12/28/2010 - BEautiful!

Well folks, I did it. I went out and got me a Be Band. For those of  you who don't know what it is, the Be Band is a stretchy piece of fabric, like a HUGE headband, that goes over the waist band of your pants and allows you to wear them, wait for it, UNBUTTONED. I'm sure by next Thanksgiving these babies will be flying off the shelves for all the over eaters out there. Why did I never think of this?? Anyway, I was fighting it. Hard. "I mean, PLEASE! I can still button my jeans" I'd say as I'm writhing on the floor trying to make the top button clasp only to sit up and feel as if I was about to spontaneously miscarry. No thank you. So I got the fat girl expander. Very exciting. Now I can breathe deeply from a seated position and feel the waistband strrrrrrrrretch! Ah, comfort!
My newest pic...

HOLY CRAP, right? My gut now sticks out more than my ribcage? Fantastic. And before you go saying "You can hardly tell!" (some of you are thinking "I wasn't about to say that) I will remind you what week 6-ish looked like...

Do you see the abs I actually had? Now come on and cry with me. The worst part is, I'm not showing enough that it looks like I'm pregnant. Right now it just looks as if I eat too much pasta and I'm TELLING you this morning when I went to Starbucks and got a blueberry scone (460 calories people, I know), the man next to me glanced at my gut. Sweet Husband says I'm nuts but it happened.
Speaking of SH, we just got back from visiting his brother and sister-in-law in Maui, where we spent our Christmas holiday. Sun, surf and snorkeling! Wanna hear what rained on my parade? Well, aside from missing out on tropical libations, my sister-in-law is 9 months pregnant and due ANY DAY now. Looking at her just made me realize how far I have to go, not to mention the fact that she looked at a 12 week pic of herself and said "I have no memory of being that small". Does the cruelty ever end?
On a more positive note, I feel as if someone has flipped a switch and I'm miraculously back to *almost* normal. Nausea only happens when I haven't eaten (or discuss chicken or spinach) and puking is a thing of the past (except for the 50 yard dash I did while dining sea side in Hawaii - I wish I could blame the food but it hadn't arrived yet). I no longer need a 2 hour nap in the middle of the day (so far, although I did sleep quite a bit on my beach chair), and I got through a two hour workout last night without having to stop ONCE! Sweet action!
Okay, here are the Blogger details as many of you have been asking me. Blogger will not email you every time I post something, you just have to check in whenever you think about it. Also, all of my posts can be read by looking over to the right (go ahead! Look!) and under Blog Archive it has all of my posts from the past. Click on any of them to read. And people, if you read this with any regularity, please FOLLOW me. I have 6 followers which is utterly pathetic and I know there are a whole bunch of you out there. Give a girl a break. I might have a hormonal swing any second now and you don't want to be on the receiving end.
Off to teach kickboxing...fingers crossed!

12/16/2010 - Surely you jest

I have not announced to any of my agents that I am "in the family way" as of yet because I feel like any "showing" I am doing here can easily be camouflaged by an empire-wasted top. I think you can't REALLY tell if I'm in clothes (and Sweet Husband is the only one who sees me WITHOUT clothes and he already knows), so who cares, right? Maybe this is just what I'm telling myself. I figure I'll spill the beans around month 4 or 5 when I need to start being cast for Pampers commercials, which I will totally embrace.
Two days ago I got a call from my theatrical agent (this means TV and movies if you aren't an aficionado on industry jargon) saying I have an audition for one of the CSI's and, if I get cast, I will need to be in a skirt and a bra as I am being held captive by a rapist. I know what you're thinking, "My god? A rape scene?? While you're pregnant!?" Know what my thought was? A BRA???!! I totally panicked, ran to the nearest mirror and threw my shirt up. Staring at my bulging belly and love handles that have recently appeared I say "Uh, yeah. Okay, sure." Jesus CHRIST! So I go to the audition in a super loose skirt and white tank and as soon as I walk into the room with the casting director, I suck my gut in as hard as I can (not an easy feat when something is actually IN there) and do my scene, praying he doesn't see the flab-alanche. However, once I leave I'm struck with the horror of WHAT IF I DO BOOK THIS? It doesn't shoot until after Christmas! Surely I'll be bigger then and without a shirt, how can I suck it in? What a disaster! I mean please!!! WHAT casts between Christmas and New Years?? This is an outrage.
I've decided today that I will seek out a dietitian to deal with this matter head-on. So if any of you know of a good one, leave the info here. My flabby thighs thank you. And before any of you hop on the bullshit bandwagon about "You are forming another human! You are not flabby, you are pregnant! That baby needs extra calories!" let me be the first to tell you, I don't want to hear it (and btw, babies need 300 extra calories, not 1,000). My actual baby bump is hardly even there. What IS there is the load of crap I've been shoveling down my throat to attempt to calm my nausea and get food to STICK. And it has stuck all right. Between my inactivity (napping almost every day) and eating food reminiscent of a stoner, it has stuck. But it's about to be unstuck.
I'll post a photo when I can bear it.
Genetic testing tomorrow. I'll post if it's really a child or some strange gilled creature created from my martini bender the weekend before I found out I was pregnant.
Over and out!

