35 week checkup

This week I had my 35 week check up. It technically should have been scheduled at 36 weeks, but Dr Pohl is planning to be out of town next week, so we went ahead and just scheduled it for this week. I wont be seen again until 37 weeks.

This appointment, again, was fairly short and easy! I was taken right back when I got there, which was GREAT because I actually had the appointment at 9am and had to be at work by 11. I know thats a 2 hour gap, but with the OBGYN, you never know!

Vitals first:
BP 82/55
+2lbs for a total of 22 I think?  or 23? Idk. I know that according to my scales at home I'm +24lbs

Pam asked if I felt ok and my honest answer was a very weak "no". My heart was racing and I just felt so, so weak. My legs felt as if they wouldnt hold me up and it was hard to breathe. I told her all of that and she asked if it was an episode of sorts or was I feeling that way consistently these days. I told her I had only been feeling it the last 5 min or so and she assured me that these kinds of episodes can be normal and its usually heart palpatations that cause an increase of blood flow to certain parts of the body, making other parts weak. I remember feeling that way fairly consistently towards the end of our vacation a couple of weeks before but I had honestly not been feeling bad lately... so I was for sure hoping that it wasnt a turn for the worse and that I wasnt going to keep feeling that way till delivery or something...

I got taken back to a room and reminded her that Dr Pohl would be doing my cervical check and strep B test since I wouldnt be there for my 36 week check.

So, I nuded up and tried to get that little piece of paper (which is plenty sufficient when I'm not preggo but not so much when i am!) to cover my back side ;-). And sent a few texts and made a phone call (our insulation was getting inspected that day and I had gotten word that the inspector was on his way!) and Dr Pohl was there! I was, again, surprised at how quickly he came! And grateful ;-)

Fundal Height: 37+.
I expressed my frustration that HOW am I measuring that much farther ahead this week?! Did baby have a growth spurt? NO growth spurts are allowed!

Dr Pohl went on to check my cervix and said i'm fully closed, which was good news and that the baby is super high.

He went on to explain that while fundal height is pretty accurate for the first and second babies, it is less accurate at predicting size with each additional pregnancy due to the fact that the uterus is stretched and the baby has more room to move in and out of the pelvis. That the most accurate fundal height measurements to predict baby size are when the baby is fully down in the pelvis, which she WAS at my last appointment. And today she is much, much higher!

I asked him if that could also affect my symptoms (the feeling bad after eating, having heart palpitations/weakness) and he assured me that this is exactly why some days I feel great (when she's lower) and others I feel just plain bad! I was so grateful to learn that! I've been trying to relate it to how much water I drink, what I've eaten, etc... and while those things certainly can affect how I feel, i just knew in my gut that it was something more that was out of my control since some days i drink exactly the same amount of water as the day before and eat healthier, yet feel worse!

I had  a couple of questions for him:

1. Back to wanting to breastfeed and dealing with low supply issues... I've spoken to 2 LC's  (lactation consultant) who suggested I try domperidone to help increase supply. It is a medicine not yet FDA approved and is used in other countries as a motility drug (to help with nausea) AND as a lactation drug (at different dosages). I wanted Dr Pohls opinion, although I was pretty sure I knew what it would be.
His take... he wouldt recommend that his wife take it. Since its not fda approved we (in the US) do not have studies on the affects of it. He did, however, assure me that it DOES work and that it quite likely will help me make milk should I choose to take it (but I would have to order it via online in Canada).

