Definitely my worst morning sickness yet. Not being sick, but have a bowl upstairs and a bowl downstairs, and very nervous about the prospect of needing them. Can not possibly feel more like being sick without actually being sick, and yet it's ALL. THE. TIME. from opening my eyes in the morning to losing consciousness late at night. Have been panicking about it a bit the last couple of mornings, but I have still made it through the day "intact". It's desperate though, getting through the day. Each day feels like several - three or four at least, because every morning I genuinely can't get my head around the fact that I am still only one more day pregnant than I was 3 days ago when I last checked. It actually feels like that! I can't BELIEVE I am only 6 weeks and ONE day pregnant, and it's so discouraging because the last 3 days have been, "I can't do this, I just CAN'T, I'll never make it through the day!" To get through it and have the reassurance that a week has passed would have made it bearable, but it's just the day of turning 6 weeks, the day before it, and the day after. Urrrggghhh...
I absolutely do not know how vomiting mamas ever make it through a day, let alone hundreds of them! :S
On a more positive note (I am still overjoyed to actually be pregnant!), I am having a little bit of fun with announcing my pregnancy at Facebook. I am not sure exactly how yet, but I am enjoying figuring out little clues to drop! If you are friends with me there, please don't comment on them - well, in such a way as to attract attention to them. I'm sure they'll be too obvious to last long, but I'm having fun anyway. Yesterday I posted a funny picture of a mummy dog with 7 little puppies all standing to attention around her. Deborah pointed out (in a private message) that there's an 8th one in there, which made me slightly nervous, lol! Heather still thinks the morning sickness might point to twins, even though it's not as bad as all that. It's worse than my norm, is all.
Today I randomly mentioned something about wanting the boys to be in bed at 7. ;) Everything relates to 7, well, most of them. I know, subtle as a sledgehammer, but like I say, I'm having fun! :) I am wondering about doing 7 days of clues (by which time we plan to have told the boys - I am struggling to hide my symptoms from them, and so far am riding it on the coldy virus I'm recovering from - not letting them know it's nausea I'm dealing with, just the fact that I don't feel well), and then a photographic announcement of some sort (I'm wondering about photos of the boys in some way... I'll post here too, when I have it sorted!) and then a video of the boys' reactions when we tell them. I'm so desperate to avoid the lovely moment of telling them having to be in the form of reassurance because Mummy has just thrown up. :S The sooner we can tell them, the better, but today I had the Health Visitor round for Samuel's 2-year check (went great!) and tomorrow we have a final visit from a social worker so they can write up their report, which apparently WILL confirm that we are great parents to lovely children who they have no concerns over. Phew. Still can't breathe easy yet, and I absolutely do not want them to know about the pregnancy at this stage, so we can't risk one of the children spilling the beans by accident. Today was fine, but I was very nervous about staying well enough through the appointment to not raise suspicion. I am really nervous about that tomorrow as well. We have 4 children to take for vaccinations, 2 hours before the SW visits us. Bleurgh. No idea how I'll get through that. Neil is home in the afternoon for that visit, so he is going to help with the vaccination appointments as well.
Okay, feeling too sick to write any more, and am going to try to eat something to take the edge off it (hopefully) so that I am able to brush my teeth, and then go to bed. Elijah has been very unsettled during the evenings this week so far, and awake and crying in arms until 10 or 11pm. Very tiring. He looks like he might get his 5th tooth soonish, so maybe it's that?
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Monday, February 25, 2013
5 weeks, 6 days - bleurgh!
Really just a quick post to say, ugggggghhhhhhh I feel soooooo sick!!! :S I guess it did start mild because it was early, or something, like Samuel's pregnancy exactly (except a bit earlier this time). I seem to be prone to having a ton of air in my stomach which I can actually hear squelching about when I move or breathe in and out (!!). If I ever get that at other times, it makes me feel somewhere between queasy and really nauseous, until I can shift the air and burp. How nice! ;) Anyway, for some reason, I seem to be having this problem pretty much 24/7 at the moment, and so I feel like being sick most of the time. I haven't been (oh please Lord, may I NOT) but the nausea is just so overwhelming. Eating is hard because I feel like I'm putting food down past an urge in the opposite direction, uggghhh.
BUT! On the rare occasions when the wind problem seems to inexplicably be gone for a few hours, my nausea is more normal-morning-sickness-esque. It doesn't have that same hollow, about-to-vomit feeling, and it is actually moderate at the worst it gets - really quite manageable as far as morning sickness goes. I wish I could just sort out the cause for this trapped air thing, and maybe it wouldn't be so bad right now. This is day 3 or 4 like it, I think. Neil was off work Thursday and Friday because of my birthday, and then I was too ill to be out of bed much on Friday so he stayed home that day too. I've had the weekend to try to recover further from the viral thingy, and I'm on the mend. I am having weirdly strong post-viral fatigue though, and to say it is terrifying is a major understatement. It's like physical flash-backs to the 2 years I spent housebound with M.E. and I just never, ever (ever) want to revisit that feeling. Ever again. Ever. I hope it passes soon. I think I am a bit stronger today than yesterday, but Neil is back at work today.
Today has been okay, mostly. Just the constant nausea. I have wiped poo off bottoms x2, changed pooey nappies x2, and made lunch. Those have been the hardest parts. Breakfast was okay because the nausea wasn't quite so bad yet, but urrrghh, lunch... Now I am sitting in the kitchen, trying to cope with the smell of a pooey nappy deep in the bin, which I can't stomach emptying right now, sitting with a classpack of Crayola crayons under my nose, because somehow that seems a neutralising fresh fragrance to me right now. Weird! NOT a craving of any sort, just a pleasing smell when there's a horrid one around. I need to make the boys some dinner, but I can't face it. My mouth is just watering like crazy and I can't bear to even think about what food to make them, let alone actually go and look at it.
Of course, this is a marvellously good sign! :) My little baby must be growing well in there! I'm delighted about that, and it is a happy consolation while I feel like this. It's a bit daunting to think that I'm not even 6 weeks pregnant yet, and it could last 6, 8, 10, 12, or even 14 more weeks. Bleurgh! I'm trying to think about happy or exciting milestones - only a couple of weeks until I can start thinking about getting my doppler out in the next few days to listen for the baby's heart beating! I LOVE that moment! 8 weeks is a pretty grim time for nausea, but there's that lovely highlight for me, in there.
I told Neil about the name Toby, and how I feel about it. I told him even if we don't use it, I would love to keep the pattern we've got going - a different letter of the alphabet for each child. It wasn't intentional to start with, but I like it! He likes that idea too.
Heather keeps wondering about twins again, because my morning sickness started earlier than usual this time. The thought is VERY scary to me this time around! :S But who knows! I know my chance goes up the older I get.
I had a bit of brown spotting - I think I mentioned it last entry - on my birthday, and again the next day, but nothing since. I'm keeping a close eye all the time though.
I can't remember if I said a couple of weeks ago, but when I weighed myself then, I was 9st 7.5lbs, so that is my starting weight this time. So-so, for me! ;) I took my blood pressure yesterday because I felt so faint and dizzy (things kept starting to "white-out") and it was scaring me so I wanted to see if it was blood pressure related, or maybe it was just part of the post-viral thing. Anyway, 110/60 - very normal for me.
Okay I am feeling too sick and mouth-watery to type any longer. Neil will be home in 45 minutes, but it should be bedtime for the boys right after that, so it would not be good if I haven't even fed them yet! I have done school today. Absolutely determined to try to keep that going no matter what. With Samuel I couldn't - I stopped for 3 months, and I don't want to do that this time, with the boys that bit older and needing to keep up with school more. Also certain people watching us all the time, ugh. I am desperate to maintain their schooling. Today school has been on-and-off lessons from about 10.15am to 5ish in the afternoon. Plenty of stops for snuggles, putting Elijah to bed and getting him up, snacks, lunch, playing, too much TV, etc. Arthur was done with his school work by 11.30am! Early for him - he was very pleased! :) I am only teaching "core" subjects. The rest is autonomous (unschooled learning) - or "child-led". They learn tons from the child-led part! Today I taught Arthur maths and then spelling and handwriting. I managed to do a craft activity with Benjamin and Samuel (rarely manage to fit that in, but I am so desperate to, more often) and then Nathan joined in at the end, and went on to do his pre-writing and numeracy workbooks. I taught Matthew maths after lunch, and then a reading lesson. Nathan still needs his maths lesson, but I am not sure I can manage it now. Elijah is so clingy right now, and screams and cries clinging to the bars of the safety gate at the kitchen while I'm trying to teach lessons at the kitchen table! Makes it kind of difficult for the boys to concentrate, so then I pick him up and hold him while I teach, but lately I'm physically tired out when holding him, and also he is quite the lungey, squirmy wriggler when being held, and gets into mischief if I put him on the floor near me! We rush to get lessons done when he's napping!
Anyway, I will update again soon. I am excited that I'm 6 weeks pregnant tomorrow - another week down! But slightly dreading each day ahead as I know it will be hard to face with all the nausea. Sometimes it improves a lot just for lying down and resting for a couple of hours, but PROPER rest, not just being horizontal in parenting mode! That doesn't seem to have the same effect. And I can never, ever, expect to have the slightest rest at this stage of my life! At the weekend it helped, so hopefully Neil will let me rest to tackle the nausea at the weekends, maybe. I try to make the most of the times (twice) when I go upstairs and lay down to breastfeed Elijah to sleep for his nap. If I pretend I'm going to bed and ignore the screaming and bashing about downstairs (!!) then I sometimes trick my body into resting enough to take the edge off the nausea by the time I get up again when Elijah has fallen asleep (about 5-10 mins later).
Of course, I am also chanting regularly, "It's soooo worth it, it's soooo worth it!" :) Because it totally IS!! And it will pass. Faster with each pregnancy, as time seems to go faster each time, so that is in my favour too. :)
[ETA: 30 mins later: Praise the Lord for Tropicana tropical juice! Half a glass later and I'm simultaneously holding wiggly 'Lijah on my hip, stirring porridge (breakfast for dinner tonight), and even able to jokingly answer the slightly whiney question: "What's for food?!" with a cheery, "Poo on sticks!" - just as my own mother used to, bless her! ;) Still feel very sick but at least a bit more able.]
BUT! On the rare occasions when the wind problem seems to inexplicably be gone for a few hours, my nausea is more normal-morning-sickness-esque. It doesn't have that same hollow, about-to-vomit feeling, and it is actually moderate at the worst it gets - really quite manageable as far as morning sickness goes. I wish I could just sort out the cause for this trapped air thing, and maybe it wouldn't be so bad right now. This is day 3 or 4 like it, I think. Neil was off work Thursday and Friday because of my birthday, and then I was too ill to be out of bed much on Friday so he stayed home that day too. I've had the weekend to try to recover further from the viral thingy, and I'm on the mend. I am having weirdly strong post-viral fatigue though, and to say it is terrifying is a major understatement. It's like physical flash-backs to the 2 years I spent housebound with M.E. and I just never, ever (ever) want to revisit that feeling. Ever again. Ever. I hope it passes soon. I think I am a bit stronger today than yesterday, but Neil is back at work today.
Today has been okay, mostly. Just the constant nausea. I have wiped poo off bottoms x2, changed pooey nappies x2, and made lunch. Those have been the hardest parts. Breakfast was okay because the nausea wasn't quite so bad yet, but urrrghh, lunch... Now I am sitting in the kitchen, trying to cope with the smell of a pooey nappy deep in the bin, which I can't stomach emptying right now, sitting with a classpack of Crayola crayons under my nose, because somehow that seems a neutralising fresh fragrance to me right now. Weird! NOT a craving of any sort, just a pleasing smell when there's a horrid one around. I need to make the boys some dinner, but I can't face it. My mouth is just watering like crazy and I can't bear to even think about what food to make them, let alone actually go and look at it.
Of course, this is a marvellously good sign! :) My little baby must be growing well in there! I'm delighted about that, and it is a happy consolation while I feel like this. It's a bit daunting to think that I'm not even 6 weeks pregnant yet, and it could last 6, 8, 10, 12, or even 14 more weeks. Bleurgh! I'm trying to think about happy or exciting milestones - only a couple of weeks until I can start thinking about getting my doppler out in the next few days to listen for the baby's heart beating! I LOVE that moment! 8 weeks is a pretty grim time for nausea, but there's that lovely highlight for me, in there.
I told Neil about the name Toby, and how I feel about it. I told him even if we don't use it, I would love to keep the pattern we've got going - a different letter of the alphabet for each child. It wasn't intentional to start with, but I like it! He likes that idea too.
Heather keeps wondering about twins again, because my morning sickness started earlier than usual this time. The thought is VERY scary to me this time around! :S But who knows! I know my chance goes up the older I get.
I had a bit of brown spotting - I think I mentioned it last entry - on my birthday, and again the next day, but nothing since. I'm keeping a close eye all the time though.
I can't remember if I said a couple of weeks ago, but when I weighed myself then, I was 9st 7.5lbs, so that is my starting weight this time. So-so, for me! ;) I took my blood pressure yesterday because I felt so faint and dizzy (things kept starting to "white-out") and it was scaring me so I wanted to see if it was blood pressure related, or maybe it was just part of the post-viral thing. Anyway, 110/60 - very normal for me.
Okay I am feeling too sick and mouth-watery to type any longer. Neil will be home in 45 minutes, but it should be bedtime for the boys right after that, so it would not be good if I haven't even fed them yet! I have done school today. Absolutely determined to try to keep that going no matter what. With Samuel I couldn't - I stopped for 3 months, and I don't want to do that this time, with the boys that bit older and needing to keep up with school more. Also certain people watching us all the time, ugh. I am desperate to maintain their schooling. Today school has been on-and-off lessons from about 10.15am to 5ish in the afternoon. Plenty of stops for snuggles, putting Elijah to bed and getting him up, snacks, lunch, playing, too much TV, etc. Arthur was done with his school work by 11.30am! Early for him - he was very pleased! :) I am only teaching "core" subjects. The rest is autonomous (unschooled learning) - or "child-led". They learn tons from the child-led part! Today I taught Arthur maths and then spelling and handwriting. I managed to do a craft activity with Benjamin and Samuel (rarely manage to fit that in, but I am so desperate to, more often) and then Nathan joined in at the end, and went on to do his pre-writing and numeracy workbooks. I taught Matthew maths after lunch, and then a reading lesson. Nathan still needs his maths lesson, but I am not sure I can manage it now. Elijah is so clingy right now, and screams and cries clinging to the bars of the safety gate at the kitchen while I'm trying to teach lessons at the kitchen table! Makes it kind of difficult for the boys to concentrate, so then I pick him up and hold him while I teach, but lately I'm physically tired out when holding him, and also he is quite the lungey, squirmy wriggler when being held, and gets into mischief if I put him on the floor near me! We rush to get lessons done when he's napping!
Anyway, I will update again soon. I am excited that I'm 6 weeks pregnant tomorrow - another week down! But slightly dreading each day ahead as I know it will be hard to face with all the nausea. Sometimes it improves a lot just for lying down and resting for a couple of hours, but PROPER rest, not just being horizontal in parenting mode! That doesn't seem to have the same effect. And I can never, ever, expect to have the slightest rest at this stage of my life! At the weekend it helped, so hopefully Neil will let me rest to tackle the nausea at the weekends, maybe. I try to make the most of the times (twice) when I go upstairs and lay down to breastfeed Elijah to sleep for his nap. If I pretend I'm going to bed and ignore the screaming and bashing about downstairs (!!) then I sometimes trick my body into resting enough to take the edge off the nausea by the time I get up again when Elijah has fallen asleep (about 5-10 mins later).
Of course, I am also chanting regularly, "It's soooo worth it, it's soooo worth it!" :) Because it totally IS!! And it will pass. Faster with each pregnancy, as time seems to go faster each time, so that is in my favour too. :)
[ETA: 30 mins later: Praise the Lord for Tropicana tropical juice! Half a glass later and I'm simultaneously holding wiggly 'Lijah on my hip, stirring porridge (breakfast for dinner tonight), and even able to jokingly answer the slightly whiney question: "What's for food?!" with a cheery, "Poo on sticks!" - just as my own mother used to, bless her! ;) Still feel very sick but at least a bit more able.]
Thursday, February 21, 2013
5 weeks, 2 days pregnant - wonderful milestone!
It is my birthday today! :) I am 37 - phewee! Can't believe I am that "old", lol!
Today, Neil is off work because it's my birthday. :) I am having a nice day to some degree, but mainly I am not well today. I feel dreadful with some fluey-coldy thing which Neil had reeeally mildly earlier in the week, but it has whacked me over the head like nothing else! That is quite normal in pregnancy, to get things badly even if you normally don't, because of a lowered immune system - one of the body's mechanisms to ensure that the little one doesn't get rejected. Anyway, I don't even like to take paracetamol in my first trimester, so I feel really rotten. I think I would feel a lot better if I could just take something for the aches and so on, but it will pass. I have had to keep going back to bed today as being up and dealing with the little ones makes me feel breathless and unwell after about 20 minutes. I am going to have another go at having a birthday when I feel better! :) I did get some lovely presents and cards, and my little ones drew me pictures and wrapped me things we already have around the house, and cute things like that! :)
My absolutely hands-down FAVOURITE present today is from God. I am 5 weeks and 2 days pregnant. That is precisely the day that the cardial tubes fuse together to form an S-shaped bend, and instantaneously, the rudimentary heart begins to beat for the first time. Today my baby has a heartbeat. There is nothing more awesome that I could possibly want for my birthday! :) When I realised earlier in the week that it would happen on my birthday, it made me so happy, and I really looked forward to today because of it! :)
The other thing I have today, for the first time, is a slight bit of brown spotting, but I am hoping that's fine. I am keeping an eye on it, but it really is hardly anything at all. I have some slightly crampy discomfort but nothing more than I have been getting from time to time, most days, anyway. I will see how that goes.
I self-referred myself (thanks to having the personal contact details of the head of community midwives at the hospital, from last time around!) to the midwives via a form I filled in online, at the weekend. They are obliged to send a copy to my GP, but hopefully they won't even read it, just put it in my file. I had to fill in a lot of details about my past obstetric history and so on. Glad I know the various abbreviations and such, that make it easier to fill in these forms without a midwife being there to do it for me! I should hear back from the team of midwives within 10 days with a first appointment date and also a date for my nuchal scan (at 12 weeks) - exciting! :) If my spotting continues for a while or gets any heavier, I will self-refer for an early scan, for reassurance.
I am still feeling morning sick, so that is a great sign. It is not at all bad - it seems pretty mild as far as my personal experience with morning sickness goes. It did start earlier than ever before, and I wondered if it might get worse as I approach the usual time for morning sickness starting. It started earlier than usual (5 weeks exactly) with Samuel, seemed mild-ish, and got a lot worse after the first week, so I'm still holding my breath and waiting to see! Nervous about that prospect. With Samuel I had to stop homeschooling for months, it was that bad. With Elijah it started a bit later than usual but was milder, and so school continued without any problems. It was so manageable, even though I felt sick and yucky most of the day, and I am reeeeally hoping for that kind of experience this time. I just really wish it could be mild enough so that I can carry on unhindered, with school and mothering and meal-preparation, and so on. It would be so nice! :) It started a week ago tomorrow, but normally wouldn't start until a few days from now, so we'll see.
We still haven't told the boys, and I am still thinking about how to tell. I think I would love to take a photo of them as well as the announcement, in some way that announces our new baby on the way. I am enjoying thinking about the various possibilities there too! :)
One of my presents today was a Willow Tree pregnancy figurine! I have loved that one for years, and I'm so happy to have one! It makes my heart happy every time I look at it!
Well, there is probably more I could write about, but I think I will just update again another time. I am not feeling good and I should probably rest a bit before helping with the boys' bedtime. I'm so thankful for Neil being at home today. He is back to work tomorrow, and I'm quite nervous about how I will manage the boys while I am like this. Hopefully I will somehow be over the worst by the morning!
