Pregnancy Update: The Final Days
08
February
Courtney

I’m now 39.5 weeks pregnant and we’ve scheduled our induction. Finally, we have a timeline for getting this baby out! We’ll go into the hospital Wednesday night for the first stage of induction (administering Cervidil) and then the doctor will administer Pitocin the next morning to stimulate contractions. We’re hoping that everything progresses quickly, safely, and smoothly, so we can have Riley in our arms by Thursday evening.

There are a number of reasons we opted to go with induction. First, Andy starts a new rotation next Monday; not showing up to a rotation can cause you to forfeit that rotation, which wouldn’t be beneficial for his graduation timeline. If I happened to go into labor on that first day, there’s a risk that he would have to miss some or all of the birth, which is not a risk I am willing to take. Second, his current attending is understanding of the pregnancy situation, having three kids himself. Who’s to say that the next physician will be so understanding? Also, I’m incredibly uncomfortable. All women in their ninth month are uncomfortable, but Riley is very large (especially on my frame) and putting a lot of pressure on my joints, causing a lot of pain for me. He’s sitting on my veins and causing a significant amount of swelling from my feet to my knees, which is also quite painful (and gross looking). I’m far too heavy for my own good and I really need this weight removed from me. It’s difficult to sleep through the night and getting up to go to the restroom is very difficult, as well. All in all, I don’t think I could last much longer if induction weren’t a possibility. Nevertheless, I’m still healthy as can be with a low blood pressure, low blood sugar levels, a high degree of activity (lots of daily walks), and the ability to still work. Riley is doing great, he just wants to keep waiting in the womb and Andy and I can’t permit that any longer.

While the induction eliminates some of the “magic” of the event happening naturally, we have to be smart about what’s best for me, for Andy, and for Riley, as well as for our bank accounts and graduation. Hopefully, we can have pictures put up before the end of the week!

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Chateau Elan
02
February
Courtney

Andy and I took our last romantic vacation together (for what will be a long, long time I’m sure) a few weeks ago.  It wasn’t exactly a vacation though, as we only stayed away one night and only went about 40 minutes away, but it was still an enjoyable escape.  We went to Chateau Elan, a winery and resort roughly 45 minutes outside Atlanta.  We had a wonderful, relaxed time while we were there and the trip was completely worth it, even though it was so short.

We drove up on a Saturday afternoon, arriving just past lunch time.  First, we went to the resistance pool for some laps and swimming.  It must be noted that this pool was like bath water – it had to be 90 degrees.  It was very comfortable to swim around in it and know that no one would be butting in and telling me I wasn’t allowed to be in the water, as so often happens when you’re pregnant.  It’s like people feel like they can tell you what to do when you’re pregnant, like you’re incapable of making your own educated decisions… but I digress.  After a little time in the pool, we went over to their spa facility, which is one of the things they are most known for.  I had an appointment for a manicure and pedicure and Andy just wanted to take advantage of all the amenities they had to offer.  They had their own gym facility, another resistance pool, jacuzzi, saunas, steam rooms, steam showers, TVs (with football on in the men’s locker room and some chick flick on in the women’s locker room), and an afternoon tea service.  I enjoyed my treatment and dangled my legs in the jacuzzi, but had to skip out on the other amenities because of doctor’s orders (no overheating for the preggo).  In total though, we spent about three and a half hours at the spa and reentered the world very relaxed… and very clean.

From there we changed and went to dinner, eating at one of the restaurants they had on the property, called Versailles (do you detect their attempt at a French theme in Georgia?).  With the package we had with the hotel, we both were able to order appetizers, entrees, and desserts (and not have to worry about costs of individual items).  We started with a caesar salad and a lentil soup.  Then, Andy had lamb wellington and I had a filet mignon with bearnaise sauce and roasted veggies.  It was pretty good, though they added tarragon or something to my vegetables and it tasted off… like they were trying too hard to be French and got tangled up in the seasonings along the way.  But it was still quite good.  Dessert was excellent with creme brulee and a warm chocolate cake.  After such a “busy” day we went back to our room to relax, and I have to say, the room was lovely.  The bed was a little too high for me, but if I weren’t 9 months pregnant, I’m sure I would have liked it.  They stuck to their French theme, using a lot of gold and aqua colors, with great linens and draperies.  The furniture was excellent and I had read that they had recently remodeled (it seems to have been a success for them).  The bathroom was great with a big tub and a separate standing shower and lots of marble and tile.  It was a very comfortable room.

