Week 7!!

I’m so happy right now.  Today (Friday), is officially the first day of my 7th week.  Now while I realize this doesn’t completely get me out of the danger zone, I do feel a certain amount of relief that I have passed the 6 week mark where I lost the last pregnancy.  I’d like to say that I was carefree now, but unfortunately that is not the case completely.  I’m still a little nervous about this pregnancy.  My symptoms this week have been occasional cravings, constantly swollen belly (mostly from bloating, but even when I don’t seem very bloated I am noticing my belly is bigger.  3rd child effect, perhaps?), and slightly uncomfortable boobs.  Oh yeah, add the additional 4-5 lbs. I am seeing on the scale too.  I’ve been able to eat almost anything, although I am still avoiding hamburgers and corn.  I’ve gotten my sweet tooth back.  I’m working out 3-4 times a week still, but I maintain a heart rate under 140, and do stuff that is not too taxing on my body.  My tennis league starts next Friday, so that will get interesting in the next month or so as I grow out of my only tennis skirt and struggle to find something to wear on the court that does the job and yet doesn’t freak anyone out.  My pants are getting tight already.  If I had access to my maternity clothes, I’d be going through them already I think.  Unfortunately I have to wait until my husband comes and visits since all the clothes are in the attic.  While I would climb around up there, I cannot get the stairs down by myself without being creative if I’m not pregnant.  Not trying while pregnant.  Not worth it.  So, for the next week I will continue to “dunlap” over my pants that are getting too tight and try as much as possible to wear my workout clothes (which are also getting tight). 

The working out must be working though, because I gained 8-10 lbs by my first doc appointment with both of my other pregnancies.  What can I say? I gain a lot of weight while pregnant.  One would think that I am just eating and eating, but really I think I’ve not really eaten anymore than normal.  Not sure where this weight is coming from. 

Well, you all have a wonderful weekend! 

Haha! Buda Belly!

This is what a third pregnancy is like at 7 weeks.  You look further along than you really are.  My stomach popped this past week.  Crazy!! (and I am not arching my back—just standing straight.  I got a little booty on me too)

Henoch Schonlein Purpura (HSP) and My Crazy Day!

What a crazy past few days! 

This is potentially a wordy post, so I will try to limit myself as much as possible since I have to pack for our trip tomorrow.  Yesterday, after Doc left for his latest away rotation, we took the boys to Bert’s field trip at the local park.  An easter egg hunt and snacks ensued.  We had a great time!

Got home and pulled off Ernie’s socks and shoes to find little red bites on his ankles forming right along the line where his socks ended on his ankles.  I asked him if it hurt or itched, and he said no.  I figured chiggers and went along my way.

Fast forward bath time, I am cleaning Ernie off and his red “bites” are now the size of nickels and his ankles are swollen.  I panicked a little, but called my husband who finally picked up the phone.  Explained to him the new find on his ankles (I had mentioned to him earlier the “bites” I found) and he told me to take him to the walk in clinic. 

Got to the clinic, and their computers were down.  I forgot my insurance card at home and they turned me away until I could produce the card.  Called Doc back and he called his friend who graduated med school with him.  Doc H said to bring him up to the ER and call him before I got there.  He’d see us.  Doc H is a pediatrician who runs the pedi-ER.  He’s very reliable and great at what he does.  He cared for Ernie when we had to admit him to the hospital when he was only 2 weeks old. 

Doc H told us that he has HSP.  (you can read about it on the HSP link)  I won’t go into detail other than to say that his rash that he has will get worse before it gets better, it involves swelling and arthritic pain of the joints, and lasts about 6-12 weeks.  He has to have urinalysis tests for a while to have blood in his urine ruled out.  He can also get colicky stomach pain with it (thankfully he hasn’t gotten that).  The rash started on his ankles and is now starting to appear on his elbows as well.  It doesn’t itch, thank goodness.  Oh, and only 15 in 100,000 cases are found each year.  CRAZY!!