Today, Neil is off work because it's my birthday. :) I am having a nice day to some degree, but mainly I am not well today. I feel dreadful with some fluey-coldy thing which Neil had reeeally mildly earlier in the week, but it has whacked me over the head like nothing else! That is quite normal in pregnancy, to get things badly even if you normally don't, because of a lowered immune system - one of the body's mechanisms to ensure that the little one doesn't get rejected. Anyway, I don't even like to take paracetamol in my first trimester, so I feel really rotten. I think I would feel a lot better if I could just take something for the aches and so on, but it will pass. I have had to keep going back to bed today as being up and dealing with the little ones makes me feel breathless and unwell after about 20 minutes. I am going to have another go at having a birthday when I feel better! :) I did get some lovely presents and cards, and my little ones drew me pictures and wrapped me things we already have around the house, and cute things like that! :)
My absolutely hands-down FAVOURITE present today is from God. I am 5 weeks and 2 days pregnant. That is precisely the day that the cardial tubes fuse together to form an S-shaped bend, and instantaneously, the rudimentary heart begins to beat for the first time. Today my baby has a heartbeat. There is nothing more awesome that I could possibly want for my birthday! :) When I realised earlier in the week that it would happen on my birthday, it made me so happy, and I really looked forward to today because of it! :)
The other thing I have today, for the first time, is a slight bit of brown spotting, but I am hoping that's fine. I am keeping an eye on it, but it really is hardly anything at all. I have some slightly crampy discomfort but nothing more than I have been getting from time to time, most days, anyway. I will see how that goes.
I self-referred myself (thanks to having the personal contact details of the head of community midwives at the hospital, from last time around!) to the midwives via a form I filled in online, at the weekend. They are obliged to send a copy to my GP, but hopefully they won't even read it, just put it in my file. I had to fill in a lot of details about my past obstetric history and so on. Glad I know the various abbreviations and such, that make it easier to fill in these forms without a midwife being there to do it for me! I should hear back from the team of midwives within 10 days with a first appointment date and also a date for my nuchal scan (at 12 weeks) - exciting! :) If my spotting continues for a while or gets any heavier, I will self-refer for an early scan, for reassurance.
I am still feeling morning sick, so that is a great sign. It is not at all bad - it seems pretty mild as far as my personal experience with morning sickness goes. It did start earlier than ever before, and I wondered if it might get worse as I approach the usual time for morning sickness starting. It started earlier than usual (5 weeks exactly) with Samuel, seemed mild-ish, and got a lot worse after the first week, so I'm still holding my breath and waiting to see! Nervous about that prospect. With Samuel I had to stop homeschooling for months, it was that bad. With Elijah it started a bit later than usual but was milder, and so school continued without any problems. It was so manageable, even though I felt sick and yucky most of the day, and I am reeeeally hoping for that kind of experience this time. I just really wish it could be mild enough so that I can carry on unhindered, with school and mothering and meal-preparation, and so on. It would be so nice! :) It started a week ago tomorrow, but normally wouldn't start until a few days from now, so we'll see.
We still haven't told the boys, and I am still thinking about how to tell. I think I would love to take a photo of them as well as the announcement, in some way that announces our new baby on the way. I am enjoying thinking about the various possibilities there too! :)
One of my presents today was a Willow Tree pregnancy figurine! I have loved that one for years, and I'm so happy to have one! It makes my heart happy every time I look at it!
Well, there is probably more I could write about, but I think I will just update again another time. I am not feeling good and I should probably rest a bit before helping with the boys' bedtime. I'm so thankful for Neil being at home today. He is back to work tomorrow, and I'm quite nervous about how I will manage the boys while I am like this. Hopefully I will somehow be over the worst by the morning!
Saturday, February 16, 2013
4 weeks, 4 days - test pic
I have arrived at 18DPO! That is an established pregnancy, and my final day of temping and testing, as I always do (unless I bleed just before, in which case I might temp a bit longer, but so far this pregnancy, no spotting or bleeding!).
My temp went up a lot at 16DPO the day after my last blog post, so even though I planned to test at 16DPO, because I did so the day before and had a darker positive line, and then got a great rise in temperature in the morning, I decided not to test that day. My temp has gone up a touch each day since then - I had my highest temp yet this morning! :) I did my last pregnancy test today and was really thrilled and relieved to see a line that, at first, looked almost as dark as the control line! It faded a bit but it's still good and dark. I took a photo of all my test sticks for prosperity (!) - the top 3 are the more sensitive tests (10 mIU) at 8, 9 and 10DPO, and the bottom set of 5 are the less sensitive (25 mIU - standard pregnancy test strength) test sticks. I tried to write the DPO on them but I only have a thick sharpie marker, lol! The numbers haven't come out too clearly therefore! Oh well! ;)
Top one is 10DPO, the evening test after saving my wee a LOT longer than I had for the morning test on the more more sensitive stick. Then 12DPO, 14DPO, 15DPO (see the difference in one day, compared with the minimal difference from 12 to 14DPO?!), and today's is at the bottom - 18DPO.
So excited and thrilled to relax a little bit more (I know, I know, there are no guarantees, but I will enjoy it for all I'm worth for as long as I have it!) and just BE pregnant!! I'm pregnant, I'm pregnant!!! Wheeeeeee! :D It just feels SO surreal, and I feel incredibly blessed to be allowed to sit here, pregnant at the age of almost 37 (it's my birthday on Thursday - hello Advanced Maternal Age!), for the seventh time! Praise the Lord, oh my soul, and let all that is within me praise His name!!! :)
Well, some newsy pregnant (eeeep!!) things:
Yesterday evening we ate late - after the boys went to bed. It was supposed to be "date night" but Neil has come down with a cold that he's picked up at work, and we were both sooooo tired. We did eat and chat, but let the more romantic side of the date night go this time! ;) Anyway, it was later than we usually eat. While I was waiting for the food to be ready, I realised I was feeling a tad queasy. I get queasy quite a lot, because I'm prone to it as an expression of anxiety, and also it's a really common symptom of IBS for me - full on nausea is more like it, often. Anyway, THIS wasn't the same type of queasy. This was suspiciously travel-sick queasy, and that can only mean morning sickness, for me. I recognised it straight away. But I was only 4 weeks and 3 days - aaaaargh!! With my first 4 babies, I could time the start of my morning sickness to the day - it ALWAYS started on the dot of 5w6d. Bizarre, but there we go! With Samuel it started a few days earlier, which threw me off! And then Elijah's started on the dot of 5 weeks, exactly. Which was "different", so I wondered if he would be a girl. But no! ;) His started earlier and ended later, but was milder, as though it was "diluted" somewhat by being spread out a bit more - funny analogy, but that's how it felt!
So I thought, SURELY not?! Surely not earlier than 5 weeks?! And what does it mean for the level of intensity that it might reach when I'm between 5 and 6 weeks (when it really starts to kick in normally)? Nervous. I felt better for eating dinner. Evenings are my worst time for morning sickness - they always have been. And morning sickness is always worse when my stomach is empty. So a touch of queasiness one evening when I hadn't eaten isn't too surprising, it just slightly unnerves me that I was barely 4 and a half weeks pregnant! I am not sure if I have had any sort of quease that early before, but I will have to double check my blogs and my chart notes to be sure.
I am trying to eat protein-rich meals and snacks this pregnancy, to hopefully see if there's any improvement on how much morning sickness I experience, and also to try and sort out these frequent spells of dizziness and lightheadedness that I've been getting since before my tests showed lines properly. I think the dizziness is a bit better, but maybe that will just clear up on its own anyway, and that's why? Anyway, I bought some trail mix, some salted cashews, and some brazil nuts. I love brazil nuts, but eating them yesterday afternoon left me feeling a bit... yacky. Not quite as far as queasy, but not far off. It seemed to stay with me into the evening and then not eating until late pushed that sensation juuuust into the realms of nausea. Hmmm...
Today I do NOT want to eat brazil nuts! I was chewing my fingers (gross habit, but yeah) just a little while ago while I was setting the laptop up to update my blog, and noticed that it was quickly making me feel a bit sick. TOTAL confirmation for me, that this is morning sickness starting. The only time ever in my life when biting my nails/fingers makes me feel sick to my stomach is when I am pregnant. Even if I am desperately needing to bite them, and I do, the nausea is right there to make me stop, as soon as I start. First trimesters are the only times I ever have nice long nails and smooth fingers, lol! I really like it (I hate being a nail-biter, but it's almost impossible to stop), and try to continue it, and I usually make it to my 3rd trimester before I cave. So anyway, yay for my nails about to get nice. Boo for nausea! ;)
On the other hand, I'm excited to be starting morning sickness because I know that it means things are going well in there with my little beany person! In fact, I announce to the general world at large much earlier than many people do, because I can't keep it to myself any longer (mainly), and also because I want the world to celebrate with me, even if I lose my treasure. Even more reason to celebrate with joy while the little one is with me! I have a bit of trepidation early on, usually because I am bleeding in some way, but also because you never know how things are going with the pregnancy, if there are no particular encouraging symptoms yet. So, I tend to announce on Facebook and to friends and family everywhere (except my grandparents...) when either I have an early scan for bleeding and get visual evidence of my dear little person, OR when I start morning sickness, which is good evidence that the baby is growing well.
But I'm not quite ready to announce yet. My idea for announcing my pregnancy is to tell the boys in some way, video them finding out, and make the video my announcement! :) I can count on my kids to be absolutely ecstatic about us having a new baby, so their excitement makes for a good announcement when it's your Nth baby in a row, close together, and many frown on that. I am trying to think of ideas for cute ways to tell them. So far my favourite idea that I've had is to make gingerbread men for us all - a large (adult) one for Neil and I, and then small ones (I have a cutter set) for all the boys, including this little baby (who needs a nickname, now I think of it! I'm sure the boys will be eager to oblige - they've been suggesting nicknames for "the next baby" for months!). I could pipe smiley faces on them all, and then each boy's initial on the tummy of each one. I want to write "October" on the baby's one, but I am not sure if I can fit that in with icing on a small gingerbread man, lol! Another idea I had was to send them a letter with clues inside, to send them on a treasure hunt round the house for more clues, until it reveals the news. Not sure how easy it would be to take a video of that though...
Anyway. I am open to ideas! :) It's so much fun that some of them are old enough now to really get creative with ways to announce to them that they will be having a new baby brother or sister in October! :)
Okay, I saved the above in draft because I was writing it mid-morning today while Elijah was napping and Neil was out at the park with the boys. Elijah woke up and so I put the laptop away, and here I am now (mid-evening) with my next opportunity to continue.
Since this morning, I have most definitely started morning sickness! Noooo mistaking it. I feel sick all the time, it's so very familiar to me. My protein snack and meal ideas are either not appealing at all, or else not helping in the least! :S Oh well! Unless they actively make me feel worse, I will persevere, because I am sure I need protein. I did have fish fingers, mashed potatoes and veg for dinner, because my children won't eat them and there were lots left over! Anyway, I felt gross starting to eat, but I felt about 90% better immediately after eating, which was wonderful! It lasted maybe 5 minutes, if that, and then the nausea came right back. It's not too horrible, it isn't nice, but I just hope it doesn't get much much worse as the next couple of weeks go by.
Today is such a huge change to yesterday! Yesterday evening I was digging into a tub of Ben and Jerry's ice-cream happily, and today just looking at the tub makes my stomach churn! Yesterday I was dutifully drinking water to get my fluids in, and today I have sipped at two glasses of water and only managed to actually finish one of them, because water makes me feel sick. This is exactly my experience with my other pregnancies, so it's not a surprise or anything. A cup of tea went down fine this afternoon though. And milk is fine. Tropicana tropical fruit juice is AWESOME. Like nectar. Mmmm.... :)
My little bean is visible to the naked eye! :) 1mm to 1.5mm in length, and has a neural groove and blood cells! Everything changes so fast at this stage. There are only 5 days until a tiny heart starts beating. Incredible.
I weighed myself today and I'm 9 stone and 7.5lbs. So that's my starting weight. Not my best starting weight ever, but never mind. Last time I'd had the "benefit" of a kidney stone and a tummy bug, so I was a whole stone (14lbs) lighter when I started my pregnancy with Elijah. Otherwise this is a pretty normal weight for me to be at 8 months postpartum, as it's still coming off at a steady rate, and hasn't finished yet! ;)
I forgot to post a conversation I had with Arthur last week, which I'd posted on Facebook - I must post things in my blogs as well that I post on Facebook. It's hard (if not impossible) to find really old updates on Facebook, whereas they're easily accessible here and saved properly for prosperity. Anyway, I'll copy and paste. Elijah is awake and crying in Neil's arms, and he's pretty clingy to me at the moment (just age 'n' stage, not so much to do with me being pregnant, I think) so I think he would prefer me to hold him if I can for a while. I have breastfed him already but he's still cross! Here's the conversation with Arthur:
"Arthur was sighing in a sad way a few minutes ago, so I asked what was wrong. This is our conversation (word for word):
A: "Mummy, Elijah is 8 months old, and it feels like I've been waiting for 8 or 9 months forEVER!"
Me: "Why?"
Arthur: "Because then a new tiny baby (flaps his arms in excitement on the word 'baby') might be growing in your tummy!"
Me: "Oh? You're looking forward to that?"
Arthur: "Oh YES! I love seeing you be pregnant! It's so exciting for us, and we love catching the updates (?!) with the scans and (flaps arms again) hearing the heartbeat and things like that. And Heather comes to visit a lot. And (strokes Elijah's little head - he's standing next to Arthur at the sofa), I love seeing the babies grow along their line - you know, see them develop and learn new things."
Isn't that lovely?! I'm so pleased and relieved and happy when he says things like that (Matthew and Nathan do too, regularly, but Arthur has been the most pestering child of the lot of them, about WHEN oh when can we have a new baby, lol!). I love it as well because he's the eldest of 6 already at the tender age of 8, and many would think he's a poor boy because of it, but here we have some nice evidence that he isn't poor at all! :)
Elijah is very cross now! Must go! Back soon! :)
My temp went up a lot at 16DPO the day after my last blog post, so even though I planned to test at 16DPO, because I did so the day before and had a darker positive line, and then got a great rise in temperature in the morning, I decided not to test that day. My temp has gone up a touch each day since then - I had my highest temp yet this morning! :) I did my last pregnancy test today and was really thrilled and relieved to see a line that, at first, looked almost as dark as the control line! It faded a bit but it's still good and dark. I took a photo of all my test sticks for prosperity (!) - the top 3 are the more sensitive tests (10 mIU) at 8, 9 and 10DPO, and the bottom set of 5 are the less sensitive (25 mIU - standard pregnancy test strength) test sticks. I tried to write the DPO on them but I only have a thick sharpie marker, lol! The numbers haven't come out too clearly therefore! Oh well! ;)
Top one is 10DPO, the evening test after saving my wee a LOT longer than I had for the morning test on the more more sensitive stick. Then 12DPO, 14DPO, 15DPO (see the difference in one day, compared with the minimal difference from 12 to 14DPO?!), and today's is at the bottom - 18DPO.
So excited and thrilled to relax a little bit more (I know, I know, there are no guarantees, but I will enjoy it for all I'm worth for as long as I have it!) and just BE pregnant!! I'm pregnant, I'm pregnant!!! Wheeeeeee! :D It just feels SO surreal, and I feel incredibly blessed to be allowed to sit here, pregnant at the age of almost 37 (it's my birthday on Thursday - hello Advanced Maternal Age!), for the seventh time! Praise the Lord, oh my soul, and let all that is within me praise His name!!! :)
Well, some newsy pregnant (eeeep!!) things:
Yesterday evening we ate late - after the boys went to bed. It was supposed to be "date night" but Neil has come down with a cold that he's picked up at work, and we were both sooooo tired. We did eat and chat, but let the more romantic side of the date night go this time! ;) Anyway, it was later than we usually eat. While I was waiting for the food to be ready, I realised I was feeling a tad queasy. I get queasy quite a lot, because I'm prone to it as an expression of anxiety, and also it's a really common symptom of IBS for me - full on nausea is more like it, often. Anyway, THIS wasn't the same type of queasy. This was suspiciously travel-sick queasy, and that can only mean morning sickness, for me. I recognised it straight away. But I was only 4 weeks and 3 days - aaaaargh!! With my first 4 babies, I could time the start of my morning sickness to the day - it ALWAYS started on the dot of 5w6d. Bizarre, but there we go! With Samuel it started a few days earlier, which threw me off! And then Elijah's started on the dot of 5 weeks, exactly. Which was "different", so I wondered if he would be a girl. But no! ;) His started earlier and ended later, but was milder, as though it was "diluted" somewhat by being spread out a bit more - funny analogy, but that's how it felt!
So I thought, SURELY not?! Surely not earlier than 5 weeks?! And what does it mean for the level of intensity that it might reach when I'm between 5 and 6 weeks (when it really starts to kick in normally)? Nervous. I felt better for eating dinner. Evenings are my worst time for morning sickness - they always have been. And morning sickness is always worse when my stomach is empty. So a touch of queasiness one evening when I hadn't eaten isn't too surprising, it just slightly unnerves me that I was barely 4 and a half weeks pregnant! I am not sure if I have had any sort of quease that early before, but I will have to double check my blogs and my chart notes to be sure.
I am trying to eat protein-rich meals and snacks this pregnancy, to hopefully see if there's any improvement on how much morning sickness I experience, and also to try and sort out these frequent spells of dizziness and lightheadedness that I've been getting since before my tests showed lines properly. I think the dizziness is a bit better, but maybe that will just clear up on its own anyway, and that's why? Anyway, I bought some trail mix, some salted cashews, and some brazil nuts. I love brazil nuts, but eating them yesterday afternoon left me feeling a bit... yacky. Not quite as far as queasy, but not far off. It seemed to stay with me into the evening and then not eating until late pushed that sensation juuuust into the realms of nausea. Hmmm...
Today I do NOT want to eat brazil nuts! I was chewing my fingers (gross habit, but yeah) just a little while ago while I was setting the laptop up to update my blog, and noticed that it was quickly making me feel a bit sick. TOTAL confirmation for me, that this is morning sickness starting. The only time ever in my life when biting my nails/fingers makes me feel sick to my stomach is when I am pregnant. Even if I am desperately needing to bite them, and I do, the nausea is right there to make me stop, as soon as I start. First trimesters are the only times I ever have nice long nails and smooth fingers, lol! I really like it (I hate being a nail-biter, but it's almost impossible to stop), and try to continue it, and I usually make it to my 3rd trimester before I cave. So anyway, yay for my nails about to get nice. Boo for nausea! ;)
On the other hand, I'm excited to be starting morning sickness because I know that it means things are going well in there with my little beany person! In fact, I announce to the general world at large much earlier than many people do, because I can't keep it to myself any longer (mainly), and also because I want the world to celebrate with me, even if I lose my treasure. Even more reason to celebrate with joy while the little one is with me! I have a bit of trepidation early on, usually because I am bleeding in some way, but also because you never know how things are going with the pregnancy, if there are no particular encouraging symptoms yet. So, I tend to announce on Facebook and to friends and family everywhere (except my grandparents...) when either I have an early scan for bleeding and get visual evidence of my dear little person, OR when I start morning sickness, which is good evidence that the baby is growing well.
But I'm not quite ready to announce yet. My idea for announcing my pregnancy is to tell the boys in some way, video them finding out, and make the video my announcement! :) I can count on my kids to be absolutely ecstatic about us having a new baby, so their excitement makes for a good announcement when it's your Nth baby in a row, close together, and many frown on that. I am trying to think of ideas for cute ways to tell them. So far my favourite idea that I've had is to make gingerbread men for us all - a large (adult) one for Neil and I, and then small ones (I have a cutter set) for all the boys, including this little baby (who needs a nickname, now I think of it! I'm sure the boys will be eager to oblige - they've been suggesting nicknames for "the next baby" for months!). I could pipe smiley faces on them all, and then each boy's initial on the tummy of each one. I want to write "October" on the baby's one, but I am not sure if I can fit that in with icing on a small gingerbread man, lol! Another idea I had was to send them a letter with clues inside, to send them on a treasure hunt round the house for more clues, until it reveals the news. Not sure how easy it would be to take a video of that though...
Anyway. I am open to ideas! :) It's so much fun that some of them are old enough now to really get creative with ways to announce to them that they will be having a new baby brother or sister in October! :)
Okay, I saved the above in draft because I was writing it mid-morning today while Elijah was napping and Neil was out at the park with the boys. Elijah woke up and so I put the laptop away, and here I am now (mid-evening) with my next opportunity to continue.
Since this morning, I have most definitely started morning sickness! Noooo mistaking it. I feel sick all the time, it's so very familiar to me. My protein snack and meal ideas are either not appealing at all, or else not helping in the least! :S Oh well! Unless they actively make me feel worse, I will persevere, because I am sure I need protein. I did have fish fingers, mashed potatoes and veg for dinner, because my children won't eat them and there were lots left over! Anyway, I felt gross starting to eat, but I felt about 90% better immediately after eating, which was wonderful! It lasted maybe 5 minutes, if that, and then the nausea came right back. It's not too horrible, it isn't nice, but I just hope it doesn't get much much worse as the next couple of weeks go by.
