15 Weeks

I am actually really excited to hit 15 weeks! Since I knew I was pregnant, I was really excited to hit the 15 week milestone - it just sounds very pregnant to me! Anyways, today our two little ones are the size of Oranges!

I'm feeling pretty good. The morning sickness is still with me, but not anywhere near as bad as it once was. I just have some nausea throughout the night and into the early morning. But I did find my morning sickness cure - chocolate milkshakes! So as soon as Brian gets out of bed in the morning, he makes me a milkshake that I get down as quick as possible. Then, I feel fine for the rest of the day!

Speaking of Brian, he has been wonderful throughout the pregnancy - he's going to make such a great dad. He's really stepping up and helping me with a lot of things that have been too hard for me to do, due to my nausea and just feeling exhausted all the time. He has also taken over the grocery shopping for the most part which is SUCH a relief. All that food and those smells in one place grosses me out in an indescribable way....

15 Week Survey

How far along? 15 Weeks
Total weight gain/loss: I am proud to announce that I am finally back to my exact pre pregnancy weight! I lost about 10 lbs. in the 1st tri. due to the severe morning sickness, but have really been trying to gain it back and I finally have! yay! So while I haven't actually gained anything yet, I'm very glad I gained back everything I lost.
Maternity clothes? I'm in maternity pants almost 100% of the time now. I'm still wearing non-maternity sweaters, but they are starting to get a little short on the bottom.
Stretch marks? Not yet
Sleep: I'm waking up a lot during the night - mainly to pee.
Best moment this week: Hitting 15 weeks! This was the week I was most excited to hit!
Movement: I'm still not sure! Every time I think I feel something, I always second guess myself assuming it's gas....
Food cravings: Besides the chocolate milkshakes every morning, my cravings come and go. I am enjoying cake however!
Gender: We find out in about a month!
Labor Signs: Nope
Belly Button in or out? Still in
What I miss: Sleeping through the night
What I am looking forward to: feeling undeniable baby movement!
Weekly Wisdom: Give into your cravings!
Milestones: Making it through the 1st week of the 2nd tri.

Well that's it for this week!

Hello 2nd Trimester!

So now we're officially up to date with this blog. I'm very happily in the 2nd trimester (finally), at 14 weeks 4 days.

Morning sickness has subsided considerably, although I still have random vomiting from time to time! But once in a while I can handle, the 8+ times per day thing was wearing on me thin!

My appetite still isn't what it once was, but I seem to be developing a sweet tooth again! Last weekend I had an intense craving for chocolate cake, so I made myself homemade chocolate cupcakes with raspberry buttercream. Talk about hitting the spot! I have also been craving Caesar Salad and French Onion Soup. But since the very beginning, my most favorite meal of all is a tuna sandwich! This is beyond frustrating because we all know that you're supposed to greatly limit your tuna intake during pregnancy, if not eliminate it all together. I have to admit, I have given into my craving twice so far during the pregnancy, but from what I have read eating canned white tuna once in a while is perfectly safe.

Our last appointment was at 13 weeks and went great! Our babies have grown SO much - they actually look like babies now! They were moving all over during our ultrasound. Baby A was especially active, my OB says we're going to have our hands full with that one! :) I love seeing them move though, it's such an amazing sight. I just want to be able to FEEL it now!!!!

Here are their beautiful pictures from the last appointment:

This is Baby A, looking cute as ever! It's head is to the left, and you can see he or she is waving to us! See the little hand right in front of the face?!

This is Baby B who is facing down. His or her head is to the right and you can see it's spine going all the way down, with it's legs to the far left.
And here they are together! This isn't a great picture though. Baby B is on the top, with it's back facing us. Baby A is on the bottom and is staring straight at us, with his or her hands to the side! Cute and a little creepy, haha!
In terms of my body changing and growing with these babies, it certainly is! Like I said before, I lost 10 lbs. in the first trimester but my belly is growing day by day! I'm in maternity pants most of the time now (and don't forsee me EVER going back to regular pants again, even after the babies are here! They are beyond comfortable!), but I can still get away with some non-maternity shirts. Here are some progression pictures I've taken over the weeks!

The early weeks...

Up until 8 weeks pregnant, I was getting an ultrasound once a week. I really enjoyed these appointments, I loved getting a peek at what was going on in my uterus! I know a lot of people don't get to see what early ultrasounds look like, so I thought I'd post pictures so you can see a progression, and see what happens from week to week with the babies.

