Life is total madness....

     It's been so long since I've written.  Every week I check all of the other blogs I follow but fail to update my own.  Life has been total madness.
    At the end of February my land lady informed us that our apartment no longer allowed pets and that we had five days to get all of ours out.  This means we have to move.  Luckily we found friends and family to watch our two cats and three dogs while we searched for a new place to call home.  It took longer than we hoped, but we found a condo that would allow the dogs (I didn't mention the cats....).  We are scheduled to move at the end of the month.
     We thought we were home free.  Then my boss informed me that she was not allowing me to work in the pet salon after the end of the month because she was concerned for the safety of my baby.  That is crap.  She is not concerned, she has hired new people who want a full schedule which she couldn't provide them while I was still working.  It is illegal for her to force me on maternity leave, howerve, I am an independent contractor so if I push the issue all she has to do is fire me and then I'm stuck with no job and no uneployment.  She wants me to come back to work three weeks after my son is born.  Excuse my language, but what the fuck?!  My only hope right now is to pick up as many hours at the register as possible (she's still allowing me to work the boutique) and pray that I can get enough grooming clients at home that I can cover my bills.  Brad still isn't working consistantly and it's driving me nuts.  It's not his fault.  His company is just slow.  Every week they promise him work will start soon.  Every week we hope.
     So that is life right now.  My son is due in one short month, I have to move in just over a week, and I'm not sure how we will be paying our bills.  But all I can do is hope and try my best to plan.  Wish me luck!

22 weeks 6 days.

     I love that this is how much life is measured now.  By weeks and days, by trimesters.  I can't believe how quickly this is flying by.  From what I've read, Liam only weighs a little over a pound now; but he already kicks so hard he can move my whole belly.  He usually does this when I'm in the tub and turn on the tap to add more water.  I think the sound of the water gets him going.  The first time I ever felt him move was in the tub at 12 or 13 weeks.  I was refilling the water to get it just a little warmer and all of a sudden I felt something poke me from the inside just below my belly button.  I wasn't sure if it was him or not, but I was afraid that I might be cooking him so I jumped out of the tub. 
     I always wondered how women could miss the feeling of being pregnant once the had their precious babies in their arms.  Now I think I get it.  In general I've had an easy pregnancy.  Even as much as I bitched about morning sickness it wasn't half as bad as it could have been.  I feel pretty awesome.  I'm growing a human after all.  How cool is that?  I feel pretty much exactly like I did prepregnancy. But what I will miss is feeling my son wiggle, kick, punch, and squirm in my belly.  I imagine I might forget how awesome that was once I get to watch him do all of those things.  But it is completely natural now to feel this other person moving inside of me.  Brad just recently felt Liam move for the first time and thought it was awesome.  But I feel EVERYTHING and I'm the only one who can say that.  It's like my special bond with him and I just adore it.
     It's getting to be crunch time as far as baby prep goes and I am completely slacking.  I haven't cleared out our room to make room for the baby.  I haven't finished gathering the addresses for my baby shower invites.  I haven't finished any of the hospital forms they say I should have finished weeks ago.  I haven't even called to reserve my spot in a birthing class.  I've attempted to make the task of preparing for the baby a little more manageable by making an actual to do list to follow and check things off as I go.  This has helped a little but I'm still a mess.  But at least I've gotten things started.
     The only thing I am TOTALLY on top of right now is diaper collecting.  Brad and I settled on using cloth diapers before I got pregnant and now that I get to buy them I am completely obsessed.  I've got prefolds, pockets, one size, you name it!  I'm trying to focus on collecting a variety so I can find the one that works best for Liam when he finally arrives.  So far my favorite (which just arrived in the mail today) is the BestBottom diaper.  It's a one size (meaning I can use it from birth until potty training) and the inserts snap in, so I can reuse the shell as long as it's clean.  I can't decide if it's sad or not that the highlight of my day is playing with diapers....
     Anyway, back to my to do list now!  Wish me luck!
     XOXO
PS: Any advice on preparing for baby is totally welcome!!!!

And let the chaos begin....

     Let me start by saying that getting sick while you're pregnant may be the worse thing EVER.  Tuesday night I developed symptoms closely related to food poisoning.  I was up until five a.m. sick before I could finally relax and get some sleep.  To make matters worse, all of the vomiting irritated my esophagus which made it painful to breath.  So at six o'clock this morning Brad (who had stayed up until 4:30 to prepare for his night shift tonight) had to get up and drive me to the emergency room.  I got to pay $100 for them to tell me that there was nothing they could do for me.  An hour after I got home they called and told me I have a UTI and will need to take antibiotics for the next ten days.  LOVELY!
     Can I please just go back to being healthy now?

We found out the gender!

It's hard to see in this picture, but on the right there is a computer cursor pointing to my son's family jewels. That's right, MY SON! Liam Allen David O'Conn. <3

It's Becoming Real....

