I think we're all better...

I cross my fingers while saying that because I hope it doesn't come back to bite me. Embry and I have been sick the past weekend. She started with diarrhea on Thurs, then threw up on Fri (luckily I heard it coming and held her over the tile floor for easy cleanup). She still had diarrhea/eating issues till now (Tues). Then Sat overnight I was up all night vomiting and laid in bed pretty much all day Sunday. Tony watched Embry most of the day and cleaned a bit since his grandpa was on his way out here. Yesterday I was feeling almost all better and today I think both of us are doing A-Ok. We're both eating normal food and acting like our normal selves. Yay! Although, now Tony says he's feeling a little 'off', but he never actually gets all the way sick, he's got a good immune system. I am slightly worried about baby bean after being sick. I'm hoping she didn't suffer and ill effects from the virus. :/

Tony's grandpa arrived yesterday. He drove a van out here full of Tony's dad's tools for his job. It sounds like Tony's dad might be renting part of a duplex up near his job starting the beginning of May, but it's not exactly a for sure thing yet.

A Boy Name

I think we might have actually come to an agreement on a boy name...this is a miraculous moment in time! Here it is...are you ready?

Terran Walker Ciaravella

So basically I asked Tony if he liked Taryn and he said, 'you mean like from literature, that means earth? T-E-R-R-A-N?' I was like, 'um sure!' and he said he liked it. I guess it's used in his starcraft computer game a lot and no matter how you spell it, it's not popular for a boy. Walker of course is still after George W. Bush.

Then I thought we were going to stay with Reagan for a middle name for a girl (like Embry) but Tony does not like that idea. Tentatively we are going with ...

Nola Madison Ciaravella

The tentative part is Madison. It would be after James Madison. A founding father, writer of over 1/3 of the Federalist papers, and proponent for limited federal government. Oh and bonus is that Nola hasn't been on the radar since the beginning of the 20th century, except in 2008 it randomly appeared in the top 1000 girl names at #918. I swear, if I like a name, suddenly it will become popular. :/

10 wks

10 Weeks

Taken 4/22/10

I went in for my 10 week OB appt today and got to hear the heartbeat on the Doppler. It was nice and strong about 140 bpm. I'm going back in 2 weeks to hear it again and Tony will come with me then too. I haven't gained any weight as of yet and I'm eating a lot more than I was during Embry's pregnancy at this point. I find that even if I feel sick, eating will make me feel better even if I don't want to. I'm still tired, but trying to sleep when I can. My shoulders have started hurting (like they did during Embry's pregnancy) and I've been getting headaches, so I stocked up on the Tylenol.

Why 'Baby Bean'?

Here is the reason behind calling baby #2 'Baby Bean':

At about 6 weeks, I was lying in bed and Tony was moving our ladder from our bedroom down to the garage. Embry had really enjoyed climbing up and down the ladder when it was in our room and we often (and by often, I mean all the time) talk for Embry. So as Tony was taking the ladder I said in my high pitched Embry voice, 'Oh no dadas! Don't take my ladder! I love to climb on it! Noooooo!' Then Tony looks back at me and says in an extremely high pitched, very fragile little voice, 'Oh ho ho, but what can I climb on? I'm just a little beeeeeaaaaaan!'

I cracked up, it was so sweet.

9w2d

Here is my 9 week belly shot.

Taken on 4/15/10

I feel like I'm actually starting to look somewhat pregnant and I broke out the maternity clothes on Thurs. I'm kind of tired of unbuttoning all of my pants/skirts/shorts, so I figured I might as well just give in.

I got Embry one of those swimming suits with the foam inside so she can float. She's not a fan. We were in the pool trying it out and she was fine until I set her on the second step (which she can easily stand on) and turned around to grab my camera. I don't know what she did, but she ended up face down in the water and wouldn't lift her head up. I grabbed her and she was totally fine, didn't even cough, but I'm confused as to why she just laid there and didn't lift her head up. Well needless to say, she was clingy as all get out after that. I tried to swirl her around by the arms (which I did all the time last summer and she loved) but she would have none of that. The neighbors probably thought I was trying to kill her. I think I'm going to resort to trying to floaty seats that she used last summer and hope she doesn't try to climb out of them. :/

Latest Boy Name Convo

L: Geez, Graham was #323 in 2008!

