24 Weeks Or 6 Months

Viability!

Not sure when the belly got this big but pretty sure it has tripled in size since last week.

It had definitely been a few good weeks with out any real freak outs, but then baby girl scared the crap out of me this past weekend. I didn't feel any kicking most of the one day with her being the most active at night. That night we went to a work dinner and pretty sure I left in a complete food coma, so either she was in one too or something, but she wasn't moving. I started getting nervous but figured by the next morning I'd feel some little kicks at breakfast. Breakfast came and still nothing. The next day at work I constantly was poking at my belly just hoping she was going to move, but still nothing. By the time I got home from work it was doppler time. Then more freaking out because the normal spot I get an instant heartbeat was not working. I of course found it but not before my thoughts were turning into "oh my god what if we have to go to the dr's office because we can't find it" mode.
Her lack of kicking then made me think about Liam's last day with me.  The night of and right before surgery that morning he kicked like he had never kicked before, and then he was gone a few hours later. So then I had to inform Dereck that if baby girl ever kicked like that I was hightailing it to the hospital asap.
So if she doesn't kick much I will be freaking out and if she kicks too much, like Liam did before he died, I will most likely freak out. Can't win, but at least things are still going good for now so I can't complain.

My birthday was on Wednesday. A few friends, Dereck, and I went to dinner and celebrated my 30th birthday. I am actually 31 this year but since I was so grief stricken last year for my 30th I had already declared a do over for this year, and must say I was in way better spirits for celebrating this year.

Registry is pretty well complete and my good friend is in the process of setting up a baby shower for sometime in March. Crazy to think that in just a month I will be in my 3rd trimester already.

Signed up for a breast feeding class in March. Not sure if that's too early but they aren't offered very often and wanted to make sure Dereck would be around to go with me.

Next appt with the Perinatologost for an u/s of the uterus and to see baby girl again is scheduled for next Wednesday.

I also got my "Liam" Molly Bear on Tuesday.

22 Weeks

So we are are now at 22 weeks, woohoo!
And the kicks are getting stronger and more frequent each day!

I am getting more and more excited and hopeful for this pregnancy as time goes by with less and less paranoid freak out days. I had an appt with my Ob yesterday and it was so nice hearing her say, yet again, that I am looking happier and sound so much more hopeful than from the first few months. I agree, it is definitely getting easier and easier to be optimistic with all of the good u/s and labs that we have had. I think even getting past Liam's birthday took a load off my chest.
I also know I sounded pretty bitter on my 20 week post, which was right before Liam's birthday which I guess makes sense why I was feeling that way, hence the negativity toward reaching the half way point and viability milestones. As I said though I have been feeling so much better since then.
Part of it might also have to do with some of the struggles a few of my fellow pregnant babyloss mommas have been dealing with. I hope they all know how often I think of them and there babies. I pray daily for you guys that everything will work out and your babies will born as healthy as can be.


In the meantime between working on my scrapbook for Liam, which I have been making pretty good progress on, I have also been shopping for my little lady like crazy on Amazon. I have decided that everything I need for my girl I can find on there website. Everything so far is cheaper than I can get in stores and pretty much has free shipping. So I decided for my baby registry it will be Amazon and Amazon only. Plus, not having to risk talking to a store worker about my pregnancy is awesome. I refuse to have to go through another horrible Motherhood Maternity type experience, which I wrote about at week 18, when I bought my very first pair of maternity jeans.

Here are a few things that I can't wait to see my little girl wearing:





If you think I'm cute, you should see my brother.

 


My big brother is my hero.

 



I love my big brother.



little sister

1 Year

I always try to write a letter to Liam or even write a post on the third of every month, but I am a little late this month. The third of January was the one year anniversary of his birth and passing and I just couldn't bring myself to write anything about it until now. Although, I maybe didn't write anything on my blog but I did have many talks with Liam this past week so he knows he wasn't forgotten.

