happenings
Sorry I haven’t updated in a while. I’ve been busy getting my classroom and lesson plans back in order for school. This is my last off week (except for a training day on Tuesday) before reporting back full time. I am excited! I love my job and am ready to get back in the swing of things! Although Ms. Bella probably isn’t thrilled. Summer break is officially over.
Pregnancy Updates:
- I started my third trimester…where does the time go? On one hand I feel like this pregnancy has been super fast and on the other it seems like it has been going really slowly. But the third trimester is here and I’ll take it. 🙂
- Nursery? It isn’t finished but we’ve made great progress. We’ll get there.
- Cravings? Caesar Salad! Seriously I want a chicken Caesar like every day for lunch. I literally start thinking about it right after breakfast and can’t wait to make lunch everyday. It’s random because in my non-pregnant life Caesar dressing isn’t exactly on the top of my favorites list.
- Stretch Marks? Nope…knock on wood, cross your fingers (and toes) that that continues. I am diligent about rubbing lotion on my back, hips and belly twice a day. (morning and night) I’ve used a variety of stuff but most recently I have been using Maderma Stretch Mark Therapy cream. I like it because it smells good and the consistency of the lotion is good.
- Weight Gain? Oh yes. I am now in complete awe of those people who manage to go an entire pregnancy gaining only 15 pounds. Who are you? So far I have gained 23 pounds. So add another 12 weeks of pregnancy and I am probably looking right around the 35-40 pound mark. Eh…not terrible. I notice it the most (aside from the belly) in my face. Whew my cheeks are enormous!
- Next Appointment? It’s Friday. It is also the gestational diabetes test and for some reason I am incredibly NERVOUS. Please tell me I am not the only one who fretted about this appointment??
- Swelling? Nope. My wedding rings still fit fine, no issues. My ankles are still their normal size. But we’ll see how things go once school starts again and I am on my feet a lot more.
So I think that’s it. Pretty boring huh? I always thought once I finally got pregnant and sustained it I would be one of those people who did the weekly updates and the this week baby is the size of (insert fruit/vegetable) but once it happened for us I just never followed through with it. I think in part it was me remembering how painful those updates were when I read them in the midst of my struggles and I didn’t want to do that. Not that I think it’s a bad thing to do it….I just think I realized it wasn’t for me. With that said, thanks for letting the majority of my blog posts these last 7 months be about the upcoming baby. I know sometimes it is probably annoying to read yet another post on how I am feeling pregnancy wise….but you guys rock for reading. 🙂
state of {my} marriage
So. Supposedly marriage is hard. I guess sometimes I am waiting for the hard to start. I mean don’t get me wrong some days are hard but overall marriage has been pretty good to me and on most occasions relatively easy. If someone asked me to say the first word that popped into my head about marriage, hard would not be it. Keith and I are very compatible. We are actually complete opposites. And Keith is easy. He’s easy to get along with, easy to be friends with and easy to love. I can not imagine a better man for me than Keith. He gets me, knows how to handle me and vise versa. We are pretty dang lucky in my opinion.
So let me tell you the number one things that bugs me the most. When people say things like:
- “Kids change everything”
- “Marriage is going to be so much harder with kids”
- “Just you wait and see your sex life is over”
- “Marriage is soooo hard with kids. You’ll see what I mean in a few months”
- And on and on and on….
It drives me CRAZY! I usually just smile and nod and act agreeable. But in reality I want to tell them to stop being such a killjoy. I am sure adding a child into the mix makes marriage a little harder. No doubt. You have less time to focus on one another, there is someone in the house 100% dependent on you at all times, you are tired, you can’t take spontaneous date nights, etc. But that doesn’t mean I am willing to just throw in the towel and admit defeat. To accept that my marriage will never be as good as it is now just because I have a baby. NO! I am completely unwilling to accept that. And maybe because I am unwilling to accept that I won’t let it happen.
I am not trying to say that my marriage is perfect. Because perfection doesn’t exist in anything we do. I am not trying to say Keith and I never get into fights and I don’t ever call my mom to bitch. Because we do and I do call my mom a lot. But at the end of the day hard just isn’t the word I would use to describe my marriage. And I absolutely refuse to believe that our best days are behind us now that baby Trey is coming. No freaking way.
I remember when we got married lots of people had things to say like, “marriage kills a relationship” or “Just wait until the 7 year itch.” Well to those people I say that marriage has made my relationship that much better and stronger and Keith and I have been married for 7 years now and there’s no itching on either side.” Ha! Maybe those people are the same ones who make the comments now. The ones who haven’t ever been happy or haven’t ever experienced a really good relationship that adds value to your life.