T: Oh

L: You know what name wasn't in the top 1000, EVER?!

T: what?

L: Flynn! Are you sure you don't like Flynn?

T: No, it sounds like Fin. Like a fish.

L: Fin is also a good name but I didn't bring it up because I knew you wouldn't like it. Fin is in the top 1000, Fin is a popular name!

T: What? Who in the world is naming their children after fish orifices?! *shuts door* seconds later *opens door* I mean fish parts.

TV

This is a miracle in itself...Embry is actually watching TV. I put on Sesame Street to see if she'd have any interest and she started shouting 'Elmo! Elmo!' and sat down to watch.

8w1d

Here is a pic of me after the ultrasound. The head is on the left there and then the body on the right. You can see two little white arm buds as well.

I went for my 8 week ob appt yesterday. It was extremely uneventful. All she did was measure my stomach and asked if I had any questions. I forgot to ask her where my placenta is, but I did ask how she felt about pictures being taken during and shortly after the delivery. She gave me a shpeel about the hospital's photo policy (can't take any of the waist and down of the mom) and said once she puts the baby on my chest then we can take whatever we want. She said the ultrasound looked good and she wants to see me in 2 weeks to hear the heartbeat on the fetal dopplar. My appt is on the 22nd.

In other news, Embry actually fell asleep on me yesterday morning. She hasn't done that since she was about 3 months old. It was great! Then I tried to put her in her crib and she immediately woke up. Tony's been a tremendous help the past week or so when I've needed to get some more rest. One day he came home early, took Embry and left so I could go to bed. I slept pretty much straight from 5:30pm-6am. Then Wed night he came home and I went straight to sleep before a meeting while he watched Embry and folded laundry. I'm so glad I have a husband who's so willing to help out. :)

Ultrasound

We have a heartbeat! Woohoo! It as 159 bpm and we got to see it flickering away and hear it too. Oh, it was great!

We got there a few minutes early and Embry needed her diaper changed, so I went into the bathroom to change it. Of course that is when they called us back, go figure. So we all went into the room and to begin with the ultrasound machine was zoomed out so far that I couldn't see the flickering of the heartbeat. I did a mini freak out in my head and then asked, 'is there a heartbeat?' The tech said there was and that she'd zoom in so we could see it and pointed it out on the monitor. She did some measuring and baby bean is about 1.5 cm long from crown to rump. I'm 7w5d today and the measurements put it at 8w1d, so we're right on target. Yay!

Afterward I went to MOPS and 'announced' that I am pregnant. Although some people already knew from this blog, I did manage to surprise a few people. :) I feel much more secure now that we've seen and heard the heartbeat, but I'm sure all my anxiety won't go away until after I'm holding baby bean in my arms. Then a whole new set of anxieties will set in, but that's a long time off.

I will post an ultrasound pic once I get it scanned in, but it really doesn't look much like a baby yet. More like a tadpole with some arm buds.

Goings On

I've decided that if this next kid has the same energy level as Embry, we may very well stop at 2. With me feeling perpetually nauseous (more-so than with Embry) and having to chase her around and constantly entertain her, I don't know how I'm going to make it through the rest of the first trimester. I'm 7 weeks today. That means I have about 5 weeks to go until this yuckiness subsides. Today has been much better than the past few days, so I'm very thankful for the break. I even got some loads of laundry put away...go me!

I see all these other kids that will sit on their parent's laps contently, or watch a movie, or play on their own without so much as a peep. I like to call them 'half asleep' kids. My child, is the opposite. Some say it's a sign of intelligence, I say it's a sign that I'm going to die early. :/

Embry's new wake up time is 6am. That's really all I can say about that.