This is at 6 weeks pregnant. At this appointment we got to see their little flickering hearts on the ultrasound screen. You can just kind of see them in the pictures - they are the little white specs in the black sac.

Here we have 7 weeks pregnant. You can see the "white specs" have grown quite a bit in a week! In the top picture, you can see the head to the left and the body to the right. The round circle next to the baby is the yolk sac. The 2nd picture is of Baby B, but it's not quite as clear as the picture of Baby A because it was further from the ultrasound. Also at this appointment, we got to hear the heartbeats through the ultrasound machine! What a sound!

And here we have 8 weeks pregnant! Quite a difference from 6 weeks, huh? This time you can see both babies in one picture. Their heads, bodies, and their little arms and legs. They are so cute already!

During those early weeks, I did suffer from severe morning sickness. It was not fun at all. Since it took me so long to get pregnant, I always said I'd never complain about any part of my pregnancy, including morning sickness. Yeah, that changed after it actually happened to me. They say morning sickness is worse in twin pregnancies because of the high amounts of the hormone Hcg pumping through your body, but since this is my first pregnancy I have nothing to compare it to. Around 7 weeks I started to get to the point where I couldn't function (ie. stop throwing up) from about midnight until noon, so my doctor prescribed a drug called zofran. What a life saver! As soon as I started feeling queasy, I would take one and in about 15 minutes I would feel relief. I tried not to take it every day, but I did more times than not. I finally started feeling a little better in my 13th week and stopped taking the zofran.

Another "ailment" from this pregnancy has been my loss of appetite. Nothing sounds appealing at all. I get these completely random cravings every so often, and then when I satisfy that craving I start feeling sick as I'm eating whatever I was craving. It makes no sense, but that's pregnancy for you! I rarely feel hungry any more, and force myself to eat as much as I can. I lost about 10 lbs in the first trimester, and have been slowly gaining it back. Now I'm only a couple of pounds away from from my pre-pregnancy weight.

Surprise!

After my blood pregnancy test came back positive, I was instantly wondering about the possibility of multiples - I actually could have ended up with triplets because of the fertility drugs that I was on! But before we even began treatments, Brian and I discussed the possibility of multiples in full and decided that we were completely ok with however many babies God decided to bless us with. Granted we were not hoping for high order multiples because of the health risks for me and the babies, but we thought twins would be ideal. Then our family would be complete.

So after the first blood draw, I asked the nurse if she thought the level was indicative of multiples (I thought it was pretty high, but who am I to judge?!) and she said she actually thought it was a very strong singleton. So at that point I sort of forgot about the idea of having twins...I mean, she was the nurse and has been in this business for a while so I trusted her judgment! I was just happy to be pregnant!

So after my 2nd blood draw went up accordingly, I was scheduled for an early ultrasound at 5 weeks pregnant to make sure my lining was adequate, and to see the gestational sac (or two!). At this early in pregnancy, that's pretty much all you can see. So I went in, hoping to see one gestational sac.

Well imagine my surprise when the ultrasound tech said "There's a sac...and oh look! There's another! It's twins!"
After that, I just couldn't wipe the stupid grin off my face, or wipe the happy tears from my eyes...

Our journey...

I never blogged about my struggle with infertility. I didn't want to dwell on it, so why blog about it? It was unexpected, frightening and sad, and I tried to just go through the motions of infertility treatments while always keeping my guard up.

And to this day I don't like to dwell on it, but I'm certainly not going to pretend it never happened. Now that I have seen the "other side" of infertility I can look back and truly say that I am glad it happened. It made me much closer with my husband and more importantly with God. True, there were times that I was mad with both of them! But through the hurt came a joy that I never thought possible, and I know these joys are just going to be DOUBLED over and over as time goes on!!!

So to make a very, VERY long story short, I was infertile due to PCOS, aka, Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome which is a leading cause of female infertility. That was the only issue. I didn't ovulate and it's not exactly easy to conceive when you don't ovulate! But we got that taken care of via. some awesome fertility drugs (Gonal F, Menopur & Lupron to be exact) and a LOT of prayer and, well, here we are! Pregnant and with TWINS! We love them both so much already, and are excited to share our journey with our friends and family!

I'm already at 14 weeks pregnant, so I hope you don't mind if I backtrack a little...