22 week update

It's been a few weeks since we've had an SLS (Sammi's Little Sis) update...so here it goes! Its a long one...

Finally, we've scanned in some of her 19 week ultrasound photos for you!

Above is her profile: head on right and legs going off the left side. Below is her whole body.

And, the U/S photo we opened at Cheesecake Factory...proof we are having another girl!!! This is a shot as if she was sitting on a chair and you were looking up at her from underneath.

Sam's pregnancy was hard, but this one seems a lot harder. Dan reminds me that I remember my pregnancy with Sam as being better than it actually was, and he's probably right. I have to say that the first pregnancy is much more exciting than the second. Now, don't get this confused with being excited about the baby. I am just as excited for this baby as I was for Sammi! But the pregnancy part.....I'm totally over it and can't wait to not be pregnant anymore!!!

The first 16-17 weeks I threw up all the time. I'm a person who doesn't like crowds or small spaces anyway and my pregnancy (both of them actually) has not only made that worse, but I now also get car sick easily, dizzy, and feel faint a lot. If I don't eat in time I still get sick. This makes shooting weddings and carrying equipment especially hard but I've made it through them all so far! I psych myself out a lot because I'm scared I'll get sick or faint in a public place (even though it hasn't happened yet) which just always makes matters worse!

With Sam I had two kidney infections, which are by far the worse medical thing that has ever happened to me and I am TERRIFIED of getting another. My doctor put me on an antibiotic to take everyday of my pregnancy to help prevent them this time because pregnancy makes a person more prone to them...so that makes me happy and gives me hope I might not have to deal with that this pregnancy. I, of course, being the worry wart, still worry about them all the time.

And on to my gall bladder...during my first pregnancy, I started having aching and throbbing pains in my right rib cage area. An ultrasound detected no gall bladder stones so my doc told me that I had "sludge", which is (for lack of medical terms and specifics) when the gall bladder slows the processing of fat which causes pain. It was too late in my pregnancy to have surgery to remove it so I was put on a strict diet and dealt with the pain until my delivery. We expected to have the surgery shortly after Sam was born, but then.... a miracle! All the pain went away and I was fine!!!

The relevance of telling you about that now is that I'm starting to have problems with it again this time. My doctors told me that I might, and I've been eating better than last time for sure, but I admit- not always as healthy as I should. I've read online (not always the most reliable source, but hey...) that about 12% of womens' gall bladders slow down due to hormones during pregnancy, and go back to normal after delivery. Some of those gall bladders fail after delivery, but I'm hoping that I will be fortune enough to just have the "sludge" during my pregnancies and that's it! I am avoiding the surgery if at all possible. About 30 minutes after I eat something high in saturated fat, I get the aching painful sensation in that area. Sometimes I have to lay down and rest if it gets bad enough, and some foods are surprisingly worse than others. I'm trying to be careful.

So for SLS, overall I am achy all the time, all over, and my back is always in pain (things shifting and carrying a toddler around), I'm much more emotional (for the good and bad) over things this pregnancy, but believe it or not after reading all of my woes in this post, I am in good spirits and soooooo looking forward to having this precious little girl join our family!!!! Like I said, I'm just as excited for Baby SLS...just done with the pregnancy!!! :) :) :)

On to more fun things... Sammi is starting to understand more and more that she'll be getting a sister in January. She knows there's a baby in my belly and she'll point it out to you and give her kisses. However, there are also times when you ask her where the baby is and she'll lift her own shirt up and point to her belly! Obviously we have a way to go before she really gets it. :)

We do have some names picked out but we haven't decided for sure. We've talked about what we might do with the girls' rooms but nothing is set on that yet either. Two years old seems awfully young for Sammi to be in a big girl bed, but we think if we put our queen mattress (currently in the guest room) on the floor, Sammi will do great in it. We are thinking of making the guest room her big girl room so the baby can have her current room, crib, etc. I don't really know what would be best, but I don't want to buy new furniture or another crib. With Sam it worked best for us (everyone is different...this was what worked for us to keep our sanity per our doctor's suggestion--God bless him) to put the newborn in her own bed as soon as possible (after only two weeks and this time maybe even less), so I'm not expecting to have extra time for Sam to move with the baby in a bassinet. Any ideas on when we should move Sam and how?

I'm not by any means in a hurry to get Sam potty trained, but it has crossed my mind that it would be nice once the baby is here to have only one in diapers. On the other hand, sometimes diapers almost seem easier for me than dealing with running a toddler to the bathroom every hour! :) We'll see as the months pass. These kiddos change so rapidly!

Our new studio has been taking up most of our extra time so the weeks seem to fly by, even with all of my complaining! 17 more weeks to go....ugh.....that sounds like a lot to me. :) :) :) I have to end by saying that I do feel so blessed to be pregnant with a little girl who I know I will love more than I could ever explain. I am lucky to have the opportunity to have this experience and I don't ever lose sight of that even through the aches and pains! I am truly blessed.

Belly photo coming soon....I'm getting pretty big!!! :) :) :)