Initial Cravings

Here's what I crave so far:

kettle chips and diet Coke
sweet iced tea
iced Chai latte, specifically from Buzz Cafe
french fries
potato wedges
mashed potatoes
cottage cheese
apples
pears
peaches
cuccumbers
cream of potato soup
Ritz crackers with red wine Kona cheese on them
plain chocolate ice cream
Birds Eye Classic mixed veggies in a bag--
which includes corn, peas, & carrots--cooked with butter
buttered bread slices and rolls
fried egg on toast

Memorial Day Weekend

What I have discovered is that I feel tons better outside, and a walk around the block does me a world of good. Even if all I seemingly want is to lie down and threaten anyone who jostles the bed or couch, if I just walk around outside I feel so much better. It's amazing. So I've been getting out a bit each day.

This weekend we put Tyler in his new bike seat and Elmo helmet and biked around a bit. Also, we joined DPOP/Sen. Harmon in the Memorial Day Parade through River Forest and it was so pretty out. I ate an apple on the route, sharing it with Tyler who has just discovered biting and chewing apples. So Sunday and Monday were lovely.

Friday and Saturday were bad, I could barely move. Saturday was a two-puke day, and Tyler does not understand that Mom-Mom doesn't feel well. He loves water and to play in the water in the sink, to brush his teeth any chance he can get, and drink water from his bathroom cup. So, he sees me in the bathroom hovering over the sink and running water, he wants in on the action! He just doesn't realize what I'm doing. You can't explain that too well to a 20-month old, tho maybe next time he is sick I can teach him the word "sick" or something like it and he will get the concept. He was so funny. He's only as tall as the bathroom counter, and he would push his head in between me and the sink and peel my arms off the sink and push them away and say "go, go!" Then I'd stand there incredulously while he'd realize that (of course) he couldn't reach the water, and so would turn to me with "up, up!" Which of course I could not manage for him!

Nappiness & Office Gossip

I have discovered that my sudden need for naps at work is causing a little gossip at work. When it comes over me, it's like drowning, I can barely move, and if I resist it I feel terribly sick, like the core of me is made of nauseous illness. What to do? It hits me mid-day each day. I asked a trusted coworker and she suggests I use my lunch hour like she did when she was pregnant. And that would work, because I eat late morning and after lunch anyway. So I'm going to try that.

I was angry for awhile, that there would be gossip about me and that it would be unkind. I hear during my first pregnancy there was gossip. That the moms felt I was milking it, or that I was giving pregnant women a bad name, and the non-moms felt that I seemed incapacitated and probably shouldn't even be at work. I would love to take a sabbatical, but I can't afford that kind of luxury. I was not proud of my diminished performance. I'm no dummy, I can see that I'm a little slower on the draw, a little less able to concentrate, that I would be late after a sick morning and that I would take cat naps. But my pregnancy was miserable, I hate being sick every day, all day, tired, worn out. If I didn't know I was pregnant I'd think I was really ill with something bad. As far as milking it goes, well, I can understand that others that either more carefully hid their misery for works' sake, or those that weren't as sick, would be resentful.

What really stings is the accusation that I would give pregnant women a bad name. That stings. As a feminist I want to perform well and prove that women can do the job, sure. But more and more I feel like the workplace does not leave room for much humanity. We're people, not machines. I would love to see workplaces with better family- and health-friendly policies. Regularly long days make picking up kids from day-care, or being home when school gets out, tricky. Every office should have a private room for breatfeeding moms who need to pump. There are so many issues, I could go on and on. They say not to announce your pregnancy until the 12th week when the first trimester is over, but that time is when most women are sick. So we go it alone, and hide our sickness, and seek and offer no comfort to each other during what is the roughest time of pregnancy. Don't you think that's sad?

If by a giving pregnant women a bad name, they mean that I'm a poor example of pregnanthood, well, that just hurts. I was doing the best I could. No one's perfect, least of all me. And I was kind of proud that I had survived it at all.

Poopie Diapers and Pregnancy Don't Mix

Last night I encountered my first poopie diaper while under the full morning sickness influence. I had a total meltdown. I couldn't get near the little guy without nearly getting sick. I actually called Ben at work in tears, and--get this--he came home from work to change the diaper and went back again! His coworkers were all in stitches but I doubt they would allow this every night. Oh boy, I'm in trouble!

Grocery Store Drama

So I had a fierce craving for an apple and stopped at the grocery store this morning. I really felt/feel bad this morning, very sick. So I go in and there's only one line open, and the older lady in front of me is messing w/ coupons and carrying on about this and that, then I'm up, but she remembers she meant to buy a bag of manure (!!!), oh--and some stamps--and can someone carry the manure to her car for her. I was barely hanging on and that's when a dizzy spell hit me, so then I sat on the floor and since I was alarming people admitted I was pregnant and that I came in for the apple. The guy behind me, who had been making jokes before, was very nice and tried to help. He finally suggested I just start in on the apple before I paid for it, so I did. The cashier weighed it with several bites missing and gave me a paper towel and I chowed down. They were all very nice about it, and joked about not charging me the missing bites of apple.

I felt better while eating the apple but then morning sickness really hit me hard today. I snacked on potato salad mid-morning at work but could not keep it down. What I want to know is, when you're being sick in the bathroom at work, why is that when everyone needs to come in? Even tho I'm in a stall and they can't see me, I feel very self-conscious. And of course they are not helping. Ahem. It's soooo not fun. I wish I could put a sign on the door marked "busy-10 minutes please", or that there was a secondary bathroom in the building!

Here I am in my cube and... Oh god, somebody's eating tuna and... is that burnt toast??? Yee gods, help me!

First 5 weeks of pregnancy in a flash

I found out I was pregnant on Mother's Day, 5/13/07. Appropriate, huh? Up until then my symptoms were what I thought was serious PMS...that just happened to last for 3 weeks. The week before I ran to the store at lunchtime and bought all this snackfood and ate like a crazy person all day at work all week! Then I had to pee every 20 seconds, my first real hint. I also noticed that I was craving ice cubes, which is unusual, and my second hint. By Mother's Day I was a week late, and started to suspect. Kinda slow on the draw...

Ben and I think we conceived on April 16 when I ovulated on the left (I can feel it). We're hoping for a girl, and tried the Shettle's method. Keep your fingers crossed (as if that would help).

The week after Mother's Day morning sickness gradually came over me. This weekend it was pretty serious, and nothing smells or tastes the same. Of course we started off with a bang: a nasty stomach flu went thru the entire family, starting with me on Wednesday! At least morning sickness isn't like that, but it's pretty bad!

I hope to keep a kind of diary of how it's going here on the blogosphere, if that's not too self-indulgent, and hope to keep my friends and family entertained!