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Week 13 ~ April 25, 2004
~ Remodeling (In Anticipation of the Second Trimester)
I am feeling better this week. My cold is still hanging on a bit, so I'm being very careful not to overdo it. I am looking forward to being able to do more things.
One thing I would like to do is take a prenatal yoga class. I have a DVD that I was using before coming down with this cold, and the yoga positions and stretches felt so good. I'd love to get together with other pregnant women for this and learn more from a yoga instructor. I am concerned that I haven't been exercising for the last few weeks here while being sick, and I need to make sure I take things gradually and ease into it again.
I am not feeling as nauseous lately, and I love that. I still feel queasy at times, but I can drink plain water again, which is wonderful! (I had been trying other things - sparkling water with lemon was my favorite - because plain water just felt like it was sloshing around in my stomach.) I am going to make a new goal to try to drink lots of water every day.
Another goal - Kegels! Having a cold with a bad cough and sneezing was enough to tell me that I need to get those muscles into better shape. ;)
I ordered some maternity clothes from Old Navy this week. I don't want to spend too much money on things I'll only wear a short time, but I am having a really hard time fitting any of my regular clothes. I have a couple of maternity pants with the wide, soft band that can sit right on or under your belly, and they are so comfortable! They didn't have this style when I was pregnant with Charon, and I remember being really frustrated with clothes. I wore a lot of jumpers and sundresses, and I'll have to get those out again.
We are having some work done on our house right now, which is exciting, messy, and loud at times. Last winter, we had half of our basement finished, and now the other half is getting done. Pete had to move all of our stuff from one side of the basement to the other, and it's fairly overwhelming how much we have to go through. I am hoping the second trimester will bring me more energy along with some nesting instincts so that I can go through my boxes of childhood memorabilia, curriculum from my teaching years, photos and albums, old magazines and more. Actually, I think it could be kind of fun! The basement remodeling should be done by early May, so once we sweep out the dust, I can get started.
We also had the cement redone outside our house this week. The noise on Monday was overwhelming (jackhammers chopping up concrete), but after that it was fun to watch. Pete wants to put down grass seed now, and I'm looking forward to having a nice little backyard to enjoy with Charon on lovely summer days. My dad may find a spot to put in a swing for her, and we hope to have a vegetable garden again.
I have been able to focus more on reading again. Reading is one of my passions, and it always feels strange when I go through a dry spell. During the first few weeks of the pregnancy, I was having a hard time concentrating on anything very literary, and of course that was the month I suggested that my book group read a nominee for last year's Booker Prize, Brick Lane by Monica Ali. I did finally finish it, but it took me forever. I would get stuck on her use of language, which was really amazing. I'd read through a page and realize my brain was still stuck a few paragraphs back, contemplating a facinating image.
My cousin, who is pregnant herself and due in August, lent me her copies of the three Shopaholic books by Sophie Kinsella, saying in her first trimester that these were the only kind of books she could concentrate on. Well, after Brick Lane, I scooped those up. They were each funny and light, with a story that gets out of control so that you have to keep reading and then wraps up neatly at the end. Perfect first trimester reading! Now I'm reading Al Franken's Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them, which is surprisingly similar to the Kinsella books. (Funny and light, despite the subject matter, and an out-of-control story... but I don't think there will be a neat wrap-up at the end.)
Now I am feeling ready to tackle some deeper stuff. For my online book group, I've finally started our April book, Into the Forest by Jean Hegland. It is intriguing and I look forward to reading more. My other book group just picked The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant for our next read, and I anticipate escaping to another time and place and learning more about history and art. I just signed up for Barnes & Noble's May class on Oryx and Crake, where author Margaret Atwood will be participating. I saw her speak last year and bought this book, and have been intending to read it ever since. This will get me to do it.
So, I have lots of new goals and dreams for the next few months. I am considering fourteen weeks as the marker for my transition into the second trimester. My midwife set my due date about a week later than I did, and I don't mind that because I want to give my baby as much time as s/he needs to be inside me. I was going from my ovulation date, which I knew because I was charting and had o-pains; she went with my last menstrual period, which makes the new due date November 3rd. My dad's birthday! (The due date I came up with, October 28th, is my sister's birthday, so I think it's pretty neat to have one or the other.) That means that as of today, I am 12 weeks and 4 days pregnant. Second trimester is getting close!
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