Dear baby

17/9/17
Baby you’re growing big! You kick me a lot in the early mornings and I love every little squirm! It feels like such precious time, so much so that once I’ve woken up I can’t go back to sleep as I just want to lie there and feel you move. Some of your kicks are getting uncomfortable but weirdly those are my favourite as they show just how strong you are! You then squirm and kick on and off all day before your big finale at bed time when you seem to go bonkers in there! I wonder what you’re so busy doing. 

I get worried about your movements, it’s such a big responsibility to make sure you’re ok. When I’m working I’m so busy it’s hard to concentrate and I can’t wait for maternity leave to begin so I can just focus on you.

I’m 34 weeks pregnant with you now, it’s flown by. We get to meet you in a few short weeks and both of us are getting emotional about it all. Mumma starts her third year of uni around the time your due so it’s all go around here. We’ve decorated your nursery, our room and swapped the living room/office around so you have a safe space to one day learn to crawl. Grandpa is redoing our bathroom for us too, so the place is a mess but I don’t think you’ll mind. 

What else? We’re trying to teach your doggy siblings not to bark and every leaf that blows past so they don’t wake you constantly. I hope you’re getting used to woofs in there! 

All our lovely friends and family have been gifting us so much! And your aunties have been knitting non stop. Granny has found jumpers she knitted me 30 years ago! You’ll get to wear them soon but she wants them back after ok? 

We’re ready for you baby 💛

Buying for our baby; sleeping

I thought it may be interesting to record some of our baby preparations. Ok, well it’s interesting for me a least! We’ve started early with the aim of spreading out our preparations so as to reduce stress, ensure that the big items aren’t impulse or panic buys and spread the finachial cost as really I am the only earner at the moment. 

I am an inconsistent mix of practical and frivolous, but overall try and live to motto of everything should be both ‘beautiful and useful’, and so this has shaped most of my purchases so far. 

As we are having a surprise baby and hopefully there will be siblings to follow, I wanted to keep all items gender neutral so they can be reused (hopefully) in the future. We’ve chosen grey and yellow as our main colour for the nursery, so a lot of items we’ve bought so far reflect this. 

These are the items we’ve brought with safe sleeping in mind. This is something close to my heart due to my job, and a something we have some control over elements of. 

Moses basket. Some of them look so ugly to me, and so flimsy. We wanted a Moses basket for downstairs, so baby had somewhere safe to sleep in the day (a huge amount of cot deaths happen on sofas) and when I saw this one by mokee I fell in love! It cost far more than I actually wanted to spend (about £100) which now seems slightly silly especially as we have been offered a few freebies since! And now it’s arrived I’m unsure if I would feel comfortable using it for unsupervised sleeping as it is so deep and the material so dense that I would worry about increased risk of cot death due to lack of ventilation… but still, so pretty! Also it feels pretty sturdy which is important to us with two mad dogs running about. 

We also bought the Mokee cot which was much more reasonable cost wise especially as it is suitable from birth through to toddlerhood. It changes into a toddler bed, comes with a draw and a change mat that sits nicely on top. This was a bonus as I didn’t want a change table as there is no room for that in our room, and barely any room in the babies room. This way we can use the change mat top of the cot to save our backs etc but also can take the change mat downstairs and use as normal in the day. I also wanted a small cot so that we could fit it down the side of our bed and use for nighttime sleeping immediately. It needed a drop side so we could semi-bed share to support breastfeeding but without the risk of overlaying (slightly cot death obsessed over here). I didn’t want to use a next to me type crib as they are the same size as the Moses baskets and so I assume won’t last long. I intend on semi co-sleeping as long as baby seems to need, so didn’t want to have to get something else once baby started rolling and climbing about! 

Another area that babies seem to sleep a lot in is their car seats. It is a pet hate of mine to see a scrunched up newborn being pushed around the shops for hours in a car seat pram. There is so much research showing that babies oxygen saturations significantly drop after just 30 minutes in them and unfortunately many babies have died, with this as a contributing factor. Yet I totally see how tempting it is to leave the baby asleep and just simply transfer the car seat to the pram chassis. 

With that in mind, when I saw this car seat recommended as which Best Buy and endorsed by the lullaby trust I knew that’s what I wanted for the baby. 

