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2004-09-26 - 3.47pm��previous entry��next entry
34 weeks, 2 days
Whoops, two days late with the 34 week entry and belly pic, sorry! But here I am, and the belly picture is up in the gallery (do you see Arthur's little sleepsuits drying on the radiator behind me?!!). Neil just took it today, and I don't like it much at all because man am I starting to look like I'm putting on weight! I hate feeling chubby in my face, and I definitely look chubby in my face now :( Plus (woe is me!) two nights ago I got the shock of my life when I happened to be undressing for bed near a mirror. Guess what I have? Yup, stretch marks. Not on my belly at all (yet), but urgh, I really don't like what I have. My WHOLE butt is a big mass of purple stretch marks. I first noticed them over my hips, creeping round to the front a bit, just a few small purple lines, and when I investigated further, I discovered they cover my entire buttocks. Entirely. They look like I have a nasty purple infectious butt rash and even though I was soooo sure I would never feel down about things like stretch marks, I feel awful about how my behind looks now that they are there :( I know they'll fade, and Neil doesn't appear to mind them at all, but somehow I feel hideous. I feel like I am getting so fat that I outgrew even my skin, and stretched it all ugly. I know I'm being silly but yeah, that's how I feel about it. I feel like my butt will never be remotely sexy again. But anyway. So yeah I have stretch marks now. I have lots on the undersides of my breasts too but they are much fainter and thinner, and my breasts are so veiny now anyway that I hardly notice them. But my butt is just plain ugly.
Urgh. Hopefully I won't get any on my bump, though I'm not holding my breath any more. I know I am just piling on the pounds and maybe I should have tried to do something about that, maybe that might have prevented my butt outgrowing its skin? I have to say, that part of me has been the biggest size problem this pregnancy - I mean, my problems with growing out of clothes has been exclusively down to my bottom expanding, not really a bump issue. Yuck.
Oh well.
In other news, we went to a wedding last night of a very dear school friend! It was nice. I haven't seen her since she was a bridesmaid at our wedding over 5 years ago. It's the weirdest thing when you're standing with a bride on her wedding day in all her finery, surrounded by admiring guests, and she rubs your bump and says, "I'm so jealous!" That is craaazy, a bride on her wedding day who is jealous of anything in the whole world at that moment in time!! But I told her she wouldn't be jealous in a couple of years time (they are planning to start trying for a baby pretty much straight away). She just wanted to talk about my bump and about how it feels to be pregnant! It was a lovely wedding. I couldn't sit where the band were playing though, the music was too loud and it made me feel weird. Within about 5 minutes of the music starting I had a strong Braxton Hicks contraction, and then they kept coming every 2 or 3 minutes for the next half hour - yikes! So eventually we went away from the music and I went for a pee, and things got a little better. If I went back where the music was too loud then the contractions started up again, and one or two of them were painful, like a wave from the top of my womb to the bottom, which is a first for me. My BH contractions are always painless, just rather uncomfortable.
They took ages to open the buffet meal and then I just about FELL on the food, I was so hungry!!! There was one other pregnant guest there with her husband (I didn't know anyone else there at all) and she was 32 weeks pregnant and equally famished by the time the food was ready! So the four of us sat and ate together and chatted about pregnancy - aren't pregnant women boring?!! Hehe!
We left a bit early because Neil got a headache, but I think that was good because I was getting pretty tired. I feel so huge lately, like I am drawing people's attention with my hugeness. People watch me wherever I go, strangers mostly. I used to say how I like this, but lately it is starting to feel less wonderful, as I feel more self-conscious about how I look now, and I am well aware that I waddle quite significantly (!) and look tired and breathless most of the time as I move about. I feel big. Reeeally big. I keep thinking I actually look quite small for a heavily pregnant woman (bump-wise, that is), but everyone who commented on my bump at the wedding gave me a wide-eyed look and said how I looked like I didn't have long to go. So I guess maybe I look more pregnant than I realize! Which is nice. But yeah, I am not feeling quite so happy about my image at the moment, which is CRAZY since I've never been someone to have that kind of issue or self-doubt. Hmmm. Maybe hormones are to blame for the extra sensitivity?
Why didn't I update on Friday? I can't remember.... ohhh yes, it was a kind of busy day. I didn't sleep well because I had to take a nap the afternoon before because I got a bad headache. But yeah so I was really tired, but I had to get up early to wait for the new washer/dryer to be delivered and a new phone and pillows and stuff from Argos too. I had to wait in between 8am and 6pm. This is not normally a problem for me though! But I wanted to go to the cemetery because it was the first anniversary of Cameron's death. Well the deliveries were made by 4.30pm and I had spent most of the afternoon till then in bed because I was so sleepy. After that I went to the cemetery and then when I got home, Neil was back from work and then the evening just disappeared and um, I didn't get round to a belly pic or my diary entry. And then Saturday was full of wedding stuff. And this morning we went to church, which was great.