12/12/2010 - Resurrection of the Ejection

Just when I thought it was over! "I heard morning sickness goes away or AT LEAST gets better after the first trimester" say many well-meaning females, almost always adding "I never experienced morning sickness MYSELF, but that's what I've heard". Mmm...
I've moved on from the crackers upon waking (people, listen. Stop telling me to eat crackers. The mouth is SO very dry when you wake up. YOU eat a god damn cracker while laying down and see how well it goes for you! Hello choking hazard!) and moved on to Del Monte's delicious little fruit cups. Peaches! Pears! Mandarin oranges! Yum! Well, the other day I did not eat the cup that I keep by my bed, instead I got up and walked into the kitchen feeling fabulous. I opened the fridge and fetched a nice cold tropical fruit mix. The colors peeking through the clear cup enlivened my mood. Pink! Yellow! White! Gorgeous! I carefully peeled back the plastic covering, scooped up a spoonful of delightful fruit and placed it into my mouth. One chomp down on the tropical medley flipped my stomach, made my eyes roll back into my head and had me turning violently into the sink to barf up a nice medley of my own. After retching for what seemed like an eternity (especially since, let's be honest, I didn't actually CONSUME any of this food or anything else since 7pm the night before) I slid down my cabinets, drew my knees into my chest and cried for a solid five minutes. It was then I realized that I've completely forgotten what it's like to feel normal. To feel SO normal that you wake up and don't even think about how you feel. Where the smell of food is always enticing, eating is a joyful and fulfilling experience, your lower stomach doesn't feel like it's being pushed out from the inside, your bowels aren't constantly in a knot and the only time you experience nausea is after a particularly fun night doing body shots off some hot Mexican guy at the nearby El Torito. I have no fabulous memories of last night because I passed out cold around 8:59pm. Eating is always disgusting and guess what else? My back now hurts.
After avoiding a bikini wax for WAAAAY too long (thank you Sweet Husband for not making Chewbacca noises every time I exited the shower), I forced myself to go yesterday afternoon. We're heading to Maui for Christmas (don't be too jealous...no umbrella drinks, no barely-there bikinis...or a body for which to fit one on, for that matter) and I can NOT go with 70's bush, period. So, I made an appointment and off I went. Let me tell you something. I have no idea if your skin is supposed to be more sensitive while you're pregnant, but ladies DO NOT WAX ANY AREA YOU CONSIDER TO BE PRIVATE WHILE YOU ARE PREGNANT. Oh my god I have never IN MY LIFE experienced pain as bad as this. I was sweating, tears were rolling down my cheeks and I was moments away from confessing every horrible secret I've ever had just to make the torture stop.  I literally walked out of the salon as if I had been riding a wild stallion for DAYS. And when I got home, upon further inspection, it looked as though bees had been let loose on my lady parts and some kind soul had attempted to save me by swatting them off with a wooden spoon. I had chills for hours. I may never be the same.

