Memorial Day weekend was a much needed long weekend without the kids and quality time spent with my family. Sunday was my birthday (my last one, I'm going to stay 29 forever. Actually, I take that back, it was my 5th time turning 25, so I'm going to be 25 forever, okay?) I have this fear of getting older. I don't know why, but when I think of aging, I get panicked and feel depressed. Terry is 43 and he talks freely about his age and doesn't seem to have a care in the world about it. I wish I could feel that same way. I know it's a normal thing (well, aging is, but so is not wanting to age), but I try not to think about it. I never know what to ask for for my birthday and my family finally gave up and started finding cute things that they knew I would like but wouldn't necessarily buy for myself (shoes, garden ornaments, etc.) and money from my parents so I will actually buy something for myself. I'm a very frugal person. I don't shop for myself, I don't ask for gifts because I feel like I have everything I could ever want (except for a house to call our own, that's coming soon I think!). So, I feel blessed! Saturday Terry had the entire day planned out for us. He surprised me with a trip to the horse races, which was awesome because I've mentioned about a dozen times over the past 3 years that "I'm GOING to the horse races at least once this year!" We hadn't made it over the past few years, so it was really sweet that he planned this for us. Mini-doughnuts are an absolute must-have if I go somewhere that serves them (fresh), so we indulged in a bag of mini-doughnuts and cheered for our horses. After the races we went to our favorite wing restaurant and had our tasty chicken wings. It was a great day!
Sunday we went to my parents' for dinner and spent the afternoon hanging out, just lounging around and talking. My favorite time is time spent with my family and I cherish every moment of it. Monday morning T&Y started calling in the morning and I finally sent them a message and told them I was still in bed and staying put until I felt like getting up. I felt bad, but we were exhausted and took advantage of not having our kids to get up for! The rest of the day was spent mattress and house shopping. One of those is much more fun than the other, I'll give you three guesses :)
So, now onto that dreaded word again...."exhausted". I struggle with extreme fatigue/lethargy/exhaustion on a daily basis and it's usually around the same time, I've noticed. It usually causes me to feel very out of breath, almost like I'm going to pass out, nauseous, and desperate. I'm no stranger to fatigue, I've been dealing with chronic fatigue for years and I will admit that this is definitely the worst it's ever been, but it's obvious as to why. During my last OB appointment, I asked if it was OK for me to start taking SOMETHING...ANYTHING...to help. I was thinking Vitamin D and Iron. My OB thought that was a great idea and to add Vitamin C to help with the iron absorption. Now, I'm going to be brutally honest here, so skip forward if you would rather not hear the nitty gritty of what pregnancy brings to some women..I'm not usually one to talk about this next subject although it doesn't bother me to hear about others'. I am not a "regular" person, bathroom-wise, to begin with. I never have been. I "go" once every 5 days on average and it hasn't bothered me until surrogacy. With the medications, dehydration, hormones, bloating,etc., it can make things a LOT worse in that area. And there you have it.....my very first hemorrhoid. I have never had one before. Mine isn't big (my OB barely even noticed it), but it's there and, although I can't feel it and it isn't bothersome physically for the most part, I think about it ALLLLL the time and am quite obsessive with my witchhazel and cotton balls, if ya know what I mean. So when the mention of Iron came into play, I also mentioned that I heard it could make those things worse. Now enter, stool softeners. To help with my irregularity (which, remember, didn't bother me until just this past year) I have tried my hand at gentle laxitives from straight ex-lax to milk of magnesia and also fiber tablets. I've been told by people who have used these things that "oh yeah, I take double the dose and am able to go right away and feel amazing afterwards, cleans me right out!" Um, they never mentioned that they were laxative junkies. Which is so not true for me. I take HALF the dose and nothing happens for 12 or so hours and then BAM, I'm in so much discomfort and stomach pain that I can't sleep nor can I function or feel OK during the day. I never know when it's going to kick in, and half the time it doesn't do anything but cause massive pain. Fail.
One more fun topic of pregnancy, boobage leakage. I didn't experience any leakage of breastmilk with Kaleb until I was at least 8 months pregnant, and it wasn't so much that I was leaking as it was that I could get some breastmilk if I squeezed my breast/nipple hard enough (I don't even know why I even got to the point of squeezing my boob or nipple, don't ask). So imagine my astonishment when I started leaking breastmilk about one month ago, and it only gets more and more frequent with every day. I "let down" several times in an hour, but it's not much more than the feeling and some slight leakage. It really doesn't bother me, except that I want to know that it is not some sort of indicator that I might go into very pre-term labor. Aside from feeling like I should be breastfeeding a newborn already, I'm looking at the upside and feeling confident that I will have NO problems pumping breastmilk for the twins when they are born. I didn't have any issues with Kaleb, but I know it can be different with each pregnancy.
During my last OB appointment, they drew my 2nd round of blood for the last part of the Nuchal Translucency test (remember, that's the 1st trimester test preformed to detect abnormalities). I am not worried about those results, but I know T&Y worry, so it will be good to have the results soon. I don't want them to worry. He also listened to the heartbeats, but admitted that it is hard to tell whether he is detecting the same twin twice or two different heartbeats. By what others have told me, I was expecting him to measure my uterus that day, but he didn't. Some days I feel like I'm pretty big, and other days I feel the opposite. I think it seriously depends on whatever I eat, because I tend to get a "food baby" easily, anyways, which makes me look like I'm pregnant when I'm not.
My next appointment is the BIG appointment! When I went to schedule it, my OB instructed me to return in 4 weeks but the receptionist informed me that he would be out of the clinic that week, so I either needed to come in the week before (which would put me at 19 weeks 5 days) or the week after. Can you guess which one I picked?! Again, I'll give you 3 guesses :) We are impatient people, us surrogates and intended parents, I'm tellin' ya! June 14th will be a very exciting day for us. I am going to steal the idea of another surrogate and have the ultrasound tech. put the sexes of each baby into envelopes. When I return from my appointment and get to work, I plan to Skype with T&Y and we can open the envelopes together :)
Today I received, from T&Y, some awesome pregnancy belly oil for the prevention of stretch marks. That was such an awesome gift! I haven't mentioned a thing about the fact that I already obsessively apply oily lotion that I made myself, at least twice per day. How the heck do they know me this well?! I can't wait to use it tonight! They are so sweet!
On to another few weeks of boring-ness, and I'll take it!
Yay! I'm happy to see an update. It's so great to hear the babies are doing well. Sorry to hear about the not-so-great side effects the pregnancy is causing. Now... hurry up June 14!
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