Less than impressed but still thrilled!

First and foremost... baby looks happy and has all the right organs! No wings! I have no idea what the numbers she wrote in my notes actually mean but everything has a nice little check mark next to it. We're absolutely thrilled to have a little complete baby whose only job now is to pack on the pounds! :)

On the other (Rebecca-needs-to-rant) hand.. ARGH!!!

The sonographer's goal seemed to be to suck all the joy out of the experience. I know for a fact they weren't busy. Mark and I were the ONLY people in the waiting room. She didn't seem to want to answer any of our questions. They were simple questions like "so where does that mean the head is?" or "is that the heart we're looking at?" Those sort of innocent questions. I was treated more or less like an inanimate object that she had to work around in order to get the measurements. For goodness sakes, we're human beings having a baby for the first time, have a little compassion! Although baby was awake, it wasn't in the right position to be able to see the sex so I asked if there was anything I could do to convince the baby to move, she kinda grunted at me and said, "no, it's just your baby." What does that mean?! That makes no sense.

The pictures we got were only close ups of the head even though baby did a ton of cute things and the full body shot with the spine was AMAZING! Definitely one for a frame. We even said how much we liked that view but no.. she didn't get the hint. I have to learn to be braver and speak up for myself. Actually say "Can I have a photo of that please." But noooo I'm too shy. Stupid me. This baby is only going to be inside of me the once!

So now I really want to go to Babybond and get a sexing scan done but it will cost £79. Mark thinks it would be smarter to spend that money actually ON the baby. Diapers, clothes, etc.. and I know he's right. But I just want to start calling my little one by a name!! *sniff* pregnancy hormones and all that. We haven't made a decision yet. I'm going to try to ebay some stuff today and if any of that sells I can put it towards the price of the private scan and then it won't feel like we're out of pocket.

Is it wrong that I want to know so badly? We have a boy's name chosen but can't agree on a girl's name. We don't want to go through all the stress of debating a girl's name if we don't have to. I want to give the baby a name and bond properly.

Here's the newest pictures of the little one:


Stay tuned- 20 week bump pictures should be going up later tonight.

Food on the brain..

There should be entirely new food groups for pregnant woman. First food group: Brownies.

So today Mark and I were going to head out to Silverburn to hunt for maternity clothes... then I decided I didn't want to get out bed and that Silverburn was too far. *laughs* it's mostly because all the stores will shut at 6pm today and I hate it when the sales people stare at you like "why are you still in my store? Leave!" Plus, I hate crowds and weekend shopping in Scotland is like trying to go into Walmart on Christmas Eve. Not recommended. We've decided that we'll try mid-week. Mark's going to come home on time Tuesday which means we should be able to get back out there by 6ish and have a good three hours of non-pressured shopping/wandering around time.

Okay now I'm hungry. I was laying in bed earlier thinking how much I would love to go to Denny's, IHOP, Cracker Barrel, anywhere with an all day breakfast really. (I resent that IHOP call themselbes the International House of Pancakes... because I see no pancake houses over here!! They should rebrand as AmericanHOP) I miss brunch entirely too much and nowhere over here understands brunch at all. I'd love some biscuits and gravy just like Grandma makes... last time I tried, my gravy turned out like some white gelatinous mass. It definitely wasn't the yum I grew up with. Plus Mark won't eat it anyway so it's a lot of effort to go to for one.

Sidenote: (bottom-note?): Either the feature is new or I've just been really blind, but I've finally set it up so blogger will email me when I have a new comment on a post so hopefully you guys won't have to wait weeks for me to respond to something anymore!

Ps. remember to check for tomorrow's post!! New pictures and meatball will get a gender!!

Quote of the day courtesy of Mark: "That's no meatball, that's a beachball!" :D

19 Weeks!

Feeling rather yucky today,.. and I was doing so well! It's been about 2 weeks since my belly decided to call a fire drill... but changed it's mind this morning. I'm not at all sure why either. There was nothing in there! well except for your traditional stomach bile which no one wants to hear about. ;) That coupled with the incredible amount I slept today makes me wonder if the little one is having some kind of growth spurt this week?

Can't wait till next Monday!! It's the 20 Week anomaly scan. Sounds kinda scary... since they'll be checking meatball has all the right organs and spine legos, no rabbit ears, that sort of thing. I'm just ignoring that part and concentrating on the exciting bit, we should be able to find out the big Boy or Girl question!! :)

Yesterday I left the house. *laughs* Can you believe it? Mark took me shopping. The intent: to buy maternity clothes. The result: I bought one sweater thingey. I have no idea where you're supposed to buy maternity clothes. We went to the mall and ONE store had ONE maternity rack. That was it!!! We wound up at Asda on the way home and they had a few things, but their one rack was even smaller. On the plus side the material they used didn't seem to be fashioned from cardboard and glass and was actually comfy. However, all their stuff was obviously for the more heavily pregnant and everything I tried on looked like I would be wearing it as sleepwear. Hopefully I'll find somewhere that sells maternity clothes before I have nothing left to wear! Hanging around the house is just fine cause I can wear pj bottoms all day.. but I really do only have one pair of pants that I can comfortably wear outside of the house and I'm kinda getting sick of them! :)

Week 18: The Bump

Mark was a stickler for details and made sure I found the same outfit I was wearing last time. So, not huge yet.. but baby is definitely growing in there! We definitely need a new camera. Two weeks ago I fully charged the battery to take 5 pictures of the bump. I then uploaded the pictures. Today Mark tries to turn it on and nada. It's dead. So we had to wait another 30 minutes while the batteries charged themselves back up. Whatever you do, don't buy a Kodak EasyShare Camera. They are redonkuclous.



