A Tale of Two Pregnancies

Hello. Yes, I still exist!

The last time I posted, it was back in March, and it was about my first prenatal appointment, and all the hullaballoo about the subchorionic hemorrhage. Now it's September, I'll be 37 weeks pregnant tomorrow, and all is well.

I've been reflecting on some of the similarities and differences between this pregnancy and my first one. Some are simple and obvious, and others not as much:

~ My first was a girl and this one is a boy.
~ Both were conceived via IUI with no meds - first and fourth attempts, respectively. I'm very lucky!!
~ I was miserable during and beyond the first trimester with both, but I was more miserable the first time. I never threw up either time, but had lots of nausea. The first time, I took plenty of Zofran, the second time, I didn't take it once.
~ I weaned off lexapro before getting pregnant the first time, and stayed off it until the day after Jordyn was born, when I started taking Zoloft (so they each got a "Z" med!). I've been taking it ever since, including throughout this entire pregnancy. Which I'm pretty sure made a big difference in terms of...
~ I developed significant anxiety (and maybe depression?) during my first pregnancy. I read back on some old posts recently, and... wow. I was a mess! I couldn't sleep, I cried all the time... This time? I'm sleeping fine, other than waking up to pee every 2 hours or so. No anxiety. It's more like I'm in denial. The first time, I was convinced every single little thing had to be perfect, every i dotted and every t crossed before the baby came. This time, every so often I'm like, oh yeah, there's a baby coming soon. I should probably get on that! Wait... there's a BABY coming soon?!? Oh that's right, I'm pregnant - very pregnant at this point, and that means that soon I will be a mother of TWO. Holy shit! Ok, so maybe just a little bit of anxiety! But nothing like the first time! No crying jags, no insomnia. It's a whole different ball game.
~ This baby has a foot, or both feet, over on my right side, in pretty much the same place that Jordyn had a foot toward the end. I guess there may be something about my anatomy that that's the comfortable position for a baby to be in in there.
~ This time, I have someone's hand to grab and put on my belly when the baby kicks - Jordyn's. And she gets a kick out of feeling him kick! It's been nice to have someone to share the experience with.
~ I don't love being pregnant any more this time than I did the first. I like having a belly I'm not trying to hide (which is what I'm always trying to do otherwise), and I love feeling the baby move. I'll admit, there's also something I like about some of the attention you get when you're obviously pregnant, i.e. "Here, sit down, are you feeling ok? What can I get for you?". I DON'T like the obnoxious attention like, "Wow, your belly's getting really big! Are you sure there aren't two in there?!". Ugh. But I think the positive attention is nice, because when do I get that otherwise?? It's not like I have a husband to tell me to sit down and take a load off after a long day, and give me a foot rub, or whatever. But when I'm really pregnant, it's kind of nice to be taken care of, in a way. But otherwise, I'm not such a big fan.
~ Not as much heartburn this time, I don't think, but a few instances of pretty significant heartburn that woke me up and kept me up at night.
~ I think I carry babies low. I've never had much trouble with shortness of breath from the baby being up high and squishing my lungs. I don't even feel many kicks up that high. This guy does it occasionally when I'm lying down in a certain position, and I guess maybe he's able to stretch out a little more. But mostly the movement I feel, at least at this point, is on my right side where his feet are, and VERY low, like just above my cervix, maybe, where his head and hands are. I swear sometimes he's trying to punch his way out, and I'm going to end up with one of his fists through my cervix!
~ I'm pretty sure I didn't get the first stretch mark when I was pregnant the first time. This time, though? I'm covered in them! My whole lower belly/bump, from my belly button down, all the way across, and a couple of small ones above my belly button, too. Plus a few small ones on my upper thighs. My mom told me today that she got a lot of stretch marks, too. Not sure how I got so lucky last time, but not this time. Hopefully they'll fade over time, but it's not like anyone sees my belly (other than Jordyn), anyway.
~ No baby shower this time, except I think some of the nurses at work might be planning a small breakfast "sprinkle" one of these days soon. My job-share colleague asked me if it was ok, but it hasn't happened yet. I created a small registry with a few things I need (like infant boy socks), but I already have all the major stuff. I'm pretty sure no one even knows about my registry!
~ Jordyn has come with me to some of my prenatal visits, and she has helped the midwife find the baby's heartbeat with the doppler, and measure my belly. I have a few pics of this - so cute, and I love that she's been playing a role all along. She's excited about the baby, but we'll see what reality brings!
