Sixth baby

I've kind of neglected my pregnancy as far as blogging about it goes. I know it's the sixth, but it's so special to me. And since this is my place to document family events, I wanted to update the pregnancy stats thus far.

I didn't begin documenting the belly until about 12 weeks. I didn't even plan on doing it this particular day, but as I was getting ready for work, I took a look in the mirror and saw the pooch. Thankfully, this one is a baby pooch and not just a "I've had lotsa babies" pooch. But that'll rear it's ugly head in a few months, too.

Here I am at about 15 weeks. I am horrible at keeping track of what week I was in a photo, but I'm just making guesses based on the date attached to the photo.

This is a new maternity shirt. I haven't been a preggo in the summertime for five years. My last two pregnancies were mostly in the winter, so I was in need of some new clothes (that fit). My mom blessed me with a shopping trip to Motherhood where she bought me several new shirts, a skirt, a few pair of capris, and a trusty pair of jeans. I'm so very grateful because at this stage, I could no longer wear my regular jeans comfortably.

17 Weeks brought me such a bad stomach. I don't believe it's heartburn--though I'm not sure I've truly experienced it before--but this feels like it's all in my stomach. I have a feeling it's starting to get a little squished and pushed on, so that is probably why I'm experiencing such awful feelings. Luckily, about five minutes after I pop four Tums I'm feeling much better. I'm just glad it doesn't linger.

This is between 17 and 18 weeks on Easter day. I bought this dress two years ago when I was losing weight and wanted to be a little more bold in my clothing choices. Well, I pulled the tags off on Easter this year--I didn't ever wear this in the past two years because I found out I was pregnant right after I bought this dress. But I figured if there's ever a time to flaunt curves it's when your halfway through your sixth pregnancy!

Finally, 18 weeks. I am sporting new clothes again {SMILE}. Matt and I are wanting to do something different for finding out the sex of our baby. Originally, we wanted to have a delivery room surprise, but then I thought about a gender reveal party. Ironically enough, my friend approached me about having a GRP at Mops two days later. I figured that was my sign! So I'm thinking that's the direction we'll go. I just don't know how it'll work out because I don't want to know until the surprise is revealed at the party. I love the idea of celebrating this new life. I've had showers, "make something for the baby" parties, and a sip and see that was more like an eat and see, so it'll be fun to celebrate our baby with a new kind of party. Ideas welcome!

Close to 18.5 weeks--My jeans are maternity but my KU shirt is obviously not. I've said for a while now that I feel like my first and second trimesters were reversed. The whole first trimester really wasn't that bad--especially when I compare it to all of my previous 5. I held down two jobs, five kids and a house during the first 13 weeks. In all of my previous pregnancies I was exhausted and sick. I missed events all the time due to how I felt. This pregnancy though, has been rather smooth.... until the second trimester. The exhaustion kicked into high gear, the stomach problems came on, I already feel too much pressure when I stand, my head aches about 4 days a week (sometimes awfully bad), and I have spells where my heart races and makes me feel like I want to pass out. Oh, and my feet swell---and it's not even summer yet. I'm in for it, I'm sure.

19 weeks has been pretty good to me. Except for today--it's the first time I ever got sick due to what I think is the pregnancy. Nobody else is sick and I don't have a fever, so I'm assuming baby didn't like my tea this morning. I saw the doctor at 9, 13 and 17 weeks. At our next appointment I'll be 21 weeks exactly--and this is also the sono appointment. I plan on having the tech write the gender down on a piece of paper--what we'll do with that paper is somewhat up int he air. But I'm hoping it will be shown to only one person who will keep it a secret and help us reveal it to family and friends at a party.

So far I haven't had any real cravings. I've had more aversions than cravings I suppose. And my aversions are to anything that isn't white or carb-loaded. I can pretty much always eat bread or noodles. And what's crazy is I don't really eat white foods--I buy whole wheat bread, pasta and tortillas and brown rice--I just don't really care for the white variety and it's not that good for the body. But for some reason I can't seem to stop thinking about big pretzels and marinara sauce--pizza will do the trick too, but I usually don't want the accompanying grease and cheese.

Nothing major has happened related to the pregnancy. The doctor did test my thyroid due to a hunch about what happens to me after I give birth. My TSH came back low, but my T3 and T4 were normal. So they're doing nothing for now and will retest me after I have this baby (that's when the symptoms start).

This baby did give me a scare at our first two appointments when we couldn't find the heartbeat. Due to this, I did get two sonograms--one at 9 and one at 13 weeks. Turns out the placenta is posterior (?) meaning it is in front of the baby, thus blocking the thumping noise I wanted to hear so badly. But both times we did see the heart flutter on the screen. At 17 weeks I did get to hear it with the doppler and it was in the 140s--which I don't interpret that as anything. I've heard of several mispredictions about gender based upon the heart rate.

I'll check back in with the pregnancy soon--and hopefully I'll stay on top of the growing belly and preggo facts.