Dear Baby Girl "Yet-to-be-named"...

Dear baby girl,

I realized today that I have done a horrible job at documenting my pregnancy with you. I was pretty good at keeping track of the feelings I was having/things I was experiencing when pregnant with your big brother, Noah, but I've been busy (and slack) this time and have mostly been posting updates on Facebook. However, since my blog also serves as a journal, I wanted to document as much as I can remember here.

The first trimester was relatively uneventful. Though I found out very early that you were on your way, it whizzed by before it really hit me that I was REALLY GOING TO HAVE ANOTHER BABY!! I was a little sicker (and tireder!) than I had been in my pregnancies with your brothers and sister, but that could have been a result of having a 3-year old and 2-year old to chase...and a teenager to...well...just trust me, teenagers can sometimes just zap your energy. The doctor's appointments were minimal early on, but we did have some non-invasive screening done which indicated the risk of certain health conditions was low, so we chose to forgo any additional testing. You see, mommy is considered "geriatric" in terms of pregnancy, so the doctors recommend lots of testing. You are our child...and we will love you and cherish you no matter what, but do want to be prepared to help you get the very best start!

At about 16 weeks, mommy had an ultrasound done. We were so very anxious to know if you were a boy or a girl and the ultrasound tech said she was 110% sure you were a girl. Subsequent ultrasounds at 18.5 and 28 weeks seem to confirm this finding. We would have been thrilled either way, but it's nice to "even the score" with 2 boys and 2 girls. Your big sister is just as happy as she can be to get a sister after 2 brothers. She seemed to know that you were a girl from the start and declared that she already had 2 brothers, she NEEDED a sister! :)

A little later in the second trimester, I started having some problems catching my breath and the doctor thought she detected a heart murmur (on me) during a routine exam. I visited a cardiologist and had lots of tests. Luckily, it turned out that my heart was in better shape than it had been during an echo 2 years earlier and the problems were chalked up to anemia. I started taking iron supplements and after a while, began to feel MUCH better.

Apparently, you are one SWEET baby already because a couple of weeks ago, I was diagnosed with Gestational Diabetes. Doctors now believe that I actually had this with both Grace and Noah, but that it developed after the screening tests and therefore went untreated/unmanaged (which explains why they were both almost 9 lbs at 36 weeks and probably explains why I had polyhydramnios both times). I started a pretty strict diet about 3 weeks ago which is so far controlling all of my blood sugar numbers except the fasting one. Last week, I started taking an insulin injection each night. So far, we haven't gotten the dosage exactly right, but I am working closely with the nutritionist and feel confident we'll get it under control soon!

You have gotten to be one active little girl and it is fun trying to figure out what kind of movements are causing the alien-looking contortions of my tummy. Yesterday, we hit the 30-week mark. That means, at most, we have 9 weeks to go!! The doctors want to schedule the c-section for 39 weeks if we make it that far. I can't believe how time is flying, but we are all very anxious to meet you, so I can't say that I'm too sad that it is. :) As is evident from the title of this post, Mommy and Daddy are still "discussing" your name. I know eventually we'll come to an agreement and it will be the perfect name for you, but it hasn't happened yet!

So, there you have it...the first three fourths of the pregnancy in a nutshell! I will try to do better at updating over the next few weeks. Starting in 2 weeks, we will have to go to the doctor for twice weekly non-stress tests and things tend to get a little more eventful during that time. Hopefully, things will be different this time and we'll sail right through, but if not we are very fortunate to have an army of people praying for us, so I know we'll be okay. :)

Lots of love,
Mommy