This Really is the Last Time, I swear.

So tomorrow I will be 32 weeks pregnant and I know it is supposed to feel like I'm in the home stretch, but another 8 weeks of this sounds awful. Stupid hot weather and disrupted sleep. We did get good news at my doctor's appointment yesterday - the baby is head down! This was not expected. My first child was breech and so we were kind of expecting this one to give me a hard time, too. I really don't want another c-section, but I would do it if I had to. At least this time I would know what to expect! My doctor is 100% on board for me to VBAC, though, so hopefully this baby stays head down. There is still enough room for her to flip back up, but let's hope she doesn't.  School starts back up in 6 weeks and they tried to schedule me for clinicals the week I am due! When I got that email I was super stressed so I called my mom and she laughed. Of course they scheduled my clinicals for the week I'm due. WHEN ELSE WOULD THEY SCHEDULE THEM? I know they will be sw...

Today I get to do the dreaded fasting glucose test . With my last pregnancy, I remember that I was SO AFRAID of this test because of all the awful things I had heard about it. And then it ended up being not totally horrible. I even woke up early today so that I could eat breakfast before I started my 2 hour fasting. Today is also the day I get to meet my new OBGYN. We moved to a new area at the end of last month it was just no longer feasible to see my existing OB, so I had to switch. I really, really liked my old OBGYN, so I hope this new doctor measures up.

Well, I'm still pregnant... so that's a plus. But I'm starting to experience what I call "belly fatigue". My stomach muscles are getting tired earlier in the day. For example, it's 9:50am and my belly is starting to wear out. I don't remember this happening with my last pregnancy. It's not painful, but it is uncomfortable and I'm not sure what to do about it. I Googled it and I can't really find much on it. Oh, well.... par for the course, I suppose.

They say 20 weeks is halfway through pregnancy, but I call bullshit on that because technically the first two weeks of pregnancy are freebies. I will consider myself halfway done when I get past my 22nd week and have only 18 weeks left. I'm still in shock I've made it this far. I'm now wearing maternity clothes and I have gained about 11-ish pounds, which is apparently right on track despite the fact I feel like a whale most nights. I should probably invest in a couple more pairs of Gap Body maternity leggings because the Old Navy ones just don't fit me correctly. Also, my placenta is anterior, so I'm not feeling as many kicks as I would like... but oh, well. I'm sure in a couple more weeks this baby girl will get her sea legs and I will be wishing for a break. We are moving to our new house at the end of May and I am excited to have a bigger space, but moving is a friggin' hassle. I haaaaate moving. We have met two of our 4 cul-de-sac neighbors and so far...

I can't believe this pregnancy has actually made it to 17 weeks. I had to start seeing a chiropractor for my sciatic pain, but for the most part things are going well. I'm sleeping better than I did in the first trimester and I feel a lot better than I did the first trimester, too. I have been gaining weight a liiiitle faster than I'd like, but I really think that's just because I have been unable to exercise due to the sciatic pain. I'm feeling better now, but the weather doesn't really lend itself to comfortably exercising/walking outside... so I haven't done much. The reality of all this is sinking in and I'm really trying to figure out how in the hell I will manage a newborn and nursing school come September. WHAT WAS I THINKING??

For some reason I always thought the 2nd trimester began at the end of the 12th week, and not the 13th... but I was wrong. I was hoping to be in my 2nd trimester already, but no such luck! Anyway, here is a video of the fetal doppler being put to use.

Things are going much better. I stopped getting the hunger-nausea a few days ago and I'm pretty glad it's gone. Also, I've been doing my progesterone suppositories faithfully every night and I think I'm about done. It's been 9ish days since I stopped the injections and my OBGYN told me at my last visit that the placenta takes over at 8 weeks. I'm out of the 100mg suppositories, but I still have ten 50mg ones that the fertility clinic gave me at my last appt. Maybe I should just do them since I have them? I would hate to stop before my body is ready and just completely fuck everything up. I've told more people about this than I probably should have. It's not public knowledge, but I do have about 14 people on my "know" list, not including professors and school personel. They won't remember that I was pregnant, so I don't need to worry about telling them about a miscarriage if it happens. Additionally, I bought a fetal heartbeat doppler ...

