For those who've been wondering when the emotions would kick in...

I’m a little sad today. Not that overwhelming, gut-wrenching, down-to-the-core sadness that can paralyze you, but just a general build-up of tears that is usually released with an all new episode of ER. As I’ve watched the Pistons fight in the series against Cleveland, I’ve been missing my dad a lot, so that’s part of it. After Tuesday night’s game I wanted to call him up and ask him what he thought of Chauncey’s decision to go for three, and I wanted to tell Dad how much I’ve come to dislike Gooden. I’m sure we’d also talk about how Kobe Bryant is a big whiner and trade him to any place but Detroit. :)

As I approach the end of the first trimester and start to feel more and more secure about this pregnancy, it’s sinking in that I’m going to be a parent. And I’m going to be a single parent. I thought through all of this ahead of time and I definitely know it’s what I want, that it’s the right thing for me. But as with most expectant moms, I’m starting to realize the enormity of what that’s going to mean.

During my commute down the river valley this morning, I listened to NPR, and as always they had a lot of coverage of the war…. military officials saying this summer is going to be particularly bloody, academics saying that what is ultimately going to dictate how this war turns out is the lack of forces (we’re simply stretched too thin), soft pieces about the funerals of local hometown heroes. This morning they broadcast a recording of a phone call between two parents whose sons had recently been killed by an IED near Baghdad. A mother who laid her son to rest this past Memorial Day weekend spoke with a father whose son’s body arrived Tuesday. They had barely said hello to each other when I started bawling. They talked for several minutes about how they understood how the other felt, how they were proud of their children, how the pain of losing their children was the same as it would be whether he died while fighting in a war or while painting the house. And I continued to bawl long after the story finished and Kathy Wurzer started talking about Northwest Airlines coming out of bankruptcy.

Yesterday my friend Sarah was telling me about a nightmare she had in which her little boy was drowning and she was unable to reach him, to save him. I remembered when Mom called me early in the morning ten years ago to make sure I was alright. “I dreamt that we found your dead, naked body in the garden,” she said. “It was so awful and so real, that I had to make sure you were okay.”

Tuesday night I had a dream that I was driving home from a night out with friends and I started swerving. I suddenly realized that I had had too much to drink, that I shouldn’t be driving. And a second later I thought, “What the hell am I doing drinking? I’m pregnant.” I woke up in a panic that something was wrong, that my baby was hurt.

From what everyone tells me, this is the beginning of a lifetime of these kinds of fears… balancing your desire to protect your child with your desire to see them grow in to secure, responsible adults.

And of course, this makes me miss my dad. He would be as excited as I am that the Pistons are headed back to The Palace to set things right in the NBA.

10 Weeks

Not much new to report. The nausea continues off and on, but it does seem to be bothering me less frequently. I have started other digestive tract related symptoms, but I'm not going to discuss those. 'Nough said.

Baby should be about an inch and a half long at this point and he/she is free to move inside the womb. Bones and cartilage are forming. Baby's stomach is now producing digestive juices, and his/her kidneys are producing large quantities of urine. Not unlike his/her mother. (Wow. That's me. Mother. That feels weird. ) I haven't slept for more than 2 hours at a time for weeks since I'm getting up to pee several times a night. Everyone says it's good practice for later.

This weekend Brooklynn and I spent the day together. She is very excited about the baby.

"Grace would be a good name for a girl," she told me.

"I hope you have a boy," she said later. "Baby boys are very cute."

Last month after she and I spent the day together shopping for her birthday presents, she said to her dad, "The best birthday present of all is that I'm going to be a big sister!" She's very excited, and I actually had fun explaining to her how babies are made... mine in particular.

CVS testing Tuesday next week, and after that just one more week until I'm through the first trimester. I can't wait to have my energy back.

9 weeks!