We've been obsessively watching the show 'Lost' for about a month now. Started at season 1 and now we're on the last episode of season 5. When the intro comes on and the word 'Lost' glides across the screen and turns sideways, Embry turns her head sideways and smiles really big. Then when the end credits come on and the song plays, she goes 'do do do do do do' along with the tune. It's quite adorable, and a sign that we watch too much tv.

Embry used the kiddie pool that my sis Jen got her for the first time a few days ago. I did something very uncharacteristic for me and didn't take a single picture, but it was darn cute. She quickly learned how to tumble out onto the grass and back into the pool over the side. Of course, now it's back down to 55 and rainy so it will be a while before we set it up again.

I would take and post a belly pic, but oddly my clothes are already not fitting. That doesn't even make any sense though because my uterus isn't supposed to be above my pubic bone yet. Maybe it's just that I have to unbutton all my pants because my stomach hurts. Anyhow, it's not a pretty sight.

Bad Dreams

Apparently I'm a little more concerned about this pregnancy thing than I would let on. Last night I had some of those dreams where when you wake up in the morning you think it really happened. In my dreams I kept going to the bathroom and seeing lots of blood. I kept wavering between thinking 'maybe it's just normal spotting, it doesn't mean anything' and 'I'm almost 7 weeks, this isn't supposed to happen' and 'why did I tell all those people, this is ridiculous.' So when I woke up, I thought that's what happened and was really upset. Once I got up, I went and checked and everything was fine thank goodness.

So in other news, I've been feeling somewhat nauseous, but no puking at all. I called the dr's office about moving the U/S up and they said they were waiting until they got the preauthorization from the insurance to call the U/S place and see if they could get it moved sooner. I'm not good at waiting for things, as you can tell, I'm a little worried about things. I'm trying to take a nap everyday when Embry takes a nap because I'm exhausted. Although this means my house is in a perpetual state of disarray. Oh well.

Embry's been whining a ton lately, it's driving me bonkers. I have no idea what to do about it and it just doesn't stop. We've implemented time out in her rocking chair with straps. We ask if her she wants to go to time out when she's being bad and she shakes her head and says 'no' then usually walks away. We just put the dining room chairs back around the table and so far she hasn't gotten on the table again, but I'm assuming it's only a matter of time. That will be a rough day. Oh, she had another ear infection and she's almost done with her antibiotics now. She's feeling much better. She's repeating a lot more words now too, it's kinda fun.

New Ultrasound Date

So it appears they need a prior authorization from my insurance before I can have an ultrasound. The OB's office wanted me to reschedule for monday, the earliest they can get me in is April 6th. I am very unhappy about this.

Results

HCG on 3/17: 3151

Yaaaaay!

ultrasound is scheduled for Thurs (3/25) at 9am. :)

Booyah!

Dr Golden just called with my HCG results:
Sat 3/13: 602
Mon 3/15: 1476

That's more than double and I couldn't be happier! I'm going in for the 3rd tomorrow at 10am. The dr isn't in the office until Monday, so she said she expected it to be over 2000 tomorrow and would call me about it on Monday to schedule the ultrasound. She said it would be likely that we'd be able to see the heartbeat at the ultrasound, so yay! I'm not sure how far out they're scheduling ultrasounds, but it will be at the same place we went with Embry for U/S's, the perinatal assesement building at St. Joseph's.

:) :) :) :) :) :) :)

4 wks, 4 days

I took another test Thurs morning. Then another one fri morning, sat morning, sun morning, and this morning. Each time the line has gotten slightly darker. I am taking this a really good sign. Although I am obsessively testing, I justify it because I still have about 25 sucky tests that expired in 2009, so I figure, might as well use them now!

Thurs morning at 2:30am I got up to take a 'good' pregnancy test and then woke up Tony to help me take some pictures. Here's the one with our excited faces, I love how Tony can barely contain his excitement. Hehe. I think I was also oddly tired because as I was standing there setting up the self timer I was thinking 'isn't Tony lucky to be married to someone so crazy to make him wake up at 2:30am to take pictures of a pee stick?' and then I went to say 'step back a little' to Tony, but instead just said "CRAZY!" and then started laughing hysterically.

