Friday:

I went in to work on Friday feeling tired, which was pretty usual for me by this point. On the weekends I had realized that a nap at around 11:00 am would perk me right up, but those are hard to come by when you’re in an office working, so I was going to bed extra-early hoping to compensate.

I still had a week left of work, and was getting ready to start tying up loose ends as of Monday, finishing documents, sending them to the Creative Director, contacting the people at HR and making sure that they had the right documentation from me, that kind of thing. I had plans for the weekend to pack my hospital bag with all the things I’d be needing, possibly also doing some of the baby laundry that needed to be done. There was also a vague plan to visit Ottawa and spend some time with my Brother and Sister-in-law who are expecting their first baby in December. I wasn’t sure if I’d feel up to it.

The truth was, I was feeling pretty lousy. I wasn’t sure if it was just that it was the third trimester and that’s usual. It felt… different. I had been slowly feeling worse all week. Nauseated sometimes, headachey sometimes, really tired overall. My feet had swollen to look like sausages. On Thursday I’d called my doctor’s office to mention the feet specifically, but they said the swollen feet  were likely an effect of the heat wave (it was beastly hot and humid that week) and I should go home, elevate my feet, and get as much rest as I could.

But Friday was worse. I spent much of the morning trying to figure out if I could really work for another week. I looked up pre-eclampsia symptoms online, and it seemed like I had several of them. I worried about it – but surely, I didn’t feel that bad yet. Surely it was my imagination.

That morning, just before lunchtime, I went to a really interesting presentation about game narrative. I almost fell asleep while it was going on.

Understand: When I say that I nearly fell asleep, I don’t mean that I felt tired. I mean that I very literally almost fell asleep. I was actually pinching myself to keep awake. I never, EVER fall asleep involuntarily. I may lay down and doze on the sofa sometimes and sleep for longer than I intended, but I never just fall asleep without realizing it. I always know that I’m tired enough and likely to fall asleep. Yet I was in this meeting catching myself nodding off.

I knew something was definitely wrong. I called my doctor’s office and they sent me to the hospital for a non-stress test. Scott and I apologized to the friends we were meeting for lunch, and off we went to my local hospital, where I had planned to deliver.

After a few minutes’ wait, I was ushered into a triage room. They hooked me up to a fetal monitor, took my temperature and blood pressure, and told me that the baby was fine, but my blood pressure was high and I was not going back to work. (Much to the relief of Scott who had been wanting to suggest that I just call it quits, owing to how tired I obviously was.) Moreover, I was staying in the hospital for 24 hours observation.

They set me up in a room, and I spent most of the afternoon napping. Scott eventually out to get dinner for himself, and to pick up clothes and books for me (I had come right from work, the hospital bag wasn’t packed, I had nothing to do but nap, and I had a feeling that Senseless Boredom was going to set in soon). When he came back he didn’t have the books I requested (Chapters was sold out of the series I wanted to read), but had raided our bookshelves at home and come up with the book I was currently reading, plus a copy of Twilight.

Yes, Twilight. I had borrowed the copy from a friend ages ago, planning to read it on an evening when I just needed something brainless to keep my attention. Scott thought the hospital stay was the perfect opportunity – and I agreed. It was exactly the right thing (plus, it made me laugh a LOT.)

All in all, by later that evening everything seemed fine. My blood pressure was still up but I was resting, had slept fairly well through the afternoon and evening and felt better than I had in days. I was pretty sure I’d be sent home Saturday morning or afternoon. We called Scott’s parents, and his brother, and let them know what was happening – we were fine, but we couldn’t make the planned trip after all. We refrained from calling my parents (still in Halifax) until the next morning when we’d know more about what was going on (to avoid the scariness of the ‘I’m in the hospital for observation. Now you know everything I do.’ conversation). Sometime later that night I sent Scott home – the hospital offered to pull in a cot for him, but as home was a 10 minute drive away and an overnight emergency unlikely, we both figured he’d be better off sleeping in his own bed.

Saturday

I was up early on Saturday morning (not sleeping in my own bed made me restless, go figure.) I spent most of the day reading Twilight (which I finished) and calling family and letting them know what was happening. After 24 hours observation, the doctors had decided I needed more observation, so I was stuck in the hospital until at least the next morning. I had some of the signs of pre-eclampsia, but nothing definite, so I guess what I had was pre-pre-eclampsia. They weren’t sending me home until they were sure my symptoms weren’t worsening.