I've got a headache tonight, the fun sort where moving makes every bit of your brain throb. So the plan is limited moving. :) Only 2 more weeks till the next ultrasound! I'm still feeling nauseous, but there hasn't been any more vomiting. (Yaay!)

and knowing is half the battle!

Half a jalapeno is half a jalapeno too many.

Antacids are the other half of the battle.

The dating game.

Okay we're in the 17th week now. (Wait... If I'm 17 weeks already that means we're in the 18th week... so confusing.) Shouldn't all this nausea and queasiness be gone by now? Because it's not, and I'm not impressed! When do I get to glow??

Speaking of dates.. the midwifery staff can't seem to keep things straight. When I went for the 12 week scan I thought I was 11+6 but they dated me at 12+1, so I switched to a conservative 12 weeks even. At my appointment on Monday when I should have been listed as an even 17 weeks Allison *cough cough HACK* wrote my dates as 16+5. I know none of these little dates matter much at all because despite being unable to agree about how far along I am, my due date seems to remain steady at February 8th. (And we all know babies never agree about due dates anyway!)

Mark's taking me out for some nibbles and a movie tonight. Going to see G.I. Joe. (because knowing is half the battle - and if they don't say that somewhere in the movie someone is going to pay.) Just have to remember to take some disinfectant wipes and look like a dork. :) Hey! last time I went to that theater I'd lost most of my voice before we'd even left! It's germ ridden. I do not fancy getting ill again. Being nauseous is enough for me to deal with on its on, thank you very much.

I don't feel like I look that much bigger this week, so the next photos will probably go up on Monday at 18 weeks. :) (Notice I said look bigger, I definitely FEEL bigger.)

Meeting the consultant, kinda.

This did NOT go as well as I'd hoped. It started off well with Mark and I actually finding a parking space at the hospital, (No easy feat.) which was followed by a very short wait. However, that's where the goodness ended. The midwife who walks in is none other than "Allison." She was the surly midwife who showed us around the hospital in Paisley, basically scoffed at questions and generally looked like she was having a bad year.

We went into the little check-up room and she asked me a few questions even though she didn't seem to care what the answers were. Since yesterday I've been getting really intense pelvic pain on one side and it's been making it hard to walk so I definitely wanted to ask someone about it. She shrugged it off saying it was ligament pain. I tried to explain that I know what ligament pain feels like and that this felt completely different. She obviously wasn't going to listen. I'm just a dumb patient who doesn't know anything. When I told her I'd been able to feel the baby moving occasionally she rolled her eyes at me and said it's far too early for that. (Can you believe her? Rudest midwife ever!) After she took my blood pressure, without explaining it to me at all or even saying, "that's okay then." She said she'd pop outside to see if she could find a doctor. A doctor?? A doctor? What happened to the Dr. Ellison that my appointment was scheduled with? No one ever explained where Dr. Ellison was.

The doctor who came in was actually quite nice. At first I was worried because she asked me why I was here and when I said that it was because I had hypothyroidism, she said "ah, overactive thyroid." Um no. Under. It was only when I told her my medication that she looked up at me and said.. "Oh you mean under active." Ahem. That IS what I said. She asked me most of the same questions the midwife had and despite the fact that mean midwife was still standing there I decided to voice my concerns all over again. Mark says I probably teed the midwife off even more doing that but I didn't care. I wanted someone to actually listen to me. The doctor was much nicer when I told her about the pain. She thinks it's just muscle related, but did tell me to see my GP or go into A&E if it gets worse or I get any swelling.

Here comes the bit I was waiting for- time to listen for baby's heartbeat! Doctor is writing something in my notes and midwife pulls out the doppler. She attempts to find the heartbeat but is just getting a lot of static. After about a minute she asks me if I had just put lotion on my belly. Umm a few hours ago. That convinces her. It's all my fault, the lotion is causing interference. uh huh.. Depsite it being all my fault she goes to get a new machine anyway. While she's struggling to find the heartbeat the nice doctor suggests that we just go next door and do a scan. Yaay that would be awesome! Alas.. mean midwife makes an interception. She frowns at the doctor and says "Someone's in there." Like we wouldn't have happily waited to be able to see baby again. Allison decides that she's found something that sounds like a heartbeat to her. She holds it up towards my ear but all I'm hearing is static. She does try to reassure me at one point and says, "I do hear baby moving around." Apparently this is enough for her and we're done. :( I was really looking forward to being able to hear the heartbeat and she couldn't bear to spend 10 minutes with me? Mark says I need to learn to speak up a bit in these situations.

It's all over quicker than any of my appointments thus far. I'm so glad Mark had the day off and didn't have to miss work to take me. Midwife hands me the hospital's folder of my notes and tells me to take it to the receptionist who will make a 28 week appointment for me. We wander back to reception but there's no receptionist so I flick through my notes. They are MY notes after all. Uh oh. Allison comes in and sees me looking at my notes. She actually takes them out of my hands and puts them on the receptionist's desk and says. "We'll put this over here so she can see it." The nerve! They're MY notes lady. I felt like picking them right back up but of course I'm not that brave.

So I have another appointment to see Dr. Ellison on November 23rd, but who knows if she'll be there then either. Hopefully 'Allison the evil' won't be there when I go back for my 20 week scan... and that just maybe she'll be on holiday in February when it's time to actually have the baby!