Of Cervixes and Coffee

Had another cervical check this morning, and I'm oh so glad to report that it continues to do it's job; that is, it's staying tightly closed even under pressure. The Bee's heartbeat was 145, which was right on target, as was the size of my uterus. After everything we went through to try to get here, we're incredibly grateful that this pregnancy has been fairly uneventful. My acne, has, in fact, cleared up beautifully and I am currently enjoying a complexion unseen since before puberty. The scars are still there, but no new events. So yay for me!

On Saturday I had the delightful pleasure of meeting up with Thalia for coffee, although it wound up being yummy salads. She was such a lovely and graceful person and I feel privileged to be able to meet her IRL. That was just so neat. Regrettably I was terribly late but Thalia was rather gracious and I sincerely appreciated it. I'm not very experienced at navigating Manhattan traffic, but I held my own and made it in and out just fine.

Work has been busy; Mr. Right is working on a very long term project which requires him to work 16 hour days until the deadline is met. The deadline approaches this Friday, but it appears that will need to be extended. We're working with several off-site illustrators to get this project completed, and it's just a tremendous amount of work. The client has been thrilled with the work that has been produced thus far and is a bit flexible on the date they receive their project, so that is helpful. That means I'll be traveling to my Dad's alone this weekend to celebrate his birthday and Christmas, but I'll still have fun (although I wish Mr. R could join us). I visited my Mom's for Christmas this past Saturday (large part of the reason I was late for my meeting with Thalia), which was the complete opposite of fun. However, lucky you, I met with my therapist last night to discuss so I don't need to vent all this crap here. To be honest, I actually get tired of talking about it. A tremendous pet peeve of mine is complaining about problems but not fixing them. If I have a problem, I want to figure out how to remedy it; I don't want to sit here kvetching about it endlessly. It's annoying as hell, to me included! So yay for therapy!

That's one of the aggravating things about ART; here you have a problem and you're so desperately trying to fix it, but aside from doing all you can, there's nothing else you can do. A lot of it is trying and then playing the wait-and-see game. This is a problem we would do anything to fix, but you get to a certain point where it's out of your hands. I'm really hoping 2006 will be a better, more fruitful year for everyone. May you all have the families you so desire. Until then, I'm happy to read about all your journeys towards parenthood.

May the Force be With Us All

****Disclosure: Baby Info in this post.****

We went for our big ultrasound on November 25th, at 20w4d. All went well so we were naturally very relieved. The Bee is measuring right on target and looks good. He "waved", kicked and swallowed, which was just so incredibly cool to see! The only minor problem was that my right uterine arteries have not grown as large as my left. They're going to keep an eye on me and prescribed baby aspirin once a day. Then it's back on January 6th to take a look at the Bee and see how his development is coming along. I spoke with a friend of mine who's a medical malpractice paralegal who told me it's not that unusual, and that the body will usually overcompensate wherever it's lacking. He's also a dad to two girls and has gone through a miscarriage, so I trust him. That put my mind a bit at rest. And of course I'll be back on the 13th so they can make sure my cervix is continuing to so it's job. So far it's long and tight, and the internal os is staying closed. So! Good news from the cervical front. The perinatal doctors are just fantastic there. After they look at my cervix, they're always excited to look at the baby and get his heart beat. This is the same hospital where we terminated the Bee the first time, so everyone there is so happy and really pulling for us. It's a lovely environment. In fact, the doctor who delivered the good news about our 20 week scan was the same physician who performed the potassium injection, so to be able to tell us that our baby looked perfect and healthy really made his week. What a lovely moment for us all.

It's truly amazing that there is a wee person growing inside of me; sometimes I still can't believe it, although his movements and kicks are getting stronger and hard to pass off as anything else. There are just not enough words in the human language for me to express how grateful I am to be here, with our wee little Bee growing inside. Mr. Right is so incredibly sweet, and has been an extremely attentive husband and dad. He asks me if I'm enjoying my pregnancy; that means a lot to him. What's not to enjoy? I have some minor symptoms of pregnancy: swollen legs, ankles and feet (which when I awake are magically thin again! Well, relatively thin...); itchy red bumps all over my body which come and go but that's pretty much it. My dehydrosis is acting up, and the prescription ointment is a category C drug, so the hell with that. I'll be a little itchy, but it's not like hives, not unbearable. We tried so hard to get here that my attitude is: just let the baby be okay. This little person who we haven't met yet is very much a part of our lives. That's one of the reasons we wanted to know the gender so we could bestow his name. He's not here, but still a person, and we'd like to address him as such.

We've looked at baby stuff, but couldn't buy anything yet. I'm sure I'll get there eventually... Just not yet. Other people, however, have been really generous. Some friends lent us their 2 year old crib, which looks brand new and is gorgeous. She also gave me some maternity clothes, baby monitors, some toys and has some more stuff for us once the baby gets here. The lady who does my laundry gave us a whole bunch of 0-3 months baby clothes, freshly laundered. My mom has sent some things - CDs, wash cloths, t-shirts, a frog night light. Gramma C has made us a quilt and crocheted a blanket, hats and booties. They're all adorable! She's also sending us an old time pram which has been in our family for years. I may just use it as a bassinet, and can roll it around our apartment. My ILs bought a bunch of baby stuff pretty early on, all these amazingly cute little outfits. My MIL also found some things that were Mr. Right's when he was a wee lad. We're really happy to have all these things, and touched that these people thought to send them.

I've got to run, this time for fun - after a week of getting up at 6 a.m. and working until 10 - 12 midnight to meet deadlines, a friend of ours is coming to visit for the day. Mr. Right is still working - his project is due in two weeks, so he'll need all the time he can get between now and then to get everything done - but we'll pick him up for dinner. Our friend & I will grab some lunch at my favorite tea room, wander around the neighboring town shops and maybe catch a movie. I can certainly go for Goblet of Fire again. Must print out movie times...

Have a great weekend, everyone. Wishing only the best to you all. Manuela, good luck with your 2ww. Let's hope Han is The One. May the Force be with you. Always.