I called Arin, who I knew would sympathize with my “In hospital. Deadly bored. Send help.” plight. She offered to take a break from her insane house-packing spree to visit and bring me the books Scott had been looking for at Chapters. (I have awesome friends.)

There wasn’t much to do all day so I spent it alternating eating, sleeping, reading, and telephone calls. Again, I felt much better and pretty rested. That evening, the doctor on duty told me that they were keeping me in to monitor my blood platelet levels, and if they went back up overnight, I’d go home in the morning, with blood pressure medication. So I went to bed with every expectation that at around 10:00 the next morning, I’d be heading home.

Of course, as it turned out, that was exactly not what happened.

Next: Transfer, Labour and Delivery

She was born on Monday, August 9th, so is 2 weeks and 1 day old as I write this. 5lbs 2oz at birth. She’s still very small, but seems to be gaining weight well. Both the baby and I are fine (if a little tired).

There’s a more detailed post (possibly a series) in the works about what exactly happened, since I know a lot of people are wondering. Short version: after a short hospital stay, I was transferred to a hospital that specialized in pre-term infants and labour was induced because of severe preeclampsia. The baby spent 12 hours in an incubator for observation, but is fine apart from being quite small and was sent home with me 4 days later. I spent more than 24 hours in intermediate care, but am fine apart from currently having a cold.

More to come. In the meantime, feel free to follow the above photo to Scott’s flickr site, where many more adorable photos of the Most Beautiful Baby Ever (possibly I am *slightly* biased) await you.

Theoretical number of weeks left : 11

It’s been a busy couple of weeks, and I’ve been exhausted, as I believe I’ve mentioned on several occasions. This was starting to frustrate and upset me, but this past weekend I felt like I regained some of my equilibrium. The gist of it was this: I’m still tired very often, and not getting as much done around the house as I would like because I go to bed so early now. It seems like there’s so much to do, all at once, and I get frustrated because I can’t do two things at once. More accurately, I can’t do two things with the energy I have, so if I focus on getting housework done, baby stuff doesn’t happen, and if I focus on baby-related stuff, the housework falls behind, and it feels like I’m running full-out but still not getting it all done.  By the beginning of last week I got to the point where any setback would make me burst into helpless tears.

But late last I took two days off,  because of doctor’s appointments and blood tests and whatnot, plus a conveniently-placed provincial holiday. That meant by the time the weekend rolled around I had done a lot of the stuff I had planned to do, and so the weekend was like an extra vacation. Sunday was given over to weeding the garden, reading and swimming. It was a lovely day for it, and so I got a lot of work and a good bit of relaxing in. I finally felt like I was enjoying my summer, rather than racing to finish all the things I hadn’t finished during the week. I hope that’s a feeling I can hold on to as I go, because I’ve been warned that the third trimester will go FAST.

EEP!

Here’s what else has been going on:

The nursery is (mostly) cleaned out and the furniture has arrived and has been assembled. It’s dark wood, and the nursery walls are a sagey green. It looks great! Scott took some pictures, which I don’t have with me at the moment, but I may try to update later to include them in the post. I still have to clean off the bookshelves and move the children’s books into the office, and the office books downstairs. Plus the clost in the room hasn’t been cleaned out and is full of Stuff that needs to be dealt with. Those are details, though. Mostly: It’s done.

We now have a baby stroller and infant car seat. It’s still a little early to needthis yet, but the stroller we wanted went on sale, so we snatched it up while the getting was good! It’s currently also in the nursery, though that’s not where it will stay. It’s in the house and out of the way for now, and one more thing off our list, so that’s great.

We also have a Doula. She came over on Wednesday for tea and our first visit. We talked over her role in the hospital, what we’d like to have happen at the birth, and different options that are available to us. And about my hopes and fears for delivery, that kind of thing. Our next meeting will be a lot more detailed, and we’ll talk about the delivery process, options and potential problem situations – should be interesting!

And I’ve started making calls about daycares and getting on waiting lists. One today totally threw me for a loop, when the francophone woman at the other end of the telephone warned me (in french) that the daycare was primarily english. Getting on waiting lists progresses slowly. I hope we find something we’re comfortable with before it’s time for me to return to work. I feel like I should have been calling earlier (I thought most daycares wouldn’t let me put a baby on the list before there was a baby to put on the list!), but there’s nothing for it now. Please keep your fingers crossed for us!