So, it seems like I have reached a turning point in the pregnancy and it's making me a little nervous. For the past 4 weeks, I have gotten really pretty nauseous/hungry if I didn't eat every 2 hours. But, since yesterday, I've felt really pretty good. It seems like it's too early to be feeling this well. Makes me wonder if something is wrong in there. Yesterday was my last day of injectable meds so if something bad happens because of less progesterone supplementation, I would likely start showing symptoms (spotting, cramping, etc) in the next couple days. I have my first visit with my OBGYN on Monday morning, so it won't be too long before I will know for sure that everything is ok (or not okay) in there. Fingers crossed everything is ok. Oh! I found out yesterday I am not the only pregnant nursing student in my class!!! One of my clinical group buddies is 6 weeks along. I know it's awful to say, but it's nice knowing I won't be the only one people...

So, I will give myself my last progesterone-in-oil injection tomorrow at 12:30pm. I'm not gonna lie... I am a little nervous. I'm sure everything will be fine, but I've been told multiple times the last 6+ weeks that these meds are what is keeping this pregnancy going so one can imagine it will be hard to let go of them. I will continue with progesterone suppositories for about another 2 weeks. Also, I will see my regular OBGYN on Monday. I have "graduated" from the fertility clinic and so now this is about to turn into a normal pregnancy. It's all still weird to think about. Also! The state university came to talk to my class about doing a special pathway program they offer the community college students so they can easily get their BSN degree after graduating with their ADN. I still need to take microbiology and I am trying to figure out when I will be able to do that with a wee baby. I've easily met all the other requirements, so I suppose I'm l...

I just received what will be the last PIO vial and last suppositories I will ever have to order. I have 15 days of injections left and after that I think I will switch to oral progesterone for about 2 weeks just to make sure I don't lose this pregnancy before the placenta takes over. THE END OF MEDS IS IN SIGHT. I can't wait to not have to carry around my little black medication kit that I've made myself. It always has at least two syringes, two injection needles, two needles for drawing up the med, two alcohol wipes, cotton balls, bandaids, and the vial of PIO (sometimes two if the first vial is nearly empty). I have to have it because I have to do injections at school. And, starting next Thursday, I will have to do them at clinical, too. But only for two clinicals. My last scheduled day of PIO injections is my 2nd clinical day. I should still have one day of PIO left in that vial, so I will probably also do an injection the next day, too. Also, I think I have about 20 day...

Things seem to be going fine thus far. I have had some issues figuring out how often I need to eat to prevent getting sick, but it seems like every 1.5 to 2 hours does the trick. I'm trying to stay away from unhealthy foods, but it's difficult. Twice at school I have bought a bag of potato chips from the vending machine because I was getting shaky (and apparently needing salt). I also bought a bag of peanut M&M's because they looked sooooooo good. I ate 95% of them and ended up with a stomach ache. Next hurdle will be successfully completing my clinicals next month. I have them every Thursday in February and they last from 630am to 7pm. I will need to tell each of my preceptors about my pregnancy and hope they don't treat me like I'm incapable. I will also need to take LOTS of snack  breaks. I imagine I will be running around quite a bit and I don't want to get sick. I also hope my unit partner won't figure out that I'm pregnant because I don...

Holy crap this morning the morning sickness was in full effect. I had very, very mild "morning sickness" with my son and it was only really in the afternoons. This morning, however, I waited for my toast to cook while I was laying on the kitchen floor because I was afraid if I stood up I would actually vomit. Since breakfast, I've been nibbling on the candied ginger my husband bought me and I'm hoping this will allow me to get through some studying I need to focus on. Fingers crossed!