2. I asked him why all the rage about cord clamping... what are the benefits? Does he do it?
His answer: its mostly just a trend that is hogwash. Here's why
The idea is that you want the baby to continue to get the oxygen rich blood from the cord and so many moms request delayed cord clamping until the cord stops pulsating. The problem with this? In our bodies the arteries bring oxygen rich blood to us and veins take the biproducts away. But in the umbilical cord, its the opposite. The Cord has one LARGE vein that runs down the middle which brings oxygen rich blood to the baby and two smaller arteries that are on the periphery which take biproducts away. The ARTERIES are what pulsates. And what causes that pulsation? The baby's heartbeat.
So as long as the baby's heart beats, the cord will pulse to some extent. UNTIL the placenta detaches from the mother, that is (because at that point the mom's body gives one last gush of blood through the vein). But even after the placenta detaches, the baby's heart obviously still beats, causing a pulse in the cord. Now, the end of the cord closest to the placenta will be the first to stop pulsating and the end closest to baby will literally still have a pulse up to an hour or so after birth.
So he said its an inconsistent practice as each dr has their own opinion as to what part needs to stop pulsating before clamping, but that AGAIN... the point is that the pulsating arteries are taking biproducts AWAY from baby so who cares if they are pulsating or not!
He said that his practice and belief is that the cord should not be clamped until that gush of blood which indicates that the placenta has separated from Mom. That as long as its in tact, the baby is getting nutrient rich blood. That he definitely takes his time and cleans baby and suctions and massages the cord to help get all of that blood from the vein in the cord to baby, but that after that gush, there is minimal to no benefit of delaying clamping past that point regardless of if there is a pulse in those arteries.

Are yall bored? I was intrigued. I LOVE science and the body and this stuff fascinates me :-)
So... he'll clamp after the gush. Sounds good to me :-)

And I'll likely order some domperidone illegally from canada in hopes of a better breast feeding experience :-)

Because some Dr's orders are worth following, and some are meant to be broken, right?! ha!

Here's the only pic I have from this week. Its horrible. And My melasma (dark spotting on my face from pregnancy hormones) is BAD. I'll be so glad to get a chemical peel and get rid of it!

33 Week Checkup

Vacation (mine AND Dr Pohls) threw off my every-other-week checkup's this pregnancy. Normally I'd go monthly till 28 weeks, then every other week (28,30,32,34,36) and then weekly till delivery. But this go round, I had a visit at 28, 30, 33, 35, 37 and then weekly till delivery. So this was what SHOULD have been my 32 week check, at 33 weeks exactly :-)

I got put back rather quickly into a room, but after vitals were taken, of course. I actually took the kids with me to this appointment as Jeff had his bible study that morning and then had planned to head to a friends house and help him lay some hardwoods! I had talked to the kids at length about what behavior I expected from them and I'll just say right now, they were fantastic! I was so proud. They both sat and looked at books the entire time I was with Dr Pohl and were both nice and quiet. I'll say it again, i was very proud of them!

BP was low as always: 88/53. Yes, I know... but thats my "normal" :-)

Weight: up 2lbs for a total of 20lbs so far

My biggest Concern was of course Fundal Height...
34cm! At 33 weeks the ideal height is 33cm so this is an IMPROVEMENT! I'm only measuring one week ahead now!!! I was ecstatic! :-)

I really didnt have any questions at this appointment either! It was short and sweet and I think I was just so excited to be measuring closer to normal that I didnt want to ruin my high ;-).  I mean, the kids were great, my checkup was great... that was a great way to end the appointment!

No pics around this time were taken... it was the week of the 4th of July and we were mega busy so I forgot!

Disney! Day 5 *evening!!!

After our fun morning at Animal Kingdom,we made it back to the hotel around 2:45 and took some good, long naps. I dont think we all got up until around 5:30... and then we headed to the POOL!

The Art of Animation Resort has 3 pools. A Car themed pool on one side of the resort (opposite side than we were on so we actually never even walked over to see it! The resort is huge and we did plenty of walking around without walking over there to check out that pool), a Little Mermaid themed pool on our side and the "Big Blue" pool in the middle, just outside of the eatery. Its the biggest pool on any disney resort AND there was music that played under the water. Mack, especially, found that to be quite amusing!

It was pretty cool in the evening... it had been hot and the sun was shining till about 2 minutes after we got to the pool... when a big cloud covered the sun and it stayed that way the entire time we were there!
So, I opted to take some pics and talk with my mom on the phone for a few minutes while the kids swam

To the guy behind Jeff, can I just say... eww? Poor fella is one hairy dude! EEK!

