35 Weeks + Dr.'s Appointment #10 + Fetal Monitoring #2

Fatigue has set in. No matter how much I sleep at night, I find myself yawning as soon as I get up. I'm working 4 hours each Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, and have all of Wednesdays off. It's a good balance right now. I'll probably follow this schedule for another week and then will re-assess.

Jon was at Fleetwood Park until 9:00/10:00pm every night this week. I think I ate at my parents' house every night this week as a result. I always struggled to find the desire to cook, and now, with the increased fatigue and only having to cook for one, my desire is even less. Thankfully, my mom doesn't mind to cook for one extra :)

I've also started to have swollen ankles and feet for the last week or so. I wear flip-flops to work because my dress shoes are too tight. I still manage to fit into my runners when I have to leave the house for appointments. I had Jon take a picture last Saturday:

The babies were much more active with this second fetal monitoring appointment. They were almost too active! I couldn't leave until they saw each baby have at least one minute of 'down' time, where their heartbeats were relaxed. The entire monitoring took about 30 minutes, which wasn't too bad. My next fetal monitoring appointment is on Wednesday (and I will continue to go every Wednesday until I deliver).

I had a doctor's appointment on Thursday, and she said everything is looking good. She figures that if I were to deliver now, the babies would both be able to go home with me right away, which is good! The longer I can keep them in me, the better (for them! They're starting to reek havoc on my skin...Jon pointed out some stretch marks under my stomach that I couldn't see! Oh well, I guess I shouldn't be complaining. I didn't honestly expect to come out of a twin pregnancy with no stretch marks).

I gained 4 pounds since last week, making my weight gain at 45 lbs. I now weigh the same as Jon. He nearly died.

I'm pretty comfortable for the most part. I do get tired of lugging around my stomach every now and then, and I look forward to clothes actually fitting me. It's nice to have a large selection of 'comfy' clothes to choose from, because they're pretty much all I wear right now.

Can you believe that in less than 3 weeks, they'll be born? I can't. Jon can't. It's a little bit scary. We'd both be fine with another 3 months. Maybe by then we'd feel ready for what's going to hit us!

Hmmm...what else? Oh! I know! Pet peeve: people who park their car too close to mine! How do they expect for me to climb into the driver's seat of my car when they only give me 1 foot to open my car door?!?!?!? Also, it's become difficult to sit on the toilet. I find I just have to stand in front of the toilet and drop, hoping my butt lands on the seat. I can't do it slowly because I can't see the toilet seat anyways, and my muscles aren't strong enough to prevent me from just dropping. Luckily, there's no room on either side of the toilet for me to miss. It would be pretty funny if Jon woke up in the middle of the night to me sitting beside the toilet lol.

I'm still in the process of giving our house a good clean. I wiped down and cleaned up the fridge today. On the list for this week is: wiping down the freezer in the fridge and washing the walls in the bathroom. I think the latter has been on my to-do list for 4 months. I'm running out of time to get it done, so I'm hoping by telling everyone that I'm going to do it will keep me accountable to actually doing it. I also intend to make a pot of soup tomorrow.

Here are my 35-week pictures:

3 weeks left...but who knows, maybe this is my last pre-baby post? I'm quite enjoying being pregnant, so it will be sad to not feel them moving around anymore. Maybe if I hadn't have had such an easy pregnancy I would be more 'ready' for them to be born?

33 Weeks + Dr.'s Appointment #9 + Ultrasound #7 Results + Fetal Monitoring #1

So, this is pretty late...I'm practically 34 weeks now, but I was waiting to get my ultrasound results back and have Jon upload some pictures before I posted.

Here goes...

Things continue to go well, which is great! I'm still working and still coaching, which I'm very happy about. Last Monday (the 7th), I was starting to feel really cramping at night and my braxton hicks contractions were coming pretty frequently so I went to bed right away, at about 8pm. I took the next two days off of work, until my next doctor's appointment. By then, things were back to normal. Phew! We were a little worried. Dr. Huckell figured it was because 1) I had had a busy day on Monday and 2) my uterus is 'full-term', but it doesn't realize that it can't deliver yet because there are twins. Since then, I've slowed down quite a bit. I have so many sick/personal/vacation days banked at work that I don't have to be working for financial reasons...so I'm definitely putting the babies (and myself) first. Starting this week, I'm only working about 20 hours a week, and am taking Wednesdays off. Jon has been really understanding and is the first to tell me to stay in bed longer in the mornings and to take the day off.


Speaking of Jon, he has been putting in super-long days at Fleetwood Park (usually staying until about 9pm) so that he can be as far ahead as possible in preparations before the babies arrive.

I went for my first Fetal Monitoring appointment today. The babies weren't overly cooperative, but the nurse (who had kids at FVC when my younger siblings were there) finally managed to get enough data on them. I have to start monitoring their movements daily myself, timing how long it takes for me to feel 6 movements from each baby. If I don't feel 6 in two hours, then I have to call the hospital. I also have to go for a fetal monitoring appointment every Wednesday now.

The babies' movements have really changed the past few weeks - they are less 'kick-like' and more 'movement-like'. I can tell they are getting really squished in there because it's getting really easy to tell what part of the body I'm feeling, whether it be a foot, or a butt, or the head. Hiccups are also a daily occurrence, at least for the boy. He has less room to move his head, so every little 'jump' is easily felt. The girl likes to stick her butt between my hip and ribs on my right side, so often you can see a bulge sticking out.

Here are the results from my ultrasound on February 7th:

DATA	BABY A	BABY B
Heart Rate	137	141
Lie/Position	Cephalic	Cephalic
Est. Fetal Weight	2064 g (4.55 lbs)	2088 g (4.59 lbs)
MEASUREMENTS
Head Circ.	310 mm	299 mm
BPD	86 mm	82 mm
Abdominal Circ.	275 mm	283 mm
Femur	59 mm	62 mm
Gestational Age	32 weeks + 1 day	32 weeks + 0 days

Looks like Baby A (Boy) has a Vander Ende head and Struik legs. haha. Although, we are talking about measurements in mm...so they're VERY close!

Sleeping has continued to be pretty easy for me. I've added an additional pillow under my head (so now I sleep with two), but that's only because it raises my head higher which helps with my nasal stuffiness at night, and gives me more air as Jon's fan (on the other side of Jon) is the only one we're using right now. I get about about three times each night to go pee, which is the result of 1) drinking a lot of water before bed and then after each time I get up, and 2) a squished bladder. Most of the time I'm able to fall asleep again right away, thank goodness! Jon has yet to wake up yet when I'm getting up, which makes him pretty confident that he'll "conveniently" sleep through each time the babies wake up crying during the night. We'll see about that :)

I'm waiting for Jon to come home from Fleetwood Park (it's 9:48pm...he must be coming home soon!) so that I can post a couple pictures. I think I'll just add them in the morning, so make sure you check back. I'm going to post this and then help myself to a warmed brownie topped with vanilla ice cream, and chocolate and caramel syrup. YUM. I'm going to miss not eating extra calories! Have a good night!

As promised...here are the pictures taken at 33 weeks (last week)...wearing one of the few 'nicer' shirts that kinda fit...and now looking at the pictures you can tell it is being stretched!