Still Cooking

It's 1:00 pm on Sunday afternoon and yes I'm still pregnant. I think I'm going to start charging a dollar for every person who asks me "You still haven't had that baby yet?" What's with these people? It's my first baby and my due date isn't for another week. Why is there an expectation that this baby is supposed to come before he's due? I don't think people understand that I'm not miserable and breaking down my doctor's door to try to get him to induce me. I'm sleeping through the night, except to get up to the bathroom, and I'm happy to report that my hip hasn't hurt since Friday before last. I don't understand it, but I woke up one morning and the pain was far less, then the next day it was almost gone. I'm just going to take it as a blessing from God and not question Him! I have felt so great the past week, like I could run a marathon. My only true complaint would be my feet and ankles which are swollen to about 3x their size and I only have 2 pairs of shoes that I can stuff these boats into. Erik affectionately named them "Skeenkles" for ski-ankles because he says they look like ski boots. Har har. I would post a picture but I have a little more self-respect than that.

Don't get me wrong, I would love to have this baby this weekend, preferable after Friday because I have a hair appointment and I really wanted to get my hair cut before he comes. I have both our bags packed, the cameras charged and ready to go, and the house is almost totally clean. Every night I go to sleep and think this could be the last time I get to sleep uninterrupted for the next few years. I can't wait to meet this little guy, see who he looks like, and share him with the world. However, if he could wait until after I get my hair did I would be much obliged.

Not Just Waddling

I started having pain in my left hip almost 2 weeks ago that was just kind of annoying, not really that bad. It progressively got worse over the week to the point where walking, turning over in bed, and generally just bearing weight in my left leg was really painful and I started limping. I finally (at Erik's insistence) went to my doctor on Monday. I know that hip pain is not an OB problem but unfortunately when you're 9 months pregnant every doctor except your OB is scared of treating you, so that's who I went to. Since I work with my doctor we have good communication and I think he understood that I was really hurting, especially since I've had no problems at all so far. He sent me to the orthopedic doctor who saw me the same day and I was really impressed with this guy. He spent at least 20 minutes with me assessing my hip and range of motion with my left leg. I had an idea of what I thought I might have, but he blew me away with his diagnosis. I have Transient Osteoporosis of the Hip. Not at all what I was expecting, especially since I'd never heard of it before! http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/topic.cfm?topic=A00205 This website has some good info on it. Basically the bone density in my hip joint is severely decreased causing intense pain with weight bearing. It's uncommon and only occurs in pregnant women in their 3rd trimester and middle aged men. There's no definitive cause and the treatment is pain meds and trying to stay off the affected joint with crutches or a walker. The only positive thing about this is that it resolves within months after delivery and your bone density returns to normal.

So what does this mean for me? Well, because I work full time and I'm the only employed member of this family I have to keep working until my due date. I'm taking off for maternity leave starting on the 19th of March, which is not what I wanted to do. I wanted to work up until delivery just so I could save up my leave for when I actually have a baby at home. This shouldn't affect my delivery in any way. The ortho guy gave me crutches to use and I do use them at home but I'm too proud to use them outside my house. It's bad enough getting stared at everywhere I go because my stomach is huge, let alone being a huge preggo on crutches. I'm not going to lie, my hip hurts and walking is really painful. I can't do certain things like put my pants on standing up, pick up heavy stuff, or push a stretcher at work. The mornings are the worst and I want to cry when I wake up because I know how bad it's going to hurt to move around and get going. Once I'm going it's tolerable and when I'm sitting it doesn't hurt at all. I'm also really thankful that nothing is wrong with my baby and this doesn't affect him at all. I could have so many worse things wrong with me, I'm still a healthy pregnant person, and it will get better after I deliver. I also have the best coworkers ever who understand and help me out at work. Erik has been a huge help and picked up some of the slack at home with cleaning tasks that I just can't do. I'm trying to keep a positive attitude but sometimes it is overwhelming. I'm not used to having physical restrictions and it really makes you appreciate your health when you start having problems. It's possible that the pain might get worse before it gets better, but I'm a little over 3 weeks until my due date and I know I can keep on keeping on until then!

Things I never appreciated before I was pregnant

1. Being able to get up from a supine (laying down) position in one move. This is no longer possible and requires several adjustments before I can actually stand up.
2. Bending down to tie my shoes, pick up something I dropped, bending in general.
3. My ankle bones. I sure do miss them.
4. Jeans with zippers.
5. Being able to hold it. You ladies know what I mean.
6. How cheap it is for 2 people to live. Have you people seen the price of diapers lately?!
7. Being able to walk around all day without needing to sit due to this searing ligament pain-by far my most annoying pregnancy symptom.
8. Not going to the doctor. I love my OB and getting to listen to the baby's heartbeat but drs offices are gross and loud. Before I got pregnant I had never seen a dr in an office in Waco.
9. This relates to #5 but sitting through a movie without having to get up to use the ladies room. It just ain't happening.
10. On a sweet note, feeling your baby move inside you is so awesome and I'd take double the annoying just to feel it.

christmaspic2010

Peppermint Dots Christmas Card

Shutterfly Christmas cards

View the entire collection of cards.

Free Shutterfly Christmas Cards

I love the holidays and one of my favorite things is making our Christmas card and sending it to everyone. This will be our fourth year to do a photo Christmas card and something special will be featured-my baby bump! I've tried to include our dogs in every picture, but I have a feeling someone small and precious will be taking their place in our next Christmas photo. These are the only 2 previous Christmas cards I could find. Neither of these came from Shutterfly, but this year I will definitely be using them. I've already made a wedding photo book using Shutterfly with my new printer/scanner, and if I get 50 free cards that's even more incentive to use them! We are having professional baby bump/Christmas pictures taken in December so I'm going to use those as double duty for our Christmas picture. I wanted to get belly pictures when I'm still cute and pregnant and not fat and pregnant.




You can find Shutterfly's photo cards here: http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-photo-cards . It's so easy to upload your pictures to their website. I use a Mac desktop and I have a tool where I can send photos to Shutterfly directly from my iPhoto pictures. I also highly recommend signing up for their emails. They send me discount codes at least once a week. Once this baby comes I know I'll be using their website even more to make baby photo books and order prints to send to relatives!

Bloggers get 50 free holiday cards from Shutterfly http://bit.ly/sfly2010

It's a Boy!

OK so it's been 3 weeks since we found out but I thought I'd go ahead and post this anyway. We can't wait to bring this little guy home!

Bun in the Oven

Time to update the old blog with our wonderful news. We're expecting! Baby Fuqua will make his or her appearance sometime around March 22nd, 2011. We couldn't be happier. So far everything is going well. I've only had a little nausea and although I get very tired in the afternoons most of the time I feel great.

Had to put in the obligatory pregnancy test shot.

Our baby's first pictures! I think at this point he/she was the size of a blueberry.

Erik's parents came to visit in early August and we had such a good time telling them in person. I ordered a cake and they were so surprised!