Week 24

This has been an interesting week, in good and not so good ways!  First, let's see how big Johnny is getting...approximately anyway.  At 24 weeks gestation, Johnny should be just over a pound and just over a foot long!  We're both just getting bigger at this point... :)

For the good news, we had our first appointment with Ali this week.  It was wonderful!  Seriously, I can't tell you how wonderful it was to spend right around 2 hours talking about the baby, pregnancy, and birth as opposed to spending that time in a waiting room wrestling the girls for three minutes with the doctor!  Ali did perform a prenatal exam, including a urine strip, pulse rate, blood pressure, weight, and measurements.  I'm very healthy right now, with the results of all the exams being good.  The result of the measurement had me "measuring big", closer to 25 weeks.  SO...according to the first ultrasound, I should be due August 19th, according to the second ultrasound August 11th, and according to my most recent measurements, August 4th!  Bottom line: we're doing this old school...sometime in the month of August we should see our son!  I'm actually liking the lack of a due date.  Hopefully it'll make mid-August a little less discouraging!

At any rate, Danny and I are still feeling very confident about our decision to birth at home.  I'm really so very excited!  I really think this is going to be a life-changing experience for me.  My testimony has already been bolstered by this whole experience, so I can't imagine how I'm going to feel when I hold my son for the first time, in the peaceful surroundings of our home.  Makes me smile just thinking about it!

The hard part of this week has come in the form of some pretty debilitating pubic and pelvic pain.  It's left me barely able to walk at times, and has kept me from doing anything that requires bending over or getting on the floor.  Needless to say, my house has been a disaster zone!  I talked to Ali about it yesterday (it was SO nice to just be able to discuss my concerns with her and not feel like I was bothering her!), and we both think I must have strained all those lower muscles, resulting in the painful muscle inflammation.  She recommended that I take it easy for a couple of days, and eat some anti-inflammatory foods including spinach, blueberries, pineapple, and papaya.  I'm still hurting today, but not as bad as yesterday.  Let's hope the trend continues!