It kind of sucks as an adult, when the day after christmas you don’t have any cool toys to play with. I’m 27 and it still feels a little weird to be the adult, thinking about cleaning up rather than figuring out how to dump out all my toys to play with them all at once. (Of course that doesn’t mean I actually did any cleaning, but it did cross my mind!)

It also sucks to have to drag your ass out of bed, shower, get dressed and go to work the day after christmas. It just doesn’t seem right.

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My belly feels so heavy lately, I find myself often rubbing it along the bottom. The other day I was holding it lightly and started shifting from foot to foot, swaying back and forth and I felt everything inside move side to side, like a big balloon of water was sloshing around in there, a very strange feeling! Which it is, really – a big uterus full of fluid. It reminded me that even though the baby only weighs half a pound, everything else weighs considerably more!

This baby’s movements don’t seem to have any rhyme or reason, yet. They do come most predictably when I am sitting or laying still somewhere quiet – usually in bed – but other than that there’s not much predictability. Last week I was feeling a lot of rolling, stretching movements – this week it seems to be predominantly kicks, much less frequently than I felt things last week. The good part is that I have been able to feel two kicks with my hand, but I wish they came more often! Even where the movement is changes from day to day, minute to minute. Top right, bottom left, dead center, bottom right… I never know where it’s coming next. Obviously the baby still have plenty of room to move around in there. And kicks to the front are still very light compared to the top and sides. Kicking my left ovary still seems to be a favorite, I get that one every couple of days, and then it’ll just keep happening for an hour or two. Apparently it’s in the baby’s way.

Much to my frustration I find myself getting more paranoid instead of less. I know part of it is the fact that the ultrasound is creeping up. It’s easy to be excited about an ultrasound, but I also start to get more and more paranoid as it gets closer. I find myself stopping whatever I’m doing to sit down, lean back, and wait to feel something, to tell me it’s still alive. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t. I just have this huge fear of going into an ultrasound and being told my baby is dead again. As long as I know it’s alive, then I’m fine.

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In other fun news I’m pretty sure I’m sick. And not with the virus that was going through my work, either – at first I thought maybe I was, it feels like something is coming on, but then it turned into a sinus thing and not the rest of the throat/body yuckies that the other girls got. Nope, not me. Just my damn sinus. I know I’m prone to sinus infections because of my allergies constantly irritating my sinuses, and then with being pregnant everything gets stuffier just as a matter of course. Add to that my indulging (over-indulging?) in milk again – because it’s good for the BABY, I tell ya – and I think I basically created the perfect conditions for a nice infection in there. It’s just on my right side. Feels like I have balls of cotton stuffed up there. I’ve been trying to irrigate it (neti-pot style) and let it drain, but it’s only getting me so far. It seems to be getting worse every day. So I might end up calling the doctor. At this point it might need some kind of antibiotic. Bah. So for the time being I’m saying no more milk, which is making me extremely sad. But at least this will force me to drink more water!

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I hope everyone had a peaceful Christmas, no matter where you are in your journey, no matter what you are struggling with. I know they won’t always be happy, but hopefully friends and family are there when you need them (or not, when you want to be alone!). This was certainly not a perfect Christmas – I should have an almost-2-year-old to share it with – but it was good, it was peaceful, it was positive. And that’s all I ever hope for anymore.