Today is such a huge change to yesterday! Yesterday evening I was digging into a tub of Ben and Jerry's ice-cream happily, and today just looking at the tub makes my stomach churn! Yesterday I was dutifully drinking water to get my fluids in, and today I have sipped at two glasses of water and only managed to actually finish one of them, because water makes me feel sick. This is exactly my experience with my other pregnancies, so it's not a surprise or anything. A cup of tea went down fine this afternoon though. And milk is fine. Tropicana tropical fruit juice is AWESOME. Like nectar. Mmmm.... :)
My little bean is visible to the naked eye! :) 1mm to 1.5mm in length, and has a neural groove and blood cells! Everything changes so fast at this stage. There are only 5 days until a tiny heart starts beating. Incredible.
I weighed myself today and I'm 9 stone and 7.5lbs. So that's my starting weight. Not my best starting weight ever, but never mind. Last time I'd had the "benefit" of a kidney stone and a tummy bug, so I was a whole stone (14lbs) lighter when I started my pregnancy with Elijah. Otherwise this is a pretty normal weight for me to be at 8 months postpartum, as it's still coming off at a steady rate, and hasn't finished yet! ;)
I forgot to post a conversation I had with Arthur last week, which I'd posted on Facebook - I must post things in my blogs as well that I post on Facebook. It's hard (if not impossible) to find really old updates on Facebook, whereas they're easily accessible here and saved properly for prosperity. Anyway, I'll copy and paste. Elijah is awake and crying in Neil's arms, and he's pretty clingy to me at the moment (just age 'n' stage, not so much to do with me being pregnant, I think) so I think he would prefer me to hold him if I can for a while. I have breastfed him already but he's still cross! Here's the conversation with Arthur:
"Arthur was sighing in a sad way a few minutes ago, so I asked what was wrong. This is our conversation (word for word):
A: "Mummy, Elijah is 8 months old, and it feels like I've been waiting for 8 or 9 months forEVER!"
Me: "Why?"
Arthur: "Because then a new tiny baby (flaps his arms in excitement on the word 'baby') might be growing in your tummy!"
Me: "Oh? You're looking forward to that?"
Arthur: "Oh YES! I love seeing you be pregnant! It's so exciting for us, and we love catching the updates (?!) with the scans and (flaps arms again) hearing the heartbeat and things like that. And Heather comes to visit a lot. And (strokes Elijah's little head - he's standing next to Arthur at the sofa), I love seeing the babies grow along their line - you know, see them develop and learn new things."
Isn't that lovely?! I'm so pleased and relieved and happy when he says things like that (Matthew and Nathan do too, regularly, but Arthur has been the most pestering child of the lot of them, about WHEN oh when can we have a new baby, lol!). I love it as well because he's the eldest of 6 already at the tender age of 8, and many would think he's a poor boy because of it, but here we have some nice evidence that he isn't poor at all! :)
Elijah is very cross now! Must go! Back soon! :)
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
4 weeks, 1 day
Just a quick post to note that my temp is hanging around lower than I'd like it (went up a tiny touch today) and even though I'm 15DPO today and not "due" to test again until tomorrow, I decided in the end to pee on a stick this morning anyway. I was SO relieved because the line (haven't had time to take a pic today) is much darker than yesterday's! How funny that it didn't change much at all from 12DPO to 14DPO, and then suddenly about twice as dark at 15DPO! In any case, it has reassured me greatly. Still hoping to see my temp go up tomorrow.
I am so exhausted today again, and I have had a really yucky headache from late afternoon onwards. I should have been in bed hours ago, but Neil and I had to discuss loads of stressy stuff about moving house and family things, and then I needed to make a Tesco order online for tomorrow, otherwise we won't have much for dinner and will have run out of milk for the next day! So I've done that now. Totally done in. Going to bed. Feeling kind of depressed tonight, but so happy to have my little tiny person growing inside me! :)
I am so exhausted today again, and I have had a really yucky headache from late afternoon onwards. I should have been in bed hours ago, but Neil and I had to discuss loads of stressy stuff about moving house and family things, and then I needed to make a Tesco order online for tomorrow, otherwise we won't have much for dinner and will have run out of milk for the next day! So I've done that now. Totally done in. Going to bed. Feeling kind of depressed tonight, but so happy to have my little tiny person growing inside me! :)
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
4 weeks pregnant! :D
Thank you for all the lovely congrats! :)
I so wanted to update the last few evenings, but just haven't had the chance. Yesterday was my Granny's 87th birthday, and a few days before her birthday I ordered a card with all my little boys' smiling faces printed on it, in a large size. When it arrived I knew it was too big to fit through their letterbox, and it was too late to rely on the postal service to get it there for her birthday. Suddenly I wanted to bake her a birthday cake and drive over there (they are about 30 mins drive away) with cake and card on Sunday evening. So I did! I was exhausted, and it was sleeting after pouring with rain all day, but I went anyway. I drove carefully, suddenly really nervous about keeping safe because of all the little loves needing their mama to stay alive and well, not to mention the one I'm carrying with me... But it was so worth it. They were so thrilled to see me, sans kiddies (never happens, ever!) and loved the card and the cake so much. I stayed a while and chatted. They told me they had been feeling a bit isolated and lonely, and Granny was feeling down about her birthday the next day, so then I KNEW why I had such an urge to do that. Thanks Lord! :) I called her tonight and she said it turned her birthday around and made her day. :) Elijah woke right after I went out though, and he cried without stopping until I got home (about an hour and a half), despite Neil holding him and talking to him and rocking him the whole time! He is having major separation anxiety at the moment, and I am pretty sure he is aware of my pregnancy in some way, which probably adds to it. When I got home it was 10.15pm and he wouldn't go to sleep for another hour, even though I was either holding him or breastfeeding him the entire time. He was tired out, and kept rubbing his eyes, but he spent the whole time gazing at my face from about 6 inches away in my arms, and sort of "holding" my face with both hands on my cheeks for long silent periods of time. Sometimes he just leaned his forehead on my chest, and after a minute he would lift it back up, tired as he was, and do the gaze/face-hold thing again. Dear little treasure! My heart just melts for that little boy! He needs his mummy right now, and I'm SO privileged to be HER! :) What an honour!
Anyway, so I have not had time to update lately. I have been really tired.
I am planning to test with the normal cheapy test sticks every other day. I got my positive with the digital test and the less sensitive cheapy test at 10DPO, so I planned to test at 12DPO, 14DPO, 16DPO and 18DPO. I will finish temping and testing at 18DPO. It's just what I like to do! :)
Today I am 14DPO - exactly 4 weeks pregnant. I am still temping. I got my highest temp yet at 12DPO and a darker line on my pregnancy test. :) Then yesterday morning (13DPO) my temp dropped a bit. A fair bit, although still within the high range. I didn't pay it any attention, but today it dropped again. I know it's normal for temperatures to fluctuate in early pregnancy, I do. But I am not allll that thrilled to see it drop twice in a row. It hasn't dropped below the coverline or anything like that, but I am a little anxious to see what tomorrow's temp will be now. I know there's the whole bit of advice that says to just stop temping and not worry about it, but I like a heads up, to be honest. I know it is a bit of extra anxiety, but I would prefer to have a little advanced warning if something is going wrong, than to be hit with it suddenly in an unpleasant way. At least then I am prepared.
I did test this morning for 14DPO, and it's still a good positive, but it doesn't look much darker than the one at 12DPO. The hormone responsible for the line is supposed to double every 48 hours (roughly) if all is going well, so I'm slightly nervous about the fact that it isn't noticably darker.
Here is a rather poor photo of the three cheapy test sticks, but it gives you an idea of what I'm talking about. Top stick is 10DPO, then 12DPO below it and 14DPO at the bottom. See how the 10DPO one is faint, and although the others are faint too, they're stronger than the first one, but basically identical to each other... :S
The difference between my lines at 12DPO and 14DPO in previous pregnancies has been more obvious, sometimes reeeally obvious. I know it's still a nice positive test, and I'm focusing on that as much as possible! I am eager to see my temp tomorrow, and hoping for a nice reassuring rise! I am not planning to test tomorrow.
I am still feeling pregnant, which is another good sign, but I know that even if I miscarry I will continue to have pregnancy symptoms for a bit as my body adjusts. I am going to stop talking about that now. Right now there is no point even thinking about it! :)
I am still mildly crampy here and there, but it has definitely eased off a lot over the past few days. I love the idea that my little one is burrowing in snugly every time I feel those cramps! I will have to start looking up the developmental information that I always follow when I am pregnant - it starts SO early on, and it's amazing to think about what's actually taking place in there as it happens, even as early as this!
My main symptom for the past week has been dizziness. Not a tired out exhausted swing-y-ness, but just vertigo, sort of. I don't like it! It doesn't feel nice, but it's not there all the time. It comes and goes. I definitely feel it's a pregnancy symptom - I did before I even had confirmation that I was pregnant. This week I am trying to combat it with a good diet/fluid intake, and in particular I am trying to eat a lot of protein. I keep hearing people saying that their morning sickness is more bearable if they whack it with lots of protein, and those "crashes" which for all the world seem like low blood sugar (but aren't - sugar doesn't help them. I haven't had any yet though, bit early yet) are actually most easily fixed with protein rather than sugar. Interesting! I am going to really try to keep my protein topped up throughout the day, and hope for a mercifully mild time of morning sickness this time around. I am nervous that on the very slim chance that the baby is a girl, I might have different morning sickness (worse, that is), because it is bad enough with the boys!
I started a food log (just a bit of paper really!) yesterday where I write everything I eat and drink, so I can see what I'm taking in, be held accountable so that I actually make the effort to eat better (because I know I'll be writing it down later!), and to help me pinpoint things that make me feel better or worse later on. So far I am trying to eat a good amount of protein in all 3 meals, and a protein-ish snack at least once a day. I had a hard boiled egg with a glass of milk for my snack today, and didn't feel so dizzy for a while after that, although that could have been a coincidence.
I am hungry, but not insanely so. Definitely need to eat though! Also thirsty, so I am drinking more water than I have been, which is good. Trying to keep to a cup of tea per day (max) as I also eat chocolate and too much caffiene isn't safe in early pregnancy. Finally taking my prenatal vitamins regularly - I didn't even START them until I was testing! Feel a bit bad about that, but it just didn't occur to me... I am getting enough folic acid in my supplement, but also Marmite and fortified cereals are probably giving me another half of my RDA again.
I am not enjoying breastfeeding Benjamin and Samuel much at ALL at the moment. I know that's very very pregnant of me, so in a way it's good! ;) But I feel completely touched out and irritated when breastfeeding them. Benjamin currently asks once or twice in the day and also at bedtime. Samuel asks a LOT, and until I got pregnant it was no trouble to nurse him. I loved it! At the moment it's really irritating, and it's also a bit sore to nurse in general at the moment (normal), so that doesn't help. He's always been a bit of a fiddler while nursing, and I knew a day would come when I would need to nip that in the bud, but I never minded it before really. Well, a bit, but not enough to motivate me to stop him. He has wandering palms and also likes to tweak a bit of my skin (usually my tummy, there's more skin there than I need, lol! Still not gone back to pre-pregnant yet!) between thumb and forefinger and twist it this way and that. Right now it drives me CRAZY. Crrraaaaazzzzzzyyyyy. If he wants a cuddle, is sad or hurt, or sleepy, and isn't breastfeeding at that moment, Samuel will suck his thumb, and put his other hand under my top and fiddle with my tummy. Sometimes he goes to sleep doing this. It's very absent-minded and he probably doesn't realise he's doing it for the most part, and I really haven't minded it at all, but now it's very irritating. Poor Samuel! I so don't want to suddenly get all snappy and irritable, and push his hand away all the time, just when subconsciously he might know something is different about me. But the urge is overwhelming sometimes, it's like I want to pull my own skin off! I have read about this, of course, and know it's very normal and entirely to do with pregnancy hormones.
I don't have such strong feelings when nursing Elijah, but he's starting to do the sitting-up-next-to-me nursing, where he'll do some acrobatics (stand, bob, sit, try and turn his head upside-down, etc) while nursing, and also grabs my breast none-too-gently with a scrunch of his fingers and tries to shove it in his mouth via his grip - those things physically irritate me no end! Gentle sleepy nursing? No problem. Toddler-style nursing? Super irritating. Hey ho! Such is life! I'm so blessed to be nursing my littles, still, while expecting another, and I know the feelings will pass!
This evening when Neil was arriving home from work, I suddenly felt SURE I was bleeding, and waited until he got in and waded through the crowd of small boys, until I had chance to go and check. I was actually surprised that it was just normal CM, and no spotting or bleeding.
This morning I went crazy cleaning and decluttering the dresser in the kitchen. I mean, I cannot even get across to you how BIG a deal this is! That dresser has been cluttered for years. Yeeeeaaaars. So badly that we can't use it for anything, and for the past 6 months or more, it has been too cluttered to even access anything on the shelves properly. I shove a space on it now and then because it's where I store the school stuff for the lessons we'll do over the week ahead, at the weekends. I usually just pile it in a space, and then have to hold the pile steady while I ease out a workbook or some papers, day by day over the week as we need them. It's the best place to store school stuff that we need regularly, because we homeschool at the kitchen table. Anyway, I threw a ton of stuff away, packed up and labelled various bags and put them away, organised craft stuff, and then cleaned the shelves! I cleared the top of the dresser, and climbed up there to clean it (the dust was several mm thick!). I even cleaned the wall up to the ceiling behind the dresser - no more cobwebs! :) I restocked the shelves with school stuff ONLY! Pencils and supplies in glass jars, and I made a cereal box into a magazine holder with some pretty wrapping paper, and put all the worksheets and exercise books in there (with a label!). It looks sooooooo much better, and I'm so proud of my efforts! Heather wanted a photo (she was that amazed at my news of having cleared it, having herself wanted to do *something* with it over the months but never getting chance!) and when I sent it to her she asked what on earth had caused me to be able to do it at last?! I told her pregnancy hormones! Because that HAS to be it, doesn't it? I only do these things when I'm pregnant, it seems, and I tend to really get stuff done when I have those good old hormones working for me! :)
In the afternoon, I was nursing Samuel on the sofa, and he started to fall asleep. I was suddenly overcome with sleepiness. I NEVER get this way, and I am well aquainted with sleep-deprivation and the need to lie down and fall asleep at any (or all) parts of the day, believe me. I often WANT to lie down and fall asleep, but I really don't ever get so that I physically can't keep my eyes open, even trying hard to fight against it, unless I am pregnant. That's what happened today. Samuel leaned against me, and I leaned, and there we leaned, together. He went to sleep, and despite lots of rowdy play around me, and every now and then having to mumble, "Boyshkeepitdownbit" or "Careflov'Lijah" (they were all around me, even 'Lijah), I pretty much dozed and came to, and dozed and came to (repeatedly) for the best part of an hour! I can't remember the last time I did that, even when unwell, or having had hardly any sleep the night before. The boys still came to my side frequently saying, "Look what I built!", "Matthew isn't listening!", "Benji's being horrid!" etc, and I believe I answered them appropriately, but it was a weird time of semi-consciousness where I just. could. not. keep awake properly. I felt like I had taken a sleeping pill or something (not that I ever have, so I can't really say, but yeah!). Finally I pulled myself together, realising the time, and woke Samuel (I only let him nap 30-60 mins max if he falls asleep, to help him keep his night sleep consistent. A short nap seems to suffice even though I'm sure he'd prefer longer!). I went to make a cup of tea in a desperate attempt to WAKE. UP! And while I was making it, it suddenly occurred to me that the sleepy thing was entirely familiar to me ONLY from pregnancies past. Specifically, I seem to do that quite a lot during my first trimester, no matter how well I sleep the night before. I just get "pregnant" exhausted by the afternoon, and often - later in the first trimester - in the mornings as well. So in a way that was really encouraging! :)
The tea did help a LOT, and then at 4.30pm we started school, haha! Very topsy-turvy day. Tuesdays and Thursdays are always our "light" school days (just spelling, reading and handwriting) so I knew I had a bit of leeway, but we got down to it quickly and were finished an hour later! :)
Well it's late and I need to get some good sleep if I can. Elijah has woken a couple of times this evening already. He has cut another new tooth today - that makes four now! Two at the top and two at the bottom. He is also trying to let go of me and stand alone, but hasn't quite managed it yet! My big clever boy at just 8 months old! He is the earliest of all my boys to have four teeth (Matthew was close behind though, by a couple of weeks, I think), and he has suddenly started eating food today too! We are getting over a cold, which is always nice - to be on the other side of it with nobody left to come down with it! :)
I will update my chart with my temp tomorrow. I really hope it has gone back up. I was cold when I temped on the first morning so I wondered if it was just that, but then it dropped again today... I hope everything is okay with my tiny little person in there. I am looking forward to SO many things with this baby, and I really want everything to be well.
I so wanted to update the last few evenings, but just haven't had the chance. Yesterday was my Granny's 87th birthday, and a few days before her birthday I ordered a card with all my little boys' smiling faces printed on it, in a large size. When it arrived I knew it was too big to fit through their letterbox, and it was too late to rely on the postal service to get it there for her birthday. Suddenly I wanted to bake her a birthday cake and drive over there (they are about 30 mins drive away) with cake and card on Sunday evening. So I did! I was exhausted, and it was sleeting after pouring with rain all day, but I went anyway. I drove carefully, suddenly really nervous about keeping safe because of all the little loves needing their mama to stay alive and well, not to mention the one I'm carrying with me... But it was so worth it. They were so thrilled to see me, sans kiddies (never happens, ever!) and loved the card and the cake so much. I stayed a while and chatted. They told me they had been feeling a bit isolated and lonely, and Granny was feeling down about her birthday the next day, so then I KNEW why I had such an urge to do that. Thanks Lord! :) I called her tonight and she said it turned her birthday around and made her day. :) Elijah woke right after I went out though, and he cried without stopping until I got home (about an hour and a half), despite Neil holding him and talking to him and rocking him the whole time! He is having major separation anxiety at the moment, and I am pretty sure he is aware of my pregnancy in some way, which probably adds to it. When I got home it was 10.15pm and he wouldn't go to sleep for another hour, even though I was either holding him or breastfeeding him the entire time. He was tired out, and kept rubbing his eyes, but he spent the whole time gazing at my face from about 6 inches away in my arms, and sort of "holding" my face with both hands on my cheeks for long silent periods of time. Sometimes he just leaned his forehead on my chest, and after a minute he would lift it back up, tired as he was, and do the gaze/face-hold thing again. Dear little treasure! My heart just melts for that little boy! He needs his mummy right now, and I'm SO privileged to be HER! :) What an honour!
Anyway, so I have not had time to update lately. I have been really tired.
I am planning to test with the normal cheapy test sticks every other day. I got my positive with the digital test and the less sensitive cheapy test at 10DPO, so I planned to test at 12DPO, 14DPO, 16DPO and 18DPO. I will finish temping and testing at 18DPO. It's just what I like to do! :)
Today I am 14DPO - exactly 4 weeks pregnant. I am still temping. I got my highest temp yet at 12DPO and a darker line on my pregnancy test. :) Then yesterday morning (13DPO) my temp dropped a bit. A fair bit, although still within the high range. I didn't pay it any attention, but today it dropped again. I know it's normal for temperatures to fluctuate in early pregnancy, I do. But I am not allll that thrilled to see it drop twice in a row. It hasn't dropped below the coverline or anything like that, but I am a little anxious to see what tomorrow's temp will be now. I know there's the whole bit of advice that says to just stop temping and not worry about it, but I like a heads up, to be honest. I know it is a bit of extra anxiety, but I would prefer to have a little advanced warning if something is going wrong, than to be hit with it suddenly in an unpleasant way. At least then I am prepared.
I did test this morning for 14DPO, and it's still a good positive, but it doesn't look much darker than the one at 12DPO. The hormone responsible for the line is supposed to double every 48 hours (roughly) if all is going well, so I'm slightly nervous about the fact that it isn't noticably darker.
