Motherhood

It seemed fitting to me that since I am 20 weeks pregnant, I will tell about my journey thus far to motherhood.

I still can’t totally wrap my head around it. 20 weeks pregnant and I’ve yet to fully grasp the concept that this little being growing inside me is MY CHILD!

It was a shock when we found out. I was 4 days late and the week before my family had suffered through the most tragic loss of life in our history – my 18 year old cousin Colin died in a freak accident while exploring in a quarry. I was wrecked. Our family was wrecked.

One week later and I was not expecting to be pregnant. We’d been trying for 2.5 years – I had finally given up and accepted the fact that birthing a child may not be what God wants for my life. Everyday I was more and more okay with that idea, by the grace of God. So to wake up on a Monday morning, June 15th, and realize that I was four days late was a little weird. I decided to take a pregnancy test, knowing that it would be negative.

It was positive.

Already my life has totally and completely changed.

I was 5 weeks pregnant. Literally the baby was the size of a grain of rice. I got to go into the doctor and he showed me the little flash of light blinking at an amazingly fast pace. That was the baby’s heart! My doctor, Dr. Abisogun, shared my enthusiasm for the miraculous new life growing inside of me. Come to find out he’s a man of faith who believes that each life is precious – thank you God for gracing me with a doctor that values and respects my child!

Sure enough the morning sickness happened RIGHT after I found out. I have no idea if it was because I hit the 5 week mark, but all of the sudden I felt ill all.day.long. The only relief I found was when I was swallowing food. To this day if I start to get hungry I frantically look for something to eat – because I dread the nausea so much.

I’m much better now, most of my day I feel great. I get tired around 2pm, then tend to feel a little lazy. By evening time I’m ready for bed around 8. I’m telling you, my life has already started accommodating this baby.

On a Sunday, the first day of my 17th week of pregnancy, I had some incredible back pain. It was my lower left side. I felt that I had sat wrong on the couch. The next day was Memorial day and I felt the same. My back hurt SO BAD. Came home from lake time with the family and continued with the back ache. Tuesday AM I woke with chills and a fever. I called my dr. and my sister took me in. They suspected a kidney infection caused by an untreated UTI, but it would take 3 days for the cultures to come back.

Excuse me I KNOW when I have a UTI and I did not have one. Apparently symptoms can be different during pregnancy. sheesh. So they gave me meds that made me horribly nauseaus. I took tylenol which helped every 5 hours or so. My fever got worse however. I went to urgent care Tuesday night because my fever was 102, anything over 101 can be dangerous for the baby. Too much heat for the baby to withstand. They put me on IV fluids and antibiotics. I was better by 2 am when they sent me home. Wednesday was the exact same thing. Fever kept spiking once tylenol wore off. Went back in for more IV fluids since I couldn’t eat or drink and different antbiotics. They decided to keep me overnight. I had fluids all night so the next day I wasn’t dehydrated, still nauseous however and fever and heart rate were still elevated. They decided I needed to be admitted to the hospital.

While at the hospital (this was Thursday) they introduced yet another new medication, the big daddy of antibiotics that was safe for the baby and would kick the infection’s butt. It worked. By Friday morning, even though Thursday was the worst night of sleep in my life (I think because Robb finally left my side to go home and sleep in a bed and shower), I was pretty great! Eating, feeling awake. They decided to give me another round of different antibiotics, just to be sure they kicked it. I really wish they hadn’t. That was so incredibly miserable. I threw up all the food I ate that morning before they discharged me, I threw up out my passenger door in rush hour traffic (sorry drivers!) and again at home. We had some Zofran at home, thank God! I checked that it was safe for baby and took some. That saved me. Nauseau was gone by the next morning.

By Monday, I was back at work. That week was a total whirlwind and I never want to go through something that terrifying again. I was so afraid my baby was suffering. Turns out he was just fine!

Yup, my baby is a HE! Can’t wait to meet my little man. This is our Social Media announcement on Week 20.

God has granted me the greatest desire of my heart by gifting me this child. I didn’t think it would actually happen that I would get to grow a little human inside of me!