Physically, I’m fine other than a little heartburn, and a slightly swollen ankles (particularly when it’s hot outside.) I can now feel various body parts when the baby moves around – though I haven’t managed to have Scott in close enough proximity to say “LOOK! A foot!” when it happens.

In terms of names, since people *will* keep asking, I am leaning towards Zelda. One of those old-fashioned names that doesn’t get much use any more — not to mention being the title of my favourite series of video games. Maybe we could couple it with some other well-known video game character names. Zelda Lara, or Zelda Farah, or Zelda Jade.

Physically, I feel fine. I’m tired a lot of the time, but I figure that’s par for the course. The baby is kicking and twirling and generally making her presence known at all hours of the day and night, but it’s not yet at the point where she’s waking me up. I am getting to the point where I can identify body parts moving along the surface of my stomach. A few times I’ve had what I’m pretty sure is a baby head poking out of the side of my tummy. This looks less odd than it sounds – Scott can’t see it unless I point it out to him, but since I can both feel the pressure and see the slight bulge, I know it’s there.

(I am trying not to think about what the baby is bracing herself on to get her body parts to protrude like that. Likely it’s an internal organ I’ll need later.)

We’ve also started reading stories to the baby (okay, ostensibly to the baby. Really this is my excuse to actually read the full Winnie-the-Pooh series). I’ve been getting Scott to read out loud because I figure hey — I talk rather a lot. The baby hears me all the time. But he doesn’t talk much at all, and is around the baby less, and so I want her to recognize his voice, too.

Also, it is magical to have someone read a bedtime story to you, even if you are 33 years of age.

Last week was busy. We either had someone at the house, or we were out every night. I promised myself this week would be different, but it filled up as well. *sigh* Maybe next week.

We got a very-slightly-used diaper kit, the one we had been looking at in the local stores, and picked up a few other accessories to go with it on Saturday,  so we’re set for diapers now. The cloth kit was an easy decision – we got it for a fraction of the price of buying new, so it’s a really good investment if we keep using it, and if we decide it’s not for us, we’re not out $300-$500.

We went to the meet-the-doulas evening I had mentioned, and met with very many doulas and had all our questions answered. We registered for pre-natal courses. We went to a pre-natal fair and got information from many different businesses about local businesses and baby products. We went out looking at baby furniture. Did I mention it was a busy week?

We think we’ve found a doula – our first meeting with her is scheduled for next week. I’ll write a bit more about that next post, or the one after.

This week we searched for (and found!) a used glider rocking chair and ottoman. We’d been hunting for one at furniture stores, and this came up on Craigslist. We picked it up on Tuesday night, managed to fit it into the car, and have installed it in our living room. It’s in excellent condition. The cats will sit on it, but they look vaguely uncertain about it. Scott and I both love it, and I joked that we now need to buy a second one because we will clearly be fighting over this one.

Last night was our first pre-natal class, and I’m glad it’s close to home. It didn’t end until after 9pm. My current bedtime is sometime between 8:30 and 9, so I came home exhausted, with my brain full of information, and didn’t sleep so well all night. The courses are good, though and the nurse who taught it was very nice. Because of scheduling, we won’t be back there for another month, but we’ll (theoretically) be taking 5 different courses between now and the birth.

I still haven’t done any work on getting on more CPE waiting lists. Last week was busy so I’ve been a bit less on the ball this week. Next week, for sure!

And this weekend, of course, is finishing the barely-begun cleaning out of the soon-to-be nursery. Whereas we now have a rocking chair to go in it, I figure we’d better get a move on!

• unload the dishwasher
• Do (a very small amount of) dishes
• Eat breakfast
• Go for a (quick) grocery-and-cat-food run
• Make a pan of macaroni and cheese

And just like that I was completely and totally exhausted. Saturday was no different – Scott and I ran out to a couple of stores (literally two) to look at reuseable diaper options, and when I came home I had a two-hour nap. This after sleeping 11 hours the night before. I can’t even blame it on yard work – it rained all weekend. I didn’t have to do a thing outdoors.

Sunday ended up okay – I had a nap and managed to get a decent amount of cleaning done in the 45 minutes we had before running out again to a gathering (Where I performed the vigorous tasks of sitting in a chair, eating nibblies, talking and singing, and left exhausted. AGAIN.)

I hear the baby forms its spine and lung capillaries in the 25th week. Maybe that’s why I needed the sleep.