12/8/2010 - Motel 6

Lemme tell you what I find the MOST sucky. Yeah, barfing was really bad, the nausea and headaches...but actually having to think of someone else before you make a decision for yourself BLOWS. For instance, Monday night I was teaching class. That day was especially grueling as I had to teach 4 classes (cardio/Pilates fusion, boot camp, a high-intensity weight lifting class and kickboxing, in that order). In class 3 I started to feel faint and vomity. Big time. Normally, I'd muscle through no big deal. But do you know what happened? I started thinking about this paragraph I read in some book about exercising when pregnant and how, due to weight lifting, this woman tore her uterine wall and was on bed rest for a month! A MONTH?! O-M-G! No way. Is that even real? Can that even happen? I scoffed when I read it, but now it's implanted on my brain. What to do? DAMN IT! I decided to pull way back to finish the class.
Then this morning, after a particularly crappy night of sleeping, I woke up feeling god awful. Feverish (no fever, says my $5 thermometer), nauseous, major headache. I had two classes to teach this morning. As I started getting dressed, Sweet Husband called. "You need to find someone to take your classes. You can't push it." and I knew he was right. WHAT KIND OF LIFE AM I LIVING?? Since WHEN do I sub out my classes at the gym because of feeling a little lill? Since WHEN do I lift light to no weight in a power lifting class? Since when do I pee myself when I jumprope??? SINCE WHEN!? Also, I'd like to mention, when I jump up and down now, it grosses me out in a big way. It feels like I have a small water balloon in my belly, just below my navel. It's just in there, bouncing around and making me gag. Sick.
On to other news, I have to finish up my genetic testing with a TWO AND A HALF HOUR sonogram session. Say WHAT now? Our baby better be hosting a kegger in there (then again that would require more than one fetus...unless he/she is a "drinks alone" kind of baby, in which case I've got bigger problems) because I am going to be bored to TEARS! SH has been bugging me to come along on doctor visits, so I said this one he could come to. Then he finds out about the time and goes "uhhh..." HA! Perfect.
My stomach continues to bulge but luckily my jeans still fit. I think my boobs have stopped growing, which is quite a drag.

12/4/2010 - A Cup, here I come!

Well, again. It's been a while. My parents were in town for a spell and then I got a bad case of the lazies and didn't care to write about anything. I'm growing a human here people, piss off.
Anywho, check out the start of my pot belly! Lord HELP us! The good news (I know! Didn't you guys think I would just bitch the whole time? Silver lining!) is that I can now fit quite snugly into an A-cup bra *applause*! Thank you! A few months back I was hit with the realization (and a sales girl at Nordstrom armed with a measuring tape) that I wasn't the A I always thought I was, but in fact, I was a AA. For you large-breasted women who didn't realize an AA cup can be MADE for adults, I'm here to rock your world. I bought a ton of them. Also downgraded to an XS sports bra and voila! Perfect fits. Now, I'm spilling out. Can you "spill out" when you're clocking in at a whopping AA? Yes you can, bitches. Yes you can.
The nausea isn't totally in check, though the puking has slowed down to barely noticeable. However, this week I neglected to eat for 4 hours (this means something) and was so sick by the time I did eat that I ended up going straight to bed and skipping dinner only to wake up and feel extra awful the next day as well. How wonderful.
Went to the doctor this past Thursday and they said I only gained 1/2 of a pound, which can't POSSIBLY be correct! Again, I'll refer you to the above picture and below-the-button protrusion, but whatever. I saw the little olive (maybe it's a Brazil nut now) flip over and kick what I believe was some sort of leg protrusion. Very surreal. I had a litany of tests done to see where we stand as far as development and retardation (need I mention my luck here?) and will hear back in a week or so.
Now, on to the bitching. Why in the WORLD does everyone now feel free to tell me how to properly run my life? Have I not been at this exact task my entire adult life? Aren't I still standing here before you? Able bodied and healthy (kind of)? Then WHY start now?
"Oh no! You can't work out!!" My doctor says it's fine.
"Wait! Don't lift that it's heavy!!!" In response to a 6# box after I taught a class that required me to squat a 50# bar.
"You can't adopt now! You'll never be able to handle two kids. You don't even know what you're in for!" My personal favorite.
"You HAVE to let your husband in the room when you give birth." You are welcome to give birth in the middle of Times Square ON that goddamn sparkly ball during the NYE countdown. I'll give birth around whom I choose.
"You need to find out the sex. You need to go shopping before the baby gets here!" How did we ever survive in gender-neutral clothing???
LISTEN UP PEOPLE. I'm sure you mean well. Good for you for trying to get a fine deed done for humanity today! But I am not interested in your opinion or what you think about my choices or my lifestyle. When I am looking for your opinion I will start my sentence with "Hey, I'd like to get your opinion on this..." Until that day comes, kindly shut the hell up.
That's all for today!
Snuggles!