Belly Dance

If I had a video camera and knew how to upload a movie to this site I'd film my belly for you all so you could see the fun I have every afternoon about 3:30pm. It's a rather fun show. Pregnancy has given a whole new meaning to the phrase "belly dance."

Warning---Pregnant Belly in Jeans

I woke up this morning excited about the gorgeous drive up the Mississippi River Valley, the entire area decorated with flame-colored stands of birch and poplars and maples. But I wasn't sure how to dress. This is fall. Jeans weather. But a pregnant woman in jeans? I'm not comfortable with the way my butt looks in jeans when I'm not pregnant (though, like every woman I know, I fake a level of security with my own body that really only exists for brief moments of time). But the cool, crisp air and the thought of crunchy piles of leaves under my feet made me dig out the three pair of maternity jeans that my friend Sarah gave me four months ago. And when I found a pair I didn't hate, I decided to leave the house in them and wear them for my meeting with Rhonda.

The Belly in Jeans

Rhonda is a friend from the Twin Cities who is just 6 weeks behind me, carrying an active little girl that is probably well over a 1 pound at this point. And now that we live two and a half hours apart, it's been tough to find time to get together and catch up. We decided to meet halfway in Red Wing for a walk on the Cannon Valley Trail and lunch at Lilly's Coffeehouse on Main Street.

Despite the cloudy skies, the drive up the Mississippi River Valley did not disappoint. Around each new curve I encountered slashes of bright yellow and orange that always surprise me when they occur naturally. The bright yellows along the highway and hanging over the little towns along the river look like they would glow in the dark if someone turned the lights out, and I kept pulling over to take pictures. The drive is a commute I made every single day for the last several years, but for a few weeks in October every year, it becomes even more magical, and i feel truly blessed to live in such a beautiful place.

Rhonda and Barb, Two Bellys on the Cannon Valley Trail, Red Wing

Rhonda and I met and started walking fast and hard, not even paying attention to our heavy breathing and the stretching ligaments below our growing bellys. It had been so long since we'd seen each other and we had so much to catch up on... boys and houses and jobs and money and so very many stories. But most of all it was so great to be able to talk to somebody else who knows exactly what you're talking about when you say you are in love with the movements going on in your own belly, somebody else who understands that sometimes you stand in front of the mirror after your morning shower and study the line down the center of your belly and the way your belly button has flattened out and the way your profile looks like you have a basketball stretching your skin from the inside. It is so nice to confess these things to someone, to say "I can't believe it's me that's pregnant, it's me that's going to be the mom" and have them say "I know. Exactly." It really is the most unbelievable experience, and I am so glad to be able to share it with so many people, but days like today when I get together with my friend who has chosen this same path of single motherhood and understands so many of the ups and downs and fears and joys of this whole process, I feel especially grateful. When we got back to our cars in the parking lot and looked at the clock and realized we had been walking and talking for two solid hours, we let ourselves admit to sore backs and aching feet and stretching ligaments. We probably walked well over 5 miles which ain't too bad for a couple of pregnant women of "advanced maternal age." In Jeans!

Something About Me That's Normal

Just a quick update since so many people have been calling or emailing to ask about the glucose tests. After 100 g of orange-soda-flavored sugar and 4 blood draws and 3 hours sitting in a doctor’s waiting room observing old men in farmer hats with canes and old women with walkers and young paralyzed people in motorized carts and young mothers toting infants while holding the hands of unruly toddlers, my results came back as completely normal. All four blood draws (fasting, 1-hour, 2-hour and 3-hour) all came in at normal levels. So there’s something about me that’s normal.

The time in the waiting room wasn’t as bad as I expected. I spent much of it watching all the people and reading a Howard Norman memoir on the time he spent translating the Noah folktales of the Inuit people (more interesting than you’d think) and watching The Belly bounce around. As I tell Ann every day, I don’t think this child ever sleeps. When I’m sitting in the car he’s kicking at the seat beat. When I’m at my desk the skin above my belly button pulses and taps against the edge of my desk. When I sit with my arms crossed at a work training session he pushes my arms up, reminds me that he wants all the space he can get. When I sleep he wakes me at 3 am with an elbow or a foot or knee to my bladder. He never seems to stop moving… except when I move…. which isn’t often these days. I spend a lot of time NOT moving. And when I’m not moving I am constantly entertained by an active little one who I am hoping will sleep much more after he’s born.

30 Weeks and Growing

Aunt Judy sent me an email the other day and told me it was great to finally see my belly sticking out further than my boobs. (Thanks, Aunt Judy.) To date I’ve gained 23 pounds, and since I’m supposed to gain about a pound a week during the last trimester, I’m right on track for a 30 pound weight gain. And according to the experts, this is where all that weight will go:

Uterus 2 pounds
Breasts 1 pound
Increased blood 3 pounds
Water 4 pounds
Fat 8 pounds
Baby 7-8 pounds
Placenta 1-2 pounds
Amniotic fluid 2 pounds

And most of that is riding out in front of me at the moment straining my lower back and making it painful to sit and uncomfortable to try to sleep at night. (Notice I said “TRY” to sleep.) On top of all that Baby recently shifted into the head down position, so his head is sitting right on top of my pelvic floor muscles and my bladder. Not fun. It’s a good thing he continues to entertain me all day long with kicks and jabs, so I can remember why I’m going through all this. My mornings continue to be joyful as I sit at my desk and watch my belly jump around. Sometimes I am so enthralled with watching him poke and pulse the skin of my belly that I get almost nothing done.