~ Much less focus on the pregnancy this time. I'd heard about this, and it's true - when you already have a child, you have to maintain focus on them, and so the new one coming gets less attention, at least until they're on the outside. I do usually remember how far along I am when people ask, but there have been times I've forgotten I'm pregnant, and then someone will say something about it, or it'll pop back into my head, and I'm like, "oh yeah, I'm pregnant!".
~ Along the same lines, I can't come home from work and just collapse on the couch, or spend all day on the couch on my days off this time. I have a child already, so I have to feed her dinner, give her a bath, do her whole bedtime routine... even when I feel like I just can't walk one more step. Suffice it to say we've eaten more takeout and delivery than ever before, she's skipped baths on nights when she really could've used one, and she's had to deal with some pretty cranky behavior on my part (so maybe now we're even, ha!). Eh, at least we've both survived.
~ Also relatedly, my parents are local this time. Last time, they moved to Boston barely a month before Jordyn was born. This time, at least they've been here to help. They've babysat so I haven't had to take Jordyn to ultrasound and other appointments, had us over for dinner so I didn't have to worry about dinner that night, etc. It's not all fun and games, but it's been helpful at times. Oh, and my dad has spent three days at my house with a handyman while I was at work recently, so I could get some projects done around the house before the baby arrives and they never happen.
~ As of yesterday, this pregnancy has a deadline. An expiration date of sorts. Since I'm now over 40 (41.8 to be exact), they won't let me go past my due date. Jordyn was five days late, and that was fine when I was 37, but my midwife told me they'd induce me between 39-40 weeks (which is fine with me!!). My official due date is October 15, but just yesterday I scheduled an induction for October 8-9, if he hasn't come on his own by then. Yikes! That's two weeks from tomorrow!!! It's weird, and sort of surreal to know there's a definite end point, since last time it was just a waiting game until she came on her own.
~ This time, I'm having to face some things that I didn't before. One is that once this baby is born, I'll never be pregnant again. I'll never feel a baby move inside me again. It'll be the end of an era, and that makes me a bit sad (even though I don't love being pregnant!). But what makes me even more sad is facing the fact that my relationship with Jordyn as we've both known it for over four years is coming to an end. She'll never again be my only child. Like it or not, the dynamic is going to shift, because it's going to have to. Maybe it'll be a positive thing, but I bet it won't be easy, at least at first. I know this is a common feeling with women pregnant with their second, so I know I'm not alone in this, and I know it ends well. It's been made less big of a deal because Jordyn is so excited about the baby coming, and is excited to help with him. But, who knows what it'll actually be like when he's here! She may change her tune a bit! But seeing her excited about being a big sister (even though she wanted the baby to be a girl) has made it easier to not be too upset about losing what we have.
~ I still don't have a name finalized. With Jordyn, I pretty much had her name set in stone months before she was born. I shared it pretty widely, because I knew I loved it and was going to use it and didn't really care what people thought. Plus, I'm pretty much an open book. But this time, I decided not to share, except with my family. That was my fatal flaw, of course! My mom doesn't like the first name I think I've decided on. That isn't necessarily going to stop me from using it, but it does make me feel like I have to keep trying to find a different name. I've tried, but I can't seem to do it. At this point, we've stopped talking about it, and she's basically said to just name him whatever I want, and let her know the name after he's born. Fine. I'm pretty sure I'm going to use the name I like (and she doesn't), but now I may switch the middle name I was pretty set with, but not 100%. Ugh. Why do I have such a hard time with boy names?? I could name six girls right now, easy. At least four. But boys? SOOOOO much harder for me!
~ I'm planning a bris this time, since I'm having a boy. It's been interesting, because I have no experience with this, and I still don't have all the details worked out, but I'm working on it. I have a punchbowl invitation all ready to send - once I fill in the date, time, and the kid's name! Haha! I've contacted a few mohels, and will finalize one once the baby is here and I know the date of the bris. I met with one of the rabbis at our temple to ask some questions and get a bit of guidance. She sent me a list of possible readings for the service, and lent me a book. I'm sure it'll all come together.
