30 Weeks - A General Update

(Unpleasant) Pregnancy Symptoms
It has been an interesting week.  It started off pretty great, but the first day back to work after Labor Day was really rotten.  I felt so wretched that after my first morning trip to the potty, I crawled back in bed and just cried.  I was imagining the remainder of the 3rd trimester and how awfully long it would be if I felt this bad for the next 2.5ish months.  Dave was still mostly asleep, but he put his arm around me and I fell back asleep for a bit.  Honestly, I probably should have stayed home that day, but I sucked it up and went to work.  A couple co-workers told me (later) how pitiful I looked and that I should have taken the day off.  Ahh well.  I'm trying to save up my PTO (paid time off) for maternity leave, so I was motivated to stay regardless of how lousy I felt.

Food / Nutrition
The rest of the week took a definite upswing.  Looking back, I think I ended up eating "too Paleo" just before going back to work, and let me tell you now that going 'No Carb' when you're pregnant is a BAD idea.  I learned first-hand why.  Since that day, I've been making sure to get a serving of whole wheat carbs at 2 meals a day (at least).  I don't want to go over 4-5 servings of carbs per day because then I feel bad in an entirely different way.  It helps that the whole wheat bread tasted absolutely heavenly!!  Cheeseburgers have been my craving for the week, so I made some at home to control the amount of sodium that goes into it.  When you get to eat the exact food that you're craving, it is positively blissful!  My mom got to see me devour a cheeseburger the other day (the last from the batch I made), and she commented that I looked like a 5-year-old enjoying her meal.  I must have looked simply gleeful.  Hehe...  I got to have some cappuccino (fake) ice cream for dessert, so I was a happy camper.

More on Unpleasant Pregnancy Symptoms
Once the wretchedness from earlier in the week was gone, my overall sufferings subsided to more tolerable levels.  I had a couple hours yesterday where I was upset about something and I couldn't put my finger on what it was.  I thought I was frustrated with Dave, but thinking about it now, it wasn't really him at all.  I ended up curled up on the couch (with a pillow between my knees, of course), and just cried.  Poor Dave.  He said to me, "There are so many tears, and I don't know what's wrong."  It kinda made me laugh because I realized then that I didn't know what was wrong either.  Once that first chuckle escaped me, though, I felt (almost) instantly better.  Sometimes you just need to cry...especially when you're pregnant.  Is that one of those mood swings people talk about?  ...cause....Wow.

I've also been dreaming nearly every night...I think.  I wake up and the last thing I usually remember is the "dream" I just had about labor and giving birth.  I must be really anxious about it if I obsess over it in my waking and sleeping hours.  In the birthing book I got from the WBWC (Women's Birthing & Wellness Center) called Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth, I finally got to the chapter on "Coping with Pain."  The thought of unknown amounts of pain I'm going to have to endure to birth this baby has really been worrying me.  I know that's pretty normal, especially for first-time mothers-to-be, but I just could not escape this underlying panic.  Nothing anyone who's been through it has said to me has been much comfort.  It's not their fault; it's not anyone's fault because that is an experience that you have to go through to fully grasp what it's like.  I totally get that.  BUT it doesn't help me with learning to cope with this unknown.  Anyway, a section of this chapter actually helped put my mind to rest.  I'm going to include it here because (for me) it made an important distinction that I hadn't realized I wasn't making.

Pain Versus Suffering 

Because pain and suffering often go hand in hand, we tend to think they're the same thing.  But they're not.  Pain is a physical sensation, while suffering is an emotional experience.  We may suffer (feel helplessness, anguish, remorse, fear, panic, or loss of control) even when there is no physical sensation of pain.  And we may experience physical pain without suffering.

After reading this, something clicked inside my head.  I really understood this differentiation.  I compare it to my rehabilitation after my knee surgery.  So far, that is the most physical pain I have ever had to endure to get my body--my legs--back into functional shape, and I've dealt with feelings of depression.  The former was a huge struggle for me because I had never gone through such targeted training and didn't know how to process the physical sensations that went with rehab.  It probably made my rehabilitation period longer than it should have been, but eventually, I was able to get back to the mat and practice Tae Kwon Do again.  (I wasn't back to 100%, but it was more like 95%.)  For the depression part, I knew what endless despair and hopelessness felt like, so when my brain tried to equate the two things I knew (physical pain from rehab and emotional suffering from depression), it's no wonder that something inside me began panicking.  Who wouldn't when you take the worst moments of your life and combine them?

A Reprieve
So after reading this excerpt, I was able to separate the physical and emotional aspects, and that knot inside me released.  The unknown of childbirth doesn't seem so scary to me at the moment.  (That could change in an hour, but I'm going to enjoy the reprieve from the underlying panic while I can.)  I suppose I was imagining emotional suffering along with the physical pain, which is what makes it so terrifying to me.  Knowing that some kind of pain is coming but that it's finite is an enormous relief.  (Kinda like when I was training for the endurance part of a TKD test...it would definitely suck at the time I had to do it, but it would end.)  Maybe that's what makes depression and emotional suffering so unbearable.  You don't know if or when it's going to end, especially when you're in the midst of the emotional turmoil.  So for today--right now--I feel great!

Baby Movements
William has been extremely active this morning.  I found myself giggling loudly each time I felt him move when I woke up this morning.  Dave was upstairs and heard me laughing, so he came down pretty quickly.  He laid next to me with his hand on my belly and just felt William's movements.  It was (and probably will be) one of my favorite memories of pregnancy.  Dave doesn't often get to feel the baby move that much because during the day, when I tell him that the baby is moving and by the time he can come over to me and touch the belly, the baby has stopped moving.  But for whatever reason, first thing in the morning, he is all over the place.  Even now, as I write this, he is squirming like a wiggle worm.  I can't really tell what his position is and I don't really see any distinct body parts through my belly, but he is definitely dancing up an amniotic storm in there.

Belly Picture & Prenatal Appointment
I was amazed at the belly growth from last week to this week.  (The 30-week picture has been posted.)  My prenatal appointment went well.  I went in a day early because of the pressure I had been feeling in my lower abdomen.  The midwife checked my cervix and confirmed that it is thick, not effaced, and my uterus is soft, which are apparently good things when you want to determine a woman is not in pre-term labor. My appointment was at 29 weeks, and she measured my uterus at 29 cm.  Yay!  On target!  The weight gain still worries me a bit, but 'not eating' isn't really an option, as I mentioned above.  So, I've rededicated my efforts to including more superfoods into my diet.  I have a bag of sweet potatoes in the house now, lots of kale, spinach, and brussel sprouts, a package of whole wheat slim sandwich rounds, different types of fruit, and even some yogurt.  We also have meats that make brief appearances in the frig, but they don't last long at all.  I just had some leftover smoothie that had kale in it, and it was quite good!  I'm ready to make another and find different combinations of fruits and veggies to find what is my favorite.

I guess that's all the updates I have for now.  See you next week!

PS...I'm about to write a post on my non-baby blog, so check it out if you have time.