Also, here's a pic of the 'good' test from thurs morning.

Ok so here we go into the long and drawn out explaination of my trip on Thurs to the new OB...
I had to switch OBs because my insurance changed, so I went to the new OB Thurs (Dr Pamela Golden). They had actually rescheduled me from last week when the dr was called out on a delivery, but naturally, they didn't actually put my new appt time in the computer...so long story short, they had to 'squeeze me in' which meant waiting for a while and Embry getting super cranky cuz she was tired.

The doctor seemed really nice. She spent quite a bit of time talking to me about having lupus/pregnancy and the plan of attack. Basically, she's sending me in to get my blood drawn 3 times, 48 hours apart, which started last Sat, to track the growth of my hcg levels to make sure they're doubling every 48 hours (which would mean it's a viable pregnancy). That will really help to put my mind at ease. Then she said once the hcg level is up to 2000 (maybe a week or 2) then I'll have my first ultrasound. Then another ultrasound at 18 weeks and every 4 weeks from then on. After 36 weeks, she wants me to go in twice a week for a non-stress test. All of this is basically to make sure the baby doesn't suffer from intra-uterine growth restriction which is common with lupus patients.

Oh, another fun tidbit is that I asked her if she could tell me if my uterus is tilted (which pretty much everyone's is one way or another) and she said it was tilted forward, so that might actually be part of the reason why it was taking us so long to get pregnant.

First HCG was Sat morning, then the second was this morning. I went by the dr's office afterwards and they said she would call me tomorrow with the results and based on those she would decide if she wants me to go in for a 3rd HCG on Wed. I will post the results once I find them out. I'm feeling like this one might work out and yay, wouldn't that be awesome! :)

Here We Go Again?

Test taken on 3/10/10 at 2:43pm.

I caved. I wanted to test yesterday morning and this morning and wouldn't let myself because testing day is not until tomorrow. Then I gave into temptation after my nap and this is what I got. This would lead me to believe that it's a 'sticky bean' because these are the sucky pregnancy tests (didn't even get a positive until a week late with Embry), I tested a day early, and the line is darker than it was with last month's pregnancy. I'm keeping my fingers crossed and praying that we get a healthy little baby this time. :)

This baby is due Nov 18, almost exactly the due date Embry had.

Dealing

So I think now I'm setting myself up for a huge letdown. It's really a double edged sword because now I know that we can conceive in a 'normal' amount of time, but I'm going to be even more disappointed if I don't conceive again this month, or next month, or the next month etc. I've hardly taken any pictures over the last few weeks, so obviously, something's up!

Update on the sickness. Last Wed-Thurs I was sick in bed again. Same thing as last time, so Tony worked from home on Wed to watch Embry. Although he had to leave that night which left me to watch Embry in our room from the bed. I felt so bad because I had to throw up again while I was watching her and of course she came with me and starting crying when she saw I was sick. :( Poor baby.

I took Embry in for her 15 month check up yesterday. She's 31.5" tall and weighs 21lbs 6oz. That puts her about 80% for height and 35% for weight. I also saw the dr for my stomach issues while I was in there and he thinks it's my reflux. I find it hard to believe that reflux can have that sort of effect, but we'll see. So he's just increasing my prilosec. Bleh, I hope this helps.

Roller Coaster

Thurs, Feb 11, 2010. Period Due. 4am pregnancy test.

Thurs, Feb 11, 2010. 2pm digital pregnancy test.

Thurs, Feb 11, 2010. 4:30 pm.

Friday, Feb 12, 2010. 2pm. Family of 4 picture in the snow.

Friday, Feb 12, 2010. 3:30pm. Started spotting.

Saturday, Feb 13, 2010. 4am digital pregnancy test.