I know this shouldn’t bug me. I know that. But it does. It so does. Why do people think that just because I am sporting a baby bump that this is the time to fill me with dread about the upcoming state of my marriage?
Here’s the thing, my marriage is just fine and the upcoming state of my marriage is just fine too. So leave me alone and take your negative, killjoy, pessimistic advice to someone else.
Rant done.
unanswered prayers
This might be a heavy post…fair warning. 😉
The thing about having multiple miscarriages is that it affects different people in different ways. For me, I was overcome with such anger. I was angry at everyone. I was angry at friends who were pregnant and friends who had kids, myself, Keith, even God. I was angry at the entire world for every and no reason at all. And the thing is I didn’t even have it as bad as some people. I knew that. I still know that. I was angry at myself because I couldn’t reconcile my feelings. I felt lucky to have such a good life but I also felt like it was incomplete. I just didn’t know how to handle my feelings and they manifested themselves in the form of anger.
I was even cold to people who probably didn’t deserve it. People who had what I wanted. I tried to stay friends but it was too hard. I didn’t go to baby showers, call to check in, and I let some people just drift slowly out of my life. I really didn’t know how to handle how I felt. It was so much easier to avoid the people who made me think about the life I wasn’t having. I realize now that this was a very selfish attitude. If I could go back and handle things differently, I would. In a heartbeat. I was with a friend the other day who had 7 miscarriages in a row coupled with fertility issues and she was a much better person than I. She hosted baby showers for her friends. Me? I walked out on friendships. Honestly, I am a little ashamed but I also know that I was in a lot of pain and I was coping as best I could. I go back and read old posts of mine and my pain and anger are palpable. My heart breaks rereading them.
The other day I was driving in my car and the Garth Brooks song, Unanswered Prayers came on the radio. For those of you who don’t know that song (first of all are you living under a rock?) it is about a man who prayed to God to marry his high school sweetheart. He didn’t and at a high school reunion years later he sees her and realizes that God’s greatest gift to him was unanswered prayers because his current wife was the best thing that happened to him. That song not only transplanted me right back to high school but it also made me think about my current situation. Maybe God’s greatest gifts ARE unanswered prayers.
As much pain and anger as I felt over those miscarriages had either of those pregnancies happened I wouldn’t have baby Trey in my belly right now. And that is hard to fathom. I also wouldn’t have Bella. That is impossible to imagine. We got her the day after the second miscarriage and that dog means more to me than I could ever put into words. I also wouldn’t be a teacher. I was in the process of getting certified to be a teacher and I was substituting. The odds of me getting a job would have been slim had I been pregnant and then I fear I would have lacked initiative to job hunt if I had a baby at home waiting for me. So…I now have a job I love, a dog I love, and soon to be a son that I already love so much.
I really really like my life. Like a lot. And I fear had either of those pregnancies not resulted in miscarriage I would have greatly altered this life I like so much. I don’t believe things happen for a reason. I don’t believe in fate. In fact one of the things that used to make me so angry was when people would say my miscarriages happened for a reason. I HATED that. That made zero sense to me. Why would crack babies be born or babies to teenage mothers be the right reason?? No, I believe that we live in a universe of free choice and free will and there are a lot of random acts that make absolutely no sense that happen every single day. The randomness of life is what makes it so scary and so great all at the same time.
I guess that tonight when I go to bed I will be thankful for the friends who stuck by me and opened their arms back up to me in recent months, I’m grateful for my Bella, my life, my job, baby Trey….
and unanswered prayers.
what we’ve been doing
Hiiiiiiiii.
I am definitely enjoying the summer! I’ve been resting a lot….who knew making a baby was so dang tiring. Ha! I’m kidding. But I am definitely enjoying my daily nap. It’s going to be hard once school starts.
So what else have I been doing aside from napping? Well lots of entertaining this sweet thing:
It’s so hot here that it’s hard for lots of outdoor play time. I say it all the time but I absolutely hate Texas in the summer. Hate it. I can only image how much worse it would feel if I was covered in black fur.
We’ve also been painting (er….Keith has been painting) the nursery. I went ultra original and went with a color called Melting Icicles AKA white. I like it.
We are doing a sports theme nursery. I promise to show it all when it is completed but for now here’s a teaser. These are the letters I ordered off Etsy with his name!
How stinking cute are these? Keith and I are big sports people so it just seemed natural to do a sports themed nursery. In fact, even my class at school has a sports theme. What can I say…I’m consistent.
Other than that I am just growing a baby and getting bigger by the day. {grin}
How’s your summer?
What Kelly Said 