This is the kiddy Evoluna i-size infant carrier. Again it’s pricy but it can be used in a lie flat position enabling the baby’s head neck and body to stay in line and therefore keep an open airway. This is (I hope) win win!

Our last (so far) sleep related purchases have been sleep bags. I’m not 100% convinced on the safety of these as to me it seems baby could overheat, but they come in different togs and I guess the key is insuring the room temperature is correct (room thermometer is on the to buy list). Lullaby trust have suggested in a talk I attended that baby sleep bags are protective against cot death as baby cannot squirm down and end up with covers over its face. 

Anyone have any other advice on sleep safety and what’s worked for them? 

💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛

A little love letter

31/5/17My baby,

You are a 19 weeks old foetus tomorrow, which means it is 17 weeks since the egg that made up half of you met the sperm that made up the other half and you started to become you. I guess the egg had been maturing for a couple of weeks prior to meeting its other half hence the 19 weeks, but who knows, maybe it’s just to make us pregnant people feel better about being so knackered because hey, look how pregnant we are! 
Being pregnant with you is my dream come true. You’re making me a mother, something I’ve dreamed of for years and something that feels like it’s still a dream to be honest, I can’t really believe that you’ll be coming to meet us soon, earth side. I’ve felt you move this last couple of weeks, but today I felt your squirms and worms so strongly, I like to think they were proper kicks. It felt like strong twitches or being flicked if you’re interested! It was so magical, such a beautiful feeling. Oh I don’t know what the point of this is except to say you are so wanted, you are so loved by me and your mummy and we can’t wait to meet you. 
We are busy preparing for that day. We are so excited, as are all of your family! So far we have planned your nursery and mummy is in the process of washing the walls ready for painting them. Your cot arrived yesterday and your Moses basket is on the way. We’ve bought some clothes, and a sling to love you in. We are trying to think of your name, are you Lucca or Rupert? Or Dahlia or Matilda?  
I can’t wait to meet you, to know you, to love you 💛

Ivf pregnancy update

Today I am 20 weeks and two days pregnant (according to our dating scan! 20 weeks exactly according to, well science) and I’m so excited we made it half way! 

Throughout this pregnancy I have counted my lucky stars each and every day and I am so grateful for this babe. I wouldn’t say I’ve been outright anxious about things going wrong, but I am a realist and I know that shit happens. 

Pregnancy so far; 

After our beautiful 12 week scan I started myself on low dose aspirin to prevent pre eclampsia. In the U.K. NICE guidelines recommend it for anyone high risk of pre eclampsia, which I fall into due to using a sperm donor. None of my blood relatives have had preeclampsia and I have no other risk factors but this is one risk I do not want to take. Technically I was meant to see a obstetric consultant prior to 12 weeks to prescribe this for me, and provide a plan of care (which I hope consists of carry on as normal 😆) however I have yet to see one, and my appointment that was scheduled for next week has just been pushed back another fortnight. I guess I’ll just let them know I consulted myself instead ha.

About 15 weeks we got our Down’s Edwards as Pataus syndrome results and we are low risk. 1:1568 for downs and 1:100,000 for Edwards and pataus. This doesn’t mean no risk mind. 

16 weeks and we popped to see our lovely midwife for a quick antenatal and all my blood results etc were normal. Brief but sweet. We had a small debarcle where I left my notes at home and the wife had to run back to get them and I cried in the waiting room thinking she would miss the appointment, but thankfully she didn’t! Oh pregnancy hormones! I learnt though just how important it is that’s she’s with me all through this, I don’t want her to miss a beat. 

And our 20 week/anomaly scan! Most importantly everything looked normal. Plodding along just under the 50th centile and kicking around like crazy. It was lovely to see our little one again, and we were so strong and didn’t find out gender. We are team 💛 mostly because we love surprises and feel no need whatsoever to genderise a foetus, each to their own of course but I just want to let the little thing be. 

Here’s our babe getting itself into some interesting positions at the anomaly scan! 

The only issue I’ve really had in this pregnancy is my hips. Man, my hips. It’s quite distressing at times, and I’m not sure why it is. Gp things inflammation in my trochanteric bursa, I think maybe sciatica. Either way I’m off to see the physio today as I’ve been reduced to tears with it more times than I can count. It really is painful, but it comes and goes and luckily doesn’t seem to set in until late afternoon. I haven’t yet missed a day of work and don’t intend to until maternity leave at term! 