Dear Baby,
I loved you from the moment I saw that faint pink line. I wish we could have spent more time together, I know we would have had so much fun. You would have made Embry a big sister and me a mommy again. I will love you forever and I can't wait to meet you in heaven. You are my special angel.
---Mommy

Being Sick

Warning: this might be a little much if you have an aversion to puke stories.

So before I had Embry I had this fear that I was going to neglect my child because I would be too sick myself to take care of her properly. That's proven to be an unsubstantiated fear because as it turns out, when you're a mom, you just do what you have to do. Luckily for me, my lupus got a lot better through my pregnancy and since having Embry it hasn't returned to the horribleness that it was prior to my pregnancy. Praise Jesus.

Last week I took Embry to the dr because she had a cold, so he checked her out and said she had an ear infection. Her first one. I had a horrible sore throat so they swabbed me and said I did not have strep. We then went up to Phoenix last weekend since it was tony's sister's 18th birthday and my dad's 82nd birthday (my parents live down here, but go up to Wickenburg every year to visit friends for my dad's birthday). She seemed to be getting better over the weekend with her antibiotics and my sore throat was going away, so all was well.

Sat night we went over to my friend Jamie's house to spend the night and then go to church with her and her family at Tony's old church in Surprise. Everything was fine until about 11:30pm when I suddenly got very hot and went to the bathroom where I proceeded to throw up...then I was fine. Honestly, I don't get this. This happens about once a month with virtually no warning whatsoever then once it's done, then I'm totally fine. This is however the first time it's happened while I wasn't at home (well with the exception of Tony and my first date, you know a guy likes you when he sticks around after you vomit in front of him and hundreds of other people) and it was quite embarrassing. So then Sunday was great and we even went to Culvers after church (which is extremely greasy and delicious) and I was fine.

Then we get back here Sunday night and everything's fine. Mon I start to feel a little worse, but just nasal and chest congestion, nothing too bad. Although it was disappointing since I thought my cold was on it's way out. Tues same thing. Wed same thing until maybe 3pm. I started feeling achy and so I imagined I had a fever. Once Tony got home I took my temp, a low 100.3, and then the chills/sweats started. I took a bath to warm up and went to bed (around 7). Oddly, I couldn't sleep but was incredibly tired. Ended up watching tv and eating an apple with peanut butter and took some naproxen and tylenol for the fever. Then the aching got excruciatingly bad. It was mostly in my lower back and chest. I couldn't lay down, sit down, or stand up without doubling over in pain. I tore apart the bathroom medicine boxes to try and find something to help, ended up taking some naproxen liquid gels (that I now see expired in 2008) and went downstairs to try some other positions before heading to the ER.

Once I was downstairs, it got worse. I looked for my heating pad, but couldn't find it. Took some more Zicam flu medicine (I'm sure that was also expired) and googled my symptoms. Most things said to go to the ER and that it could be a heart attack. I can't imagine a heart attack lasting for hours, but I can imagine that's what it might feel like. So I quickly popped some aspirin (thanks Aunt Terri for sending that down last year because I never buy any) and then I went to lay down. Finally after about 1.5 hours the pain started to subside and I ended up falling asleep for about 45 minutes.

When I woke up, it was because I was extremely hot (same as at Jamie's house), so I went to the bathroom and you guessed it, threw up again. Let me tell you that if you think you might get sick, don't eat an apple before hand...the chunks are very hard to get up. Yes, I can find humor in the situation now, but believe me, last night I was not laughing. Boom, then I felt better, went upstairs and slept until 9:30am.

Now I feel pretty much like I have the last couple of days except my fever just started coming back a few hours ago. Hopefully I'll be able to ward off another episode like last night by being more proactive and taking meds before anything gets too far.

On another note, I think God might be protecting me from realizing my fear by allowing me only to get sick at night...when I don't have to be tending to Embry. With the exception of one time, the only times I've gotten sick since having Embry were at night. Even though it terribly inhibits my sleep, I can only be grateful that it doesn't happen at a much more inopportune time.

Doors

so Embry learned how to open doors on 2/2/10 and this is what she loves to do in her free time (ie any time she's not eating or sleeping)...