~ I don't remember the end of my first pregnancy being quite as uncomfortable as this one. I mean, it wasn't all fun and games, but I'm pretty sure I wasn't this uncomfortable. I don't know if it's my age, or the baby's position, or if it's just that whole "every pregnancy is different" thing, but I'm full of all kinds of aches and pains. My feet ache (even when I'm off of them), although they're doing better now that I've been wearing over-the-counter inserts in my shoes. I'm almost positive I have some plantar fasciitis going on in my left foot/heal. When I wake up in the morning - and all through the night to pee - I can barely walk to the bathroom. My lower back hurts, although that's also gotten better with the shoe inserts. I've also been going to the chiropractor for maybe six weeks or so, at the midwife's suggestion. I was having a lot of pain in my pelvic region, possibly symphysis pubis dysfunction, or whatever it's called. I still have a lot of achiness in my pelvic area, almost like I've been riding a horse for a long time. I don't remember that from the first time. At one point, I bought a belly band thing, which kind of helped, but it was over the summer, and I was way too hot wearing it under my clothes. I think there's something about this baby's exact position that when he shifts a certain way, it creates an intense pressure that almost hurts. It basically causes a Braxton Hicks contraction, I think, and makes me have to pee. It's hard to describe, but I don't remember this from the first time. Braxton Hicks, yes (I remember joking that I should name the baby first name Braxton, middle name Hicks!),  but not this weird pressure in my very low abdomen/upper pelvic area every so often that makes me shift my own position to try to shift his.
~ Speaking of uncomfortable, I'm editing this post to add something I forgot to include the first time, although I don't know how! Different random complications: The first time, I had marginal placenta previa, which self-corrected and turned out not to be an issue at all. That didn't happen this time, but at 20-something weeks, just after July 4th, I developed severe, intense pain in my right lower quadrant. I mean, REALLY bad pain - I woke up in agony in the middle of the night, dripping in sweat, and in so much pain I almost called my dad to come over so I could go to the hospital right then and there. I thought I may have had appendicitis. I took tylenol, which eventually took the tiniest edge off so I could go back to sleep. I called and spoke to the midwife on call the next day, who said it sounded like round ligament pain. Um - no. Not even close. I've had round ligament pain, and this was light-years worse! I ended up going in a day later (and saw a different midwife than the one I'd spoken to the day before), and then ended up going for an abdominal ultrasound in regular radiology to look for/rule out a few things. Turns out, it was a degenerating fibroid, which can cause that kind of intense pain. I'd known I'd had a pretty small fibroid in there somewhere, which I'd been told was nothing to worry about. But fibroids can grow during pregnancy, from the hormones, and then sometimes they outgrow their blood supply, and a part of it starts to degenerate, which is excruciatingly painful. As soon as I googled this and ready some other women's stories, I knew it was spot-on what I'd experienced. There's nothing you can really do for it, although they told me I could take ibuprofen up to 30 weeks, I think, but I never took it. The pain was horrendous for a couple of days (I could barely walk fully upright and it was obvious to others how uncomfortable I was), and then just kind of faded and disappeared entirely. I was told it could happen again, since more of the fibroid could start to degenerate, but it never did.
~ I don't remember being as hot and sweaty the first time. I must be the hottest pregnant woman on the planet! It's FINALLY started to cool down a bit, but I'm pretty sure I didn't stop sweating for three months straight (June/July, August, September). It was a ROUGH summer. I know it was hot the first time, too, and Jordyn was, of course, due and born in August, but this time has been worse, I think, maybe because I had to make it ALL the way through the summer pregnant, and not just til the beginning of August. This time, I took to putting ice packs down the back of my maternity pants, between my lower back and the stretchy band of the pants. Sounds crazy, but it helped!
~ I had a doula the first time, and I don't have one lined up for this time. Mostly because while I was planning to try for natural childbirth (and did it - even though I ended up wanting an epidural, it was too late) the first time, I'm fully planning on getting an epidural this time! I'm not going to wait until I meet the midwives' criteria to go to the hospital - I have my own plan! I'm going to go in pretty much right away, and if they won't take me yet, I'm going to hang out in the lobby until they will. Ideally, I'll have them place an IV and I'll take the pole with me to the lobby, so that once I get a liter of fluids, they'll be able to place the epidural right away once they admit me to a room!

I may come back and edit this if I think of anything else, but that covers most of it, I think.

More updates to come once the baby does (and maybe sooner)!