So that’s my update so far 😊 we’ve also been on a bit of a spending spree and are in the early process of decorating a nursery, but more on that another time! Xxxx

Dating scan

Excitingly we had our 12 week scan today, and it was incredible! Our little beauty was swimming around in there and waving its little head off! It looked like a real baby and I can hardley believe it’s there inside of me. 

Our little one was very naughty and did not want to have its measurements taken at all and after several attempts loo breaks and wiggling around (me!) we went for lunch and returned in a hour to have them repeated, took ages still as baby was not playing ball but finally the lovely sonographer got what she needed and we could complete the downs screening. The midwife was awesome at taking blood and I didn’t feel a thing. A and I had a chat about the results too, if they came back as high risk or near too (say 1:200 or close) then we’re going to pay privately for some more advanced screening for chromosomal abnormalities (NIPT) rather than go down the amino route and 1% risk of miscarriage. It’s more than 98% accurate and is a simple blood test. It will be available on the NHS soon, but currently it costs around £500 privately and is available from the hospital we had our fetiloty treatment at. 

We got a million photos from our lovely sonographer, benefit of working in the NHS apparently 😉 and I’m chuffed with them! I asked for a spine shot as they just fascinate me, that was a first apparently! 

We went on a little shopping trip after and brought some more baby clothes. So now we have a small collection of vests and grows, a baby book, a small teddy, two nightlights, a mobile and a print for the nursery wall. Our plan is to buy the Moses basket and cot this month (as there is 10% off this month on the ones we want) then next month is the baby show by which point I’ll be 17/18 weeks and we’re going to look for pram, car seat, breast pump steriliser and reusable nappy deals, though we will only buy if things are on offer.

I think we may be a bit early in buying things but 1) I don’t care I’m excited and 2) we need to spread this out! 

12 weeks

Today marks me turning 12 weeks pregnant, that’s crazy! I still can’t believe it and get a little heart skip whenever my pregnancy pops up in conversation. 

Symptoms wise I’m good, no sickness nausea or anything much. Tiredness is easing, I feel bloody lucky. I’m fat though I feel flabby and horrible and can’t wait for a real bump! Also have become slightly obsessed with looking at my boobs in the mirror when I’m getting changed, like what the hell! They’re massive perky and beautiful haha! 

Scan next week on Tuesday and I can’t bloody wait. I’ve been slightly worried that baby is not ok as I’ve been feeling so normal but I naughtily listened in last weekend to baby’s heartbeat and there it was fast and strong and just beautiful ❤ 

Midwife ❤️ 9 weeks 1 day

So today we went to meet our midwife, and I know her from uni! Haven’t seen her in a few years, but so lovely to have someone I know. She will be our midwife at least throughout the pregnancy. Woo! 

What especially impressed me was when she asked my wife for her details as next of kin, i.e name and number, she without asking or hesitating wrote ‘wife’ in the space marked ‘relationship’. I mean this is how it’s meant to be, but unfortunately it often isn’t, and small triumphs of equality like this just leave me feeling so warm and happy ❤️

Confusingly the appointment wasn’t for the whole booking, which is what I had thought, but it turns out they do things slightly different round here and it was instead to get the ‘important’ tests out of the way and to request the dating scan,  with the actual booking appointment getting done at a home visit when convenient. I say ‘important’ cuz I know that these are things hospitals get tested on, key performace indicators, so it makes sense to get these out the way asap and for the longer but less ‘important’ information to be gathered at a later date. Obviously each aspect is equally important to providing good and appropriate care, but like most things in life now, measured outcomes are prioritised. It makes sense but I was hoping it would all be done today haha, and that other than the scan we wouldn’t need to make time for another appointment until 16 weeks.

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

We had the day off together today which was just lovely, and so went on a little adventure with the dogs and found some amazing walks within an hour of where we live. The scenery was just breathtaking and we had a beautiful day. On our way home we just went to a little town nearby to just explore and picked up this little cutie for our little cutie to be! 