As you can tell from the pics, the resort (and Disney in general) wasnt really all that crowded!!!

We swam for about 45 min and then got all dried off and headed in for dinner in the eatery. By this time, we had really figured out a system and figured out what food we liked, and didnt like.

When I had scheduled the trip, i decided to take out a Disney credit card so that we would get a $200 gift card for use in Disney (for putting so much of a balance on the card and we, of course, paid it off immediately). So I brought that gift card that night so we could splurge on some desserts for Jeffs Bday!

Drama of the week to follow...

On the way back to our room we took the time to pose with some of the "characters" along the way!

Notice Mack in the background here screaming... he didnt want his pic taken UNTIL I took Rhyans! ha!

The elephant graveyard play area was tons of fun for the kids... its just some tunnels, but they loved it!

Rhyan cracked me up with how she wanted to pose like each of the figurines!

The view from our room of the resort. Keep in mind that you can only see the Little Mermaid part here and some of the lion king. The resort was seriously huge! And so clean and well kept! Our room may have been tiny, but the resort over all was massive! There was even laundry mats in each area (which I used to clean Mack's carseat cover that he tee tee'd on when he fell asleep in the car once)!

I'll share the drama I previously referred to in tomorrows post. It was a doozie! ;-)

Disney! Day 5!!! (Jeff's Birthday!)

Lots of people would DREAM of spending their birthday in Disney... Lots of people would call the trip in itself a gift! But Jeff is NOT lots of people :-). He is his own person, and as I said at the beginning of these posts, he was NOT thrilled to be spending spring break in Disney! So I tried really hard to find ways to make his day one that he would enjoy... starting with breakfast :-)

Typically, on Jeff's birthday, I buy him either Krispie Kreme or Publix (his fav!) doughnuts. But our resort didnt carry either of those as options ;-). So I went with the next best thing. Doughnut HOLES!
And we got him a post card as his card (remember, we had just moved so the things I had gotten in preparation for his day... like a card... went missing in the move). And of course we had to get him a yummy snack for the day. Snickers!

Knowing that he loves animals like he does, I intentionally planned his birthday to be our day at Animal Kingdom! And made a fast pass for the Safari which I was excited for us to get to go on!

Funny thing... I made sure we all got up and got ready early in hopes of catching some kind of opening show this day, as well. I was thinking that all the parks had an opening show, but I guess I was wrong? We got there at 8am (they opened at 9) and literally waited in line to get in. Irony is that there was no reason to wait in line. We had a fast pass for the safari. No reason to rush at all! So, lesson learned. But it did make for a relaxing morning as I didnt feel stressed at all about getting anywhere on time... we were early for everything!

When you first get through the gates the "tree of life" is in the middle of the park... I guess its the main feature of the park (like the castle or globe or magical hat...). I wanted a pic in front of it as a family but i saw ZERO cast members there to take pictures which was a let down! So heres the tree. HA!

Personally, I really liked AK! I loved how shaded it was and how it looked like you were just walking down the streets of Africa for a lot of it. All of it just felt really authentic, to me!

We headed towards the safari first and even took time for a bathroom break... but STILL had time before our fast pass. So we decided to take the walk around and see some of the animals on foot while we waited.

We pretty much stopped the trek on foot at the aquarium area, but not before checking out each of the reptile cages. Mack loved the turtles! And I about freaked over the spiders and snakes. AHHHHH!

We headed back for the safari and I made sure of one thing while in line: to request to sit in the BACK!
I had been told by several people that you get the best pics in the back and its the best place to sit. I could have sworn that Emily was one such person who advised me of that so when we sat down on the back row of the Jeep, I immediately texted her with my exciting news that "we are on the safari on the BACK row!". And her response cracked me up (b/c obviously I was mistaken). She basically said I needed to tell them I get carsick and stop them from starting, get off and sit up front! That the back is super bumpy and that I shouldnt be sitting back there while preggo! Um... scary! But we were already on the move, so I just went with it.