The next morning we had breakfast at their buffet (also included in our package) and it was excellent.  I have to say it was one of the better breakfast buffets I’ve had (assuming you aren’t including a really high end brunch like at the Wynn or Top of the Mark).  There were lots of things Andy and I liked to eat and there was no line at the omelet station (big surprise).  We lingered over our brunch, which was surprisingly uncrowded, despite going on a Sunday at 9:00.  After spending a bit more time in the room, we checked out and headed home (not wanting to miss the football games).  All in all, it was a great weekend for us, despite only being about 24 hours of vacationing.  We ate well, slept well, swam around, and relaxed – something we won’t immediately have time for in the near future.  We’d like to plan a trip back there this summer as they had a huge outdoor pool and beautiful walking trails, not to mention the entire winery, which we were unable to visit due to cold, rainy weather, but it is definitely a vacation low-key enough to bring a baby along.  Chateau Elan hasn’t seen the last of us!

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A Boring Post by Andy
30
January
Andy

There has been some talk that this blog isn’t updated frequently enough and in the spirit of picking up the slack for my overwhelmed and oversized wife (no offense honey, you know it’s all baby), I’m going to post a little bit of updating and rambling to entertain the likes of those who find this sort of rambling entertaining. As I sit here and drone over things I could possibly talk about, Peanut is meowing very insistently about the fact that she doesn’t have room to crawl into my lap while my hands are engaged in typing. Nonetheless Peanut will find something else to engage in meanwhile, such as barking at the pretty songbirds that have decided to grace our bird-feeder this morning and brighten our day. I’d like to throw a shout-out to all my Tennessee folks who are enjoying unprecedented snowfall amounts, or as we have heard it called “Tennessee Snowpocalypse 2010.” Meanwhile we’re sitting pretty on about a quarter inch of rainfall overnight and a gray, foggy day. So while all of you are enjoying the most thrilling snow day filled with sledding, snowman building, snowball fights, and hot cocoa, keep us in mind in the back of your heads and know that what you’re doing today is way more fun than the tedious chores and baby-preparation that will occupy our Saturday. Apparently we could go see a movie but I really feel my time is better spent using this rare free-time to prepare the house for our new arrival. In a sense, I’m nesting, which is a behavior usually reserved for the pregnant mother, but in this case I claim sympathy pregnancy symptoms.

Since our last update, our lives have been fairly unremarkable. We did manage to find the time for a romantic weekend at Chateau Elan, a resort/winery only 45 minutes from here with top-notch accommodations. Preggo the Hutt will provide more details in an upcoming post regarding that getaway. Suffice it to say that it was everything we were looking for in our last vacation alone, albeit short. The rest of our days have been filled with work, chores, errands, and timing Braxton Hicks contractions hoping they turn into real ones. Her contractions are becoming more frequent, though no other signs of approaching labor have been observed just yet, barring his head moving into 0 station. Look it up if you don’t know what it means. Wikipedia can almost replace a health professional these days.

My work has been fairly good. I’m working a psychiatry rotation at an inpatient facility for adolescents. Unfortunately due to the nature of our patient population I cannot give much more detail than that. I do get a lot of direct contact with the children and the rest of my time is spent doing endless documentation. I’ve already crossed another specialty off the list of possible residency ideas. Nonetheless psychiatry has its place in any physician’s arsenal, especially one who plans to enter family medicine. Family practitioners deal with psychiatric patients on a daily basis, whether the problem is simply a co-morbidity to a medical diagnosis or the psychiatric issue is the presenting problem. I will be glad when it’s over in two weeks though.

