Thursday, March 25, 2010

28 Weeks & Maternity Photos

According to the pregnancy ticker at the top of the blog, I'm 27 weeks, 6 days - the same gestation at which Elise was born.  But according to how my OB and local hospital calculate (where occasionally they drop a day), I'm 28 weeks today!  (With Elise I was around 28 weeks, 4 days according to my calculations but I believe they used her size via the ultrasound I had done at 21 weeks to date her gestation rather than my LMP date...and at one point a neonatologist told me that he thought she was probably even younger than 27 weeks, 6 days.)  In other words, it's not an exact science.

But I am definitely bigger now than I was with Elise and am near or past the gestational age when I had her.  I've started feeling much more achy now that my body has hit the point where it hasn't stretched this big before.  This morning I'm really feeling it all down the left side of my belly.  But it's a good reminder of the blessings that we have and of the joy of each day Evelyn gets to spend on the inside.

Last Friday I experienced some pain, including some that felt like a ripping or tearing sensation in my abdomen so my OB had me go into labor and delivery at the hospital where I'll be having Evelyn (different from the one where Elise was born and from the one where she was in the NICU due to insurance) for monitoring.  The nursing staff got concerned when I didn't come in right away because they thought I was bleeding and called my OB's office to make sure I knew to come right in.  But we were working on getting Kit off work to watch Elise, and since I wasn't bleeding and the pain wasn't too severe I knew that it wasn't a huge urgency.  If it hadn't been for what happened with Elise, I probably would have thought nothing of it, but we can't be too careful this time around.

Kit and Elise dropped me off at the hospital and then he took her home for lunch and a nap, which ended up being a good thing.  Because my stay simply involved being hooked up the the fetal heart rate and uterine contraction monitors for a few hours, giving a urine sample, eating hospital lunch and watching cable.  We don't have a television at home, and even if we did, Elise is always around to play with and take care of.  So I sort of felt like I was on a little vacation getting to lie there watching home improvement and decorating shows.  (With a little What Not to Wear thrown in for good measure.)

As you can tell from my casual description of the event, everything was fine.  So the pain must have just been a random pregnancy-related pain.

In celebration of passing the gestational age where I had Elise, I'm posting the maternity photos our friend Ashley took at the 26 week mark.  Here's hoping we get to do more around 36 weeks!






























8 comments:

KK said...

You look gorgeous!!!

Melissa Nickerson said...

I'm glad you had a good "mini vacay." Congrats on 28 weeks!!

Sara said...

You look great! Isn't it nice to get past the point when you delivered Elise? You can breathe a little easier - well, not really! Great pics!

Emily said...

I love the new pregnancy photos! They look so good and the ones with Ellie are adorable! And your name is wonderful by the way : )

Susan Carson said...

Those pictures are just beautiful! I love that you took them around the same gestational age that Ellie was born- that seems significant. But I also hope you get to do more later. We're so glad all is well with our Evie and she's in no hurry to come out!

Becca Sue Congdon said...

Such beautiful pictures!

I wonder if what you were feeling might be the uterine ligament stretching? You mentioned that you didn't get this big with Elise before she was born so this is the first time your body has had to grow this far to accommodate baby. In some ways, this will all be just like a first time pregnancy for you from this point on.

Enjoy it! And we'll be praying that little Evie stays nice and healthy in there. :)

Heidi said...

I remember feeling the stretching of my ligaments while pregnant. I too wondered if that is what you were feeling. I am glad all is well for you and Evelyn.

You mentioned you do not have a television at home, is that intentional? Did you grow up that way as well?

Emily said...

Becca Sue and Heidi,

It wasn't ligament pain (though I've been having that too!) but might have been uterine stretching of some sort. It didn't last very long and was so strong that my body literally forced me to move to try to stop the pain. But I haven't felt it since so we'll see.

Heidi, we actually got rid of our television around the end of last summer. We haven't had cable since we got married and watch the few shows that we really like online anyway. I had been having the television on during the daytime as sort of social stimulation once Elise came home from the hospital and we would watch public broadcasting shows on the weekend (travel shows and such) but realized that it was completely unnecessary. And Kit and I both want to try to not have our girls' lives revolve around television. We both had TV growing up (I even had a TV in my own room from about 4th grade on) so it's a new thing for us. But we want to encourage other forms of entertainment, activity and socializing for the girls. Plus, the extra space we have now that we don't have the TV and all its gadgets is a nice side benifit!