He appears to have a mild case, which 95% of them are.  This can recur but mainly occurs in childhood and to boys. 

He had no blood in his urine today (yay!) and his blood count was normal (yay!).  He did have protein in his urine that indicated HSP and his blood tests confirmed it.

The cause of all this???  It is a reaction to an infection.  Guess who has strep throat AGAIN?  I didn’t even know it!!!  Ernie tested positive today, and we now have him on meds.  If you remember correctly, I think I posted that he was sick just a month ago (then again, maybe I didn’t.  Don’t remember).  He had strep throat then too.  JEESH!

Now, another kicker? 

I’ve been drinking after him ALL WEEK.  Guess who’s going in for a strep swab tomorrow morning before we leave for our trip?  Also, our pedi was nice enough to also swab Bert too.

Whew!

These past two days have been crazy. 

Pregnancy update: Week 5

Well, I’m still pregnant!  Next week is the week it all ended last time.  I’m a little nervous.  In the last days I have been doing better, but lately I’ve had all kinds of crazy pregnancy symptoms.  The first thing was my nightmares.  Crazy, scary, worry-filled nightmares.  The only thing I can figure out about them is that in some way, they all related to loss.  I’m thinking my previous miscarriage worry is haunting me.  Doc was out of town in Hawaii on conference when it all started happening, but as soon as he got back, my nightmares went away.  I’ve now had 4 nights of wonderful sleep.  Unfortunately he leaves again next week.  Hopefully they won’t come back.

I’ve had crazy cravings and aversions this week.  For instance, one afternoon I craved raw spinach leaves.  I had two full bowls with balsamic vinaigrette dressing.  It was WONDERFUL!  I ate them rather quickly as it was at about 4pm, and I was trying to tutor at the same time.  About an hour and a half later, Doc cooked hamburgers and the smell was bothering me a little.  I didn’t realize that it was the smell of the hamburgers until I took a bite.  Fortunately I did NOT get sick, but my stomach did turn a little and I had to leave the boys and Doc to eat their hamburgers by themselves while I stayed in the bedroom somewhat shielded from the odor.  Another day I had to eat fish sticks with Bert and Ernie (Bert’s choice for dinner on Sunday).  I decided to open up a can of sweet whole kernel corn to go with it, and gagged on my first spoonful.  Needless to say, Corn and hamburgers are not on my nice list.  They are rather naughty to me right now. 

In the past day or two I have not noticed any nausea.  I’ve gone back to eating whatever again.  I’m waiting for it to strike again.  I’ve added sweets back to my diet.  (the sight of them made me nauseous until the other day). 

Other things going on?  I’ve been TIRED!

My house is a wreck!  Flylady flew right out the window!!  I’m still doing my dishes daily, and then I take a nap.  After work, everyday.  That was usually my cleaning time each day.  Whoops!  I guess I’ll get it back in order later.  Right now, a girl’s got to have her sleep!

I’m still thirsty all the time, boobs still hurting, etc…

All good signs, right?  High hormones = good pregnancy.  So far, it’s been good.  Nightmares, Nausea and all.  Bring it on!  I’m ready for it. :)

Pregnancy Update: Week 4

These last 2 weeks have been nerve-wracking at best.  I’ve “known” I was pregnant since a couple days after I ovulated, but I found out for sure last week.  I’m 4 weeks now, so it is really early.  I’ve been praying for lots of morning sickness since I figure morning sickness = lot of hormones = healthy pregnancy.  I’m thrilled to be pregnant, but so nervous this one will turn out like the one in December.  I wanted to keep track of my pregnancy, and figured a blog post here and there when I feel things are different might not drive you all too crazy.

So, keep in mind this post is more for me than for you.  I’m being selfish here, but it’s my blog…so…. ;-)

I was so excited that I got nauseous today on canned corn!!  That’s big hormones, right?  Nausea in my 4th week?  That’s good!  You are all thinking I’m crazy at this point, but I am NOT going to complain one darn bit about morning sickness this pregnancy.  For that last statement, I’ll have the worst morning sickness known to man.  I’ll live through it. 