Here is a rather poor photo of the three cheapy test sticks, but it gives you an idea of what I'm talking about. Top stick is 10DPO, then 12DPO below it and 14DPO at the bottom. See how the 10DPO one is faint, and although the others are faint too, they're stronger than the first one, but basically identical to each other... :S
The difference between my lines at 12DPO and 14DPO in previous pregnancies has been more obvious, sometimes reeeally obvious. I know it's still a nice positive test, and I'm focusing on that as much as possible! I am eager to see my temp tomorrow, and hoping for a nice reassuring rise! I am not planning to test tomorrow.
I am still feeling pregnant, which is another good sign, but I know that even if I miscarry I will continue to have pregnancy symptoms for a bit as my body adjusts. I am going to stop talking about that now. Right now there is no point even thinking about it! :)
I am still mildly crampy here and there, but it has definitely eased off a lot over the past few days. I love the idea that my little one is burrowing in snugly every time I feel those cramps! I will have to start looking up the developmental information that I always follow when I am pregnant - it starts SO early on, and it's amazing to think about what's actually taking place in there as it happens, even as early as this!
My main symptom for the past week has been dizziness. Not a tired out exhausted swing-y-ness, but just vertigo, sort of. I don't like it! It doesn't feel nice, but it's not there all the time. It comes and goes. I definitely feel it's a pregnancy symptom - I did before I even had confirmation that I was pregnant. This week I am trying to combat it with a good diet/fluid intake, and in particular I am trying to eat a lot of protein. I keep hearing people saying that their morning sickness is more bearable if they whack it with lots of protein, and those "crashes" which for all the world seem like low blood sugar (but aren't - sugar doesn't help them. I haven't had any yet though, bit early yet) are actually most easily fixed with protein rather than sugar. Interesting! I am going to really try to keep my protein topped up throughout the day, and hope for a mercifully mild time of morning sickness this time around. I am nervous that on the very slim chance that the baby is a girl, I might have different morning sickness (worse, that is), because it is bad enough with the boys!
I started a food log (just a bit of paper really!) yesterday where I write everything I eat and drink, so I can see what I'm taking in, be held accountable so that I actually make the effort to eat better (because I know I'll be writing it down later!), and to help me pinpoint things that make me feel better or worse later on. So far I am trying to eat a good amount of protein in all 3 meals, and a protein-ish snack at least once a day. I had a hard boiled egg with a glass of milk for my snack today, and didn't feel so dizzy for a while after that, although that could have been a coincidence.
I am hungry, but not insanely so. Definitely need to eat though! Also thirsty, so I am drinking more water than I have been, which is good. Trying to keep to a cup of tea per day (max) as I also eat chocolate and too much caffiene isn't safe in early pregnancy. Finally taking my prenatal vitamins regularly - I didn't even START them until I was testing! Feel a bit bad about that, but it just didn't occur to me... I am getting enough folic acid in my supplement, but also Marmite and fortified cereals are probably giving me another half of my RDA again.
I am not enjoying breastfeeding Benjamin and Samuel much at ALL at the moment. I know that's very very pregnant of me, so in a way it's good! ;) But I feel completely touched out and irritated when breastfeeding them. Benjamin currently asks once or twice in the day and also at bedtime. Samuel asks a LOT, and until I got pregnant it was no trouble to nurse him. I loved it! At the moment it's really irritating, and it's also a bit sore to nurse in general at the moment (normal), so that doesn't help. He's always been a bit of a fiddler while nursing, and I knew a day would come when I would need to nip that in the bud, but I never minded it before really. Well, a bit, but not enough to motivate me to stop him. He has wandering palms and also likes to tweak a bit of my skin (usually my tummy, there's more skin there than I need, lol! Still not gone back to pre-pregnant yet!) between thumb and forefinger and twist it this way and that. Right now it drives me CRAZY. Crrraaaaazzzzzzyyyyy. If he wants a cuddle, is sad or hurt, or sleepy, and isn't breastfeeding at that moment, Samuel will suck his thumb, and put his other hand under my top and fiddle with my tummy. Sometimes he goes to sleep doing this. It's very absent-minded and he probably doesn't realise he's doing it for the most part, and I really haven't minded it at all, but now it's very irritating. Poor Samuel! I so don't want to suddenly get all snappy and irritable, and push his hand away all the time, just when subconsciously he might know something is different about me. But the urge is overwhelming sometimes, it's like I want to pull my own skin off! I have read about this, of course, and know it's very normal and entirely to do with pregnancy hormones.
I don't have such strong feelings when nursing Elijah, but he's starting to do the sitting-up-next-to-me nursing, where he'll do some acrobatics (stand, bob, sit, try and turn his head upside-down, etc) while nursing, and also grabs my breast none-too-gently with a scrunch of his fingers and tries to shove it in his mouth via his grip - those things physically irritate me no end! Gentle sleepy nursing? No problem. Toddler-style nursing? Super irritating. Hey ho! Such is life! I'm so blessed to be nursing my littles, still, while expecting another, and I know the feelings will pass!
This evening when Neil was arriving home from work, I suddenly felt SURE I was bleeding, and waited until he got in and waded through the crowd of small boys, until I had chance to go and check. I was actually surprised that it was just normal CM, and no spotting or bleeding.
This morning I went crazy cleaning and decluttering the dresser in the kitchen. I mean, I cannot even get across to you how BIG a deal this is! That dresser has been cluttered for years. Yeeeeaaaars. So badly that we can't use it for anything, and for the past 6 months or more, it has been too cluttered to even access anything on the shelves properly. I shove a space on it now and then because it's where I store the school stuff for the lessons we'll do over the week ahead, at the weekends. I usually just pile it in a space, and then have to hold the pile steady while I ease out a workbook or some papers, day by day over the week as we need them. It's the best place to store school stuff that we need regularly, because we homeschool at the kitchen table. Anyway, I threw a ton of stuff away, packed up and labelled various bags and put them away, organised craft stuff, and then cleaned the shelves! I cleared the top of the dresser, and climbed up there to clean it (the dust was several mm thick!). I even cleaned the wall up to the ceiling behind the dresser - no more cobwebs! :) I restocked the shelves with school stuff ONLY! Pencils and supplies in glass jars, and I made a cereal box into a magazine holder with some pretty wrapping paper, and put all the worksheets and exercise books in there (with a label!). It looks sooooooo much better, and I'm so proud of my efforts! Heather wanted a photo (she was that amazed at my news of having cleared it, having herself wanted to do *something* with it over the months but never getting chance!) and when I sent it to her she asked what on earth had caused me to be able to do it at last?! I told her pregnancy hormones! Because that HAS to be it, doesn't it? I only do these things when I'm pregnant, it seems, and I tend to really get stuff done when I have those good old hormones working for me! :)
In the afternoon, I was nursing Samuel on the sofa, and he started to fall asleep. I was suddenly overcome with sleepiness. I NEVER get this way, and I am well aquainted with sleep-deprivation and the need to lie down and fall asleep at any (or all) parts of the day, believe me. I often WANT to lie down and fall asleep, but I really don't ever get so that I physically can't keep my eyes open, even trying hard to fight against it, unless I am pregnant. That's what happened today. Samuel leaned against me, and I leaned, and there we leaned, together. He went to sleep, and despite lots of rowdy play around me, and every now and then having to mumble, "Boyshkeepitdownbit" or "Careflov'Lijah" (they were all around me, even 'Lijah), I pretty much dozed and came to, and dozed and came to (repeatedly) for the best part of an hour! I can't remember the last time I did that, even when unwell, or having had hardly any sleep the night before. The boys still came to my side frequently saying, "Look what I built!", "Matthew isn't listening!", "Benji's being horrid!" etc, and I believe I answered them appropriately, but it was a weird time of semi-consciousness where I just. could. not. keep awake properly. I felt like I had taken a sleeping pill or something (not that I ever have, so I can't really say, but yeah!). Finally I pulled myself together, realising the time, and woke Samuel (I only let him nap 30-60 mins max if he falls asleep, to help him keep his night sleep consistent. A short nap seems to suffice even though I'm sure he'd prefer longer!). I went to make a cup of tea in a desperate attempt to WAKE. UP! And while I was making it, it suddenly occurred to me that the sleepy thing was entirely familiar to me ONLY from pregnancies past. Specifically, I seem to do that quite a lot during my first trimester, no matter how well I sleep the night before. I just get "pregnant" exhausted by the afternoon, and often - later in the first trimester - in the mornings as well. So in a way that was really encouraging! :)
The tea did help a LOT, and then at 4.30pm we started school, haha! Very topsy-turvy day. Tuesdays and Thursdays are always our "light" school days (just spelling, reading and handwriting) so I knew I had a bit of leeway, but we got down to it quickly and were finished an hour later! :)
Well it's late and I need to get some good sleep if I can. Elijah has woken a couple of times this evening already. He has cut another new tooth today - that makes four now! Two at the top and two at the bottom. He is also trying to let go of me and stand alone, but hasn't quite managed it yet! My big clever boy at just 8 months old! He is the earliest of all my boys to have four teeth (Matthew was close behind though, by a couple of weeks, I think), and he has suddenly started eating food today too! We are getting over a cold, which is always nice - to be on the other side of it with nobody left to come down with it! :)
I will update my chart with my temp tomorrow. I really hope it has gone back up. I was cold when I temped on the first morning so I wondered if it was just that, but then it dropped again today... I hope everything is okay with my tiny little person in there. I am looking forward to SO many things with this baby, and I really want everything to be well.
Friday, February 8, 2013
A most definite confirmation! :)
I was really second-guessing myself after yesterday's positive test, because even though it looked good and positive, by the afternoon it had faded quite a lot. By the evening I was REALLY getting doubtful about it. It looked almost like the negative test from the day before at 8DPO. I began to get that feeling that I would never see a positive test, after all the many tests I'd peed on over the past week or so, lol! Same kind of feeling as the one at the other end of pregnancy when you genuinely feel like you will NEVER give birth, lol! ;)
I did have continuing pregnancy symptoms last night but nothing new to report as such, except for a few odd sensations in the nether regions (!! - that sounds so daft, but I don't want to attract perverts via google!) which I have only ever had in the first couple of weeks of pregnancy (not all my pregnancies though, but only ever in that early stage of pregnancy). So that made me think, "Well, I obviously AM pregnant, but who knows if I will be in the morning..." and other rational things like that, haha! ;)
So this morning I temped, not having any idea what to expect - I didn't feel particularly "warm" or "cool" like I sometimes do in terms of my core body temperature. Sometimes I have a vibe of what to expect. So I was excited when I got 36.87 - almost the highest temp so far this cycle, and another tiny rise on yesterday's! :) I still wasn't sure whether to test or not, because I still had a sense of doubt over whether I'd get a line at all, and if I did, I felt like it would be likely the same as yesterday's, and then fade off. I knew if I was pregnant it needed to be darker each day, but I expected it wouldn't be, so I was nervous to get that kind of confirmation.
I tested anyway - probably about 7 hours worth of urine. I used a super sensitive test, like the previous two days. Being 10DPO, I knew I "should" be seeing a positive test with a sensitive one, by today. I was so nervous nothing would show! But I did see a line! I was cautiously excited, but it didn't look all that clear to me. It came up within 3 minutes, and it was pink. I compared it to the previous two days' tests, and figured it was pretty much the same as yesterday's, and would be likely to fade to nothing much by the end of the day. I showed Neil the three tests together, while he was trying to get ready for work - poor man! He had already said before, "Oh, just wait a couple more days and test then. Then you won't have the worry of whether or not it will be positive today."
Men seeeeriously don't understand the workings of a crazy obsesso-woman's brain when it comes to reproductive things!
So I had tested, and was flapping about whether the line was clearer than yesterday's. He said yes, it was. I said that yesterday's HAD looked like today's, but now it was like the first one at 8DPO. He said, no, it didn't look like 8DPO. That one was negative. There was a line on the 9DPO test, and a stronger line on the 10DPO test. End of. ;) So I was reassured somewhat! :)
I took a photo of the 3 tests together - the one at the bottom (3 dots) is today's test:
See, it's hard to even see the line, isn't it? It IS there, but it's really faint, and because I'm 10DPO, it's a super sensitive test, and I had a faint line already yesterday (so today's should be stronger), I was not sure about it. And see how yesterday's positive line, which was so clear on the photo yesterday, has faded away?
Today has been quite hard work. The night was awful - Nathan and Matthew went to bed with a sore throat, and we wondered if they were coming down with something. Matthew hates Calpol, but his throat was sore enough so that he wanted some pain relief at bedtime, so he let me give him some but washed every tiny sip of it down with a TON of water because he can't stand the taste. Of course he wet the bed a few hours later, so we needed to change that. Neil was out until almost midnight so I had to do the day plus bedtime (this is a bigger deal than it sounds! Bedtime is a bit of a nightmare in our house!), and evening wakings, of which there were plenty. Elijah woke 5 times during the evening, and 3 more overnight, including waking up at 2.50am and staying awake screaming for an hour and 20 minutes, no matter that we were taking it in turns to walk him, rock him, I breastfed him, etc. He was just miserable! This morning he woke up with a cold and a new tooth! Poor baby! :(
Benjamin and Samuel woke several times each, Nathan woke twice, and oh I just can't count the number of disturbances. Such a bad night's sleep! Over the course of the day, I now have five small boys running with snot and sneezing. Arthur is still standing, for now! ;) My throat isn't feeling 100% and my neck feels achy, so maybe I will be down with it next? It seems relatively mild though, so that's something at least. Anyway, so I have been really tired out today. I noticed a new thing which I put down to tiredness at first (along with the mild dizziness that I've had for the last 4 or 5 days now - pregnancy symptom, if you ask me!) - if I dash upstairs, or shout at someone (embarrassed to admit that I have been doing that), I run out of breath and have to breathe heavy for a moment. It was on the third occasion of that happening today when I finally thought, "Ohhhhhhh....!!" as I remembered the reason it felt familiar! ;) That happens to me right through pregnancy, but from as early as my luteal phase onwards. Also I had a really sore shooting pain inside my hip, about an inch or so above my pubic bone on the left side. It was like a knitting needle poking me there for 10 seconds or so. I was suspicious about it being pregnancy related, but at the start of the evening I had some tiny flashy mini ligament pains on both sides, just above my pubic bone! I KNOW what that means! :) Ooh, I have one right this second! :)
We got on with the day anyway, did school, etc. Heather's daughter came over in the afternoon, ate dinner with us, and stayed until Neil took her home after the boys were in bed, because Heather had surgery on her shoulder today and so it was a way for us to bless them by giving their daughter dinner (and she was a blessing to us in return!) and taking her home safely, as her parents weren't home at all until her dad came back late in the evening. So that was a great help to me, while poor Elijah was so unhappy, and the boys were difficult to handle as usual, etc. I was able to get maths and spelling lessons done with Arthur, as those are the most difficult to fit in when there are demands from other kiddies. If someone is here to occupy the others for a bit, I can get those lessons done easily. So I'm glad of her help today! She was not put off by our cold germs, either! :)
I had been chatting on Facebook to my friend Rebecca, who understands me very well in the ways of obsessing over early pregnancy symptoms, temps, and test sticks, lol! ;) She had suggested the super sensitive tests, and also suggested that I try a Clearblue digital test. I have had one in the house for a few days, but have been too nervous to take it, because I didn't want it to say "not pregnant" because it was too early or something. They're expensive! And I thought it would be the more likely result, and it would be kind of depressing to see. So I didn't take it.
But this evening I lay in bed breastfeeding Elijah to sleep (which didn't work), and having these mild Braxton Hicks type pressurey cramps as I did so, and the odd flashy teeny ligament pain, and I became more confident because of those sensations, that I must be pregnant. I can't be earlier than 10DPO, and my temp is still high. I MUST be pregnant. I just must. So I formulated a plan! ;) Very very naughtily, I had not been for a wee in an awful long time. I just hadn't had the opportunity, even though I had reeeally needed to go for a while. I know that's naughty of me! ;) But anyway. I had not been since I peed on a stick in the morning, so that was over 13 hours (!!!!) worth of urine! I began to get excited about the fact that it was a really good opportunity to get the best test result I could, if I tested NOW, this evening!
I went to get my tests so that I could squint at them again (haha!), and discovered to my happy surprise, that my test from this morning had NOT faded! It had a really obvious but faint line, still! That gave me even more hope that I might just get a positive result this evening.
I wanted to use the Clearblue digital, so that I could have an answer once and for all - not try to analyse the lines, but have something else do it for me and TELL me whether or not I was pregnant. Because the Clearblue digital test was sensitive to 25 mIU/ml of the pregnancy hormone, like the normal cheapy internet tests that I've always taken (not the 10 mIU tests I've been taking these past 3 days), I wanted to use a cheapy 25 mIU test as a "control". I thought that if I saw a line, however faint, I would dip the Clearblue digital in the same urine, and see what happened. Elijah took ages to settle, with Neil and I taking turns again, but part way through that, I dipped the cheapy stick and left it to sit while I held Elijah for a few minutes. Then Neil took over and I went back to look at the test stick. There was a line!!!! :) At least as strong as the line on this morning's test which was an even more sensitive test! A pink, fat, faint line! I was so excited!!! Neil took Elijah upstairs and walked him in the bedroom until he fell asleep, which wasn't too long because I had just breastfed him again.
Meanwhile I sat in the kitchen downstairs with my cup 'o' urine, and a wrapped digital test, and I was suddenly sooooo nervous and shakey with excitement! Much more so than when I do the cheapy tests, maybe because it would be so final - "pregnant" or "not pregnant". A real decision maker. I dipped the test exactly as the instructions said, put the cap back on and set in on the table. I couldn't look away! It had that hourglass figure flashing on the screen that means "waiting", and I was just practically twisting my own hands off watching it, lol! I couldn't bear the suspense, and I half didn't want to look, but couldn't look away. I couldn't sit in the end, either, so I got up and paced while I watched it. Then suddenly, up popped the result! Look what it said!!!
Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!! I'm prrrreggggnaaaaaaannnnntttt!!!! So excited!!!!! :D
It says, "pregnant 1-2" which means the test can tell that it has been 1-2 weeks since I ovulated. So 10DPO is spot on, I think. The test stick below it is the cheapy 25 mIU test that I took right before it. I don't know if you can see the line on it (it's there!) but I don't care!!! ;) There's a whacking great stick right above it that says PREGNANT!!!! :D
I showed Neil the test as he came downstairs from Elijah - I didn't want to give it away, but the ear-to-ear smile unfortunately was too powerful to override with my cheek muscles! ;) I just couldn't stop smiling, I was so excited and happy (still am!)!! He gave me a big hug and seems really happy. After a while he said, now he REALLY has to get the new role at work that he's been trying for! ;)
What a lovely way to end the day! I am wiped out but I don't even want to go to bed, I'm on a happy high after such lovely news! :) I'll still temp and test for a while, as I usually do until about 18DPO for confirmation. I like to do that.
My due date is October 22nd! My seventh baby (breathe. breeeeaaathe Alice.) is due just over 2 weeks before my eldest child's 9th birthday. Heather is unavailable for a full week from October 28th. She has arranged back up with the doula she used to work with, who is a Christian, and very lovely, but I want my Heather!! I hope the timing goes well, and I'm already considering a sweep on my due date, lol! ;) I have gone 8 days over my due date before, which wouldn't be ideal this time. I am so excited to be having an October baby! :) I love the fact that out of 7 children, they ALL have a different birth month! :) I was hoping to keep that up!
I am, of course, presuming to have a boy, especially with the parsnips being the only incidence, 4 days before ovulation. This used to be said to result in a girl, but some research found that it was actually more likely to produce a boy than a girl. Parsnips all the way through the cycle from beginning to past ovulation most likely results in a girl, apparently, and nope - we did not do that! ;) Besides, I have two babies already who have resulted from parsnips 4 days before ovulation (single occurrance) just like this time, and their names are Matthew and Nathan, so yeah - not girls! ;)
Without particularly planning it, we've ended up choosing names for the boys that all start with a different letter, and now I want to make sure we carry on that pattern! I like it. I also like that when they're in their teens and start getting more official mail, you know the type that is addressed to Mr. N. So-and-so - they will all have their own unique first initial so we will avoid having a letter addressed to Mr. N. So-and-so and having to open it and read it to see WHICH Mr. N. So-and-so it's for in our house! So, we've used A, M, N, B, S, and E. I used T for Toby - Elijah's tiny twin. Since just before I ovulated, I cannot shake the name from my head. I used it already. It would be odd to use it again. But I somehow SO want to use Toby for a child to whom I can actually say, "Toby, do you want some milky?" or even, "Toby! No hitting!" ;) I still just completely LOVE the way it sounds when I say, "Arthur, Matthew, Nathan, Benjamin, Samuel, Elijah, and Toby." Love it so much. But it feels wrong, and weird even, after using the name for a special tiny person who will always be in my heart. I can't sort out my feelings on that one. But the name won't leave my head at the moment.