Anyway, this turn of events means that everything in my life has to be accomplished in tiny steps. I can’t clean out the closet – I have to clean out a drawer of the dresser. I can’t put away all the clothes – but I can put away the sheets and towels. I can’t vacuum the entire downstairs, but I can vacuum the kitchen. At lunchtime  I make phone calls – doulas, prenatal classes, hospital tours, doctor’s appointments. I’m getting things done, but the process is agonizingly slow.

I still do not have a doula. But I’m probably going to attend a Meet-the-Doulas evening at a local collective this week, so I have high hopes. I’m trying not to be stressed about it – if it doesn’t work out, it doesn’t.

I’ve registered for the prenatal tour at the hospital, as well as prenatal courses at the local CLSC. Registering for prenatal courses came with a risk-assessment quiz about general health, income, potential medical issues – and a detailed quiz on nutrition, down to “Are you getting your 4-7 servings of vegetables a day?” Yikes. I was instructed to get up from my desk once an hour and to look for a yogurt that contains vitamins A and D.

We’re heading out tonight to pick up a very-lightly-used cloth diaper kit (the exact ones we were looking at this past weekend, actually, with most of the accessories, barely used.) We’re not totally sold on the idea of using cloth diapers – or, rather, we like the idea but I feel we might fall short in the actual day-to-day use component – so for the price this is looks like a good option. We can try out the diapers, and if things aren’t working out, we haven’t spent $500 on a kit.

(Yes, I am going to clean the diapers thoroughly before use.)

The Next Big Thing is thinking about registering at CPEs for day care. While baby Scabiosa (like the name? It’s a flower!) won’t need a daycare for more than a year people tell me yes, now is the time to get registered!!! (Sometimes with an extra !!! to emphasize the urgency.) There’s a daycare at work but it’s a lottery system to get in and the demand is high. We’ll be looking at our options around both work and home, though around work seems a better option for us.

We had an appointment with our doctor this week, which was short and sweet. There was a funny moment where she was trying to listen to the baby’s heartbeat – the baby was moving around as she usually does, so the doctor could feel the kicks, but the heart doppler she was using needed replacing, so for a while she couldn’t actually locate the heartbeat. (Clearly, I am giving birth to a vampire.)

The appointment was early and we weren’t expected at work until the afternoon, so Scott and I spent some time at Babies R Us and put ourselves in the gift registry (this is for those of you who have been asking). Most of what’s on the list is big-ticket items – car seat and stroller, high chair, play yard (for some reason they don’t call them ‘play pens’ any more…).  We’ve already settled on a crib and change table so that’s not in the list. Also not in the list is a rocking chair and glider – the ones I saw at Babies R Us were WAY too expensive to put on the list.

Speaking of expensive, for anyone who is going to wander over and look at the list – yes we have two crib/decor sets on there, both are pricey. We don’t necessarily want those exact ones. I’ve had a couple questions about ‘theme’ for the baby’s room and we picked those because they were good examples of what kind of colour/print scheme we were looking for. The room is a sage green, and the furniture will be a light-brown wood colour.  So if you’re looking and thinking “Holy crap! They don’t need two of those!” Yeah, we know. They’re examples.

The fact is we need everything, from receiving blankets and washcloths, up to cribs and tubs and car seats. Trying to encompass it all at once makes me a little dizzy.

I’m still looking for a doula (haven’t made a lot of calls as of yet, will do more today), but I’m on the list for a hospital tour, and for pre-natal courses, so things are moving along on that front.

My doctor sent me into a bit of a panic on Monday by telling me that she’d see me again in a month – and that after that, I’m to come in for appointments every two weeks! I knew this would happen when I reached the third trimester, of course. It’s just… holy crap! Am I that far along already? WHY IS EVERYTHING NOT DONE ALREADY?

Time to get started cleaning out the baby’s room (currently my office, AKA the Big Mess).

Beefsteak tomatoes (3)
Roma tomatoes (4)
Peas
Beets
Green onions
Cucumber (4)
Butternut squash
Green beans
Yellow beans
Zucchini (1)

Plus pansies in the window boxes, a bed of impatiens, a bed of wildflowers, and sunflowers.

The sunflowers are already sprouting, as are the peas. The beets are possibly also sprouting – it’s hard to tell with the weeds growing up through the dirt (yes, the weeding never ends) so I’ll have to wait just a bit to be sure. Everything else was planted 3-5 days later, so I don’t expect any new sprouts for a little while. The tomatoes, cucumber and zucchini were seedlings, so they’re already in and growing.