I’ve never had morning sickness really (a little nausea here and there..usually followed with food and it goes away).  So really, I’m due.  If you had morning sickness at all, I’m sure you’re wishing it on me right now for being one of those girls who can have two healthy kids with no throwing up.  It’s not fair, I know. 

Other symptoms I’ve had so far have been dizziness, weepiness, lots of peeing, sore boobies, afternoon nausea and being TIRED!  The dizziness thing is something I know how to work with since I also tend to get really dizzy (almost to the point of passing out) when I don’t weigh enough.  I remember having this problem with all my pregnancies.  It does hit me much faster and more often, but I know that wherever I am I must sit on the floor if I get this way.  Otherwise I get the shakes and black out.  I’ve always been this way, but not much anymore.  Just now, since the pregnancy began.  I’ve taken to a daily nap lately.  I’m so lucky that I have a wonderful kid who will let me nap when his brother is napping.  Thank you so much, Bert.  You are such a great 5 year old.  The only problem with the nap, is that I then stay up too late.  I am hoping it will correct itself since I will be back to waking up at 6am tomorrow morning.  Goodbye spring break.

These next few weeks (until I get passed that 6th week mark that I miscarried on last time) will probably be a little freaky for me.  I’m super nervous, but like everything else, I’m facing it head on. 

Thanks for your support, bloggy friends! :)

An Update of Us (Long time coming)

I hope this finds you all well and happy!  It’s been a while since I have posted on this blog.  An update for us:

Nicholas: He has been playing basketball every Saturday morning for a little over a month.  They played yesterday and had their first win!  The kids were all very excited and happy to finally beat another team.  Nicholas attempted 3 shots, but didn’t quite make them.  The fact that he attempted 3 shots is BIG!  He also assisted in another goal by passing to the scorer.  He was very proud of his performance and even Daddy got to be there to see it!  Nicholas is also trying out tennis.  We are getting free tennis lessons for him courtesy of my job.  There are some wonderful perks even if I get paid minimum wage.   He’s been a little shy at the two lessons he has had.  He’s agreed to try it 3 more times before deciding whether or not to keep taking lessons.  He is doing great when he’s there and he’s excited and has a lot of fun, but he has a kneejerk reaction everytime I say it’s time to go play.  I’m not gonna force him, but I figured that he might just need some extra time like he seems to for other things (including basketball).  I hope that he will stick with it.  He has great hand-eye coordination and it would be a more “individual” sport for him.  We’ll see what happens.  In other news, Nicholas learned to tie his shoes this past week!!!  We slowly worked on the process for about a week and a half until he had it down.  He learned it in steps and is SOOOOO proud of himself!!  Nicholas continues to do Awesome in school and he’s making major breakthroughs on his temper tantrums.  I’m really proud and I’m seeing a lot of progress lately.  He’s growing up into such a nice young boy. 

Christian:  Christian has been coming to the Falls with me every morning while I work in the nursery.  He’s made many friends and loves to play with them everyday.  He’s getting so big and still giving me lots of trouble with eating.  It is not unusual for him to skip dinner altogether 4-5 times a week.  He’s not losing weight and the Pediatrician says this is normal.  I’m sneaking veggies into his applesauce and he drinks juices that have veggies in them.  I figure he’ll come around sometime.  He has also been potty training.  He’s able to do everything but poo on the potty.  He stays dry most days.  He wears big boy underwear and has just learned to pee standing up.  He’s very proud of himself!  He turns 3 next month!!  WOW!!  We are having a birthday party for him this month since Ed will be out of town in April and May.

