The Belly Project Week 3

Another week down...lots to go! I've been feeling pretty good this week. There has been more nausea and I've still been pretty tired. The baby is the size of a blueberry right now. That's really exciting. I have my first doctor's appointment this week. It's just an initial appointment with the nurse. They educate you on what to expect, what to do, how appointments will go, talk about all of the tests that you can choose to have done, etc. Eric isn't even allowed to go to this first appointment. I wish I could bring him. He was able to go to the first Kaiser appointment when I was pregnant with Brieana, however I switched plans to them in January so I was already 5+ months pregnant for my first appointment at Kaiser last time.

I was called today by a coordinator for the research department at the University of California San Francisco to participate in a medical study. Because I'm on Humira and pregnant and plan to stay on Humira throughout. There haven't been any specific trials done on women before because not enough was known about the drug and who would want to be on a trial while pregnant? So what they did was to start tracking women who got pregnant while on Humira to see what the effects were. All of this data to date has shown that it is believed to be safe during pregnancy and breastfeeding. It is because of this research that I decided along with advice from my doctor to stay on Humira throughout the pregnancy. So, now that I have the opportunity to be a part of something that will help other women make the decision regarding staying on medication while pregnant, I think it's worthwhile.

So here is picture #3...I feel like I'm bigger even though I don't think I look bigger. I know it's from being bloated. The trips to the bathroom haven't slowed down either!! The most frustrating is when Eric leaves in the morning I usually end up waking up and having to go pee. Then I'm usually awake for the next 30 minutes and can't fall back asleep! I'm thankful for my later schedule that I can "sleep in" every morning.

The Belly Project Week 2

So here we are. It's already week 2 of the project and week 5 of my pregnancy. I have decided to take weekly pictures because I saw a really great slide show of someone's pregnancy week by week and it was fun to watch her transformation. I also got a pregnancy journal that is all about the belly. I thought it was a perfect compliment for The Belly Project. There are pictures for your belly each week.

So far I have been still feeling pretty good. I definitely noticed more fatigue all week. If I didn't know that I was pregnant it would have been easy to dismiss it as a busy week, however it's definitely more than usual. That and I've had a few minor, short waves of nausea. However, today I have had a low level of nausea all day. The other new development - cravings!! :) I have been craving a nice salad all week: iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, croutons, cheese and ranch dressing. I was able to satisfy that tonight for dinner. It was so great! Then after dinner Eric made the first cravings run to the grocery store for me. Tonight it was cookies and cream ice cream with chocolate sauce and a peeled orange (the ice cream and chocolate went together, but the orange was on it's own on the side). It was perfect. I was so happy!

Ok, here is picture #2. I am really bloated so it looks like I have a belly already! I'm hoping that it will shrink soon! All of these fun pregnancy symptoms! Oh yeah - and definitely peeing all the time! I have been trying to drink lots of water and have all but stopped drinking soda. I still have about 1 per day but that's about it and I don't even usually finish it.