31 Weeks with Emelia: Chugging along. Not sleeping. Still peeing.

I can’t tell if weekly doctor visits makes time go faster or slower. I officially start NSTs next week at 32 weeks, but once again, Queso passed her BPP quickly and looks great. We’ll measure her next week to see how much she’s grown! Her HR was 146 and she showed us an adorable chunky foot. We only got one US photo of her face.

31 weeks

You know, she has this sweet little face in real life when we see her, but then on the actual image that I get, she always ends up looking a little creepy.

My blood pressure was fantastic at 126/80. I haven’t been checking it at home, probably because I’ve been so focused on managing my diet to avoid a gestational diabetes diagnosis, so I have to make an effort to check it periodically.

Blood glucose levels have been great save for my heroic attempts at making overnight oats with museli and unsweetened almond milk for breakfast. I thought it would be enough fat and protein with a complex carb, but an hour later my BG was 151, and it’s supposed to be less than 130. But then checking at two hours it was down to 103 and he wants it less than 120. So. My body processed the sugar, just not fast enough. Goes to show I should have had some protein with it. Besides that, as long as I’m eating fat, fiber, and protein with carbs, I’m golden, which I’m thankful for. I’ve been feeling better too, and more confident. I was even able to eat two pieces of thin-crust pizza at Pizza Ranch this week to celebrate Olivia’s first day of preschool as long as I ate a salad and some chicken too.

Still, I’m starting to get impatient with wanting to meet her and be done with pregnancy. Which is sad because I love the baby kicks and know I’ll never get to experience this again. It’s just… a lot to deal with.

What’s going on with Queso

According to my app, she’s putting in longer stretches of sleep, specifically REM, which I’ve noticed more this week than last. There are longer periods where she’s asleep and there’s nothing cuter than feeling her “wake up” and start moving all of a sudden. Like, Oh hi baby! Good morning! Would you like some Lucky Charms for breakfast? Just kidding. You get a whole wheat toasted bagel with peanut butter and cottage cheese.

She can track light and has all five senses working. She can make faces and suck her thumb and pedals her hands and feet along the uterine wall. Which, trust me, I can feel. It’s a little like Alien, feeling little fingers and toes explore the inside of me.

A few times a day I’m lucky enough to get a solid kick to the cervix or bladder, but for the most part, it’s a lot of rolls and weird twisty feelings. When she does kick, because she’s breech with her feet up by her face, I can actually feel a foot. And her head. Every once in a while it presses up hard on my right side and it’s easy to feel.

And sometimes they border on uncomfortable. I’ll especially notice it when I lay down for the night and she wakes up ready to party. I don’t know what she’s doing in there, but it’s this strange tickly feeling really low down in my uterus where it’s like she’ll violently shudder and buck around at the same time and I have to move my hips around to get her to stop. And last night she simultaneously had hiccups which I felt low down, but she was also squirming around just under my rib cage and my entire abdomen was blipping around. I know I probably felt all this with Olivia, but I can’t remember any of it.

What’s going on with me

It’s been a week of symptoms. More heartburn, more constipation, more restless legs, insomnia. I finally saw my acupuncturist and she said those are magnesium related which is weird, because I’ve been taking my Calm gummies like usual and they’ve worked great up until now. I bought magnesium flakes and took a bath last night (Olivia, bless her heart, helped me). I did end up sleeping better than I have in a week.

Let’s see, I’m up peeing twice a night consistently now. With Olivia, as I got later into my thirties, I was up 3-5 times, so I know it’s inevitably coming. And sometimes it hurts. I wake up and think, OK, I need to go to the bathroom. And then I sit up and oj4jiorh;t49tug90[4uidhjdkgh;h!!!!! And then I’m waddling to the bathroom in pain. I think the baby might be sinking down into my bladder from being on my side for so long, because peeing will take forever initially while I sit there and wait it out. Ow, you guys. And then I stumble back to bed, haul myself up and situate myself with the body pillow and do it all over again a few hours later.

In fact, my life centers around now finding a bathroom. Peeing. Always.

I’ve only had a few episodes of lightening crotch, which I got all the time with Olivia. This time, the round ligament pain is more of an achy feeling in my lower belly, especially after walking. I have the Blanqi support tanks and I think I need to wear them more often to support my belly. It’s getting pretty righteous, you guys.

1st-trimester bump photos

2nd-trimester bump photos

3rd-trimester bump photos

4 Comments

  1. September 13, 2019 / 1:04 am

    Lovely news, wonderful to hear baby Q is doing so well. And congratulations to your new pre-schooler : )

    • Risa
      Author
      September 17, 2019 / 8:28 pm

      Aww thank you!

  2. September 17, 2019 / 3:07 pm

    Oddly enough, I peed less towards the end during my second pregnancy than I did with my first. I think that I was much more exhausted having to chase around a toddler that my body refused to wake up!

    • Risa
      Author
      September 17, 2019 / 8:29 pm

      Ha! Oh but then when I wake up at 4 in the morning I’m paying for that deep sleep my body gave me. 😉

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