place, because the usual trick of pulling your toes in the direction of your nose doesn't work...

Past the halfway mark

That's right - I'm 20w4d today, so even according to my French city's standards - which counts 40w3d for due dates - I'm into the second part of my pregnancy. Only if this one decides to stay inside as long as his or her older brother, then I'm not quite there yet...

Anyway, it doesn't really matter. Everything is going the way it should. Belly is growing, I feel the baby moving more and more, and I'm feeling pretty good. Leg cramps are nothing compared to my first pregnancy, but maybe that's still to come or the homeopathic treatment I gave myself (cuprum metallicum and nux vomica) did the trick, who knows...

I bought a doppler after I saw that it was much cheaper than I thought those things would be, but to be honest, I hardly use it. I prefer feeling the baby's kicks and moves - somehow I feel that those are signs he/she wants to give me him-/herself that everything is going okay in there, and with the doppler I'm somehow intruding on his/her space, or is that weird?

We should know the baby's sex at the next ultrasound in two weeks time. Somehow I'm thinking it's a boy, but no real reason for it other than that I don't know any better as my previous pregnancy was a boy. Friends around my son's babysitter say it must be a girl because a few of their pregnant friends who are due in January are all expecting girls. But then I think that ours was conceived a few months earlier, so their 'wisdom' might fall short...

I had my first prenatal yoga class this evening and it was good. A different class and teacher than I had with my first pregnancy, I think I like this one better (she's also a midwife), a little more down-to-earth. Classes are every other week, so I will try to get some discipline to also do some exercises at home, although knowing myself that will probably not happen...

I've also signed up for prenatal swimming/water exercises for which classes begin next Friday (you see, it's "la rentrée" - referring to start the new school year at the beginning of September, but also meaning all other activities, even if they're not meant for school children at all, have a summer hiatus and start up again in September - and oh my if you're trying to get into a class in mid-season!). Looking forward to that. It's in an aquatic center a bit out of town, but looks very nice, much better than the municipal swimming pools close by. We've also signed up for Saturday morning 'swimming' activities with our toddler at the same center since he showed so much love for being in the water this summer, so that should be fun too.

Other than that I'm still extremely busy with work. Had a huge deadline today, which I still haven't met, but I'm now waiting for input from two other people before I can send the docs off, so it's pretty much out of my hands (and I figured everyone has gone home anyway, so not much difference if they get it now or tomorrow or Sunday - besides, did I mention I don't get paid for this job...?! - but it's worth it, I hope). Luckily I didn't get any angry emails or phone calls, so I'm pretty zen.

18w4d - belly pics

By popular demand... ;-)

Two pics, belly looks much bigger in the second one (must have something to do with hollow or straight back I guess), so for you to decide which is the more realistic one...

Recap of the past month

Thankfully the heat wave is over! After a short and pretty mild thunderstorm cool air is flowing into our apartment again.

Our vacation didn't exactly go as planned, but was really nice nonetheless. It started with a drive up north (not all the way to Holland, but to Belgium) to celebrate my husband's uncle 50 years of priesthood. It was nice but also a bit weird - to hubby's uncle, his brothers are clearly more like family than his real family, which is understandable, but makes these celebrations in a way a bit awkward as well. But it was good to see the family, even though most things stayed pretty superficial (which was OK with me, no need for another fight between hubby and his sister).

After that we drove a few hours south, to a chic Parisian suburb, where my sister was staying with her family (they had done a house exchange for the holidays). The weather turned a lot better and it was great fun seeing our toddler interact with his cousins (whom he doesn't see that often as they live in California).

Then the plan was to drive in the direction of Bordeaux, where we would exchange our car for my dad's camper van (who was already vacationing with his girl friend there), take a 10-day trip with the camper van, after which we would return it to my dad at our home. But, my dad got sick. It wasn't very clear what kind of infection he had picked up, and whether it was viral or bacterial, but the main message was "your daughter can come visit but there should be no contact". Well, that seemed super artificial to us (and try to tell our toddler that he cannot hug his granddad, or maybe he can, but if he does, he cannot be held by his mommy anymore? Not a good idea). So we made the decision to cancel those plans, go home first, and then see from there what we would do.

I must say that the whole idea of going back home made me feel pretty miserable. I was supposed to be on holiday! But once we were back home, having our own things, sleeping in our own bed, it wasn't that bad after all. Also because by the time we were back, we had made a plan what to do next: we decided to stay home for a few days, let a cold/rainy front come through and once the sun would come out again, we would put our tent and other camping gear in the car and drive two hours to a valley we'd passed through a couple of times on our way south (via country roads) and had fallen in love with.

If we ever win the lottery, we want to live here...

So off we went. The surroundings were even more beautiful than we remembered, the campsite was nice, but the first night was interesting! I had consulted the weather forecast for the area, but only looked at day temperatures, which were really nice and warm. However, the first three nights were cold! Our poor son woke up the first night because his sleepsack and summer PJs were just not warm enough. We took him between us where he fell asleep immediately again, despite our air mattress slowly getting softer and softer, until we were on the ground! I also felt some leg cramps (which were horrible during my first pregnancy) coming up, but fortunately they stayed pretty mild and were manageable. So the next day we went to the store to buy a warm camping sleeping bag for our son and a new air mattress for ourselves, because despite having a repair kit handy, we couldn't find the leak!

The following days and nights were much better, even though our son was suffering from two emerging molars, and winced every time we had to wipe his red butt. Being pregnant while camping had its challenges too: I decided to stop taking my anti-constipation medicine, because it made me go to the toilet a bit too often. And speaking of toilet, of course I woke up in the middle of the night having to pee - quite an excercise, but oh well, luckily it was only once a night (and the stars were beautiful!).

All in all we had a lovely week, but when we came home we were also very glad to find our own bed again, having a fridge, and not having to bend over a tiny cooking stove when preparing meals.

Then the work crisis hit that I wont' bother you with.

And finally we did manage to meet up with my dad and his girl friend. They drove up with the camper van to a campground near our city and we spent last weekend with them, which was really nice. They're now on their way back to Holland.

And to finish this post, yesterday was my third OB appointment (at 18w1d) and both the bub and I are doing great! I didn't get any of the measurements other than the upper part of my BP (110) and my weight (again +2 kg from last month's appointment, so +4 kg in total), but everything was fine. Got to hear the bub's heart beat via the doppler which was wonderful. The OB was somewhat surprised that I already felt movement (since around week 15) and remarked that my belly had really popped (it has). She also had my T21 results: 1/617 (threshold is at 1/250). Maybe not super great numbers, but better than the result with my first pregnancy (which was somewhere around 1/450) which turned out fine and the OB told me there's no reason to worry, and I agree. So everything is going well! I just have to go to the lab early next week again for monthly blood and urine work and then the next OB checkup and ultrasound will be on September 19.

I'm back and will update soon

Sorry for the radio silence. I've been back home for a week now, but got into a work crisis right away (so bad that almost walked off the project), not a really nice way of coming back from vacation I must say... Fortunately we were able to work it out and all is OK again.

Currently suffering through a heat wave (38 degrees Celsius outside, 28 degrees Celsius inside with all the blinds and windows closed - no A/C obviously). Should be over by Friday. Went to the OB for a checkup today. All is well. I will write more about that and give a little recap of our summer holidays tomorrow evening.

Have been reading my blog list via google reader so am pretty up-to-date on what's going on with all of you, now only have to go back to commenting (but you're all in my thoughts!!).