     On Monday I saw the most incredible thing I've ever seen: I saw my baby move.  We sat in the dimly lit room watching a fuzzy screen as a ultrasound tech pressed a wand against my belly.  All of a sudden I saw what I knew was my little baby, but this tiny little miracle wasn't just curled up resting like I was expecting.  He (we have taken to referring to the baby as a male, but we don't know yet) was waving and kicking and even flipped! He looked like he was doing Tae Bo in my tummy!
     Now everything is starting to sink in. I'm going to be a mom.  I'm going to be responsible for another living being for the rest of my life. Forever.  I'm starting to worry about money.  I need a new car.  I'm scared that I won't be able to stay home after the baby is born.  I'm afraid that if I do need to go back to work, I won't have a job to go back too.  I'm afraid that I'll miss things.  I'm afraid that I'll make some terrible mistake that scares him or her for life.  I'm scared that I'll be a bad mom.
     I had a dream last night that I was telling someone how afraid I was that I couldn't do it.  In my dream, whoever I was talking to reached over and patted me on the head as if to say "Don't worry.  You can do this."  But I felt something physically touch my head hard enough to wake me up.  I looked up and it was my cat pushing on my head.  He has become strangely friendly since I got pregnant.  He sleeps with me every night and hangs out next to me on the couch every night when I get home.  But he has never woken me up before.  I'm not quite sure what that all means.
     I'm also dealing with the prospect of my parents selling my childhood home and moving across the country just a few months after the baby is born.  It scares me to have them so far away, but losing the home I grew up in scares me even more.  I grew up with seven acres of hills and trees around me, with coyotes and bobcats and mountain lions in the yard.  It was a beautiful, fascinating, magical place to grow up.  My parents always said they would leave it to me one day.  Now I'm trying desperately to find a way to keep it in the family so my children can experience the same awe and wonder that I did.  I am who I am because of that home.  I learned a love and respect of nature in all of it's forms.  I learned the value of wide open spaces.  I wake up every morning now to the sound of traffic in the street and it seems louder every day.  That house on the hill is nearly silent most of the time.  A single car on the street is a cause for attention.  Will my children ever know the beauty of silence without that house?  I wonder, and I am terrified.
     At the end of the day, I remind myself that I picked a wonderful partner to have a family with.  A man who loves with all his heart and shares the same core values that I have.  At my weakest points he has been my strength and times that could have torn us apart brought us closer together than I ever thought two people could be.  With him by my side I can figure it out.  I forget sometimes that creating a well-adjusted, happy human does not fall on my shoulders alone.  I have the best help in the world.  I love you, Brad.
    

My beautiful little love at 11 weeks 3 days. <3

Beautiful Little Baby

Monday was our first doctor's appointment. I was so nervous and excited. I didn't know what to think.
And then it didn't matter.  The second I saw that tiny blob and the flicker of a heart beat.  And then I HEARD it. The most beautiful 159 beats per minute that anyone has ever heard. My baby's heart beat.  I cried tears of joy and squeezed Brad's hand and wished I could listen to that "lub dub, lub dub" forever.
The doctor said everything looked perfect and I should be due May 17th.  Only about seven more months.  I can't believe it's really happening!

Still battling morning sickness....

     Yesterday I thought I had discovered the cure for morning sickness: Sea Bands.  I bought some after hearing what a miracle they were and within five minutes I felt fantastic. FINALLY!  Relief from my misery! This morning I woke up feeling ill, so I put my Sea Bands on and sat on the couch while I waited to feel fantastic again.  I flipped through some junk mail while I waited and came across a Denny's ad featuring what ordinarily would have looked like a damn tasty sandwich. I took one look at it, ran to the bathroom, and puked my brains out.  No easy feat considering I hadn't eaten anything.  So I moved to my next quick fix: ginger tea.  That did absolutely no good.  Then I decided to lay on the couch and feel sorry for myself before I had to drag myself to work. Surprisingly, that didn't help either.
     I don't know what to do!  I've actually been feeling better the last couple days.  I woke up without feeling sick instantly two days in a row.  I thought that meant I was getting better and this would be over soon.  Now I feel worse than ever!  I can hardly move or speak without wanting to throw up.  My only relief is sleep and I can only do so much of that.  I try to remind myself that this should be over in about six weeks or so and I try very hard not to cry when I think that I could do this for SIX MORE WEEKS! That is impossible!  How do women do this over and over again?  I thought labor and delivery was the worst part of being pregnant, and that results in a cute, cuddly baby.  Let me tell you, NOTHING resulting from morning sickness has been cute or cuddly so far.  If anyone has any suggestions, and I mean ANYTHING that might end this hell, please tell me!
     On a more positive note, my first doctor's appointment is on Monday.  I can't wait!  I'm nervous too, but I think that's pretty normal.  I'll be 8 weeks by then, so we should be able to see the heartbeat.  I've already warned Brad that I will cry so he better be ready for it.  I just keep holding onto the thought of seeing that little heartbeat for the first time and it's the only thing that reminds me why I'm willing to puke every fifteen minutes.