The anticipation for this time was definitely worse than the actual day. Sunday night January first, as I wrote in my post from that evening, was definitely the hardest night on me this past week. Monday (2nd) and Tuesday (3rd) were not so bad, not great, but not as heartwrenching as I figured they would be either.

For the longest time I couldn't figure out how to spend his birthday. Dereck had to go back to work on the Tuesday after Christmas and I didn't know if I wanted anyone else around or if I wanted to just be alone. I didn't feel much like talking to anyone that day but I also felt like being alone probably wasn't the healthiest thing for me to do either. Even though Dereck was working we talked on the phone as often as possible about Liam and his time with us both before and after the surgery and how we feel about everything now being a year later.

Sunday night I had came to the conclusion that for me cake, balloons, or going out and doing something wasn't right for me. I had wanted to do something that made me feel as close to Liam as possible and the thing that I figured would help me do that was to finally start scrapbooking his stuff.

By Monday afternoon I had everything from pictures of him and San Francisco to baby shower and sympathy cards to various items from babyloss moms and friends spread all over the living room. I even got out his memory box from the hospital. That brought up a lot of emotions looking through it though since I had not opened it for at least the past 6-8 months. Some of my greatest possessions, besides his pictures, are in that memory box; his layette from the hospital, his adorable little blue hat they had on him when they first handed him to me, and then there is the blanket that he was wrapped in after the surgery with spots of blood stains on it that will never be washed.

So that is how I spent my sweet little guys first birthday and the days surrounding it. It felt so good to finally make progress on his book. I can't believe it took me a whole year to start it. I am about five pages into it right now which includes "Yeah we're pregnant" through the start of "Our journey to San Francisco Begins". The hard part is next, and will be the biggest part of the scrapbook, for it will include everything from his passing through now. I figure I have another few weeks of working on it before it will be done, but really it'll never be truly finished as I am sure I'll always be finding things to add to it.


As far as my wish for him to be remembered on his birthday, I know that he was not forgetten about. I love each and everyone one of you who thought about him that day. I liked that people had asked me how I was managing that day but loved the people that posted on facebook, sent me text messages, and even called to say "Happy first birthday Liam". To see and hear others writing and saying his name followed by a happy birthday were the best parts of the day.

A good friend did come over for an hour that night just to sit with me and see how I was doing. I ended up talking a lot more than I figured I would, but she said something in that time she was there that really made my night and showed me that there really are others out there that really do love Liam even though they never got to see him, hold him, or feel his sweet kicks like I did. She told me that she loves him, not just because I love him, but because she felt like she really knew him from me speaking about him and seeing his pictures. She also told me that she talks to him and that night in particular on her way over she asked him why on his birthday it had to be so cold outside. Love it, love it, love it!

Happy first birthday Liam! Mommy misses you and loves you so much.

I have been thinking a lot these past few days on how much my life has changed since Liam came into it. Until I was pregnant with him I never new it was possible to love someone so much that you never met, but feeling those kicks for the first time letting me know he was in there, well it was instant love.
I miss that. I miss him.

As I sit here and try to type this while doing the ugly cry I can picture exactly where we were last year on this first Sunday night of the new year. I was so full of optimism before heading to the hospital to check-in for the fetal surgery first thing Monday morning.

There is so much I hate about 2011 and what it took away from me but at the same time that little boy, in the time I knew him and the months since his passing, taught me so much. I feel like I learned more about what real love, real pain, and real life are all about. But why did my son have to die?????

I have seen the many stages of grief and know that everyone goes through them at different times, but I can say that for me I am still working on the acceptance and anger stages. The blame stage took me quite awhile to get through but I think I can honestly say I don't blame myself anymore, but accept his death and not be angry about it, I'm still working on that. I know I have to get past the anger before I can finally move onto acceptance, but I don't know if I can. I just hate this so much, I hate it, hate it, hate it.

Many people tend to start the new year off with a New Years resolution. I don't know if I have stuck with one ever and last year I don't think I even made one. For 2012 I don't want to make one neither. All I want this year is two things: I want Liam to be remembered(always actually) and I want his baby sister to be born healthy(and hopefully outlive me).