Second trimester

This makes it all worth it, right?

It’s been a rough ride to get to 18 weeks. It started out so well – I was way more relaxed about the whole pregnancy than I was with Sam. With Sam there was this constant disbelief that my body would actually grow and birth a baby and while I was not sure that something would go wrong, I lived in fear of it. I was lucky enough that my first pregnancy went well, and so I went into my second pregnancy aware of the statistics, but more relaxed, more confident. No pestering doctors, no terror about a single – gasp – caffeinated drink. I just relaxed into it. More than that: I looked forward to it.

12 weeks – really?

Sam’s pregnancy was consumed with choosing a job, finishing up a postdoc, findgin a home, buy a home, packing up an apartment, moving to a new state, starting a new job – by the time all that was done and I felt vaguely settled I was well into my third trimester and the whole thing had passed. I’m a pintrest-er and a scrapbook-er and a project life-r and a blogger and and and…  and there were no weekly photographs with kitchy chalkboard, no announcements, baby books – I barely even blogged about it. I was looking forward to this pregnancy being different – Wes has made me swear that it will be my last (which breaks my heart), so I wanted to document it!

But then there was the spotting, and the sudden blood loss, and then the vomiting, so much vomiting, until 24 hours of keeping nothing down had passed, and I threw up a lone popsicle. So then there was the hospital and the doctors, and the weeks of it continung, and the isolation and the fear of getting behind – so behind – at work, and the worry about losing earnings, and the heartbreak of not being able to be with Sam, and the talk of zofran pumps, but the need to wait until after week 9 for insurance reasons and UGH, I couldn’t lift my head without heaving so I certainly wasn’t taking any photos or writing any blog posts. And I thought I would go back and do it retrospectively but I find myself pretty unwilling to revisit that time.

But then, at 10 weeks, I could at least get myself into work and keep the vomiting down to a few times a day. And I could function, if somewhat unwillingly. I could be around my son without the smell of him making me hurl. I could contemplate a few foods that sounded good to me.

17 weeks

And then at week 16 the vomiting stopped and my brain seemed to return and I thought – yes, I can enjoy this now, I can look forward to it. I might even write a blog post or two about it 🙂