Week 16

At this point we have already passed though 1/3 of the entire pregnancy! And yes, reading that last sentence freaks me out a bit. Think about it this way, in 4 weeks we will be at the half-way point. This is where I take deep breaths. When was the point of no return? This is happening way too fast. The last few weeks have invoked all kinds of emotion. I can’t remember being more excited about anything in my entire life, but at the same time I can’t remember being more afraid of anything either. Some of you in the know are aware of the “three trimesters” of a pregnancy. If you had paid attention in high school Anatomy you might even have a clue. From the reading that I have done in the last month it seems that every trimester is quite different. Everything seems to say that the first and last trimesters are tougher then the second. Based on my understanding I would like to label the trimesters hell, fun zone, and hang on we’re almost there. (in that order) Since we are headed to the fun zone I would like to take some time and look back on the beauty of hell.
For me this hardest part of the first trimester is that after you go through the “yeah we’re having a baby” moment, to me, the guy, everything at least looks the same. To be honest it was hard for me to feel pregnant at all. On the other hand Natalie is felling all kinds of changes. I must confess it is hard to be compassionate to “I’M PREGNANT OVER HERE” when you can’t really see a difference. During the first trimester, or hell, whatever you prefer, the woman can have emotional mood swings, feel very exhausted, and have nausea. Personally my biggest dislike was the threat of vomit. To be honest the whole throwing up thing went quite well for Natalie. She didn’t have a lot of morning sickness and compared to stories we heard, she had it fairly easy. So, when we are around friends,Natalie is happily proclaiming that she feels great and hasn’t been feeling nausea much, nor has she had any episodes which include hugging a toilet, I was happy. Until we would get home and she would say “oh, I feel like I am going to throw up”. What you just told everyone that you don’t have those feelings. And to my fault I could have handled these instances more graciously. To Natalie’s defense she did have one moment with the tooth brush. One night we were getting ready for bed, Natalie was brushing her teeth and I was cleaning out my ears. Out of nowhere she started to projectile vomit into the sink. I responded to calmly lift the lid to the toilet, tap her on the back, and point to the toilet. Between sessions she made it to the toilet as I cleaned up the sink. Our dog, Augie, was very confused but made sure to supervise next to the can. Brushing teeth will never be the same again. The emotional outburst were fun too, while watching Newport Harbor last week Natalie started crying while the kids were saying goodbyes and leaving for college:

I know that is some pretty heart wrenching stuff. I am still waiting for the mood swings, exhaustion, and fake nausea to go away. (The books said they would be gone 2 weeks ago) All in all the first trimester was quite the adventure, but now that Natalie is starting to show, I am ready for the fun zone that is the second trimester.