Okay, I could ramble for hours more, but I feel crampy and my back aches, and I'm tired. I have lost all track of time but I think it must be late, so I am going to put the laptop away and go to bed.
I'm just so excited to share my news!!!! Baby #7 - praise you Lord!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you! I am so blessed and happy and thrilled! Scared will come later, lol! ;) But so happy!
I did have continuing pregnancy symptoms last night but nothing new to report as such, except for a few odd sensations in the nether regions (!! - that sounds so daft, but I don't want to attract perverts via google!) which I have only ever had in the first couple of weeks of pregnancy (not all my pregnancies though, but only ever in that early stage of pregnancy). So that made me think, "Well, I obviously AM pregnant, but who knows if I will be in the morning..." and other rational things like that, haha! ;)
So this morning I temped, not having any idea what to expect - I didn't feel particularly "warm" or "cool" like I sometimes do in terms of my core body temperature. Sometimes I have a vibe of what to expect. So I was excited when I got 36.87 - almost the highest temp so far this cycle, and another tiny rise on yesterday's! :) I still wasn't sure whether to test or not, because I still had a sense of doubt over whether I'd get a line at all, and if I did, I felt like it would be likely the same as yesterday's, and then fade off. I knew if I was pregnant it needed to be darker each day, but I expected it wouldn't be, so I was nervous to get that kind of confirmation.
I tested anyway - probably about 7 hours worth of urine. I used a super sensitive test, like the previous two days. Being 10DPO, I knew I "should" be seeing a positive test with a sensitive one, by today. I was so nervous nothing would show! But I did see a line! I was cautiously excited, but it didn't look all that clear to me. It came up within 3 minutes, and it was pink. I compared it to the previous two days' tests, and figured it was pretty much the same as yesterday's, and would be likely to fade to nothing much by the end of the day. I showed Neil the three tests together, while he was trying to get ready for work - poor man! He had already said before, "Oh, just wait a couple more days and test then. Then you won't have the worry of whether or not it will be positive today."
Men seeeeriously don't understand the workings of a crazy obsesso-woman's brain when it comes to reproductive things!
So I had tested, and was flapping about whether the line was clearer than yesterday's. He said yes, it was. I said that yesterday's HAD looked like today's, but now it was like the first one at 8DPO. He said, no, it didn't look like 8DPO. That one was negative. There was a line on the 9DPO test, and a stronger line on the 10DPO test. End of. ;) So I was reassured somewhat! :)
I took a photo of the 3 tests together - the one at the bottom (3 dots) is today's test:
See, it's hard to even see the line, isn't it? It IS there, but it's really faint, and because I'm 10DPO, it's a super sensitive test, and I had a faint line already yesterday (so today's should be stronger), I was not sure about it. And see how yesterday's positive line, which was so clear on the photo yesterday, has faded away?
Today has been quite hard work. The night was awful - Nathan and Matthew went to bed with a sore throat, and we wondered if they were coming down with something. Matthew hates Calpol, but his throat was sore enough so that he wanted some pain relief at bedtime, so he let me give him some but washed every tiny sip of it down with a TON of water because he can't stand the taste. Of course he wet the bed a few hours later, so we needed to change that. Neil was out until almost midnight so I had to do the day plus bedtime (this is a bigger deal than it sounds! Bedtime is a bit of a nightmare in our house!), and evening wakings, of which there were plenty. Elijah woke 5 times during the evening, and 3 more overnight, including waking up at 2.50am and staying awake screaming for an hour and 20 minutes, no matter that we were taking it in turns to walk him, rock him, I breastfed him, etc. He was just miserable! This morning he woke up with a cold and a new tooth! Poor baby! :(
Benjamin and Samuel woke several times each, Nathan woke twice, and oh I just can't count the number of disturbances. Such a bad night's sleep! Over the course of the day, I now have five small boys running with snot and sneezing. Arthur is still standing, for now! ;) My throat isn't feeling 100% and my neck feels achy, so maybe I will be down with it next? It seems relatively mild though, so that's something at least. Anyway, so I have been really tired out today. I noticed a new thing which I put down to tiredness at first (along with the mild dizziness that I've had for the last 4 or 5 days now - pregnancy symptom, if you ask me!) - if I dash upstairs, or shout at someone (embarrassed to admit that I have been doing that), I run out of breath and have to breathe heavy for a moment. It was on the third occasion of that happening today when I finally thought, "Ohhhhhhh....!!" as I remembered the reason it felt familiar! ;) That happens to me right through pregnancy, but from as early as my luteal phase onwards. Also I had a really sore shooting pain inside my hip, about an inch or so above my pubic bone on the left side. It was like a knitting needle poking me there for 10 seconds or so. I was suspicious about it being pregnancy related, but at the start of the evening I had some tiny flashy mini ligament pains on both sides, just above my pubic bone! I KNOW what that means! :) Ooh, I have one right this second! :)
We got on with the day anyway, did school, etc. Heather's daughter came over in the afternoon, ate dinner with us, and stayed until Neil took her home after the boys were in bed, because Heather had surgery on her shoulder today and so it was a way for us to bless them by giving their daughter dinner (and she was a blessing to us in return!) and taking her home safely, as her parents weren't home at all until her dad came back late in the evening. So that was a great help to me, while poor Elijah was so unhappy, and the boys were difficult to handle as usual, etc. I was able to get maths and spelling lessons done with Arthur, as those are the most difficult to fit in when there are demands from other kiddies. If someone is here to occupy the others for a bit, I can get those lessons done easily. So I'm glad of her help today! She was not put off by our cold germs, either! :)
I had been chatting on Facebook to my friend Rebecca, who understands me very well in the ways of obsessing over early pregnancy symptoms, temps, and test sticks, lol! ;) She had suggested the super sensitive tests, and also suggested that I try a Clearblue digital test. I have had one in the house for a few days, but have been too nervous to take it, because I didn't want it to say "not pregnant" because it was too early or something. They're expensive! And I thought it would be the more likely result, and it would be kind of depressing to see. So I didn't take it.
But this evening I lay in bed breastfeeding Elijah to sleep (which didn't work), and having these mild Braxton Hicks type pressurey cramps as I did so, and the odd flashy teeny ligament pain, and I became more confident because of those sensations, that I must be pregnant. I can't be earlier than 10DPO, and my temp is still high. I MUST be pregnant. I just must. So I formulated a plan! ;) Very very naughtily, I had not been for a wee in an awful long time. I just hadn't had the opportunity, even though I had reeeally needed to go for a while. I know that's naughty of me! ;) But anyway. I had not been since I peed on a stick in the morning, so that was over 13 hours (!!!!) worth of urine! I began to get excited about the fact that it was a really good opportunity to get the best test result I could, if I tested NOW, this evening!
I went to get my tests so that I could squint at them again (haha!), and discovered to my happy surprise, that my test from this morning had NOT faded! It had a really obvious but faint line, still! That gave me even more hope that I might just get a positive result this evening.
I wanted to use the Clearblue digital, so that I could have an answer once and for all - not try to analyse the lines, but have something else do it for me and TELL me whether or not I was pregnant. Because the Clearblue digital test was sensitive to 25 mIU/ml of the pregnancy hormone, like the normal cheapy internet tests that I've always taken (not the 10 mIU tests I've been taking these past 3 days), I wanted to use a cheapy 25 mIU test as a "control". I thought that if I saw a line, however faint, I would dip the Clearblue digital in the same urine, and see what happened. Elijah took ages to settle, with Neil and I taking turns again, but part way through that, I dipped the cheapy stick and left it to sit while I held Elijah for a few minutes. Then Neil took over and I went back to look at the test stick. There was a line!!!! :) At least as strong as the line on this morning's test which was an even more sensitive test! A pink, fat, faint line! I was so excited!!! Neil took Elijah upstairs and walked him in the bedroom until he fell asleep, which wasn't too long because I had just breastfed him again.
Meanwhile I sat in the kitchen downstairs with my cup 'o' urine, and a wrapped digital test, and I was suddenly sooooo nervous and shakey with excitement! Much more so than when I do the cheapy tests, maybe because it would be so final - "pregnant" or "not pregnant". A real decision maker. I dipped the test exactly as the instructions said, put the cap back on and set in on the table. I couldn't look away! It had that hourglass figure flashing on the screen that means "waiting", and I was just practically twisting my own hands off watching it, lol! I couldn't bear the suspense, and I half didn't want to look, but couldn't look away. I couldn't sit in the end, either, so I got up and paced while I watched it. Then suddenly, up popped the result! Look what it said!!!
Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!! I'm prrrreggggnaaaaaaannnnntttt!!!! So excited!!!!! :D
It says, "pregnant 1-2" which means the test can tell that it has been 1-2 weeks since I ovulated. So 10DPO is spot on, I think. The test stick below it is the cheapy 25 mIU test that I took right before it. I don't know if you can see the line on it (it's there!) but I don't care!!! ;) There's a whacking great stick right above it that says PREGNANT!!!! :D
I showed Neil the test as he came downstairs from Elijah - I didn't want to give it away, but the ear-to-ear smile unfortunately was too powerful to override with my cheek muscles! ;) I just couldn't stop smiling, I was so excited and happy (still am!)!! He gave me a big hug and seems really happy. After a while he said, now he REALLY has to get the new role at work that he's been trying for! ;)
What a lovely way to end the day! I am wiped out but I don't even want to go to bed, I'm on a happy high after such lovely news! :) I'll still temp and test for a while, as I usually do until about 18DPO for confirmation. I like to do that.
My due date is October 22nd! My seventh baby (breathe. breeeeaaathe Alice.) is due just over 2 weeks before my eldest child's 9th birthday. Heather is unavailable for a full week from October 28th. She has arranged back up with the doula she used to work with, who is a Christian, and very lovely, but I want my Heather!! I hope the timing goes well, and I'm already considering a sweep on my due date, lol! ;) I have gone 8 days over my due date before, which wouldn't be ideal this time. I am so excited to be having an October baby! :) I love the fact that out of 7 children, they ALL have a different birth month! :) I was hoping to keep that up!
I am, of course, presuming to have a boy, especially with the parsnips being the only incidence, 4 days before ovulation. This used to be said to result in a girl, but some research found that it was actually more likely to produce a boy than a girl. Parsnips all the way through the cycle from beginning to past ovulation most likely results in a girl, apparently, and nope - we did not do that! ;) Besides, I have two babies already who have resulted from parsnips 4 days before ovulation (single occurrance) just like this time, and their names are Matthew and Nathan, so yeah - not girls! ;)
Without particularly planning it, we've ended up choosing names for the boys that all start with a different letter, and now I want to make sure we carry on that pattern! I like it. I also like that when they're in their teens and start getting more official mail, you know the type that is addressed to Mr. N. So-and-so - they will all have their own unique first initial so we will avoid having a letter addressed to Mr. N. So-and-so and having to open it and read it to see WHICH Mr. N. So-and-so it's for in our house! So, we've used A, M, N, B, S, and E. I used T for Toby - Elijah's tiny twin. Since just before I ovulated, I cannot shake the name from my head. I used it already. It would be odd to use it again. But I somehow SO want to use Toby for a child to whom I can actually say, "Toby, do you want some milky?" or even, "Toby! No hitting!" ;) I still just completely LOVE the way it sounds when I say, "Arthur, Matthew, Nathan, Benjamin, Samuel, Elijah, and Toby." Love it so much. But it feels wrong, and weird even, after using the name for a special tiny person who will always be in my heart. I can't sort out my feelings on that one. But the name won't leave my head at the moment.
Okay, I could ramble for hours more, but I feel crampy and my back aches, and I'm tired. I have lost all track of time but I think it must be late, so I am going to put the laptop away and go to bed.
I'm just so excited to share my news!!!! Baby #7 - praise you Lord!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you! I am so blessed and happy and thrilled! Scared will come later, lol! ;) But so happy!
Thursday, February 7, 2013
Confusion mayyybe resolved (still confused though, lol!)
Wow, this has been a weird one! :)
Well, it seemed like the least likely option, but I think I am going to have to presume that I DID ovulate later than I thought, which really has caught me out. I usually know my body so well! I did have some cramps that I didn't put down to ovulation at all, because I thought I had already ovulated, which (looking back) could have been ovulation pain. But still... I feel so.... it's funny, almost! ;)
I also have no idea what to make of that 9DPO test I posted a picture of. That was a line, faint, but there, and then all the other tests didn't really have anything significant to show. They all had something but I couldn't call it a positive line (I guess they are evaporation lines - again, not much experience with those as the tests I use are usually pretty good for not getting those too badly), so I charted them negative. I left the 9DPO day blank on my chart because I still didn't know whether to call it positive or negative (and 10DPO the same).
But NOW, those days are actually 6DPO and 7DPO, so waaaaay too early to test. Then yesterday when I did a super sensitive test, which was negative, that would have been 8DPO instead of 11DPO like I had originally though. Such a confusing time, lol!
Well, I had cramps and all the usual obvious (for me) pregnancy symptoms I've been having. Neil and I had date night last night which was lovely, and I was much more relaxed going to bed. I figured my temp would drop this morning but it's UP! 36.83! I didn't leap out of bed and test, but when I had fed Elijah and Samuel, and talked to Neil for a while about it, I decided to test again with a super sensitive test, just in case it WAS true about me having ovulated 3 days later (and thus today would be 9DPO).
I looked at the instructions for my new tests, and to my surprise it said to dip the stick for at least 10 seconds (never been doing that, lol!) and then to wait 5-10 minutes to confirm a negative, and to ignore any changes after TEN minutes. I always thought it was 3 minutes, but maybe different tests have different rules? Anyway, so I followed the instructions exactly. It was a negative test for about 3 or 4 minutes, and then I started to see a shadow. There was plenty going on with the kids, and Neil was rushing to get ready for work, so I didn't get the luxury of sitting for the whole 10 minutes and watching my stick, lol! By the time I had smuggled it (Arthur knows what they are and is DES. PERATE. for me to be pregnant) to Neil in the kitchen, probably 5 or 6 minutes had elapsed, and I held it up and asked him if he could see a line. He said, "Mmmm, mayyybe.... yes, there's definitely something there..." and after I'd held it at the window and under normal light, and under flourescent light (haha, slightly obsessive!) another minute had passed (still not 10 minutes yet), and Neil asked to see again, so I showed him. He said there was definitely a line, which I could see too, but I never know if I'm seeing things, lol!
Anyway, now that it's almost dry, I can compare it with yesterday's super sensitive test. They're different! Different enough for me to say that I think I am pregnant! :) I took a photo of them next to each other for comparison (the one from yesterday has one black dot, and today's has two) - the light was this really odd blue morning light coming in the window, but apart from a bit of contrast I haven't altered the photo to make it look more obvious or anything.
I think that's confirmation that I'm pregnant! :) Even if for some reason the pregnancy doesn't stick, right now I am pregnant, and I finally have evidence! :) I would normally start jumping about and saying exactly what my gestation is, etc, but I don't know what to call it! Do I stick with 9DPO (and thus 3 weeks and 2 days pregnant), or go with the original ovulation date and call myself 12DPO and 3 weeks and 5 days pregnant? I think maybe implantation occured at 7DPO with the dip in temperature, because those two days were the worst cramps EVER, even keeping me awake. The last 24 hours of cramping have been bothersome but not nearly as bad as that, so maybe... Also I would never get a positive test within 24 hours of ovulation, and a sensitive test would be the only thing to stand a chance in the following 24 hours (today), so that would make sense.
Anyway, YAY!! Pregnant! Baby #7!! Vindicated, ha! ;) I *knew* something pregnant was going on, even with my chart and test sticks confusing me!
I will definitely be back soon to update again, probably this evening as Neil is out from 8am to 11.30pm today (he's got a team-building bowling session this evening in central London), so I'll be taking a deep breath and managing all the littles by myself at bedtime, and then probably getting stuck into some internet stuff this evening while I wait up for him. I know my temp could still drop and I could still bleed (in fact, it would be statistically UNlikely for me NOT to bleed in any case), so I will post frequently to keep you up to date.
:D
Well, it seemed like the least likely option, but I think I am going to have to presume that I DID ovulate later than I thought, which really has caught me out. I usually know my body so well! I did have some cramps that I didn't put down to ovulation at all, because I thought I had already ovulated, which (looking back) could have been ovulation pain. But still... I feel so.... it's funny, almost! ;)
I also have no idea what to make of that 9DPO test I posted a picture of. That was a line, faint, but there, and then all the other tests didn't really have anything significant to show. They all had something but I couldn't call it a positive line (I guess they are evaporation lines - again, not much experience with those as the tests I use are usually pretty good for not getting those too badly), so I charted them negative. I left the 9DPO day blank on my chart because I still didn't know whether to call it positive or negative (and 10DPO the same).
But NOW, those days are actually 6DPO and 7DPO, so waaaaay too early to test. Then yesterday when I did a super sensitive test, which was negative, that would have been 8DPO instead of 11DPO like I had originally though. Such a confusing time, lol!
Well, I had cramps and all the usual obvious (for me) pregnancy symptoms I've been having. Neil and I had date night last night which was lovely, and I was much more relaxed going to bed. I figured my temp would drop this morning but it's UP! 36.83! I didn't leap out of bed and test, but when I had fed Elijah and Samuel, and talked to Neil for a while about it, I decided to test again with a super sensitive test, just in case it WAS true about me having ovulated 3 days later (and thus today would be 9DPO).
I looked at the instructions for my new tests, and to my surprise it said to dip the stick for at least 10 seconds (never been doing that, lol!) and then to wait 5-10 minutes to confirm a negative, and to ignore any changes after TEN minutes. I always thought it was 3 minutes, but maybe different tests have different rules? Anyway, so I followed the instructions exactly. It was a negative test for about 3 or 4 minutes, and then I started to see a shadow. There was plenty going on with the kids, and Neil was rushing to get ready for work, so I didn't get the luxury of sitting for the whole 10 minutes and watching my stick, lol! By the time I had smuggled it (Arthur knows what they are and is DES. PERATE. for me to be pregnant) to Neil in the kitchen, probably 5 or 6 minutes had elapsed, and I held it up and asked him if he could see a line. He said, "Mmmm, mayyybe.... yes, there's definitely something there..." and after I'd held it at the window and under normal light, and under flourescent light (haha, slightly obsessive!) another minute had passed (still not 10 minutes yet), and Neil asked to see again, so I showed him. He said there was definitely a line, which I could see too, but I never know if I'm seeing things, lol!
Anyway, now that it's almost dry, I can compare it with yesterday's super sensitive test. They're different! Different enough for me to say that I think I am pregnant! :) I took a photo of them next to each other for comparison (the one from yesterday has one black dot, and today's has two) - the light was this really odd blue morning light coming in the window, but apart from a bit of contrast I haven't altered the photo to make it look more obvious or anything.
I think that's confirmation that I'm pregnant! :) Even if for some reason the pregnancy doesn't stick, right now I am pregnant, and I finally have evidence! :) I would normally start jumping about and saying exactly what my gestation is, etc, but I don't know what to call it! Do I stick with 9DPO (and thus 3 weeks and 2 days pregnant), or go with the original ovulation date and call myself 12DPO and 3 weeks and 5 days pregnant? I think maybe implantation occured at 7DPO with the dip in temperature, because those two days were the worst cramps EVER, even keeping me awake. The last 24 hours of cramping have been bothersome but not nearly as bad as that, so maybe... Also I would never get a positive test within 24 hours of ovulation, and a sensitive test would be the only thing to stand a chance in the following 24 hours (today), so that would make sense.
Anyway, YAY!! Pregnant! Baby #7!! Vindicated, ha! ;) I *knew* something pregnant was going on, even with my chart and test sticks confusing me!
I will definitely be back soon to update again, probably this evening as Neil is out from 8am to 11.30pm today (he's got a team-building bowling session this evening in central London), so I'll be taking a deep breath and managing all the littles by myself at bedtime, and then probably getting stuck into some internet stuff this evening while I wait up for him. I know my temp could still drop and I could still bleed (in fact, it would be statistically UNlikely for me NOT to bleed in any case), so I will post frequently to keep you up to date.