Ed:  He’s been busy as usual.  He’s got only 3 1/2 more months of residency.  He went to Houston for the month of February.  He’s going to Hawaii next weekend for a conference to present a poster.  He’ll come back for a week and C’s party, and then he’ll be going to Dallas for two months.  The first month (April) he has two room hotel accommodations.  He also has the weekends off, so we will be visiting and he will be coming home on the weekends.  In May he has to come up with other accommodations.  We are excited that he will be home and done soon.  Starting in July his hours will be more along the lines of 40-50 hours a week with weekends off for the most part.  We are siked about that!  We’ve started to attend church every weekend at either my new church, Victory Life Baptist, or at the Catholic church.  We will hopefully be able to split weeks once he’s more available on the weekends.  He’s also going to take tennis lessons this summer so he and I can play together.  We want to have a couple of things that we can do together, and thought this was a good one.  Eventually we will take up golf too.

Me:  I’ve stayed busy these past months working at the nursery at our Gym.  I enjoy it quite a bit.  We have babies through 4 year olds this time of year since the bigger kids are in school.  There is one little girl who keeps me on my toes because we have to watch to make sure she’s not climbing things and falling down.  She’s just added biting and slapping to the list this past week, but we’re working with her on it.  Luckily she bit me (not too hard) and not another child.  She’s kind of stuck on me like a magnet, so when I was holding another baby she got a little jealous.  She’s only 13 months old, so she’s still learning that it hurts and it’s not acceptable.  I’m the only worker that is there every morning M-F, so having the other workers throughout the week be different people kind of mixes the week up for me.  I started tennis lessons (for free!! WAHOO!!!) with our tennis pro about 3 weeks ago.  We do an hour lesson once a week and I do it with 3 of my coworkers.  I’ve been signing up for Saturday Mixed Doubles, but I cannot do it for a couple more weeks until N’s basketball is over  because of the time conflict.  Once basketball is over, I’ll be found playing tennis every Saturday morning.  I discovered that I love playing the net.  I’m sure that once I start playing back I’ll discover that I like it too, but for now that is what I have been doing.  I also take a Cardio Tennis class every week on Wednesday.  This is a great class because it is cardio intensive tennis drills.  I had to leave the last class early last Wednesday because I pulled my Quad.  It is healing and we are taking a break spring break anyway since the tennis pros will be out of town.  I figure I’ll be ready to start back in another week.  I’ve also been working through a bible study with the Lifegroup that I’ve been attending on Sunday.  We are starting a section in fellowship and when I started going I caught the tail end of the section on prayer.  I’m starting from the beginning on my own, but also doing the sections done in my group as well.  In addition to all this, I’ve picked up scrapping the boys again on the computer.  I put up a new page under Christian’s Album on my facebook page in case you didn’t see it.  I’ll keep posting my work there.  My goal is to one day be able to take all those files and compile a scrapbook for both of them.  There are many services where you can send them the files and they will print them and bind them in a book.  I’ll be excited once I can get enough pages to do that for them.  I figured it would be an exciting present for both of them.  My other blog, Life’s Ups and Downs…and My Place in it All has taken off a little more.  I’ve recently begun participating in a writer’s workshop that is weekly.  Each week I post on the given topic and we (the other bloggers participating) can all read/comment on each other’s posts.  It has been fun so far and I’m getting some new readers and commenters.  My other blog continues to be a source for me to be myself.  Sometimes I vent and other times I celebrate things in my life.  Sometimes I just comment on things I see being done and other times I cry there.  It’s been a great way for me to get things off my chest and be honest.  I don’t really have anything to hide, so I invite everyone there. 

Well, this has been our life lately!  how are you?  comment and let me know, or just email me and tell me how you are doing.  jennozuna@nts-online.net

Nicholas's first basketball game. :)

Our first basketball game. Nicholas is playing Lubbock Christian Athletic Association basketball for 4, 5 and 6 year olds. This is his first time to play, and I am his asst. coach. Our first game was this Saturday. They did pretty well. The video here is of clips from the game. We hope to get better video at our next game next Saturday.

I wrote another post over the basketball game here. Check it out. :)