Maybe a little silly but I’m trying hard not to shop for the baby yet and I just wanted to get something special that was just for the baby. Is so small that it barely counts right! 

Other than that, the only other thing I’ve bought for the baby is this wonderful book. 

I saw it reviewed on a same sex parenting blog I follow, and they raved about it as it’s suitable for any family, and it really is! Plus it’s so beautifully thought through and illustrated but still somehow understated. I’m just in love with it and can’t wait to start filling it out! 

I’m also planning on buying a special box for all babies things, such as pregnancy tests, scan photos, the book and the letter from the sperm donor, as well as anything else we collect as the pregnancy goes on and (pleasepleaseplease) as baby grows. This is partially for us, but primarily for baby. I want him/her to know they were loved and planned for and that they may be part of an unconventional family, but that families are made of love, and not blood. 

I am feeling so so thankful and so bloody happy.  This feels so surreal, but also there is still very much an underlying worry that something could go wrong. I cannot wait till that 12 week scan so we can see our little darling (pleasepleaseplease) looking big and healthy and happy. 

Our baby! ❤️

That little blob in a blob is our real life baby! With a heart beat and everything! A real baby! We could see the heart beat flickering away and it was just the most amazing thing. I have wanted this my whole life and here it is, I’m living it. This beautiful little being is going to make us mothers, something I thought we may only ever dream of. I’m already loving the experience of being pregnant, marvelling at how tired something only a centimetre in size can make me. How that little centimetre can change my perspective on the world in a matter of weeks. How it can have caused my body to start changing already, my breasts are growing and changing and my pulse rate to increase by about 10bpm. What power this little one has to cause so much change already. What power my little one ❤️ 

7 weeks

Like a proper pregnant person! I feel so privileged to be at this point but it also feels so perililous and I’m constantly worried it’s going to be taken from us at any point. Our scan on Monday can’t come quick enough, although I am all to aware that having a successful scan doesn’t equal taking a baby home. 

Pregnancy symptoms so far seem to mainly look like extreme tiredness for me and it’s rare I’m still up at 9pm. My sleep is very broken, I’m restlessness and constantly needing a wee! That said mornings are good generally as I have more energy then than the rest of the day. I have felt very sick on a couple of occasions in the early evening before dinner but have yet to experience morning sickness. I think if I can see this week through without it then I may get away with it!! Wishful thinking perhaps? Part of me wants it to show up as I know it’s so common and often thought of as a good sign, but also I know some women just don’t get sick and have perfectly healthy pregnancies. 

A big worry is that I’ve put on weight over the course of ivf and the last few weeks which really bothers me. It’s about 4lbs. I am feeling more able to be active now though, I think my ovaries are back to normal, and so I’ve been walking the dogs more, going further and on more difficult walks and this weekend I’m going to brave a spin class! I’ve told my instructer that I’m taking it easy so he doesn’t push me, and plan on only going at about 50-75% effort max as I don’t want to compromise anything but exercise is good for me and the baby and I really don’t want to be gaining excess weight. I’ve also been planning on swimming once or twice a week after work but so far I simply haven’t had the energy by the time evening comes. Maybe tonight’s the night! 

16dp2dt

Who was I kidding. I managed one day without testing! I was doing pretty good but I’m still cramping and found out my scan will be in three weeks from today….Three! I’m sure that’s correct and fine and you know this is the NHS and I’m grateful blah blah but it feels like such a long bloody time. I’ll be 7+4. That’s like a proper pregnant person. There’s no blood tests or anything either to check levels are rising, so of course the urge to test won out! 

  
It’s getting darker and for now I’m happy. Didn’t expect to have such a long wait after the tww to check everything’s looking as it should though…. 

Telling people wise we’ve told everyone we planned on. A few close friends and parents, plus As sister. My parents seem to have shared with my aunt already though which I don’t mind as she and I are really close and they’re just so damn excited, my dad especially. Mum has already offered to help with childcare and we have about four desperate knitters! It’s so lovely to have others as excited and in love with this baby as us. 

Symptoms wise I’m still cramping which worries me on one hand but also reassures me that at least something’s going on down there on the other. My boobs are super sensitive and I’m quite tired, though not as bad as last week (or maybe I’m getting used to it?).

Roll on march!