:D
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Another 11DPO update
Well, the postman did bring the tests, and I used a super sensitive one, which was definitely negative. :( So that is that, I guess.
The only thing I can think of, other than waiting for my period to show up, is the fact that FF changed my ovulation date earlier in my cycle. Because I charted 3 days of EWCM after I ovulated, FF decided that I didn't ovulate then after all. I felt sure that I did, so I changed the EWCM on my chart to make it go back to the original ovulation prediction. I did have EWCM but it seemed not to be "peak" type of EWCM, to me (I think I blogged this?) so I felt that it was just fading off after ovulation but taking days about it, or something! ;) That sounds a bit lame, now I read it back! Also, it's unusual for me to have a pre-ovulatory temp of 36.38 (or whatever it was exactly) BEFORE ovulation. Usually I can go up to 36.2-36.3 before ovulation. Anything above that is usually post-ovulation.
So, with the slightest possibility that I ovulated a bit later than I thought, I went back to my chart and put the EWCM back as it was, to see what FF would make of it. Sure enough they put my ovulation date as 3 days later, which would make me 8DPO today. I am not sure.... Weirdly soft skin started only 5DPO that way, and I'm not sure if that's likely. Parsnips would have been 4 days before ovulation that way, which has resulted in 3 of our children before, so it's still possible...
Being 8DPO might explain why my period is taking "so long" to show up, pregnant or not. I would expect it to turn up at maybe 9 or 10dpo if I wasn't pregnant, giving me a luteal phase this cycle of 8 or 9 days. If it's this long and I'm not pregnant, that's a bit unexpected.
I'm leaving the chart as it is for a bit so you can see what I mean. Thoughts? I am basically waiting for my period, and currently okay with that, but I still can't shift the fact that I am totally experiencing proper pregnancy symptoms that can't be psychological in nature, and which I never ever get unless I really am pregnant. If my period shows up, then okay, but I'm still confused! :/
The only thing I can think of, other than waiting for my period to show up, is the fact that FF changed my ovulation date earlier in my cycle. Because I charted 3 days of EWCM after I ovulated, FF decided that I didn't ovulate then after all. I felt sure that I did, so I changed the EWCM on my chart to make it go back to the original ovulation prediction. I did have EWCM but it seemed not to be "peak" type of EWCM, to me (I think I blogged this?) so I felt that it was just fading off after ovulation but taking days about it, or something! ;) That sounds a bit lame, now I read it back! Also, it's unusual for me to have a pre-ovulatory temp of 36.38 (or whatever it was exactly) BEFORE ovulation. Usually I can go up to 36.2-36.3 before ovulation. Anything above that is usually post-ovulation.
So, with the slightest possibility that I ovulated a bit later than I thought, I went back to my chart and put the EWCM back as it was, to see what FF would make of it. Sure enough they put my ovulation date as 3 days later, which would make me 8DPO today. I am not sure.... Weirdly soft skin started only 5DPO that way, and I'm not sure if that's likely. Parsnips would have been 4 days before ovulation that way, which has resulted in 3 of our children before, so it's still possible...
Being 8DPO might explain why my period is taking "so long" to show up, pregnant or not. I would expect it to turn up at maybe 9 or 10dpo if I wasn't pregnant, giving me a luteal phase this cycle of 8 or 9 days. If it's this long and I'm not pregnant, that's a bit unexpected.
I'm leaving the chart as it is for a bit so you can see what I mean. Thoughts? I am basically waiting for my period, and currently okay with that, but I still can't shift the fact that I am totally experiencing proper pregnancy symptoms that can't be psychological in nature, and which I never ever get unless I really am pregnant. If my period shows up, then okay, but I'm still confused! :/
11DPO...
Still here, and have to be super quick!
My temp did not drop! It didn't exactly shoot up, but it's 36.75, a slight rise from yesterday's 36.71 - so still hanging in there. Hmmm....
Well, being 11DPO with my temp still up, weirdly soft skin, and crazy bad cramps, I thought I would use my last test. I was beyond confused when it was a flat out negative. Not even the line I had at 9DPO. Weird. I am not sure what to think or what to expect next. I am cramping so badly, and (I repeat!) I never ever cramp badly at all unless I am pregnant, or my period is in flow (or about to be within usually the next hour). It isn't constant, but early this morning after I woke with Elijah, it was too sore to allow me to fall back to sleep again, which is so completely ONLY going to be a pregnancy symptom. Really odd.
I have wasted too much time and energy on pregnancy ponderings this week, so today's strategy is to ignore it as much as possible, and get on with my day. The one thing left is that the postman might bring my tests, because they usually arrive the next day after I order them, and if he does I will use one of the more sensitive tests that picks up a very tiny amount of the pregnancy hormone, on my first morning urine (which I saved, and which I tested negative with earlier). If THAT is negative, I think it's a closed case. Maybe I *was* pregnant but it didn't implant successfully or something, and so it has faded away. Either way, a negative with a sensitive test at 11DPO means I am waiting for my body to catch up and for my period to start.
I will keep you posted!
My temp did not drop! It didn't exactly shoot up, but it's 36.75, a slight rise from yesterday's 36.71 - so still hanging in there. Hmmm....
Well, being 11DPO with my temp still up, weirdly soft skin, and crazy bad cramps, I thought I would use my last test. I was beyond confused when it was a flat out negative. Not even the line I had at 9DPO. Weird. I am not sure what to think or what to expect next. I am cramping so badly, and (I repeat!) I never ever cramp badly at all unless I am pregnant, or my period is in flow (or about to be within usually the next hour). It isn't constant, but early this morning after I woke with Elijah, it was too sore to allow me to fall back to sleep again, which is so completely ONLY going to be a pregnancy symptom. Really odd.
I have wasted too much time and energy on pregnancy ponderings this week, so today's strategy is to ignore it as much as possible, and get on with my day. The one thing left is that the postman might bring my tests, because they usually arrive the next day after I order them, and if he does I will use one of the more sensitive tests that picks up a very tiny amount of the pregnancy hormone, on my first morning urine (which I saved, and which I tested negative with earlier). If THAT is negative, I think it's a closed case. Maybe I *was* pregnant but it didn't implant successfully or something, and so it has faded away. Either way, a negative with a sensitive test at 11DPO means I am waiting for my body to catch up and for my period to start.
I will keep you posted!
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
10DPO...
Well, I've managed to make it to 10DPO somehow, which is rather surreal to me! That's long enough to sustain a pregnancy, anywhere from 10DPO onwards.
I haven't got much time to update this morning but I wanted to anyway, so I'll have to be quick.
I got Neil to bring home a digital test (after talking to Rebecca! :) ) and then got too nervous to use it because it's expensive, and what if it just says "not pregnant"?! Bit of a mega disappointment, right?
Then I got to thinking that when I tested yesterday at 9DPO, I had been for a wee really late at night, and then used first morning urine to test - about 6 hours worth. So maybe that wasn't adequate for first morning urine? By 11pm or thereabouts, I hadn't been to the loo since 1pm and decided to test with another internet cheapy as it was 10 hours worth of wee (yes, I should be preventing further kidney stones better. Tsk!). Anyway I was discouraged to see that it was negative. I looked back at it a few minutes later and there was a line after all, and it was the same as the morning's like - mayyyyybe just a touch darker, but basically the same. So I was back to being excited again!
This morning when I temped, I got 36.71. I feel really disappointed about that, because while it is still up there in the high temps for me, it's a drop (you can see it on my chart, the link to which is over there on the right (FF chart)), and a drop at 10DPO isn't all that good.
I debated for a while on whether to test. I talked to Neil about it before he went to work, and he was as confused as I am - I still feel pregnant. Last night I had proper bad cramps when I went to bed, and this morning the same - almost too uncomfortable to settle back to sleep when I had woken to feed Elijah. They felt like period cramps, but I don't have my period, and that never never NEVER ever happens unless I'm pregnant, unless bleeding follows within an hour-ish (which it hasn't). Neil stroked my face again and said my skin is definitely still pregnant soft. I am still weeing more frequently, and painfully hungry at times of day when I'm normally just "hungry" like before breakfast, etc. The crampiness is accompanied by a sensation of a large ball of something low in the pit of my abdomen. There is a feeling of fullness and a sort of hot pressure. It all feels very much like early pregnancy to me.
After Neil went to work, I decided I would test. I felt deflated about it even as I did so, because I didn't feel much hope for a positive, and statistically, a negative at 10DPO isn't a good sign for me. I did see a line, basically the same as the one I posted a picture of yesterday. I had probably not weed in 8 hours. Shouldn't it be stronger than yesterday's, if there's a healthy pregnancy starting? It's making me second guess whether the lines I've been seeing are real lines in the first place. :( I shouldn't have to look soooo hard for them at all angles, at 10DPO, unless they're not really there, maybe?
Then I got out the little box with all the test sticks (yes I keep them! It's a cross between "Aww!", and "Eww!", lol!) from all my other babies. Someone's are missing! :( I found Arthur's, Matthew's, Samuel's and Elijah's, all labelled. There's another set of four, labelled with DPO, but no initial to show which boy they were from. :( So they are either from Nathan or Benjamin, but the other one of those boys has no tests saved! I have no idea why, I'm sure I saved them all...
Anyway. All of the pregnancies which tested positive at 10DPO were clearer than the test I took today. Most of them I started testing after 10DPO though. Samuel's tests were interesting. I started at 8DPO with him (negative), then 9DPO (also negative) and then I was discouraged at 10DPO so didn't test, but tested again at 11DPO and got a positive, which is only a touch darker than the tests I've taken today and yesterday, so hmmm.... I compared my 9DPO tests (morning and evening) with Samuel's 9DPO negative, and the lines on the recent ones are more obvious than the not-actually-there line on Samuel's. That gave me hope! :)
I looked in my blog for a photo of Samuel's 11DPO test, and found the post where I put it, and an altered version (like I posted here yesterday) to make it clearer: (THIS IS SAMUEL'S, just to note! Not today's!)
And then I found a post where I had a comparison photo of all the tests I'd taken so far with Samuel, including the too-early ones at 8DPO and 9DPO:
BUT. I checked my now-very-looonnnnng list of charts, to look at pregnancy charts and chemical pregnancy charts since the one before Arthur was conceived. Many of my chemical pregnancies seemed to have a drop like this actually at 10DPO, and then my period or spotting at the end of the day, and a proper drop the next morning. I'm really discouraged, looking at those charts, because I feel convinced now that I am not going to be keeping this little one. I'm sure I will end up having another chemical pregnancy. :( And the only thing to do is wait.
[Edited to add: Just bought some more cheapy tests, as I only have one or two left now, and it looks like I will need some for next cycle. I bought a pack of 10 of the ones above (smallest size available, and it only cost £2.29!!!) and for the first time I decided to buy a pack of 10 of the more sensitive ones, which measure 10 whatevertheyares of pregnancy hormone, as opposed to 25 like the others I've always taken. Same as First Response Early Result. So, at least those are on their way!]
I haven't got much time to update this morning but I wanted to anyway, so I'll have to be quick.
I got Neil to bring home a digital test (after talking to Rebecca! :) ) and then got too nervous to use it because it's expensive, and what if it just says "not pregnant"?! Bit of a mega disappointment, right?
Then I got to thinking that when I tested yesterday at 9DPO, I had been for a wee really late at night, and then used first morning urine to test - about 6 hours worth. So maybe that wasn't adequate for first morning urine? By 11pm or thereabouts, I hadn't been to the loo since 1pm and decided to test with another internet cheapy as it was 10 hours worth of wee (yes, I should be preventing further kidney stones better. Tsk!). Anyway I was discouraged to see that it was negative. I looked back at it a few minutes later and there was a line after all, and it was the same as the morning's like - mayyyyybe just a touch darker, but basically the same. So I was back to being excited again!
This morning when I temped, I got 36.71. I feel really disappointed about that, because while it is still up there in the high temps for me, it's a drop (you can see it on my chart, the link to which is over there on the right (FF chart)), and a drop at 10DPO isn't all that good.
I debated for a while on whether to test. I talked to Neil about it before he went to work, and he was as confused as I am - I still feel pregnant. Last night I had proper bad cramps when I went to bed, and this morning the same - almost too uncomfortable to settle back to sleep when I had woken to feed Elijah. They felt like period cramps, but I don't have my period, and that never never NEVER ever happens unless I'm pregnant, unless bleeding follows within an hour-ish (which it hasn't). Neil stroked my face again and said my skin is definitely still pregnant soft. I am still weeing more frequently, and painfully hungry at times of day when I'm normally just "hungry" like before breakfast, etc. The crampiness is accompanied by a sensation of a large ball of something low in the pit of my abdomen. There is a feeling of fullness and a sort of hot pressure. It all feels very much like early pregnancy to me.
After Neil went to work, I decided I would test. I felt deflated about it even as I did so, because I didn't feel much hope for a positive, and statistically, a negative at 10DPO isn't a good sign for me. I did see a line, basically the same as the one I posted a picture of yesterday. I had probably not weed in 8 hours. Shouldn't it be stronger than yesterday's, if there's a healthy pregnancy starting? It's making me second guess whether the lines I've been seeing are real lines in the first place. :( I shouldn't have to look soooo hard for them at all angles, at 10DPO, unless they're not really there, maybe?
Then I got out the little box with all the test sticks (yes I keep them! It's a cross between "Aww!", and "Eww!", lol!) from all my other babies. Someone's are missing! :( I found Arthur's, Matthew's, Samuel's and Elijah's, all labelled. There's another set of four, labelled with DPO, but no initial to show which boy they were from. :( So they are either from Nathan or Benjamin, but the other one of those boys has no tests saved! I have no idea why, I'm sure I saved them all...
Anyway. All of the pregnancies which tested positive at 10DPO were clearer than the test I took today. Most of them I started testing after 10DPO though. Samuel's tests were interesting. I started at 8DPO with him (negative), then 9DPO (also negative) and then I was discouraged at 10DPO so didn't test, but tested again at 11DPO and got a positive, which is only a touch darker than the tests I've taken today and yesterday, so hmmm.... I compared my 9DPO tests (morning and evening) with Samuel's 9DPO negative, and the lines on the recent ones are more obvious than the not-actually-there line on Samuel's. That gave me hope! :)
I looked in my blog for a photo of Samuel's 11DPO test, and found the post where I put it, and an altered version (like I posted here yesterday) to make it clearer: (THIS IS SAMUEL'S, just to note! Not today's!)
And then I found a post where I had a comparison photo of all the tests I'd taken so far with Samuel, including the too-early ones at 8DPO and 9DPO:
BUT. I checked my now-very-looonnnnng list of charts, to look at pregnancy charts and chemical pregnancy charts since the one before Arthur was conceived. Many of my chemical pregnancies seemed to have a drop like this actually at 10DPO, and then my period or spotting at the end of the day, and a proper drop the next morning. I'm really discouraged, looking at those charts, because I feel convinced now that I am not going to be keeping this little one. I'm sure I will end up having another chemical pregnancy. :( And the only thing to do is wait.
[Edited to add: Just bought some more cheapy tests, as I only have one or two left now, and it looks like I will need some for next cycle. I bought a pack of 10 of the ones above (smallest size available, and it only cost £2.29!!!) and for the first time I decided to buy a pack of 10 of the more sensitive ones, which measure 10 whatevertheyares of pregnancy hormone, as opposed to 25 like the others I've always taken. Same as First Response Early Result. So, at least those are on their way!]
Monday, February 4, 2013
9DPO - morning update!
Well, as I had thought, my temperature did not drop!! :) I was so excited to see 36.89 - it went up AGAIN!!! :) My skin is definitely weirdly soft, and I'm sitting here at the kitchen table feeling more crampy than ever. Just like "pressing down" cramps, not just pains. They're not awful, but they're not my usual in my luteal phase. They are pretty usual for early pregnancy though, yay! :)
I tested, and was a bit concerned that the test was negative. I only had a couple of minutes but a line didn't come up in that time, so I put the test high up out of sight, and rescued Elijah from a climbing calamity (he's climbing now!), and then came back - must have been no longer than a minute later. There was a line on my test stick, but only if I, you know, stood on my head with my eyes crossed and looked at it under the light of a thousand suns at a 48 degree angle, lol! ;)
So now that it has dried I can compare it with the ones from the last two days, and there's definitely a very faint line!! :) I tried to photograph it, but it's soooo faint. I made a copy that I altered crazily with contast and saturation, etc. to show the line I can see as clearly as possible. Here are the two pics - see what you think...
I'm a little bit nervous, even with the high temp, that it's as faint as my positives have been with my chemical pregnancies, and so maybe this will end as a chemical pregnancy too? I know that isn't logical really, because any healthy pregnancy is going to start out with a negative and slowly slowwwly fade into a barely visible positive line, if you start testing early enough. I guess I just have to wait and keep temping (nervous about that now, though!), and testing.
I already have a new symptom today - bloodhound nose! ;) Actually I think maybe that started yesterday, because I asked Neil if he could smell cigarettes in the afternoon, in the living room, and he said no, so I dismissed it but I was sure I could smell them faintly. Today I can smell things like it's a super power, lol! I was at the tumble dryer folding clothes and I thought, "Ugh, why can I smell milk!" It smelled like it was literally spilled on the clothes in front of my nose, and I thought that was not a good sign (I have genuine reason for such paranoia in my house!), but it turned out that I was smelling the breakfast table which hadn't been cleared yet! It smelled so close to me!
Okay, I have been trying to write this for two hours now (!!) with too many distractions to count, and I've stopped to do various things with/for the boys. Now I've just put Elijah to bed for his morning nap, and I need to get started with school, so I'm going to just post this, and if there's any significant news I'll update again this evening. I do feel very crampy at the moment, as though I'm about to get my period, and have dashed to the toilet twice already today to check my underwear, as I felt SURE I had started my period, but no. This is very pregnant of me! :)
I have charted tests that look like the one above as "positive" on my chart before, but I'm not sure whether to take that leap yet or not... To be consistent I think I should, but I don't feel secure shouting, "I'M PREGNANT!!!" yet. I will have to wait to see what tomorrow brings!
I tested, and was a bit concerned that the test was negative. I only had a couple of minutes but a line didn't come up in that time, so I put the test high up out of sight, and rescued Elijah from a climbing calamity (he's climbing now!), and then came back - must have been no longer than a minute later. There was a line on my test stick, but only if I, you know, stood on my head with my eyes crossed and looked at it under the light of a thousand suns at a 48 degree angle, lol! ;)
So now that it has dried I can compare it with the ones from the last two days, and there's definitely a very faint line!! :) I tried to photograph it, but it's soooo faint. I made a copy that I altered crazily with contast and saturation, etc. to show the line I can see as clearly as possible. Here are the two pics - see what you think...
I'm a little bit nervous, even with the high temp, that it's as faint as my positives have been with my chemical pregnancies, and so maybe this will end as a chemical pregnancy too? I know that isn't logical really, because any healthy pregnancy is going to start out with a negative and slowly slowwwly fade into a barely visible positive line, if you start testing early enough. I guess I just have to wait and keep temping (nervous about that now, though!), and testing.
I already have a new symptom today - bloodhound nose! ;) Actually I think maybe that started yesterday, because I asked Neil if he could smell cigarettes in the afternoon, in the living room, and he said no, so I dismissed it but I was sure I could smell them faintly. Today I can smell things like it's a super power, lol! I was at the tumble dryer folding clothes and I thought, "Ugh, why can I smell milk!" It smelled like it was literally spilled on the clothes in front of my nose, and I thought that was not a good sign (I have genuine reason for such paranoia in my house!), but it turned out that I was smelling the breakfast table which hadn't been cleared yet! It smelled so close to me!
Okay, I have been trying to write this for two hours now (!!) with too many distractions to count, and I've stopped to do various things with/for the boys. Now I've just put Elijah to bed for his morning nap, and I need to get started with school, so I'm going to just post this, and if there's any significant news I'll update again this evening. I do feel very crampy at the moment, as though I'm about to get my period, and have dashed to the toilet twice already today to check my underwear, as I felt SURE I had started my period, but no. This is very pregnant of me! :)
I have charted tests that look like the one above as "positive" on my chart before, but I'm not sure whether to take that leap yet or not... To be consistent I think I should, but I don't feel secure shouting, "I'M PREGNANT!!!" yet. I will have to wait to see what tomorrow brings!
