Knocked Up

Browse by Tags

• Kicking Bag

  This has not been a good pregnancy week.  Contractions, a sluggish baby who refuses to kick on command, an anxious freak out at the doctor's office...   It started on Sunday afternoon.  There were contractions.  I rested.  They went away.  They came back.  I drank water and rested.  They went away.  They came back.  I drank more water and rested and considered calling the doctor.  They went away.  They came back.  I drank more water and rested and seriously considered calling the doctor.  They went away, and stayed away.   And an entire Sunday afternoon and evening, one that I'd hoped would include a walk to the park, pushing Axel on the swings, starting to organize the baby's clustered and junk-filled room, and cleaning out the refrigerator, was gone.    Usually I wouldn't be disappointed that something interferred with my ability to clean the fridge - that's the sort of thing I look for excuses not to do - but I've started to get those antsy, itchy, pregnant lady desires to alphabetize cereal by main ingredient and wash all of the onesies.  As the baby's future room is full of a desk, bed, files, boxes of baby gear, cleaning supplies, and stuff that's been displaced from the mid-remodel basement (and that can't yet be moved back), there's only so much onesie organizing that can be done.   So, my dreams of a sparkling fridge and a future baby's room with a cleared walking path dashed, it was on to Monday.  Monday, when I realized I hadn't done any kick counts in a couple of days and, come to think of it, I hadn't felt all that much kicking.   So, I drank juice.  And rested.  And drank juice.  Finally, there were some kicks.  Slow, half-hearted kicks, but ten of them within an hour.   Read More... Posted May 07 2009, 07:04 AM by knockedup with | with 16 comment(s) Filed under: pregnancy, pre-baby blues, pregnancy and anxiety, early contractions, fetal non stress test, kick counts, braxton hicks contractions

• Cry, Cry Baby

  Axel and I are both very emotional.  He's one, so many, many things he encounters daily are mildly traumatic.  I'm pregnant, so I tear up during bad movies and any baby-oriented commercial.   Last night, I stopped on a classic movie called Stick It.  I don't mean classic in the Casablanca/It's a Wonderful Life sense.  It's classic in the tween girl/slumber party sense.  If I were a thirteen-year-old gymnast, I'd probably keep this movie in heavy rotation, along with all the High School Musicals, that traveling pants movie, Grease, and Pump Up the Volume.   I caught the last fifteen minutes of Stick It, in which the main character has some sort of profound voice over about wishing that her parents were still married, things were perfect, etc., etc., ending with the thought that she wants someone to say that they're proud of her.  And then, guess what her coach says?  Yup.  And guess who started crying?  Read More... Posted Dec 07 2008, 06:51 PM by knockedup with | with 14 comment(s) Filed under: pregnancy, pre-baby blues, tantrums, hormones, crying

• Cry Baby

  We've entered the final countdown.  As of yesterday, there was just a month left until due date day - November 3.  Just a month left to deal with my shrunken stomach's rebellion against food, aching back, and the inability to bend down without getting a horrid squashed feeling and tightness in my chest.  I should be celebrating - soon, I'll be able to drink wine and run again!  But, it's also just a month to finish the remodel of our house, rearrange and unpack our things, set up the baby's room (or at least the crib in our room), get an oil change, clean the car, clean the house, narrow down our name choices.....I'm going to stop with the list now, because if I extend it much more, the tears building up in my eyes will start to pour down my cheeks.   This last phase of pregnancy is the cry baby phrase.  I teared up because I really, really wanted Casey to win on Top Chef and she just didn't live up to her full potential with her final dishes; I cried because I really wanted dinner and it was just taking far too long to cook; my eyes filled up when the receptionist at work announced she's leaving to become a flight attendant; I came close to sobbing over the roofers' delayed work on our house; pictures of naked babies and diaper commercials bring me close to blubbering.    I guess, when the books say you produce more bodily fluids during pregnancy, they mean all the fluids.  Good thing I'm drinking lots of water.  I'd show you a picture of my teary self, but posting my red, bloated face for all the world to see would probably just make me cry more.  I feel like a crazed, emotional mess, and I can only imagine what the people who see me every day think - if I can't even handle waiting for an extra hour for dinner, how will I be able to handle a newborn?   Oh my lord, now I've gotten myself crying again.  Isn't there some kind of hormonal off switch, other than giving birth?   Since there's a strong possibility that the doctor is going to induce me the week before my due date (more on that later, once I get the details down), I feel pretty confident that the hormones will diminish - or at least shift into whatever new and nutty form they take in the postpartum phase - in less than a month.  And, on the happy-crying side, it's also less than a month until we meet our baby, hold him or her, see who's been rolling and thumping around inside of me, fill our noses with that baby smell, and cover his or her head with kisses.  Sorry if I got a little gushy there - I'm still crying.   Until November 3rd (or earlier), I'll just have to invest in Kleenex.    Posted Oct 04 2007, 05:50 PM by knockedup with | with 11 comment(s) Filed under: pregnancy, bad things about pregnancy, pregnancy hormones, third trimester, back aches in pregnancy, pre-baby blues, remodeling while pregnant

• Pre-Baby Blues

  Recently, I've been overtaken by bouts of weepiness.  It's irrational and uncontrollable and not tempered by any ironic distance or sense of humor while I'm choking back the tears.  The first time it hit because I had planned to eat a breakfast burrito one Friday morning and, when I went to the fridge, the burrito was gone, having been devoured by my husband.  He did buy the breakfast burrito, so, rationally, I should have expected he would eat it but, instead, I got seriously bummed out because, when you want a breakfast burrito and you are pregnant and starving and had planned on eating a burrito and extra hormones are flooding your body, it is hard to focus on anything but the absence of that breakfast burrito.  So, I cried into my bowl of Puffins and soy milk, which did not include green chili or eggs or potatoes or a lovely warm tortilla wrapped around it, and then walked off to work in a burrito-less funk.  My husband was not home, otherwise I would probably have pouted and sent him on a burrito-buying mission.    I've cried because my belly is huge, because it might not be huge enough, because I can't decide between a Pack N Play and an Arm's Reach Co-Sleeper, because my husband talks too much, because I heard a story about a friend of a friend who was 28 weeks pregnant and just found out she'd lost the baby.  I adore the fall, with the cool air and the excitement of getting brand new pencils that have so much promise in their sharpness, and the chance the season brings to dress up like an Englishwoman who owns a country house and tramps through the woods in galoshes after a pack of rowdy dogs.  Looking through the Jcrew catalog and the warm, fuzzy argyle cashmere sweaters made me teary, because I can't order any of them as I have no idea what size I'll be come late November and I can't wear the sweaters without stretching them out for at least three more months.    Saying I've got a little less than 10 weeks of pregnancy left until d-day sounds nice and short, but two and a half months sounds like an eternity that makes me, you guessed it, cry a little.  Then I'll get weepy because we have so much damn stuff to do and only 10 weeks left to do it, and whenever I make a dent in the housecleaning or vacuuming my back starts to hurt and I have to sit down for awhile.  I try to talk myself out of the weepiness rationally, briskly thinking about hormone surges and then trying to distract myself with happy thoughts about the sock-monkey themed nursery or eating chocolate chip cookies, to no avail.  When the weepiness hits, it bulldozes through any attempts to look on the bright side and smashes my calm, rational side to pieces.  Pregnancy hormones are not to be trifled with.  All I can do is hunker down with my chocolate raspberry gelato, Law and Order reruns, and a warm bath and wait for it to pass.    Posted Aug 27 2007, 12:45 PM by knockedup with | with 12 comment(s) Filed under: things I hate about pregnancy, pregnancy hormones, pre-baby blues