Today is Sunday, and I am tired. So, so tired.
I sang at church today, and while the set was far from exhausting, the day was. Some Sundays, we show up to church and everything falls into place. Some Sundays, we show up to church and if something is meant to go wrong, it will. There were battles all across the board, but I think one of my favorite things about my church is that things still come together, no matter the circumstance. We belong to a church of committed, intelligent people, and I think that we would hold a church service in the dark before we threw in the towel on a Sunday. I'm still so very tired, and I am glad that the day is done.
Today is Monday. I've never really had a beef with Mondays.
I've decided to start typing a little bit throughout the week, because I am more likely to remember what's going on, plus it makes it easier to push publish at the end of the week. I had a little bit of blood work done this morning, and APPARENTLY it's the norm to be tested for everything in the universe.. but in case you're wondering, the lab tech doesn't think it's funny when you make an off handed remark about that time in Vegas. It was just a joke, lab tech, no need for death glares. I've learned that Doctors pretty much assume the "guilty until proven innocent" stance, because there is no other possible reason that anyone needs 5 tubes of blood removed from their pregnant body. So I stopped talking to the cranky lab tech. And closed my eyes just long enough to realize that something didn't feel right... and then the room started spinning... and then the cranky lab tech forced a questionable glass of juice down my throat. What a peach.
Today is Tuesday, and I am crazy about my husband.
This week seems to be the week that my baby belly is becoming a belly instead of a bump. It's not enormous, just enough so that everything touches when I sit. I sit slouched across a chair most of the time, and I usually look super annoyed. I'm not annoyed, I just want to remember what it's like for my stomach not to touch my thighs when I sit. This week, Cody, the most adorable daddy-to-be in the world, reached over and kind of rubbed my belly. I don't think he was trying to be adorable, and I don't think he was really even aware of how much it meant to me, but it thrilled me to my core. He rubbed my belly like it was the top of a dog's head... but he did it without prompting. And without "Cody, tell your baby Good morning!" Oh, it was the sweetest, most wonderful moment. I'll truly always remember it. Always.
Today is Wednesday, and my Heart Hurts.
Fortunately, the excessively emotional stage of my pregnancy (well, the first round of excessive emotion), was short lived. Nowadays, I only cry when I'm really angry, watching American Idol auditions of people with a stuttering problem (oh, the waterworks,) or when I'm just too tired to form words. I don't cry much these days, but today, I cried a lot. Cody's sweet, adorable, hilarious Grandpa went to be with Jesus yesterday... and it tore me in two. He called me Kay-LEE, mostly because he always called me Kayla and got annoyed when everyone in the room said "Kay-LEE." He was a man of many words. I don't think he cared whether anybody was listening to him or not, he just said what he was thinking. He would zone in and out of conversations, then talk again ten minutes later referencing a conversation everyone had already moved past. The first time I ever met him, Cody and I had only been dating about 6 months. Long enough to know that we loved each other, but not long enough that marriage was in the thought process yet. I walked into a house full of strangers, all from Cody's tiny little farm town up north, and thought "This is going to be the most uncomfortable day of my life." I stood in a corner, and finally saw a rocking chair in the living room open up next to a sleeping old man that everybody kept calling Dang. I sat down in the chair, and he said "Let me see your hand..." so I held out my hand, and he took his dentures out of his mouth and said "Hold these." I didn't know what to do, how to respond, and immediately began to fathom ways to disappear. He laughed, popped his dentures in, and said "I'm just kiddin, Kay-LEE." I stayed by Dang the rest of the evening, and I can remember thinking to myself that I could not fathom the rest of my life if Dang was not a part of it. For my first visit to Wheeler, we were eating cantaloupe at the kitchen table, and Dang said "You're eating it wrong!" He then put a boat of gravy and tons of pepper on his cantaloupe before he started rambling about city girls being sheltered. On my wedding day, he yelled "Attaboy, Cody!" during our first kiss as husband and wife. He sang songs about everything he did, and it always makes me smile to hear my husband do the same thing. He taught me all of the right ways to push my Mother-In-Law's buttons, told me stories about what a handful Cody was, and always winked at me before he made a comment that was sure to make his wife blush. He was crazy about Ann, I've never seen a man smile at his wife the way that he did. She was his joy, and spending their 55th anniversary with them is a memory I will cherish forever. He was the man to make everybody laugh, and the first one I went to whenever we visited. It breaks my heart into a million pieces that my baby will never know the man that was the first one to make me feel like family, but the memories are sweet reminders. Joe Ellison was everything a man should be, and we will raise our baby to follow the legacy he's leaving behind.
Today is Thursday, and my doctor just scared the bamboozles out of me.
There's a really cool portal that my Doctor provides his patients access to. It's like my own personal record online, and he uploads lab results, appointment reminders, and major milestones of my pregnancy. Today, I received an email, and the message said "Results attached, Everything looks good, Your Rh is negative. Ready about RH negative mothers in your book." I looked at the results and saw that my blood type is O Negative, and that was a total shock because both of my parents are O positive. Well, obviously I don't carry around my great big book of Preggers, so of course, I hopped on the internet. I've said it before, I've said it again. Stay off of the internet. I took a little gander around ye old google... and discovered the potential of my body attacking my fetus because of the risk of the baby being a positive blood type. Y'all. It was dramatic. I was sweating and my heart was racing and all I could think about was my poor defenseless baby falling victim to my blood cells. Of course Cody didn't know his blood type, but was incredibly intrigued by my blood type. "So you can donate to pretty much anybody..." "Wait, so your blood can be donated to anyone, but it has to be O negative if you needed it donated? I think that stuff is like critically low. Bummer." THANK YOU for that, Cody. So I called the doctor, and I was transferred to three different people before the most reassuring nurse in the world hopped on the phone. She talked a lot, and I don't totally remember what all she said, but basically, they'll do blood work again in about 6 weeks, and if it looks like there's any kind of funky RH factors, the baby's blood type is some type of positive, so I'll need a Rhogam shot. Why, you ask? I had the same question. According my Great Big Book of Preggers, "When your immune system (which fights off invaders to keep you healthy) is exposed to your baby’s Rh-positive blood, it will begin producing antibodies that are sensitized(designed specifically) to destroy these “foreign” blood cells." GREAT. So, the shot basically consists of a "small dose of antibodies, collected from blood donors, which kill any Rh-positive blood cells in your system and then prompt your immune system to develop its own antibodies. The donated antibodies are just like yours but the dose isn't large enough to cause problems for your baby." Irma (the calming nurse) assured me that it was fine, and it's really in subsequent pregnancies that there is a cause for concern. This is just a precaution. Of course, if Cody's blood type is negative, then I won't need ANY of this, and our baby will be a negative blood type. Genes are complicated, man. So I'm okay now. It was a scary couple of hours, though. Oh, and good news. I don't have HIV, or Hepatitis... OR any other infectious sexually transmitted disease. I'm sure the lab tech was shocked.
Okay, that's it! We are officially in week 15, and this time next week, I'll know if it's a girl Gaines or a Boy Gaines. One thing is for certain, friends. This kid is going to have BLONDE hair, and this kid is going to have ENORMOUS eyes. I'm wagering Blue eyes. I'm pretty positive about the goofy looking smile too.
Here's the bump, cast your gender vote!
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