I am getting constant comments from everyone who claps eyes on me, whether they know me or not, about my bump now. I like it :) But I'm noticing how I feel like I would reeeally really like to have a baby now. Two or three times in the last couple of days I have been walking somewhere with Neil, like from the car to some building or other, not very far, and I just feel so heavy and tired and waddly and huge, I get this overwhelming urge to just squat and give birth (!!), as if that would bring me immeasurable relief and I'm beginning to ache for that. Obviously it doesn't work that way! And Arthur needs to cook for a while longer. But I would really like to give birth now. For comfort's sake, if nothing else! Of course I do want him to stay inside me till he's good and ready, so I would like to make it to term, but then please pleeease can I have a baby already?! I am just a large "thing" that can't maneuver (sp?) anywhere anymore. And I'm keen to feel light and springy again!
Little Arthur is very wiggly still. He had such big violent hiccups this morning. Neil and I stroked him through my bump and spoke soothingly to him, and he didn't get overly thrashy like he is apt to do when he gets violent hiccups! He's so sweet :) He is now 17.7 inches long (45cm) from head to heel, and he weighs (on average) 4lbs 11oz!! The one baby I ever delivered was born at 36 weeks and weighed 4lbs 10oz and he was a real live little baby who looked just like a real live newborn baby (just a little on the small side), so it's crazy to my brain that Arthur looks like that now. I STILL can't seem to fathom the fact that I have a real baby inside me, and that he will actually come out and look (and be!) like a real baby. It's too surreal. But wonderful! :)
One thing I am getting fed right up with now is that EVERYBODY is commenting on how low I'm carrying. I don't actually mind that comment, it's just everyone is saying it over and over and over, and this one lady at church keeps being sort of funny about it. Every time I see her she says, "Ooh aren't you carrying LOW?!!" like it's something bad, and I have my regular answer to that comment, which is, "Yes I know, but it's great for my ribs!" But this particular lady does keep on about it in this tone that says something's not looking right, and I find myself having to defend myself with things like, "Well he's measuring right on target" in cheerful tones. Which is getting a bit annoying. And then the other weekend someone commented that I was carrying low (in a friendly way) and this lady was nearby and I heard her mutter, "TOO low, if you ask me..." and turned her back so I couldn't come back with something like, "There's no such thing as too low!" Urgh. I don't know what her problem is, but it's annoying me. This same lady has dressed various talk-down phrases up as interested comments throughout my pregnancy, and it really gets to me. She also is very pushy with new babies and doesn't let anyone else get to hold a new baby at church. One time (yeeears ago) I asked a new baby's mother if I could hold him, and she made this lady give him to me, so she had to, but she hung around me telling me how I wasn't holding him right, until I got stressed and the baby cried and the mother had to take him back :( Maybe she is envious or something and it comes out in her behaviour towards other women who have babies or who are expecting? She is single and in her early 40's so I don't know, maybe she longed to have children but the situation never happened for her and so she's jealous? I don't like how she makes things unpleasant for me and others, but I try to think that she must be hurting somewhere to be like that. But yeah, the "carrying low" thing is bugging me when people keep on and on saying it week after week.
I have been starting to bounce on my birth ball this week! Yay! It's nice :) I have also made 14 birth announcements - I'm making them myself, and they are a single piece of card (postcard sized) which I cut with the slicey thing (!), and then I am making tiny miniature terry nappies out of baby blue towelling, and pinning them with a tiny gold safety pin :) They are about an inch across in size, and they look very cute! Anyway I stick one of those on the front of each card, and when Arthur is born we're going to print out a ton of pieces of paper which we'll stick on the backs of the cards. Here's an example of what they'll say:
"Alice and Neil are proud to announce the birth of their beautiful baby boy, Arthur Cameron (surname), who was born at home on Friday 5th November 2004 at 8.15pm, weighing 7lbs 6oz."
I really hope I will be able to write that he was born at home! And of course he probably won't come on his due date. The weight is Neil's guess :) I can't settle on a specific weight that I'm leaning towards, but I feel sure he'll weigh 7lbs something. Maybe 7lbs 3oz? I know we both weighed around 5lbs 10oz at birth, but Neil was early, and it doesn't mean Arthur will be that little in any case. And also it depends on whether he comes before or after his due date. Anyone else have any guesses about our little man's birth weight? :)
Well I can't think of anything else for now, and my ribs are aching again, so I guess I will finish this entry for now. I can't believe I have 6 weeks (less than that now!) to go! It feels like forEVER, but I know it's not long, and it will pass.
I'll update again soon! :)
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