As far as the pregnancy goes, things are progressing smoothly if not slowly. Today marks week 38 and mommy-to-be is bigger than ever, though she has not gained any more weight, for which she is very thankful. Her symptoms are uncomfortable and disturbing at times, and some of them even affect me. Her ankle swelling is prominent and doesn’t go away when she swims anymore. The mass effect of the large infant sitting on organs, joints, and ligaments causes an overriding feeling of discomfort. Worst of all is the snoring. It seems to get progressively worse every week and now it’s so loud that I physically cannot fall asleep in the same room. It makes us sad but we have to separate at night if I’m to get any sleep. We both hope that this symptom will disappear quickly after the birth, once the circulating pregnancy-associated hormones return to their normal pre-pregnancy levels.

That’s all I really have to ramble about. Peanut has her back turned to me and refuses to make eye contact now, I hope she’ll get over it (she will). Again I wish all of you snow-bunnies in Tennessee a wonderful snow day and we all hope to see you soon with our newest family member… whenever he decides to show up. He’s late by daddy’s watch and I’m pacing back and forth wondering when he’s going to be home. Bad sign, right?

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Pregnancy Update
15
January
Courtney

Today saw another visit to my Ob/Gyn and he pretty much told me I was what he considered to be full-term, so now we just get to play the waiting game.  In all likelihood, I have another month to go, but Riley could show up anytime now.  I feel absolutely huge and monstrously uncomfortable.  We’ve devised all sorts of nicknames for me and how I look right now – Monstro the Whale, Preggo the Hutt, and other less descriptive names like Fat Wife.  46 pounds is a lot of weight on someone who used to be skinny and I can’t wait to get rid of all this extra bulk.  Seeing old pictures is enough to just about bring me to tears.  Today I dropped a pen at the doctor’s office and it took two full minutes to pick it back up.  I tried bending over at the waist, squatting, and a combination of the two, among other things before I gave up and had to crawl on the ground to pick it up and then hoist myself back up (with great difficulty).

A lot of the weird symptoms I thought I had safely avoided have come around now in the final weeks.  My feet are officially bigger.  I have one pair of shoes and one pair of flip flops that still fit and I can’t wear the flip flops anymore because it’s freezing cold, so I’ve been wearing a lot of shoes that are too tight. Maternity clothes at this point don’t really even fit.  I’m quite tired, but the baby is squashing all my organs so frequent trips to the bathroom in the middle of the night have become the norm, despite my desire to sleep all the time.  I’ve started getting a little bit of reflux in the middle of the night, which I never had before, so to alleviate the symptoms I have rearranged my “pillow fort” (5 pillows in all) to keep my head and chest up, while trying to keep me propped up on my side (apparently being on your back is a big no-no) with my belly and hips supported.  My already non-existent amount of patience has dwindled making me a bit more irritable that usual (not so much moody as just sort of grouchy).  If we’re at a restaurant and I don’t have water in front of me at all times, I get really grouchy.  I’m also not very patient waiting around for the doctor in the office for 20 minutes of more (especially when I’m half naked), but there’s nothing that can be done about that.    It’s not like I can drop my OB’s tip for not attending to me in a more expedient manner, like I can with a lame waiter.  I’m thirsty all the time – I drink probably close to two quarts of liquid in a day, which is weird for me because I never drank this much water before.  No wonder I’m in the bathroom so much.  Don’t get me wrong, these aren’t complaints, it’s just the reality of being 9 months pregnant.  I knew what I was getting into before this all began, but there’s a great deal of truth to the discomforts of being THIS pregnant.  I’m just sort of over it.  It seems like I’ve been pregnant forever according to Andy and Tyler, and honestly, I pretty much have been.  May 2009 – February 2010 is a LONG time to be uncomfortable!

