Updates on the last updates!

I had my 34 week appointment today and everything is still going well. Tyler is LOA (left occiput anterior, his back on my left, head down, facing my spine), so he's in perfect position to be born! He has hiccups frequently and it drives me crazy at times. I feel bad for him. I don't like hiccups myself, I hope they're not too unpleasant for him. Anyway, I'm measuring 30cm now so still a little on the small side but not worryingly so. I have gained 16 lbs so far. I gained 17 total with Ryan so it looks like I'll be slightly above that with this pregnancy. To be fair, I lost a lot of weight in the beginning of my pregnancy with Ryan, and this time I didn't lose any, but it took me several weeks to gain anything at all. I think I was around 20 weeks before I gained anything. Blood pressure was 110/60, so that's staying pretty constant. Tyler's heart beat was nice and strong but I didn't catch what the rate was. I have my next appointment in two weeks, and if Tyler comes as early as Ryan did (at 37 weeks), that will be my last appointment before he is born! We'll see. It's entirely possible that he could stay in there another several weeks! I have a feeling he won't, but only time will tell. It's time to really buckle down and get ready for his arrival. I have done next to nothing. Whoops!

I'm trying really hard to be prepared for either situation. I know I need to be prepared for him to come early, because I was not at all prepared for Ryan to be as early as he was. I also don't want to be totally ready for him in 3 weeks and then be disappointed when he doesn't decide he's ready to come out at that point. I'm also not sure how to plan for the labor itself. Ryan's labor was 4 hours total, so I'm anticipating an equally short (if not shorter) labor with Tyler, simply because most women have subsequently shorter labors with each pregnancy. But again, that's not always the case. I could have a 12 hour labor this time around, and I don't want to set myself up to be exhausted by 4 hours in if I'm still only a few cm dilated. *sigh* It's hard to want to plan something that you really can't plan for at all. I know I need to just let go and not worry about it. Things will happen as they will. Tyler will come when he is ready and my body will take as long as it needs to birth him. I trust the process, so I need to focus on that.

Colby had his first sleep study, a follow-up, another sleep study, and another appointment. The first sleep study was to monitor his breathing and see if and how many times it stopped during the night. He was told at his follow-up that he has moderate sleep apnea, so they scheduled a second sleep study to put him on a CPAP machine and monitor his breathing again. It helped significantly! In the first sleep study, he stopped breathing over 100 times in the 6 hours he was sleeping. In the second study, he only stopped breathing 4 times in an 8 hour period. Wow, what a difference! He then had another appointment to pick out his CPAP mask, and he should have it within the next few days. I don't know if he is excited about that, but I am!

We've now had our kitten for three and a half weeks! We named him Jasper. It took Roamy a couple of weeks, but she seems to have developed an appreciation for him. They play together frequently and I have even caught them snuggling a few times. Sometimes Roamy is not in the mood to play, and she always lets him know, but I think he is helping to keep her young. Jasper was not very good at using his litter box in the first week we had him. He had several accidents on the couch and on my bed, and I was NOT happy with that. I was seriously considering finding him a new home, but Colby said we should wait it out because he thought Jasper might have been doing it on purpose because he was upset about Roamy's treatment of him. Sure enough, once things started settling down, he stopped doing it. Thank goodness! Ryan absolutely adores him and loves to pick him up and carry him around the house. We have had to be very watchful and make sure to teach him the right way to pick him up. At first he would pick him up by the neck (in a choke hold) or the tail, or one paw. He started to get it right, though, and now he picks him up very gently, under his front legs, and holds him close to his chest. He had to learn to put him down gently, too. At first he would just drop him or even throw him a little bit, but now he leans over and gently sets him back on the ground. He is still struggling with understanding that he is MUCH BIGGER than Jasper, and he can't lay/sit/stand on him because it will hurt him. I'm slightly amazed that Jasper has survived this long, but Ryan is learning to be gentle, so I think we'll all be okay.

I guess that's it for this time. :-)

A few updates

I had my 30 week appointment on Wednesday, and everything is going well. I have gained 10 lbs, my blood pressure is good (110/70), and I am measuring 27cm. This last one had me slightly concerned, since I measured the same at my last appointment (26 weeks) and it's supposed to grow coinciding closely with the number of weeks along in the pregnancy I am, but my midwife said that it was due to baby's position. He was lying slightly sideways/diagonal instead of being vertical, so that affects the shape of my uterus. Good news though is that he still has plenty of room to move around and time to flip into a head-first position for the birth, I just need to pay attention to MY positioning and be diligent about doing my exercises. She said that she can tell just by feel that he has grown a lot in the last four weeks and seems to be much bigger. I knew he had a growth spurt from all of the stretching I've been feeling in the last week.

Today Colby went to the doctor and got a referral for a sleep study. The doctor said he seems to have moderate to severe sleep apnea. We have suspected this because he stops breathing in his sleep, then starts gasping for air. He also snores a lot and it has been increasing in volume and frequency lately. He tends to fall asleep within a couple of minutes, and I take a lot longer, so this has made it pretty difficult for me to get to sleep. He also sometimes wakes Ryan up and that's not fun for any of us. We don't know when his sleep study will be yet, but hopefully pretty soon and he can get a CPAP or whatever it is he needs. We also are pretty sure that losing weight will help him a lot, so he's been working out and eating less. With his metabolism, it won't take long to see some results.

 This evening we went and picked up the newest addition to our family: a kitten! It's a male tabby the owner had named "Smokey." That won't be his permanent name, but we haven't picked one out yet. Suggestions are welcome! He is 7 weeks old and SO cute! Ryan loves him and he seems to like Ryan, too. Roamy isn't too thrilled but I think she'll be fine within a few days.