Thank God for spring! I spent part of my day in the gardens, cleaning up the mess from last year and planting new flowers that will fill my yard with color all summer. It was just the medicine I needed to calm my crabby self. There is nothing like the endless waves of nausea and fatigue to make a person crabby, and I wonder how people stay married through this. Last night I was on the phone with a friend, and after another day of dragging and burping and feeling like spitting and puking, I heard myself say "this little shit is putting me through hell." It made me think of the pregnancy journal I made for Ann when she was pregnant with Zack, so I dug it up and read the first few months' entries. It was right at 9 weeks that she called the child growing in her tummy "Scott's evil spawn." I definitely understand that feeling. I feel sick almost all the time.

Today is nine weeks. Today Baby officially ended it's embryonic stage and entered the fetal period. Baby is about an inch long and is starting to make spontaneous movements on its own. (Though I won't feel it for a couple of months.)

I had my first prenatal visit with Dr. Brown's nurse practitioner today. After talking about genetic testing and my prenatal care plan, I had to give 8 vials of blood for all the usual prenatal testing. After all the sticking I've been through to get Baby here, I'm used to blood draws, so it was no big deal. Peeing in a cup, on the other hand, has never been one of my favorite doctor-visit things. I guess I'll be doing a lot of that during the next 7 months.

Next week I'll return for another visit with the nurse practitioner to discuss the blood test results and get a full physical. The following week I'll finally meet with Dr. Brown. June 5th I'll be going in for CVS testing, an earlier version of the same testing that amnio does later in pregnancy. It's recommended for women over 35. That means by the first week of June I'll know if I'm having a boy or girl.

In the mean time I'm going to continue to relax and stay busy in my gardens and try not to think about how much I feel like hurling behind the arborvitae.

Thanks so much to all of you for your love and support through all of this. Since I come home to an empty house with nobody to unload to every night, it is so great to have so many of you out there calling and listening to me and being my support. I am truly blessed.

Popsicles, Toast and Eddie Money

What a difference a week makes. Last week after three days in northern California and two days working near San Francisco I was feeling pretty good. Still tired but eating well. In fact I was starting to worry about the lack of symptoms and began humming the 70's Eddie Money hit Baby Hold On.

So baby hold on to me
Whatever will be, will be
the future is ours to see
When you hold on to me

You know the future's lookin' brighter
Every morning' when i get up
Don't be thinkin' 'bout what's not enough,now baby
Just be thinkin' 'bout what we got
think of all my love, now
I'm gonna give you all I got

So baby hold on to me
Whatever will be, will be
the future is ours to see
When you hold on to me

But after a chicken pot pie and glass of milk dinner with Karen and Susan Wednesday, I was pretty sure Baby was holding on tight. As a matter of fact, Baby is now running the show. I was in bed by 8pm, and I woke up at 2am to try to force leftover pie crust into my mouth to avoid having my stomach roll any further. And each day this week my nausea got progressively worse. This weekend I've lived on lime popsicles and buttered toast, and often even the toast requires chewing for several minutes before I can make myself swallow. It comes and goes, but the way I look at it, the nausea is a good sign that baby is holding on. And I'm thrilled.

8 weeks!!!

Another milestone. Today I am officially 8 weeks pregnant. What that means in terms of symptoms is more of the same: queasy tummy, difficulty even imagining eating some foods, and fairly constant fatigue. And this past week the dreaded pregnancy acne has arrived.

What 8 weeks means for baby is more dramatic. Baby is now about 1/2 an inch long, the size of a raspberry. And it's growing at about a millimeter per day. Elbows, arms and fingers are beginning to develop, and the leg buds are starting to develop notches for toes. Week 8 is when the first facial features start to develop including a nose, eyes, and ears. My little reptilean creature is starting to resemble the beginnings of a human.

The best part about being at 8 weeks is that the first trimester is 2/3 over. Hopefully only 1 more month of wanting to nap every hour and gagging at the site of scrambled eggs or the smell of cigarette smoke.

(For the record, that picture is not mine. It's from one of the dozens of pregnancy websites that allow you to see a developing baby up close and personal.)