So that’s where we are today – waiting, waiting, and waiting.  I’m torn about packing my bag for labor.  On the one hand, I have a desperate need to be prepared and organized, but on the other, I’m hoping Murphy’s Law kicks in and Riley will show up before I have time to get the bag together.  We’ll see what happens in the next few weeks, but I would imagine that we have several LONG, uncomfortable, and boring days in the coming weeks.  Stay tuned for updates!

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Atlanta Blizzard 2010
10
January
Courtney

Snow in the south!  Who’d have thought?!  Sure enough after weeks (feels like years) of freezing cold temperatures, we had snow Thursday afternoon, evening, and night.  Andy loved seeing the ground, the deck, his truck, all covered in snow, but probably not as much as he loved the snow day his attending called for Friday.  It was nice seeing the snow and waking up to a beautiful dusting all around, but the south is just not prepared for any degree of snow and the roads in many places around here are still icy, especially in shady patches.  It’s certainly pretty, but I will end up worrying about Andy with his long commute each day until the weather heats back up – which, frankly, can’t come soon enough.  I’m done with winter now.

I just haven’t been all that excited about the cold weather this year (despite it’s relative novelty for us) because I don’t have enough clothes that fit that I can successfully layer.  People always say that pregnant women in the summer are so uncomfortable, but I think the winter might be worse.  It’s hard enough finding a shirt that fits (I currently have two), but finding an undershirt, a shirt, a sweater, long underwear, pants, and a coat that actually zips up is pretty much impossible.  I’ve given up and just admitted that anytime I leave the house I will be cold.  Thank goodness for gloves, hats and scarves which don’t have sizes, and for Andy’s ski jacket (the only thing that zips over the belly), otherwise I’d be in a real mess.  But at this point, I refuse to buy more maternity clothes.  I’m 35 weeks pregnant, which means I only have a month or so to go.  It doesn’t make sense to buy something that will fit me for 4 or 5 weeks and then never fit again (until the 8th or 9th month of the next pregnancy).  I just have to accept that the only things I have that fit are sweat pants, two shirts, one pair of jeans, and one dress.  Thank goodness I work from home!  I’m at the stage where I’m just ready to be done with pregnancy, ready to have my old body back (or close to it), and ready for Riley to come out and join us.  Not too much longer now, but I have the feeling the next four to five weeks will feel like an absolute eternity.

Check out a few pictures of the 2010 Atlanta Blizzard!

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Catching Up: The Aquarium
04
January
Courtney

Okay, this is now the last post of the series (though since they show up from most recent to least recent, this will appear on top).  Read through all the “Catching Up” to get a feel for what exactly we’ve been up to.  The last main thing we did while all the family was in town was head to the Georgia Aquarium, known as the largest aquarium in the world and certainly on a list of the best.  We LOVED it.  Where else can you see not one, but four (FOUR!) whale sharks and two manta rays all in the same place?  Add to that, sawfish, huge grouper, and a number of other very unique (and large) specimens, and that was just one of the tanks.  Also, the design of the aquarium is great in that it’s set up with a central hall and a number of spokes so you can go in any order of exhibits, revisit what you want without walking for miles and miles (or what seems like miles), and you can skip things you aren’t interested in seeing.  It’s a great aquarium and while we were there, we picked up annual passes for ourselves since we know we’ll be going back.  Andy took mostly video of the trip which will take far too much time to upload, so for now, here are the pictures of the aquarium.  If anyone is interested in visiting us, I highly recommend the Georgia Aquarium as a must see!

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Catching Up: Christmas Day!
04
January
Courtney

Probably one of my favorite parts of this year’s holiday season was having my brother, Allison, and our nephew Dylan come visit us for several days.  Andy hadn’t seen Dylan since he was five weeks old and I hadn’t seen him since he was about 6 months old, so now at 13 months, he’s changed quite a bit!  It’s been too many years since I’ve been with my entire family on Christmas (and we didn’t quite get it right this year since mom left the 22nd and I didn’t get to see my dad at all), but spending it with Chris, Allison, and Dylan was a great compromise.  The last two Christmases have brought major changes for all of us, with Dylan’s birth last November, Riley’s impending arrival in about a month, and our moves all over the country, so having our house here in Atlanta as a place to host everyone brought a sense of permanence and stability that we haven’t had recently.  Here are a few pictures from our Christmas (messy, wrapping paper covered living room included) – hopefully the amount of fun we had is evident in the pictures!

