I am 13 weeks pregnant today. It feels like it has taken an eternity to get through this 1st trimester. The 1st trimester for me has been a total mixed bag. Besides the 24/7 nausea that has plagued me, I have teetered between super overwhelmingly excited to complete shock and confusion. Tack on the constant worry? Oh yes. Past miscarriage plus a combined nearly 7 years of infertility = constant concern over every little twinge. Am I ready to be done with week 13? Hell yes. Unfortunately, as I learned the first time around, the 2nd trimester isn’t magic. I may still be feeling sick for weeks to come. However, I have hope. I have made it so far.
I went in for my 1st trimester screening and genetic counseling. Part of that screening is an NT scan. What is the NT scan you ask? It is a screening via ultrasound where they determine your baby’s risk for Down Syndrome, other chromosomal abnormalities as well as major congenital heart problems. Yikes, right? Many women do not even bother with this screening as they say knowing of these conditions would not affect the outcome (i.e. going to full term and keeping the baby vs. termination). While I agree to an extent in terms of knowing we will keep the baby no matter what, I also feel like it is important for us to be educated as well. I would want to be fully prepared to parent a child with special needs. Also with these results, we could know ahead of time whether or not we’ll need PICU care or even surgery for our baby at birth. My husband and I are planners, so it is important for us to have all the facts about our baby as early as possible. Should our NT scan come out with unfavorable results, we will likely do further testing to know exactly what is happening. There is amazingly cool technology available today where they can take a blood draw from the mother and be able to separate the fetal blood from the mother’s blood thus being able to test the baby’s blood for these abnormalities. They can also determine the baby’s gender from this blood draw! I find this absolutely intriguing and amazing. While it would be awesome to know definitively early on what the gender is, our want and our hope is that the NT will show us at a very low risk and we can simply move on with a happy, healthy pregnancy. In my head, I look at this as just another excuse to see my little nugget. We will have our results later this week.
Without further ado… Meet my miraculous little nugget. No guesses on gender. Baby wasn’t willing to show even a little bit of its goods. We will find out that fabulous nugget of information on August 8.
On a more positive note, I have been feeling better. My good days have started to outnumber the bad ones. I am working on my self-image. Gaining weight and just “looking” bigger has kind of done a number on me so I am embracing my growing belly and no longer hiding it. I desperately need more maternity clothes but despise the thought of spending a lot of money on them. Even Target seems expensive. The one thing that has really changed in this week number 12 is my hunger. OH my god. I am like a bottomless pit! Now that I have been feeling better I am REALLY trying hard to focus on making smart choices. I kid you not- I am hungry within 30 minutes of eating and if I don’t eat? My stomach rumbles and the nausea makes a return. Overall, I am ridiculously excited. We announced on Facebook (which is a big deal because that’s a lot of people to tell). I feel FREE to be able to talk abou this now! My husband is over the moon. Even Jackson is excited and tries to “listen” to the baby in my tummy (which then he hears my tummy rumble and assumes the baby is making weird noises. Best mommy trick ever). He did say that he doesn’t want to see the baby come out of my tummy. Thank god for that.
I’m a little behind on my belly pics, but here is week 11.
Yes… I was in a dressing room shopping for maternity clothes. Bought those pants. |
And… yes, I missed week 12, but here is week 13.
Kind of hard to see.. but yeah, the belly is definitely expanding! |
Now, I can’t be forgetting about baby!! He or she is the size of a peach this week! So tiny! (So why am I so big??? LOL)