How to Eat During the First Trimester

Every pregnant girl should have a friend like Pam. Not only did she pick me up in the mess of SFO on a Friday afternoon, but she brought me to her home in Davis for good food, good conversation, and Stanley Cup playoff hockey. We woke to the sound of turkeys gobbling in her backyard, watched Fenton chase geese and ducks in the alfafa fields, and grabbed a tasty Chai Freddo at Peet’s. And the Davis farmer’s market was a festival of amazing smells, which is something I’ve been hoping to find since my sense of smell has started ruling my life. Fresh strawberries and peaches and tarragon. We made our way through the sea of couples with strollers and came home with plastic bags filled with tiny baby turnips, green garlic, juicy deep red tomatoes, and locally caught wild salmon. Back at the house Pam made a feast that seduced my nose before I ever opened my mouth to eat any of it. The salmon topped with green garlic and sweet onions and tarragon, baked to perfection. The tomatoes sliced and topped with thin onion slices and fresh avocadoes and locally pressed olive oil that melted in my mouth. The steamed baby turnips were, as Pam said, “like candy.” It seems every meal I eat that Pam puts together is one of the best meals of my life, and this lunch did not disappoint. It was so nice to be overwhelmed with beautiful smells that made me want to eat and eat and eat.

Graduation Day

Today I had my 7-week ultrasound with Dr. Malo-- as he called it "Graduation Day." As of today I'm officially done with the Center for Reproductive Medicine, and the only way I will need to see Dr. Malo again is if I want to go back and make another baby.

I was watching his face when he first pulled up the images on the screen, nervous that he was going to find no baby, no heartbeat. But he quickly turned the screen so I could see a bright pulsing dot in the middle of a kidney-shaped cloudy image. He pointed out the big black circle of the gestational sac, and moved the ultrasound to measure the little blob that will become baby. Crown to rump length was about 9.9-10.5mm which is a little over a third of an inch. Perfectly normal for a 7 week gestational age. The trace of the heartbeat showed a healthy 150... a normal fetal heart rate. I had to hold back tears because I really don't know Dr. Malo, and despite what many of you have seen to the contrary, I'm not usually very emotional in front of people I don't know well.

Actually I haven't had any of the big emotional symptoms that everyone has predicted. I get pretty irritated with slow drivers in the fast lane and people who still write checks in line at the grocery store, but that's normal Barb operational mode. As a matter of fact, I just came from Kohl's (where I went to buy some shirts that might fit me for the customer visits I have next week since all of my tops seem to pull on my expanding chest---how is that possible?) and despite all my efforts to be calm and patient and sweet, I eventually wanted to slug the old woman in front of me that insisted that the coffee maker she was buying was advertised as being 99 cents cheaper than what it rang up as. Note to self: do not shop at Kohl's during their One Day Senior Citizens Sale when pregnant. Or actually, ever.

My love affair with milk has ended. I still drink a couple of glasses a day, but I seem to get very full very quickly, and milk is not always appealing. My most noticeable pregnancy symptom continues to be the sense of smell that really is incredible. It keeps me from walking through the kitchen because I am absolutely convinced there is something dying in the drain of my sink.

Morning sickness continues, though nothing too terrible. I've found if I keep food in my tummy I'm okay. But there are definitely foods I can't stomach. Suddenly deli turkey is the most disgusting thing on the planet. Yesterday I had to pull the turkey off my sandwich and eat just lettuce, tomato and mayo or I wasn't going to get anything in.

I'm exhausted and queasy all the time, and I spend more time walking back and forth to the bathroom than I would have believed possible (why, oh why, do I have to get up to pee every two hours at night?), but I am absolutley thrilled and excited. After seeing the heartbeat I am beaming! It finally feels real, and I'm so grateful to have so many of you that have been supportive and encouraging through this incredible journey.

Official due date: Christmas. :)

Be Careful What You Wish For

Since my symptoms have been so mild I've been really anxious for the upcoming ultrasound. I've been thinking that I would feel more confident and less anxious if I had more severe symptoms. Can I take that back? :)

The official morning sickness has started. And now I understand why they call it "sickness."

(I want my mommy.)