As I enter the last few weeks (days, please, PLEASE??) of the pregnancy, I'm getting quite nostalgic for the entire process. Evidently, reflecting makes my feet swell.
I thought I'd break it down for history's sake.
Number of trimesters involving vomiting: 3.
Of course! Why would I stop throwing up when everyone else does? To be fair, the third trimester session was a one-time thing, but I do feel like it rounded out the pregnancy nicely.
Number of times of vomiting to realize that I'm an idiot: 12.
I'm estimating here, but it was a fairly high number. Guess what? If I take a prenatal vitamin with juice of any kind, I will throw it up within 10 minutes. It took me many, many learning trials to figure that out. Impressive, no? I talk about classical conditioning in class, and even discuss how single-trial learning is common for nausea/vomiting. (Throw up something even once, and you remember it and avoid it, at least temporarily.) Still, it took me until halfway into my second trimester to realize that when I took a prenatal with juice, I throw it up. When I took it at any other time, I didn't. Also, I realized that I'm an idiot.
Number of shoe sizes that I'm up: it depends on the shoe.
My feet are large. They look like Cabbage Patch Doll feet. I wish I was kidding. I would post a picture, but then you'd have to have your memory scrubbed so you could get a decent night's sleep. You're welcome. All those that have seen them first-hand, well, the reactions have been mixed. All, even experienced doctors, make the same face. It's stunning. But back to the numbers! I needed shoes recently, to go to a baby shower in my honor. My sister and I went to Target, where I tried on every shoe imaginable. I usually wear a size 8. I was trying to cram my feet into a 12 (you read that right), when my sister told me to give it up. The issue is that the tops of my feet are puffy, which is right where shoemakers put the parts of the shoes that keep them on your feet. How clever! I'm wearing crocs to work now. Crocs AND socks. I'm the classiest pregnant lady ever!
Number of hours sleep per night: 6, in 45 minute intervals
Knowing what I know about sleep cycles--it takes longer than that to get into REM, I know I'm sleep deprived. SO FANCY that the tiny baby is keeping me up all night before she actually needs me to be up all night. Sometimes she likes to kick a bunch and wake me up and remind me that I'm pregnant. It's usually right in the middle of those dreams, you know, the ones where you can walk normally, fit into your shoes, and eat bleu cheese. I love those dreams.
Number of crazy third-trimester symptoms: 847,343.
Rough estimate. My least favorite of all is the morning-time pain. I wake up unable to make a fist every morning. Not in the usual hey-I-can't-squeeze-hard kind of way, but instead that my joints on my fingers won't bend without threatening to burst through my skin. It's 10 a.m. right now, and it still hurts to make a fist. Getting the lid off the milk container is so painful, my hands sweat just thinking about it. Also? I can't raise my arms over my head. Something is up with my shoulders. This means that I haven't fixed my hair before noon in weeks. Now recall the Crocs and socks. It's looking rough, people. I take the hottest shower I can, and in it, I flex and contract all my joints to help a little, but I still drop things. Just last week, I had a student in my office for advising and my phone rang. When trying to put it back on the receiver, I threw it across my desk because my shoulder, right then, decided to quit working. I'm glad to be done with work, because the students (might) still respect me, sortof.
Number of minutes in public per day that I display that I'm pretty sure I'm dying: ZERO.
That's right. If you see me, you'd never know I was .000000001 seconds away from tears at a moments notice. See my pretty smile? Oh yes, I'm getting big aren't I? Why, I hadn't noticed that my feet are replaced with elephants feet! Pain? What pain? This is a blessed experience! I couldn't be happier about bringing a new life into the world! (Ok, so that last one IS true. I'm pretty excited about meeting my girl.) I think the secret to maintaining the public ease-of-pregnancy image is that everyone is so darn excited for you. Which makes you not want to be a whiny pregnant lady. Plus, who knows who I might be talking to that can't have children? That person definitely doesn't want the woe-is-me routine. So the only person who sees the flirting-with-crazy me? You guessed it, Poor Mikeburns.
So far, I've been checked for signs of imminent labor twice at the doctor's office. It's not pleasant, but I'm hoping against hope that when I'm being checked, suddenly the doctor will stand bolt upright and scream, "You're at 10 centimeters! It's time to PUSH!" Hey, a girl can dream, can't she?
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