Sunday, February 3, 2013
8DPO! :)
Yes, you're right - definitely time for an update, lol! ;)
So I am now 8 days past ovulation, which is when my temperature had dropped and spotting/bleeding started last cycle, even though a pregnancy had started. This time things look pretty good at 8DPO! :)
My temperature went up yesterday morning, at 7DPO, significantly enough for me to think, "Oooooh!", and I had more "bad" cramps - the type I only get when pregnant. So I did the sort of thing that's perfectly normal for Crazy Obsesso-Woman (she's baaaack, haha!), and peed on a stick! At 7DPO! lol! Ah, I know, I know. Of course it was negative - really negative, and I still have last cycle's test sticks, so it was comforting all over again to compare yesterday's test with those, and see again that there really was a positive result last cycle.
So, 7DPO, negative test. I had a really busy day yesterday. After my long email to Heather, she wanted to talk about some of the things in it properly, so Neil (marvellously!) looked after all 6 boys while I went and met Heather in a cafe, and we sat on a comfy sofa with cups of tea and talked for THREE HOURS!!! :-O A lot of it was really serious stuff related to me needing to DO certain stuff related to getting social services off our backs, etc. And some of it was just uncomfortable for me to talk about. Heather thinks I should consider the likelihood that I am suffering from depression, and that considering medication might be a worthwhile thing. I have nothing against the condition, or people who suffer from it, but I have such a BIG personal issue with ME suffering from depression (long and complicated past history), that I really really REALLY don't want to go there - to think that I'm going down that road again. Ugh. I have been on medication for depression before, and do not want to again. I have nothing against anyone who does, or againt anti-depressants in general, but I. don't. want. it. for me! :( I don't know why, I just don't. I just think everything will be alright in the end, or else I want to pretend it will, but Heather thinks I am maybe burying my head in the sand, and that I will need to take action on it in some way for it to get better. I still hope she's wrong...
Anyway. We discussed a lot of tough subjects, and none of it was awful or stern, just uncomfortable subjects, but with the world's best listener and "sorter" - she is so resourceful and thoughtful on ways to help, and gives so lovingly and generously of herself in the solutions she thinks of. There's too much to list here, and this entry isn't really about that, but I'm just making note as I likely won't make note of it anywhere else. Also to note that the morning utterly and completely wiped me out. I think it was the emotional aspect (not that I got teary or anything, just... it was uncomfortable) or something, and the length of time. In the last 15 minutes or so I started to feel kind of unwell, as though I was too tired in my head to take any more. I felt dizzy and started to feel a bit nauseous with it too, and then I came home. Elijah took a nap and Neil took the other 5 boys out to the park, while I prepared school for the week ahead, photocopied worksheets, etc. (yes, I own a photocopier. One of my best school-related buys ever!) and looked up a few of the things Heather had suggested. I had a headache and felt really tired but I needed to get school prepared. I had put the dizziness down to tiredness, but actually I noticed some the day before - just little moments here and there throughout the day - and yesterday I continued to have the odd dizzy spell right up to the end of the day. I kept feeling somewhat in denial that it could possibly be an early pregnancy symptom, even though it IS, for me, often. I just thought that if I was as tired as I was, dizziness like that was to be expected. I have changed my mind today, because I'm still feeling totally exhausted, and having more dizzy spells too. I think they are early pregnancy symptoms, to be honest.
What else at 7DPO? I should update every day, otherwise I have to remember the other days' stuff as well, and then it's not so relevant in any case, but I need it for the full picture. I will definitely update daily from now on, until I have some news (of either sort).
The busy day (well, busy for me!) continued with a fantastic evening at church, especially for ladies! :) Heather bought us both tickets weeks ago (isn't she wonderful?!) and I left my excellent husband to put all six boys to bed, and spent 3 hours of the evening with 250 ladies, being entertained (oh I actually cried running tears during the stand up comedy section! I was so glad I had been to the loo in the interval, lol!), drinking wine (well, I only had 1/3 of glass before I started to feel a bit weird and dizzy, so I stopped then), eating incredibly yummy cupcakes, and generally having a wonderful time. It was run by World Vision, so the emphasis was on the desperate need for sponsors for needy children. I have sponsored an 8-year-old boy in Uganda. It will be wonderful for my boys, and possibly life-saving for him.
I was quite crampy on and off through the day. I definitely needed to chart "bad cramps" because it was bad enough to make me distracted at both the cafe AND even during the entertainment in the evening, so that's noteworthy. The sensation was a sort of crampiness inside my pubic bone/hip area (an inch above) on one side or the other, but mostly on my right side.
I also felt that I could possibly chart frequent urination yesterday (and today is the same), but only because of needing to wee a bit more than I usually do, and feel quite urgent and seem to have a lot to wee when I do, despite not drinking enough fluids. I don't have any UTI symptoms.
Otherwise I was feeling quite neutral yesterday, in terms of whether I felt like I was really FEELING pregnant or not. I began to THINK I was. Oh but I did have the same tender breasts symptom that I charted the day before. I had noticed that I hadn't yet felt what I usually do when in early pregnancy - really sore "flashes" of stabby pains. This was just achy and sore, which I can get before periods too. I don't get the flashy pains normally, before periods. Anyway, yesterday afternoon I had some flashy pains!!! I was really excited! :)
So, 8DPO - today! :)
At 4.30am, I woke up because Elijah did, and was PAINFULLY, burningly hungry! I also really really needed a wee, but didn't do anything about either, partly because I had no opportunity, and partly because I wanted to save the wee for a test if my temp stayed up! ;)
I was so excited, but not at all surprised, to get my highest temp yet this cycle!! :D That's a reeeeeeally good sign for me at this stage. I really feel pregnant today - I both think it, and feel it. And the temp was really encouraging. 36.8*c is a temp I don't usually reach on non-pregnant cycles. I mean, I CAN and sometimes do, and a good pregnancy sign for me is getting to 36.9, or a SURE sign is 37.0. I have never reached that unless pregnant, and when pregnant I ALWAYS do, eventually, in my LP. But 36.8 is pretty stonking. I know it can go either way still, but I am sure now that I am pregnant, and just hoping it doesn't end in a chemical pregnancy, as I would love an October baby, and not to have to get into the hassle of Heather starting all her craft fairs from the end of October to just before Christmas (where she would be unavailable to be at the birth as my doula - can't even imagine!!! :( ). I would also just love not to lose this baby...
So of course I tested! ;) The test was negative, though I wondered if mayyyyyyybe there might be the slightest shadow where a line is supposed to be, compared with the day before. But I honestly could well have been seeing things, so I am not putting anything on that. It's definitely a negative test. At only 8DPO, that is not too surprising. I think the earliest I had a proper positive test has been 9DPO, but sometimes I've had a faint line at 10DPO and nothing at 9DPO (once? I can't remember if more than once). Anyway.
So, today I have had plentiful nagging aches and pains around, to the side, and above my pubic bone - mostly on my right side. Sometimes it's like a boring pain. It's actually just started again as I'm writing this. It bothers me every time I'm lying down breastfeeding, but it's not a constant pain at all. It feels similar to cramps, but just not. I also had a moment this afternoon when I was breastfeeding Elijah for his nap, that I started to feel an increasing pressure, like a wave of proper bearing-down type cramps - those felt very much like my period was starting. I have been checking quite a few times today, because sometimes it felt like it was starting, but it never was. No spotting at all, though I have been scrutinising my underwear, lol! I do have the same CM as I mentioned before, still.
Today I asked Neil to check my face (he has always been my chief tester for this particular pregnancy sign, and is very experienced at knowing the difference between normal-soft and pregnant-soft, hehe!), and he stroked my cheek, and had barely touched it when he said, "Yep!" :) Definitely "weirdly soft skin" - as I chart it! I only ever (EVER) get that when pregnant, and usually from about 8, 9 or 10DPO. There isn't another possible explanation for that one! :) I am sure sure SURE that I am pregnant. :)
I am hungrier than usual, and the main thing about it is that I'm suddenly URGENTLY hungry, seemingly out of nowhere, and I MUST eat or else my tummy hurts and I feel weird. I have also been dizzy on and off again today, like I said earlier, and I feel really really exhausted - pregnant exhausted, or about to get my period exhausted.
It hurt to breastfeed the little two at bedtime, and I have just feel very irritable and moody this evening too. Pre-menstrual, sort of, but I strongly suspect it's actually down to pregnancy hormones, such as it has been at this kind of stage in previous pregnancies (and I've always wondered about PMS then too!).
What else? I'm really bloated, as yesterday (and pretty much the day before too, now I think about it). I am also "gassy" in the chartable sense - which is an absolute pregnancy symptom for me, in each and every pregnancy (chemical and not), in my luteal phase. Lovely! ;)
I can't think what else... and I'm really tired out so I am starting to feel a bit woozy and not think too clearly. I'm feeling optimistic and excited about temping in the morning - quite excited to go to bed just because it means the morning will come soon! :) But I'm also slightly wary of being optimistic, because I very easily COULD find that my temp drops, pregnant or not, and I start to bleed. It has happened so many times now, even with a beautiful chart full of obviously pregnant rising temps, or temps that have plateaued out at a high level. Still it can plummet without much warning, and then it's over and done with. This time I don't know what it is... I feel terribly attached already, to the possibility of this particular little one. I don't even know why that should be. It won't have any bearing on whether or not this particular little one stays with me or not, but I think it will have a big impact on my feelings this time if this little one doesn't "stick". I normally just think, "Ah well!" and know that God knows best. This time I just SO want this baby - the feeling has taken me by surprise and just come from nowhere, and I'm trying to mentally chant in the background, "God knows best, God knows best, God knows best..." to keep me focused on what's actually important, not what *I* want. But this time, for some inexplicable reason, it is more difficult. I don't even have confirmation that he/she is even there, but I love this baby so much. I feel really vulnerable even writing about it, without that security of a stick in my hand with two lines on it. It could all crumble away to nothingness tomorrow...
Neil is also sure I'm pregnant. He says he just knows I am. The boys continue to talk about "what we'll call the next baby!" and I found Neil at the computer this evening looking at 15 passenger vans!! :) I keep being distracted by the thought that I might be on my journey to have my 7th, seventh, sev-enth baby!!! Six I had hoped for and longed for, prayed for, even, since I was 6-years-old. Six I had dared to expect, in the last couple of years. But seven? Beyond my heart's desire? Could God - would God really actually be that generous to me? I can't stop thinking about it, and breathlessly asking myself that question. I can't believe He would really bless me that much! More than I ever asked for, even though I asked for quite a generous blessing in the first place! Me - the mother of seven children?! I feel slightly in disbelief that that person could actually be me! And I'm not - yet. Not until I know for sure that I am pregnant. But it feels so close... I can almost touch it. Such a generous and loving God! Now, God also knows that the desire of my heart is to have a daughter, but if He chooses not to give me a daughter, then who am I to complain at him and bemoan the fact that he has given me alllllll these sons!!! "Sons are a heritage from the Lord", says the Bible, and I believe it! :)
I will have to just wait and see. I expect my temperature to be high, still, even if it's a bit lower than today. A big drop would surprise and disappoint me, but I think I would still test all the same. I have 4 tests left. I will definitely use one tomorrow, whatever my temp is.
Thanks so much for keeping up with me and for your lovely excited comments! :) I really love reading them, and I feel kind of surrounded by friends in my journey which is lovely! I will update tomorrow as soon as I can, re. my temp and test. I'll update my chart as well. Back tomorrow! :)
So I am now 8 days past ovulation, which is when my temperature had dropped and spotting/bleeding started last cycle, even though a pregnancy had started. This time things look pretty good at 8DPO! :)
My temperature went up yesterday morning, at 7DPO, significantly enough for me to think, "Oooooh!", and I had more "bad" cramps - the type I only get when pregnant. So I did the sort of thing that's perfectly normal for Crazy Obsesso-Woman (she's baaaack, haha!), and peed on a stick! At 7DPO! lol! Ah, I know, I know. Of course it was negative - really negative, and I still have last cycle's test sticks, so it was comforting all over again to compare yesterday's test with those, and see again that there really was a positive result last cycle.
So, 7DPO, negative test. I had a really busy day yesterday. After my long email to Heather, she wanted to talk about some of the things in it properly, so Neil (marvellously!) looked after all 6 boys while I went and met Heather in a cafe, and we sat on a comfy sofa with cups of tea and talked for THREE HOURS!!! :-O A lot of it was really serious stuff related to me needing to DO certain stuff related to getting social services off our backs, etc. And some of it was just uncomfortable for me to talk about. Heather thinks I should consider the likelihood that I am suffering from depression, and that considering medication might be a worthwhile thing. I have nothing against the condition, or people who suffer from it, but I have such a BIG personal issue with ME suffering from depression (long and complicated past history), that I really really REALLY don't want to go there - to think that I'm going down that road again. Ugh. I have been on medication for depression before, and do not want to again. I have nothing against anyone who does, or againt anti-depressants in general, but I. don't. want. it. for me! :( I don't know why, I just don't. I just think everything will be alright in the end, or else I want to pretend it will, but Heather thinks I am maybe burying my head in the sand, and that I will need to take action on it in some way for it to get better. I still hope she's wrong...
Anyway. We discussed a lot of tough subjects, and none of it was awful or stern, just uncomfortable subjects, but with the world's best listener and "sorter" - she is so resourceful and thoughtful on ways to help, and gives so lovingly and generously of herself in the solutions she thinks of. There's too much to list here, and this entry isn't really about that, but I'm just making note as I likely won't make note of it anywhere else. Also to note that the morning utterly and completely wiped me out. I think it was the emotional aspect (not that I got teary or anything, just... it was uncomfortable) or something, and the length of time. In the last 15 minutes or so I started to feel kind of unwell, as though I was too tired in my head to take any more. I felt dizzy and started to feel a bit nauseous with it too, and then I came home. Elijah took a nap and Neil took the other 5 boys out to the park, while I prepared school for the week ahead, photocopied worksheets, etc. (yes, I own a photocopier. One of my best school-related buys ever!) and looked up a few of the things Heather had suggested. I had a headache and felt really tired but I needed to get school prepared. I had put the dizziness down to tiredness, but actually I noticed some the day before - just little moments here and there throughout the day - and yesterday I continued to have the odd dizzy spell right up to the end of the day. I kept feeling somewhat in denial that it could possibly be an early pregnancy symptom, even though it IS, for me, often. I just thought that if I was as tired as I was, dizziness like that was to be expected. I have changed my mind today, because I'm still feeling totally exhausted, and having more dizzy spells too. I think they are early pregnancy symptoms, to be honest.
What else at 7DPO? I should update every day, otherwise I have to remember the other days' stuff as well, and then it's not so relevant in any case, but I need it for the full picture. I will definitely update daily from now on, until I have some news (of either sort).
The busy day (well, busy for me!) continued with a fantastic evening at church, especially for ladies! :) Heather bought us both tickets weeks ago (isn't she wonderful?!) and I left my excellent husband to put all six boys to bed, and spent 3 hours of the evening with 250 ladies, being entertained (oh I actually cried running tears during the stand up comedy section! I was so glad I had been to the loo in the interval, lol!), drinking wine (well, I only had 1/3 of glass before I started to feel a bit weird and dizzy, so I stopped then), eating incredibly yummy cupcakes, and generally having a wonderful time. It was run by World Vision, so the emphasis was on the desperate need for sponsors for needy children. I have sponsored an 8-year-old boy in Uganda. It will be wonderful for my boys, and possibly life-saving for him.
I was quite crampy on and off through the day. I definitely needed to chart "bad cramps" because it was bad enough to make me distracted at both the cafe AND even during the entertainment in the evening, so that's noteworthy. The sensation was a sort of crampiness inside my pubic bone/hip area (an inch above) on one side or the other, but mostly on my right side.
I also felt that I could possibly chart frequent urination yesterday (and today is the same), but only because of needing to wee a bit more than I usually do, and feel quite urgent and seem to have a lot to wee when I do, despite not drinking enough fluids. I don't have any UTI symptoms.
Otherwise I was feeling quite neutral yesterday, in terms of whether I felt like I was really FEELING pregnant or not. I began to THINK I was. Oh but I did have the same tender breasts symptom that I charted the day before. I had noticed that I hadn't yet felt what I usually do when in early pregnancy - really sore "flashes" of stabby pains. This was just achy and sore, which I can get before periods too. I don't get the flashy pains normally, before periods. Anyway, yesterday afternoon I had some flashy pains!!! I was really excited! :)
So, 8DPO - today! :)
At 4.30am, I woke up because Elijah did, and was PAINFULLY, burningly hungry! I also really really needed a wee, but didn't do anything about either, partly because I had no opportunity, and partly because I wanted to save the wee for a test if my temp stayed up! ;)
I was so excited, but not at all surprised, to get my highest temp yet this cycle!! :D That's a reeeeeeally good sign for me at this stage. I really feel pregnant today - I both think it, and feel it. And the temp was really encouraging. 36.8*c is a temp I don't usually reach on non-pregnant cycles. I mean, I CAN and sometimes do, and a good pregnancy sign for me is getting to 36.9, or a SURE sign is 37.0. I have never reached that unless pregnant, and when pregnant I ALWAYS do, eventually, in my LP. But 36.8 is pretty stonking. I know it can go either way still, but I am sure now that I am pregnant, and just hoping it doesn't end in a chemical pregnancy, as I would love an October baby, and not to have to get into the hassle of Heather starting all her craft fairs from the end of October to just before Christmas (where she would be unavailable to be at the birth as my doula - can't even imagine!!! :( ). I would also just love not to lose this baby...
So of course I tested! ;) The test was negative, though I wondered if mayyyyyyybe there might be the slightest shadow where a line is supposed to be, compared with the day before. But I honestly could well have been seeing things, so I am not putting anything on that. It's definitely a negative test. At only 8DPO, that is not too surprising. I think the earliest I had a proper positive test has been 9DPO, but sometimes I've had a faint line at 10DPO and nothing at 9DPO (once? I can't remember if more than once). Anyway.
So, today I have had plentiful nagging aches and pains around, to the side, and above my pubic bone - mostly on my right side. Sometimes it's like a boring pain. It's actually just started again as I'm writing this. It bothers me every time I'm lying down breastfeeding, but it's not a constant pain at all. It feels similar to cramps, but just not. I also had a moment this afternoon when I was breastfeeding Elijah for his nap, that I started to feel an increasing pressure, like a wave of proper bearing-down type cramps - those felt very much like my period was starting. I have been checking quite a few times today, because sometimes it felt like it was starting, but it never was. No spotting at all, though I have been scrutinising my underwear, lol! I do have the same CM as I mentioned before, still.
Today I asked Neil to check my face (he has always been my chief tester for this particular pregnancy sign, and is very experienced at knowing the difference between normal-soft and pregnant-soft, hehe!), and he stroked my cheek, and had barely touched it when he said, "Yep!" :) Definitely "weirdly soft skin" - as I chart it! I only ever (EVER) get that when pregnant, and usually from about 8, 9 or 10DPO. There isn't another possible explanation for that one! :) I am sure sure SURE that I am pregnant. :)
I am hungrier than usual, and the main thing about it is that I'm suddenly URGENTLY hungry, seemingly out of nowhere, and I MUST eat or else my tummy hurts and I feel weird. I have also been dizzy on and off again today, like I said earlier, and I feel really really exhausted - pregnant exhausted, or about to get my period exhausted.
It hurt to breastfeed the little two at bedtime, and I have just feel very irritable and moody this evening too. Pre-menstrual, sort of, but I strongly suspect it's actually down to pregnancy hormones, such as it has been at this kind of stage in previous pregnancies (and I've always wondered about PMS then too!).
What else? I'm really bloated, as yesterday (and pretty much the day before too, now I think about it). I am also "gassy" in the chartable sense - which is an absolute pregnancy symptom for me, in each and every pregnancy (chemical and not), in my luteal phase. Lovely! ;)
I can't think what else... and I'm really tired out so I am starting to feel a bit woozy and not think too clearly. I'm feeling optimistic and excited about temping in the morning - quite excited to go to bed just because it means the morning will come soon! :) But I'm also slightly wary of being optimistic, because I very easily COULD find that my temp drops, pregnant or not, and I start to bleed. It has happened so many times now, even with a beautiful chart full of obviously pregnant rising temps, or temps that have plateaued out at a high level. Still it can plummet without much warning, and then it's over and done with. This time I don't know what it is... I feel terribly attached already, to the possibility of this particular little one. I don't even know why that should be. It won't have any bearing on whether or not this particular little one stays with me or not, but I think it will have a big impact on my feelings this time if this little one doesn't "stick". I normally just think, "Ah well!" and know that God knows best. This time I just SO want this baby - the feeling has taken me by surprise and just come from nowhere, and I'm trying to mentally chant in the background, "God knows best, God knows best, God knows best..." to keep me focused on what's actually important, not what *I* want. But this time, for some inexplicable reason, it is more difficult. I don't even have confirmation that he/she is even there, but I love this baby so much. I feel really vulnerable even writing about it, without that security of a stick in my hand with two lines on it. It could all crumble away to nothingness tomorrow...