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Catching Up: Mom’s Visit
04
January
Courtney

And now enters the part I don’t have any pictures of – my mom’s visit and the second baby shower.  I packed my camera in my purse for the baby shower, but it never occurred to me to take it out, which is incredibly disappointing as most of our best friends were all in the same place at the same time!  Suffice it to say it was a beautiful shower and it’s a real shame I don’t have any pictures of it.

But first, my mom came to visit (that was my Dad’s Christmas gift to her, sending her here for a week), where she helped me out with a lot of household tasks – grocery shopping, scrubbing the kitchen, organizing the pantry and refrigerator, ironing, cooking meals, and cleaning the bathrooms.  As things have been getting a little more difficult to do myself, it was so nice having her here to help me out with one of the things she was always best at – being a stay-at-home mom!  During her visit, we drove up to Nashville for our second baby shower, this one thrown by my best friend, Erin, at a tea house in Franklin called World Cup of Tea.  Everything about the shower was exactly as I had hoped it would be – many of our best friends were there to celebrate with us, we were able to catch up with people we only get to see occasionally, the food, tea, and dessert were exceptional, and it was a nice, relaxed atmosphere.  We received some wonderful gifts which we are really thankful for, it’s just going to take me some time to get all those thank you cards out!  As much as I love explaining our gratitude for everything we have received, it is a time consuming process at a time when I don’t have much free time.  Several of my pregnancy books say to bring thank you cards to the hospital and finish them there, but I think the last thing I want to be doing while laboring and recovering will be writing a thank you note.  But I digress…

Despite the fact that there are no pictures, know that the shower was really, really lovely and that having my mom here was fantastic.

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Catching Up: Christmas Photos
04
January
Courtney

For those who didn’t receive our Christmas card (I ordered too few this year, unfortunately, and ran out far too quickly), here are the pictures from the photos we took for it.  Our friend Matt, of Matt Britton Photography in Franklin, took these pictures of us and we really loved them.

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Catching Up: Preparing for Riley
04
January
Courtney

Baby Preparations

Naturally, we’ve also been working very hard on putting together Riley’s room.  Thanks to two showers, Christmas, tons of hand-me-downs from Dylan, and some very generous grandparents (and our own ingenuity), we have finally finished his nursery.  It’s a beautiful room and now we know it’s also functional, since Dylan has already broken it in for him a little.  That’s what cousins are for, right?  It didn’t start out finished as you can see from these photos of Andy putting together the crib.

Now, I would show the most recent pictures of Riley from the ultrasound, but they kind of suck.  He covered his face with his arm the entire time.  We got a pretty good look at him (at least his shape) and he looks perfect, but he was shy about showing us his face.  I guess he wants it to be a surprise when he comes out in a few weeks.

I’m enormous.  Ask anyone who’s seen me recently, I have now crossed into that other world of being 34+ weeks, where you just look like a house.  Nothing fits (not Andy’s clothes, which make me look fat, or my maternity clothes, which can’t cover my bust or belly anymore) and I’m pretty uncomfortable most of the time.  I’m ready to get this kid out of me.  As it is, I’m up 5 or 6 times a night anyway, so if I’m not going to be sleeping through the night, I would prefer that it be for a good reason, like, say, nursing our baby.  We’ve begun preparing for birth and delivery, making packing lists for the hospital, lists of things to stock up on before the birth, and tasks that need to be done beforehand for fear they would never get done if we waited.  There are some good prego pictures of me in some of our Christmas photos, so if you really want to know what I look like now, you’ll have to look at those.

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