And I'm SO glad I did! YES, it was bumpy. But not bad, really. Mostly because the giraffes kept blocking the road and making us stop/slow wayyyyyy down! But we got to get some nice pics of the animals! And the kids loved sitting back there and getting to look behind us!

My big mistake of the day: I totally forgot my telephoto lens (55-200). So ALL of these were taken with my cheapo lens (18-55) w/ very limited zoom capability. Cool part about that... its obvious as to how close we truly were since I couldnt zoom much!

Hippos everywhere! (look for their backs in the water)

So, these trees are pretty neat because, as the narrator of the ride was telling us, they look like they are upside down... that the roots are in the sky with the bulk of the tree being in the ground! Neat!

The other strange thing is all of the termite mounds you see there. The guy said some get all worn down (like the one above) because of animals scratching their backs on the mounds...) while others are tall!

Isnt that a beautiful sight?!

As soon as we passed the giraffe's they were back out in the road, blocking the next round of jeeps! ha!

The Kids really did love being able to turn around and look out the back and take their time checking out the scenery we had just passed! It really is a beautiful property!

As mack says "El-a-flants!"

LION!

After the safari, we headed a little deeper into "Africa" to ride the train. The train ride takes you to Rafiki's island (an area with monkey's i  presume), however, we really just wanted to let the kids ride the train and didnt get off at the stop ;-)

Rhyan and Mack were being so sweet, playing together and tickling each other. Love those moments!

After our train ride, we headed on out to Dinoland. I was pretty excited about dinoland since Mack is SO into dinosaurs! I knew he would love it! And anytime Rhyan sees dinosaurs she automatically says "Oh! Mack would love that!!!". She's always thinking about things he likes :-)

Rhyan wanted to ride this one roller coaster called "dinosaur". Let me preface by saying that Emily had warned me to NOT let Rhyan ride it. I told Rhyan that I thought it was scary and that she might want to skip it but she insisted and Jeff said they would be fine... So they rode it. And regretted it ;-). Rhyan said it was SCARY!

But while they were in line and riding Dinosaur, Mack and I walked around and visited some dinosaur's of our own!

He LOVED this dinosaur! Sadly, we had a spanking moment in front of this fella ;-). Mack was pitching a FIT, not wanting me to take a pic of the dino. I told him that he didnt need to be in the picture and I just wanted the dino but he was screaming at me like nobody's business. Which earned his bottom a spanking. I HATED spanking him at Disney. But hello, he cant yell at us.

Luckily, we quickly recovered as we rode the dinosaur version of Dumbo and took a potty break. When we came out of the potty, guess who we saw?!!?!? GOOFY! That made this boy pretty happy :-)

There was a very short line so I called Jeff immediately and told him and Rhyan to come right on over so we could get some family pics... we had to let a couple of people jump ahead of us to wait for them, but that wasnt so bad! Mack was so happy to get to see Goofy!

Rhyan, on the other hand wasnt quite as thrilled. She liked them, but she wasnt jumping to hug them ;-)

From the family pics we headed on over to Finding Nemo, the Musical. Honestly, the kids were getting pretty tired at this point. It was hot and we had been there since 8am (it was now around 12:00 I think)

This musical was SO interesting. The "characters" were basically like stuffed animals but were carried around by the actors playing their part...who were also dressed similarly.

The colors were absolutely amazing in this musical! It was memorizing! And it was really a great chance for us to all sit down and relax for a little while... It helped the kids to recharge. And us!

Lunchtime was after the musical and I had been told by several people to try to eat at the bbq place at Animal Kingdom... so we did! I would say that it was definitely good!

We had fast passes for Jeff and Rhyan to ride the expedition everest (yes, Rhyan was tall enough and she LOVES roller coasters!) but JEFF said he was tired and didnt care to ride it and just wanted to head out. I tried to talk him into riding it... because I KNEW he and Rhyan would LOVE it! But in the end I just had to remember that it was JEFF's birthday... so, we left!

More to come about the evening... up next.