16 Weeks Now.

So, at 16 weeks, Brownie and I have been feeling ever so slightly better. With a daily dose (read: 3 times daily) of nausea medicine, Zofran in between, and the occasional Preggie Pop for immediate relief, I've managed to gain some weight. I still feel rather nauseous randomly, and yesterday it hit hard.

Gaining two pounds between January 7 and January 14th kept me from being taken out of work, put on bed-rest, and having a full-time nurse to administer nausea medicine to me through what is essentially an insulin pump. Yay!

One perk of having been so naturally small, and having lost so much weight due to being so sick, is that Hubs and I will get to find out the gender of our baby a full month earlier than planned! It was  originally planned for February 24, but as I'm so small, our doctor reassured us that it would be a cinch to check out 'the goods' (or lack thereof) at the end of January! So a week from today, on January 27 at 11:30AM Sir-Hubs-A-Lot will take his first gander at the special places that our child has developed.

I've chosen to remain in the dark until the mini Gender Reveal party we are throwing for just our immediate families, which will be the following weekend. Hubs will have a hard time not using pronouns to talk about Baby for those 4 days!

A few updates (categories stolen from a pregnant friend):

Total weight gain: -6 lbs, up from -12 lbs
Maternity clothes?: Not required, but dang these jeans my mom got me are comfy. (Side note- all the maternity clothes I have acquired are from my mom- countless tops, several bottoms, dresses, and swimsuits.)
Sleep?: Very very well. I take a daily nap if possible, and typically have no issues falling - and staying- asleep all night.
Peak of the week?: Learning we can find out Brownie's gender four weeks earlier than expected!
Pit of the week?: Definitely spending yesterday morning married to the toilet being sick, after several days of not having been sick,
Missing anything?: The ability to get up in the mornings. 5:30am comes quickly, no matter what time I go to bed.
Food cravings: Steak. Sweet unhealthy things. Cold things (ice cream, super cold water). Cheese.
Anything that makes you feel sick or queasy?: Oranges, store-bought pizza (Papa John's, Kroger, etc), the smell of basically any super meaty sandwich that Hubs loves, pink lemonade, being a passenger in a car (as opposed to driving), and whatever it was that Hubs ate/drank yesterday that was just not acceptable.
Happy or moody?: Happy overall, but definitely get moody if you get between me and my food, or me and the possibility of a nap.
Looking forward to: next week's appointment so Husband can learn Brownie's gender, and our party next weekend so the rest of our family and I can learn!!

Brownies.

First things first:

Hubs and I are expecting our first Baby Brownie in July 2015!

I told Hubs on Thursday, November 6, by giving him this giraffe. This stuffed giraffe is something I've been eyeing at Target for years. Literally, years. Since 2006. But I never had a reason to buy him (yes, it's a "him") until now. 

Husband was thrilled. Of course. We'd been trying for about half a year.

Weeks 5-8 went by without a hitch. Thanksgiving was in the middle of Week 8. I'd convinced my mom to fly up under the pretense of "Melissa just got married and will be wanting to spend the holiday with Lu, and they'll probably go see his family, and I found this plane ticket, and it's not crazy expensive, and yada yada." She came.

We told.

During Week 6, we decided how we would tell, so we got to work on the details.

We colored.

 We made each person who was going to be at Thanksgiving dinner a personalized place card. So, we made 10 different place cards with crayons! We love coloring!

And we made this special one:

Once we'd prayed as a family around the kitchen island, and everyone had loaded up their plates with all the delicious foods and made their way to the dining room table, Hubs slowly and quietly made his rounds around the table to hand out the place cards. Everyone was all "aww this is so sweet!" 

Then he sat back down next to me, and said, "Oh, and we have one extra." He held up Brownie's place card or all to see (mostly our moms). Instantly, my mom got it. Tears ensued. Hubs' mom got it very soon after, as well as his father, brother, and our sister-in-law. 

For the rest of the evening, I swear any time I'd look over at Husband's mom, she'd just be staring at me, smiling. My mom didn't stop crying for about a week, roughly.

At the beginning of Week 9, I started to feel sick. Nausea and morning sickness on and off for a few weeks, and then the week of Christmas (Week 12), I had a couple of really bad days. I was able to enjoy Christmas Eve and Christmas without much nausea excitement, and then, at the end of Week 13...

I was admitted into Crestwood Hospital after 3.5 ours waiting in the ER, 2 hours in a room in the ER receiving IV fluids and nausea medicine, and 6 weeks of fairly non-stop nausea and vomiting causing nearly 12 pounds of weight loss. 

I was admitted overnight and was set up in a room on the maternity ward (shout out to my down-the-hall neighbors Amanda and Wade).

I was so severely dehydrated that I went through several- a handful- of IV fluid bags. I had my blood drawn a total of 4 times that week- three from my left arm and once from my right. I had a bad reaction to the nausea drug Phenergan Friday night in the ER (thankfully I was in the ER!). The nurses and doctor wouldn't let me eat anything until Saturday morning around 10am. So I was one hungry, nauseous, pregnant lady. 

I was happy to be able to go home Saturday afternoon. 

I'm so grateful that my in-laws and Hubs were there with me. I couldn't have gotten my blood drawn, or gotten the IV, or listened to the doctors without their eyes and ears. My mother-in-law is the one who ran down the hallway in the ER to get the ER doctor to come back after I started having the bad reactions to the Phenergan.  My sister-in-law help my shoulders and helped me be brave while I was having a meltdown when the doctor came in with the tools to put in the IV. Ole-Blue Eyes himself stayed the night with me and slept on what had to be the most uncomfortable pull-out chair ever invented. Hubs also ran down the hall when my IV started to beep because it was running low on fluids. They were an invaluable part of my hospital stay- which happened to be the first weekend of 2015.

So far, the rest of Week 14 has been hit or miss. I've been sick overall, but I've also felt generally better overall.

Long story short, we're having our first baby and we couldn't be more excited!

Hubs holding our first ultrasound, where Brownie is 8 weeks. 

(Token Puppy shot, of course.)