Ok, so it's not a baby just yet... still just an embryo... BUT OMG LOOK IT HAS A HEARTBEAT. I still can't believe it actually worked. I'm pretty sure it's going to take me a little while longer until I actually believe this is real. The chance of miscarriage drops once you see the heartbeat, but I still have 5ish weeks until I'm out of the danger zone. I guess I can try to relax about all this now. I will try to start doing yoga again soon because I think that will help with my stress levels. Also, they gave me a Rhogam shot today because I had been spotting, but it was really just to be cautious.

Aaaaand.... there's spotting. Not a lot, but enough to make me panic. I called the doctor and they said it's not uncommon for women to spot in early pregnancy. My husband says I spotted with our son 6 years ago, too. I don't remember that but it could just be parental amnesia. Either way, I'm panicking a little. Actually, a lot. I didn't come this far only to come this far. I've told a couple close friends and I don't really want to have a miscarriage and then have to tell them and see the looks on their faces. I don't want that. I did that with my ectopic pregnancy (started bleeding at 6 weeks) and it's just uncomfortable for everyone involved. Hopefully all this is is a little spotting. Nbd, right?

Not much has been happening here. My new semester started last Monday and it was chaos as usual until Thursday afternoon. Next week I should only need to go to school twice: once for class day and once for lab day. I had to tell my lab instructor about my injections so that I could procure a private space to do my PIO injection that wasn't a totally public restroom. I don't know if he thinks I'm actually pregnant or just trying, but they will all know soon enough. Obviously I'm not showing yet, but I have lost 4lbs so if this keeps up I imagine I will be showing sooner than later because there will be less belly fat to hide the organism * growing inside me. It appears that I'm going to get nausea in the afternoons like I did with my son. I never had sickness in the mornings, just light nausea in the late afternoons. I never threw up like you see newly pregnant women doing in the movies. I would like to find a tea made only from ginger (no hibiscus, no lemongrass,...

Apparently my levels are over 7,000 mIU/ml. I guess I should have asked her to repeat herself because that's REEEEALLY HIGH. Technically my number pretty much tripled. I was hoping for anything over about 2,500 mIU/ml. Now I'm really hoping there's not two in there. We only transferred one embryo and I know they can split... but I really don't want twins. I can't handle twins. I would likely not be able to maintain breastfeeding for as long as I did with my son. Plus how could I possibly manage nursing school with newborn twins?! Oy. Anyways, I'm scheduled for my 7 weeks OB ultrasound on Thursday the 18th. I'm curious to see what's going on in there!

I go in tomorrow for my repeat beta HCG blood draw and I'm hoping my numbers are continuing to increase at a healthy rate. I've got all the pregnancy symptoms, but that could be because of all the meds I'm on. No nausea yet, but I don't think that generally kicks in until 7 weeks. I've also switched back to the standard progesterone-in-oil mixture for my injections and my bum is feeling the pain. I may ask to switch back to the ethyl oleate mixture because it never left a bruise. I would like to hear what my doctor has to say about each one before I make and decisions.

I just got the call and it's 182!!! That's waaaaaay better than I hoped for. Holy shit I'm so fucking relieved.

So, it turns out this cycle was a success. All that extra shit I went through to determine the best possible time to put embryos in my uterus was WORTH IT. However, this breast tenderness I've got going on is not a constant thing (it comes and goes) and it's making me really pretty nervous about my HCG Beta blood test I'm having tomorrow. When I had my ectopic pregnancy in 2010, I knew something was wrong pretty early on and my breast tenderness did pretty much the same thing it's doing now. When I was pregnant with my son, I remember my breast tenderness was strong and unwavering. I'm nervous that my HCG levels will be below 80 mIU/ml, which can be an indicator of a non-viable pregnancy. When I had my ectopic, my levels never got above about 50 mIU/ml. I know there is really no sense in worrying about it because it's going to be whatever it is... but we are so close to what we have been working for that I am going to be pretty devastated if it doesn't work...

Due to a nationwide shortage of my usual progesterone-in-oil, I have been using some compounded stuff that uses ethyl oleate and HOLY SHIT IT HURTS. It goes in a lot easier, but it seriously hurts. I hope the manufacturer gets their shit figured out soon because I would like to go back to my old formulation as soon as humanly possible.