Neil is also sure I'm pregnant. He says he just knows I am. The boys continue to talk about "what we'll call the next baby!" and I found Neil at the computer this evening looking at 15 passenger vans!! :) I keep being distracted by the thought that I might be on my journey to have my 7th, seventh, sev-enth baby!!! Six I had hoped for and longed for, prayed for, even, since I was 6-years-old. Six I had dared to expect, in the last couple of years. But seven? Beyond my heart's desire? Could God - would God really actually be that generous to me? I can't stop thinking about it, and breathlessly asking myself that question. I can't believe He would really bless me that much! More than I ever asked for, even though I asked for quite a generous blessing in the first place! Me - the mother of seven children?! I feel slightly in disbelief that that person could actually be me! And I'm not - yet. Not until I know for sure that I am pregnant. But it feels so close... I can almost touch it. Such a generous and loving God! Now, God also knows that the desire of my heart is to have a daughter, but if He chooses not to give me a daughter, then who am I to complain at him and bemoan the fact that he has given me alllllll these sons!!! "Sons are a heritage from the Lord", says the Bible, and I believe it! :)
I will have to just wait and see. I expect my temperature to be high, still, even if it's a bit lower than today. A big drop would surprise and disappoint me, but I think I would still test all the same. I have 4 tests left. I will definitely use one tomorrow, whatever my temp is.
Thanks so much for keeping up with me and for your lovely excited comments! :) I really love reading them, and I feel kind of surrounded by friends in my journey which is lovely! I will update tomorrow as soon as I can, re. my temp and test. I'll update my chart as well. Back tomorrow! :)
Friday, February 1, 2013
6DPO
Just an update on how this cycle is progressing.
I am 6 days past ovulation today and feeling pretty neutral, physically - neither pregnant nor like a period is coming. It's a weird sort of calm-before-the-storm feeling, and I'm not sure what to make of it!
My temp, which shot up the last time I updated at 4DPO, dropped down a bit the next day, and today was pretty much the same temp (I use a fertility thermometer which has two decimal places, and today's was 0.02 degrees lower - basically nothing). I am just waiting to see what happens tomorrow with that, and I'm unsure what to expect. Maybe it'll drop lower and I'll get my period over the weekend sometime. Or maybe it'll be similar to today's again. Or go up? I will just have to wait and see.
I am having a lot of "different" CM this cycle, since ovulating. I actually went back and changed the last day that I'd charted EWCM - because I am not sure I was right about that. It's continuing the same but it's not true EWCM. Not fertile CM, but certainly different from what I'm used to in my luteal phase. It's sort of like at the end of pregnancy when I lose little bits of my mucus plug (not the proper "show") - sorry for the detail! ;)
Um, what else?....
I have been pretty crampy - that's worth noting. Mild cramps mainly, but I have also had some odd discomfort above my pubic bone - different places at different times, too. Sort of a pully/pressy achy feeling - not like a bruise, mostly like a crampy sensation, but not exactly cramps... I can't really put my finger on it. It's been there since 3DPO, on and off, and when it has been bothersome enough to distract me, I've wondered if maybe there's something up with my bladder/urine, but I think that's all fine. It goes through to my lower back. I've had quite a lot of low backache, and just a low pressure sensation front and centre as well. Such vague feelings, and I can't believe I've had so many pregnancies and I'm still going, "Hmmm, I'm not sure what to make of this....", lol! Today and the day before yesterday (4DPO), I have even charted "bad cramps" very tentatively, because the crampy sensation was actually proper sore. When I went to bed that night at 4DPO, I felt crampy like a period was starting maybe. So for me, that is not my usual mild cramps, and I show that difference by charting them as "bad cramps". Today I have had the same (not yesterday though). I second guess myself a lot and wonder if I've just "tweaked" some muscle or ligament in my pelvic region, or something daft like that! ;) But I don't know. It's bothering me now even, all of my lower back, but deep, not surface muscles, and above my pubic bone about 1 inch on my right side. I have only ever charted "bad cramps" (as I've probably said a zillion times over the years, lol!) when I am pregnant, even if it's a chemical pregnancy in the end. I haven't ever had bad cramps in my luteal phase when I am not pregnant. Ever. Once I thought I was wrong for the first time ever - I had bad cramps, felt sure it must mean pregnancy, and then got my period and pretty much said, "Ah well! There's a first time for everything!" thinking that I had finally been proven wrong on the "I only get bad cramps when I'm pregnant" thing. And then I discovered Elijah was on the way a couple of weeks later! ;)
Soooo, going by that, I would say the cramps are pretty self-explanatory and they make me feel pretty confident that they are implantation cramps! :) I am trying not to get overly excited about it because I have had too many occasions where that implantation never got finished because of a short luteal phase, and it could happen the same way this time. I was driving to an appointment this afternoon, and thinking about it as I went along, and I thought that surely it was too early anyway at 8 months PP, for my luteal phase to be likely to sustain a pregnancy. I'm not sure why it escaped my mind that my last two babies were conceived at 8 months PP! I also thought that because my LP was only 7 days long, the LP in my next cycle would surely not be long enough yet. But then I checked my chart this evening and saw that the cycle before Elijah was conceived had a 6 day LP. So, I guess anything is possible! :)
Today's appointment was a follow-up with the stone clinic at the hospital - after my kidney stone in July 2011. The consultant is going to discharge me back to my GP if an ultrasound and X-ray of my bladder and kidneys shows me to be stone-free at the moment. I have a greater chance of developing kidney stones now that I've had one in the past (whoop. dee doo.). So today was my appointment for those tests. I had the ultrasound which took aaaaages, and I'm so thrilled that they didn't find any stones even though they searched for ages! :) Small stones can't be seen on ultrasound so there might be some of those, but hopefully not, and they're small enough so that they pass without causing trouble, apparently. Anyway, I knew that I shouldn't have an X-ray if I'm pregnant, and I'd googled this week to check if that was true of very early pregnancy. It is. So when they said that I would be going for an X-ray next, I said, "Hmmm, I might possibly be pregnant...." and they said that they have pregnancy tests if I needed to find out. I told them that I was only a week past ovulation, and they said that I had better hold onto the request form and make an appointment for an X-ray at least 10 days after my period starts. If it doesn't start, then obviously I wait until after the baby is born. But if it does, they have a rule of waiting 10 days, and no parsnips are allowed from the start of that cycle until after the X-ray. The hospital is brilliant and it turned out that I could attend a walk-in X-ray clinic (!!!) at my own convenience, any day of the week or at the weekend, so long as I have the request form. I would have loved to find out once and for all today whether I have any kidney stones at all, but I feel happy to have made the decision for the wellbeing of my tiny tiny little baby (if that tiny tiny little baby is in there). Even if I am pregnant and lose this little one, I will feel like I have made a decision on something for him/her - something I planned to do was changed for that baby's sake, and that makes the baby all the more real somehow, even if I end up with a chemical pregnancy again. I will be able to think, "Oh remember when I declined that X-ray because of the baby?" That feels comforting. Because I have no idea whether I will get to keep this little one (and I guess by the way I'm apparently writing, I do feel like I am carrying one, then...), being able to think of something tangible like that will make that baby permanently real to me.
Anyway. So I haven't had an X-ray yet, and maybe I won't?! ;) I can't tell anyone why I haven't had it, so I'm hoping nobody asks, or else just not mentioning much about my appointment to family, etc!
The doctor who did my ultrasound was so lovely. She said, "Aw, will it be your first?" lol! I NEVER get tired of these moments, hehehe! I told her that I have six children, and she looked rather shocked, haha!! :)
Well let's see... what else? I have had some breast tenderness since 4DPO. A sort of bruised feeling that throbs, and comes and goes, not the usual tenderness, but not the flashing pain that I often get in early pregnancy either. It's not there all the time, and it's not all that bothersome, but I'm making note of it all the same, for future reference.
I am charting increased appetite today, not that I'm ravenous before meals are due or anything, but because for breakfast I had 4 waffles, butter and maple syrup, and then for lunch I ate a load of leftover chicken pasta bake and a sandwich (!), and then for dinner I ate a huge plateful of salmon in white wine sauce, pasta and vegetables! And THEN put away a slice of chocolate brownie cheesecake. Oh yes. And that doesn't include snacks (of which there have been quite a few. *cough*) I have been hungry before all my meals, but not painfully or long before they're due. I have had a lower than usual appetite for the past few days, so this is a huge contrast. I'm also much more thirsty today than I have been, even though I'm drinking more today.
I have had the strangest feeling through the middle part of the day today. I kept needing to go and check whether or not my period was starting. I kept feeling sort of leaky, and with a crampy sensation which made me feel SURE I was starting my period, so I would go and check or wipe, and of course there was no blood. That's something that I remember from early on in my pregnancies, but I can't remember whether or not I also found that it happened sometimes when I wasn't pregnant too.
I think that's it really. Oh but yesterday afternoon, Matthew randomly made a suggestion for what we could call the next baby while he was in my tummy! And today - completely out of nowhere - Nathan did the same thing, and Matthew overheard him, and the two of them started coming up with suggestions (sillier and sillier as time went on, I might add!), until Arthur joined in as well. Arthur has been actually pestering me to pee on sticks, and asking when a new baby would be in my tummy, etc. for some months! Today while they were discussing names, he suddenly said, "Mummy, do you have a new baby in your tummy now?" and I told him that I couldn't answer his question, because I didn't know the answer at the moment. He said, "You could wee on one of those sticks..." and I told him that was a decision between Mummy and Daddy! I don't want him to know "early" before I'm ready to tell them, when I get pregnant. I want to announce it, and probably not the day I test positive either. I want to be a bit creative with them, if I can, because the older ones are old enough to appreciate a bit of cryptic excitement now! ;) We'll see. I think I managed to throw him off the scent anyway. I love that they're suddenly asking random pregnancy-related things, since yesterday! :)
The only other thing of note is that I have been feeling really quite depressed and unhappy this week. Heather emailed me to ask for an update on the social services situation (she's a great support), and I did update her, and then ended up sending her a separate (very long!) email just spilling out my entiiiiire heart on everything. She emailed me back with lots of love and encouragement, and some suggestions, and said we need to chat face-to-face about some of the things I told her about in my email. So tomorrow morning I am meeting her for coffee somewhere (Neil is looking after the boys, including little 'Lijah!) while I do that. Nervous, but reliiiieved to have a wonderful friend to really talk to over things that are overwhelming me. Our church has a special event on for ladies tomorrow evening as well, and Heather bought us both tickets to go! Wine, music, laughs, chocolate - sounds wonderful! :) Have I mentioned lately that I love love love Heather completely?!! :)
So, I will see what my temp does in the morning, and hopefully if I'm going to get my period it will wait until a convenient time like Sunday afternoon, lol! I will keep my chart updated even if I haven't updated here, but I'll aim to update here soon as well.
Ella, if I am pregnant, I will be due October 19th! :)
I am 6 days past ovulation today and feeling pretty neutral, physically - neither pregnant nor like a period is coming. It's a weird sort of calm-before-the-storm feeling, and I'm not sure what to make of it!
My temp, which shot up the last time I updated at 4DPO, dropped down a bit the next day, and today was pretty much the same temp (I use a fertility thermometer which has two decimal places, and today's was 0.02 degrees lower - basically nothing). I am just waiting to see what happens tomorrow with that, and I'm unsure what to expect. Maybe it'll drop lower and I'll get my period over the weekend sometime. Or maybe it'll be similar to today's again. Or go up? I will just have to wait and see.
I am having a lot of "different" CM this cycle, since ovulating. I actually went back and changed the last day that I'd charted EWCM - because I am not sure I was right about that. It's continuing the same but it's not true EWCM. Not fertile CM, but certainly different from what I'm used to in my luteal phase. It's sort of like at the end of pregnancy when I lose little bits of my mucus plug (not the proper "show") - sorry for the detail! ;)
Um, what else?....
I have been pretty crampy - that's worth noting. Mild cramps mainly, but I have also had some odd discomfort above my pubic bone - different places at different times, too. Sort of a pully/pressy achy feeling - not like a bruise, mostly like a crampy sensation, but not exactly cramps... I can't really put my finger on it. It's been there since 3DPO, on and off, and when it has been bothersome enough to distract me, I've wondered if maybe there's something up with my bladder/urine, but I think that's all fine. It goes through to my lower back. I've had quite a lot of low backache, and just a low pressure sensation front and centre as well. Such vague feelings, and I can't believe I've had so many pregnancies and I'm still going, "Hmmm, I'm not sure what to make of this....", lol! Today and the day before yesterday (4DPO), I have even charted "bad cramps" very tentatively, because the crampy sensation was actually proper sore. When I went to bed that night at 4DPO, I felt crampy like a period was starting maybe. So for me, that is not my usual mild cramps, and I show that difference by charting them as "bad cramps". Today I have had the same (not yesterday though). I second guess myself a lot and wonder if I've just "tweaked" some muscle or ligament in my pelvic region, or something daft like that! ;) But I don't know. It's bothering me now even, all of my lower back, but deep, not surface muscles, and above my pubic bone about 1 inch on my right side. I have only ever charted "bad cramps" (as I've probably said a zillion times over the years, lol!) when I am pregnant, even if it's a chemical pregnancy in the end. I haven't ever had bad cramps in my luteal phase when I am not pregnant. Ever. Once I thought I was wrong for the first time ever - I had bad cramps, felt sure it must mean pregnancy, and then got my period and pretty much said, "Ah well! There's a first time for everything!" thinking that I had finally been proven wrong on the "I only get bad cramps when I'm pregnant" thing. And then I discovered Elijah was on the way a couple of weeks later! ;)
Soooo, going by that, I would say the cramps are pretty self-explanatory and they make me feel pretty confident that they are implantation cramps! :) I am trying not to get overly excited about it because I have had too many occasions where that implantation never got finished because of a short luteal phase, and it could happen the same way this time. I was driving to an appointment this afternoon, and thinking about it as I went along, and I thought that surely it was too early anyway at 8 months PP, for my luteal phase to be likely to sustain a pregnancy. I'm not sure why it escaped my mind that my last two babies were conceived at 8 months PP! I also thought that because my LP was only 7 days long, the LP in my next cycle would surely not be long enough yet. But then I checked my chart this evening and saw that the cycle before Elijah was conceived had a 6 day LP. So, I guess anything is possible! :)
Today's appointment was a follow-up with the stone clinic at the hospital - after my kidney stone in July 2011. The consultant is going to discharge me back to my GP if an ultrasound and X-ray of my bladder and kidneys shows me to be stone-free at the moment. I have a greater chance of developing kidney stones now that I've had one in the past (whoop. dee doo.). So today was my appointment for those tests. I had the ultrasound which took aaaaages, and I'm so thrilled that they didn't find any stones even though they searched for ages! :) Small stones can't be seen on ultrasound so there might be some of those, but hopefully not, and they're small enough so that they pass without causing trouble, apparently. Anyway, I knew that I shouldn't have an X-ray if I'm pregnant, and I'd googled this week to check if that was true of very early pregnancy. It is. So when they said that I would be going for an X-ray next, I said, "Hmmm, I might possibly be pregnant...." and they said that they have pregnancy tests if I needed to find out. I told them that I was only a week past ovulation, and they said that I had better hold onto the request form and make an appointment for an X-ray at least 10 days after my period starts. If it doesn't start, then obviously I wait until after the baby is born. But if it does, they have a rule of waiting 10 days, and no parsnips are allowed from the start of that cycle until after the X-ray. The hospital is brilliant and it turned out that I could attend a walk-in X-ray clinic (!!!) at my own convenience, any day of the week or at the weekend, so long as I have the request form. I would have loved to find out once and for all today whether I have any kidney stones at all, but I feel happy to have made the decision for the wellbeing of my tiny tiny little baby (if that tiny tiny little baby is in there). Even if I am pregnant and lose this little one, I will feel like I have made a decision on something for him/her - something I planned to do was changed for that baby's sake, and that makes the baby all the more real somehow, even if I end up with a chemical pregnancy again. I will be able to think, "Oh remember when I declined that X-ray because of the baby?" That feels comforting. Because I have no idea whether I will get to keep this little one (and I guess by the way I'm apparently writing, I do feel like I am carrying one, then...), being able to think of something tangible like that will make that baby permanently real to me.
Anyway. So I haven't had an X-ray yet, and maybe I won't?! ;) I can't tell anyone why I haven't had it, so I'm hoping nobody asks, or else just not mentioning much about my appointment to family, etc!
The doctor who did my ultrasound was so lovely. She said, "Aw, will it be your first?" lol! I NEVER get tired of these moments, hehehe! I told her that I have six children, and she looked rather shocked, haha!! :)
Well let's see... what else? I have had some breast tenderness since 4DPO. A sort of bruised feeling that throbs, and comes and goes, not the usual tenderness, but not the flashing pain that I often get in early pregnancy either. It's not there all the time, and it's not all that bothersome, but I'm making note of it all the same, for future reference.
I am charting increased appetite today, not that I'm ravenous before meals are due or anything, but because for breakfast I had 4 waffles, butter and maple syrup, and then for lunch I ate a load of leftover chicken pasta bake and a sandwich (!), and then for dinner I ate a huge plateful of salmon in white wine sauce, pasta and vegetables! And THEN put away a slice of chocolate brownie cheesecake. Oh yes. And that doesn't include snacks (of which there have been quite a few. *cough*) I have been hungry before all my meals, but not painfully or long before they're due. I have had a lower than usual appetite for the past few days, so this is a huge contrast. I'm also much more thirsty today than I have been, even though I'm drinking more today.
I have had the strangest feeling through the middle part of the day today. I kept needing to go and check whether or not my period was starting. I kept feeling sort of leaky, and with a crampy sensation which made me feel SURE I was starting my period, so I would go and check or wipe, and of course there was no blood. That's something that I remember from early on in my pregnancies, but I can't remember whether or not I also found that it happened sometimes when I wasn't pregnant too.
I think that's it really. Oh but yesterday afternoon, Matthew randomly made a suggestion for what we could call the next baby while he was in my tummy! And today - completely out of nowhere - Nathan did the same thing, and Matthew overheard him, and the two of them started coming up with suggestions (sillier and sillier as time went on, I might add!), until Arthur joined in as well. Arthur has been actually pestering me to pee on sticks, and asking when a new baby would be in my tummy, etc. for some months! Today while they were discussing names, he suddenly said, "Mummy, do you have a new baby in your tummy now?" and I told him that I couldn't answer his question, because I didn't know the answer at the moment. He said, "You could wee on one of those sticks..." and I told him that was a decision between Mummy and Daddy! I don't want him to know "early" before I'm ready to tell them, when I get pregnant. I want to announce it, and probably not the day I test positive either. I want to be a bit creative with them, if I can, because the older ones are old enough to appreciate a bit of cryptic excitement now! ;) We'll see. I think I managed to throw him off the scent anyway. I love that they're suddenly asking random pregnancy-related things, since yesterday! :)
The only other thing of note is that I have been feeling really quite depressed and unhappy this week. Heather emailed me to ask for an update on the social services situation (she's a great support), and I did update her, and then ended up sending her a separate (very long!) email just spilling out my entiiiiire heart on everything. She emailed me back with lots of love and encouragement, and some suggestions, and said we need to chat face-to-face about some of the things I told her about in my email. So tomorrow morning I am meeting her for coffee somewhere (Neil is looking after the boys, including little 'Lijah!) while I do that. Nervous, but reliiiieved to have a wonderful friend to really talk to over things that are overwhelming me. Our church has a special event on for ladies tomorrow evening as well, and Heather bought us both tickets to go! Wine, music, laughs, chocolate - sounds wonderful! :) Have I mentioned lately that I love love love Heather completely?!! :)
So, I will see what my temp does in the morning, and hopefully if I'm going to get my period it will wait until a convenient time like Sunday afternoon, lol! I will keep my chart updated even if I haven't updated here, but I'll aim to update here soon as well.
Ella, if I am pregnant, I will be due October 19th! :)
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