Musings of a Loquacious Mind

"OB" Appointments are more fun than the "/GYN" part

I've decided the 24 week Ante-Natal obstetrician appointment is the best one. I guess it would be better if it included an ultrasound (it's always fun to see what the kid is up to), but other than that it has several distinct advantages:

1. I don't have to talk about throwing up - because I'm finally not (much)! I'm down to maybe a whole tab of Zofran a week (I was up to three a day and still mildly miserable for quite a while), and while I am not completely nausea-free, I am not by any means nausea-ful.
2. I'm not in heartburn city yet. About the time the nausea subsided last time I was spending about half of my nights sitting up and sleeping against the wall, crunching a half-dozen or more Tums a night. I'm not there yet! I have to take a few Tums right before bed, but other than that it is good going. And pizza for dinner might not have helped matters.
3. I'm not big and broiling yet. I gained just 2.5 lbs since my last appointment (total weight gain: something like 10 lbs), and can still fit in non-maternity clothes (some with more success than others). And while my poor husband has to bite the air-conditioning price bullet and my sister-in-law keeps socks at our house so her feet won't be cold when she comes over while I still wake up with my hair soaked with sweat, I'm not the furnace that I'll be at 9 months. Why my mother decided to be nine months pregnant in the middle of hot, sticky, humid Southern summers all three times I don't know!
4. The entire appointment went like this: get there, change insurance forms (grr, City of Richmond! but now we have vision (but that's another post)), get called back, do the 'pee in a cup' routine, get weighed, listen to the baby's heartbeat, talk to the doctor for a little, hug her and go. When else do you want to hug your doctor? Especially the "big girl doctor"?

So all in all Broccoli is doing fine and Mommy is doing fine.

Oh, I'm still a little dehydrated, so you can buy me a (completely non-alcoholic, possibly non-caffeinated) drink the next time you see me!

Labels: pregnancy

A Different Kind of Tummy Suck

You know you've done it. There are a million different reasons why, but you know you've sucked in your tummy before. To zip up your pants. To see your scale. To see what you'd look like 5 pounds lighter. To make someone think you always look 5 pounds lighter. To get behind a chair at a dinner. Whatever.

And pretty much the way you suck it up is by contracting your abs to bring in the pooch.

But I've noticed that - while pregnant - I do a different type of tummy suck. Especially right now, at about 23 weeks, when I don't always look pregnant (especially when wearing a totally non-maternity outfit, of which I have many that fit just fine due to the 15 or so pounds I lost right before I got pregnant). I don't tense the lower abs to pull in my gut; I contract the top of my stomach (upper abs? I don't know) to pull in the area between my chest and my gut. In effect, making my baby bump look bigger.

I want people to think I'm pregnant, not that I'm just oddly proportioned and fat.

I wonder if I'll still do this when I am obviously pregnant? Did I with Kaitlyn? I think yes. I think that, for the same reasons I've identified that I do it now, I'll still do it later. I'll want it to look like I've got a basketball in my dress, not just like I've puffed up like the Stay Puff Marshmallow Man. But it's interesting. At least to me.

Labels: pregnancy, ruminitions

2 Corinthians 12:9

But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you,
for my power is made perfect in weakness."
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses,
so that Christ's power may rest on me.
~ New International Version ~

Labels: faith

This seems petty...

Secret: Shower Fresh

I've been using this brand and fragrance of deodorant for about forever. Well, after I (a) hit puberty and (b) realized "Teen Spirit" had no antiperspirant properties. I wish other 7th graders had realized the same thing. And that "Smells like..." perfume sprays and cologne coverups were not the way to go, either.

Actually, I used those gel antiperspirants for a while in high school, then I used "Secret: Powder Fresh" for a while, but never really liked the way it smelled, and and switched to "Shower Fresh" sometime before college. So about 10 years. Longer than I've been with my laundry detergent (I switched from liquid Cheer to liquid Tide when I moved to VA, because they sold Tide at Sam's Club, but not Cheer. It took some getting used to, but no where near as bad as that time I used my then-boyfriend's "Sun" detergent. I didn't break out like I do with powdered detergents, but I was very distracted by the fragrance and ended up rewashing some clean clothes.)

My point is this: these are subtle scents. They are meant to not really be noticed. And yet when they change, well, I have maybe more problems with change than other people.

Over the years the container for Secret has changed, but the scent remained the same. So when I was at the store picking up some deodorant the other week I didn't think twice about the new packaging art. But it hid something sinister. They have changed the fragrance of my deodorant!

And I don't like it.

Not just do I not like it because of the "why did they go and change it"-fear-of-change response, but I really do not like it in a "boy, that doesn't smell good" way.

Now, I'm cheap enough (or love my husband who is cheap enough) that I'm not going to toss my two sticks out (it was a twin pack, naturally), so I have quite a while to get used to the smell. But I imagine in, what, a year when I'm running out again I'll have to switch fragrances (and maybe brands, since Secret has betrayed me).