Tonight I fast for my 3-hour glucose tolerance test tomorrow. And in two weeks I go in for the next ultrasound. TT is going to make the drive over to go with me, and I can’t wait to see how big my little boy has gotten. He’s probably well over 15 inches and 3 pounds by now, but he should start gaining weight rapidly now. Just 9 more weeks before he arrives.

29 Weeks

Another doctor’s appointment. Another step closer to bringing Baby home. I drank the orange syrup that so many women have warned me about (it really wasn’t bad at all… just tasted like orange soda), and then the nurse and I went over treatments for all the little “challenges” the third trimester brings. I’m supposed to lay down to avoid hemorrhoids, but I have to stay upright to avoid heartburn. No wonder hormonal pregnant women have trouble remembering little things.

I was fighting a nasty cold at the time of my appointment.

“If you could take anything for your cold right now, what would you take?” Dr. Peck asked.

“Alka Seltzer Cold Plus,” I said.

“Go right ahead.” He said I’m at the stage in my pregnancy where just about anything is safe because the baby is well developed.

He reviewed all my surgical records and drew little pictures to help explain to me that my previous surgery did not enter the endometrial cavity, so I can keep the baby in there a lot longer than Dr. Brown (in Minneapolis) wanted to. So it looks like I’ll be bringing baby home just in time for Christmas.

“Smart baby,” Dr. Peck said as he measured my uterus and felt my abdomen. “He’s already head down”… which explains why so much of the kicking and movement seems to be right around my belly button.

Last night I drank a big glass of Alka Seltzer Cold Plus and finally got a good night’s sleep, and this morning I got a call from Dr. Peck’s nurse. I have to go back in for the follow-up 3-hour glucose test. They require the more extensive testing for anyone who tests over 140 on the glucose test, and mine came back at 141.

“Damn,” I told her. “I should have done a few jumping jacks on my way to the lab.”

So next week I go in for 3 hours of bloodwork. Halloween morning is the next big ultrasound, and then after that I’ll have weekly appointments to monitor the baby. This is standard protocol for a 40-year-old high risk pregnancy.

I’m getting very excited!!!

A Visit from Grandma

TT Relaxes on the Deck

A great weekend with Mom. She seemed to be very tolerant of my new lifestyle which includes a lot of eating (followed by heartburn and indigestion and whining about how full I am even after small meals) and a lot of sleeping. We went for walks and watched the sunsets and drove through Perrot State Park and ate delicious sandwiches at The Trempealeau Hotel and bought a pie at Galesville Apple Affair. She told me stories of when she was pregnant, and I kept making her put her hand on my belly just in time for the baby (who she calls Sam or Max) to apparently decide he didn’t kick on demand. He continues to be very, very active… except, as it turns out, when you want him to be. Last night Mom kept trying to feel the baby kick while I was, as she said, “channeling your father” during the Packer game. (How could anyone NOT be upset by the turnovers and Brett’s dangerous interception followed by two quarters of ridiculous play calling and unnecessary penalties? We should have won that game!)

The Belly At 28 and a Half Weeks

I Fell Off the Wagon

When I gave up caffeine 8 months ago, I didn't know everything my body would have in store for me during my pregnancy.

"They are parasites for 9 months," my mother says.

There are lots of things a baby inside you and the hormones he brings along with him do to your body that nobody warns you about until it's too late. Today I decided that a little caffeine was a fair trade for hemorrhoids and constipation and constant heartburn and lower back aches and insomnia and tugging abdominal cramps and sore boobs and night-time congestion and other more unmentionable symptoms that any pregnant woman knows about but doesn't talk about.

I fell off the wagon. Hard. I pulled up to the Mugby Junction drive-through and ordered a double hazelnut frappe. No whipped cream. Half-caf. (I did show some control.)

Oh my God. I have missed you, my sweet friend. Oh, how I have missed you.

Very Special Gifts

This weekend Brooklynn spent the weekend at my house. We made cookies and homemade pizzas and hiked through the Wildlife Refuge and played games and sorted baby clothes and cheered for Brett Favre and the Packers to defeat her father's team and just had fun being together being Sisters. Brooklynn is such a joy to me, and we talked a lot about how important it will be for us to continue to make time for each other after the baby is born. She is very excited, and she helped me sort the baby clothes so we had the newborn and 0-3 months stuff ready. We oohed and ahhed at the little brown dogs on light blue stripes and fuzzy lions on safari-colored overalls and the little Winnie the Pooh sleepers and the tiny little newborn mittens to keep him from scratching himself. She told me that she thinks "this boy will be spoiled. He's already got more clothes than me, and he's not even born yet." As soon as we finished sorting and I put the clothes for 9-12 months away, she asked me if we could pull them out and sort them all over again because they were so cute and so fun to look at. Brooklynn's presence in my life is such a gift, and every time I see her I am grateful that we found each other when we did.

Oh, how I wish she were here tonight to see what greeted me when I got home from work... a package from my beautiful friend Kae who lives in Denver. She sent me adorable little Denver Bronco socks and a onesie that my son will get to wear while Bush is still president. I love it!!!! Thank you Kae.

"I already know more than the President."

For more pictures from my action packed weekend with Brooklynn, see my website.