we survived...and it was almost fun

We both survived the visit from my family. And, oddly enough, all of that dread and pessimistic preparation seemed to have done the trick - we actually had a good time, we all got along, and I almost feel bad for dreading it so much! My nieces - 4 and 2 -were wonderful and fun to spend time with. My SIL seems to have come down a notch or two and was very easy to talk to and, at one point, asked me if my mom was throwing me a shower b/c she'd like to be "in on it" but said it would be hard to plan exclusively from 4 hours away....which was shocking to me...and considerate! She did look about 7 months pregnant...but I guess that is expected with your third. She looked at me and said how she remembers she didn't look as big as she does now with her first until she was almost giving birth (very unlike her to be self-deprecating, so I was nicely surprised again). In any event, we had a good time. Brett and my brother sat around laughing and drinking beers. We do all know that we have different views on things and, though my brother and his wife used to pick on us horribly for that, they seem to now be willing to live and let live. Maybe we are all growing up.

I have discovered one major pregnancy symptom- I am a HUGE klutz. I am hurting myself and breaking things left and right. I'm not very big so my balance can't be that far off (and yoga has been going fine) so I'm assuming it has something to do with being tired a lot...so I don't move as well as I usually do...not sure. I just know that I have a sprained finger, a blood blister from where a mop 'bit me', a badly stubbed toe, almost fell down the stairs 2x yesterday and broke a glass 2 days ago. I'm a mess.

The other thing is that I have a lot of pulling pains in my belly area. It is really really uncomfortable. It seems that that nice strong core I've cultivated from 12 years of yoga is holding in my organs and uterus and everything and this is seriously causing my hips to move slightly out (which makes them sore)...it is also causing stretchy pains from the strain of holding all of that in. My mom just keeps looking at me and going "I don't remember any pain like that, are you sure that is normal?" Yes, mom...its normal...

So...onto where our little peanut is in her development...





She is the size of an avocado! This week she is apparently working on her facial expressions! Her uterus is fully developed and her ovaries are already containing primitive egg cells (uh oh, watch out daddy!). Her skin is still translucent but her heart is pumping 25 quarts of blood a day...crazy.

Interesting developments this week - there have been a few instances this week of women who knew what sex baby they were having finding out they were having the other sex. One of them transferred a CGH normal female embryo and her 20 week anatomy scan showed that she was very clearly carrying a well-endowed boy. Um, eeek. She then discovered that this is the main error for CGH embryos b/c the x and y chromosomes are the smallest and so are the hardest to define with accuracy. So, we might still have a surprise. Another woman did one of those genetic tests at home where you prick a finger and send your blood to a lab and they tell you if you are carrying a boy or girl. It said "girl", and her anatomy scan said "boy". She is now pretty upset and selling brand new baby girl stuff on craigslist. The last one is a friend of mine who, at her 20 week scan, the OB said, "it is a girl - I am 99.9% sure". Well, at 29 weeks, she had a 3d u/s and boy did they see boy parts! She isn't upset -other than the fact that they need to re-paint the nursery and return a lot of stuff (and get the word out b/c her shower is next week!). So, my first thought was, uh oh...maybe we shouldn't have told anyone we were having a girl...and then more stories came up and now it seems that the "wrong gender predicted" quota is likely met. So, I'm pretty secure that we are having a girl...but I really still don't care either way. I just think it must be very mind-shifting to be talking about "her" and "she" and picturing her for months and then be told otherwise!

We have our next OB appt in 2 weeks or so and we are getting our detailed (and last) scan then. Hopefully they will be able to confirm or deny our CGH results...