Oh, and the mint is growing back. Exactly where I expected it to, though a little earlier than I thought I’d see it. Along with the bindweed, which is also growing right up against my foundation where it’s hard to get to (beastly stuff). It’s still small yet and not threatening any plants, so I’ll wait for it to get a bit bigger before I pull it out (more chance of pulling up some of the roots that way.)

I feel like I’m getting a lot of my energy back. Possibly I’ve entered the ‘nesting’ stage? I don’t know. I am really tired in the evenings, but on weekends I don’t want to stop doing stuff around the house. I take frequent breaks, but as soon as I cool off and have a drink of water, I want to be up and at it again. I’m not feeling the need to nap as much. I want to be home  a lot more (curse this lack of vacation time!), getting the room ready (haven’t even started yet), making sure the place is clean and tidy and as neat as I can get it before baby arrives.

Not to mention that the garden feels REALLY important this year – which I expect has to do with the food/nurturing aspect of it all.

New symptoms this week include swelling in my ankles, a combination of the current heat, and the . I try to keep them elevated when I’m at home – it’s less possible at work, and yesterday (in the middle of our first summer heat wave) the air conditioning was out on my floor. It wasn’t good. Today I’m working at home (where there IS air conditioning), but I caught a glimpse of my feet and I’m pretty sure they belong to somebody else – someone whose feet are several sizes bigger than mine. They are elevated as I write this, not to worry.

Last week Scott asked me if I was still feeling the baby kick. Oh yes, yes I am. In fact, I feel entire somersaults sometimes. She seems especially active just after lunch. We went to a wedding on Sunday, and when people were whooping and cheering the bride and groom, I got a whole series of kicks in what seemed like a reaction. I know babies can respond to loud noises at this point so that seems logical. Not sure if she wanted to join in with the cheers, or wanted all us outside people to shut up so she could get some sleep.

What Scott’s question made me realize, of course, is that I stopped telling him every time the baby started kicking – because it’s happening all the time now, so often I mostly don’t even think about it. I’m trying to be better about telling him when we’re sitting together and the baby is kicking – he doesn’t have quite the up-close-and-personal experience of it that I do.

I’ve started looking for a doula this week. No luck yet, but I’ve only made two calls and I have several more names on my list.

People have been asking what the name-of-the-week is for the baby. Which I suppose serves me right for being so snarky about it in the first place – now I’m under pressure to come up with a new name every week! People have been sending in suggestions, too, which I appreciate.

This week’s name is taken from a book I just finished reading (”The Birth House” by Ami McKay). It’s both traditional (along the line of names including “Charity”, “Chastity”, “Virtue” and “Thou-Shalt-Not-Steal”, but also has an additional video and RPG gaming bent that we like:

Experience.

“We could call her XP for short,” says Scott, who is ever-quick with the nicknames.

I think a good middle name could really enhance the effect, so it shall be something like “Experience Orcslayer” or “Experience Elf-Friend”.

Except… after an entire day of working at it, I crossed about two things off the list. That’s not to say I didn’t make progress on a lot of other list items, but I just didn’t manage to finish. You see, all of these things looked deceptively simple. For example:

Dig up mint
Plant Garden

Two simple tasks, right?

I should tell you some background on the mint. There is mint in the sunniest part of my garden. A lot of mint. Mint that has taken over that whole corner of the yard. I did not plant the mint; it was put there by the people who last owned the house. They did not know that mint is supposed to be kept separate or it will take over everything. And so, the mint took over everything – exactly where I would have liked to plant vegetables.

I started small with the garden last year, so I didn’t actually clear out the space where the mint was, but had it on the task list for this year. The space it’s in is not actually all that big; probably about 3 ft by 8 feet, all told…

It felt like it was several acres. Because when I write ‘dig up mint’ what I’m actually doing is this:

Turn over a shovel full of earth
Break up the earth with the shovel
Tear out all the roots (including mint, dandelions, bindweed, grass, and I don’t know what else)
Separate the mint out for use (and giving to friends), throw out the roots and other crap.
Repeat until done.

It took me WEEKS. I don’t mean I was spending full 8-hour days at it, but it was several weeks of sneaking in an hour here, a half-hour there, doing what I could before running back into the house to cool off and have a snack. Not to mention if I picked a time when I could be outside it was either pouring rain, or blistering hot (meaning I could do even less at a time) . My intention was to have the garden in reasonably early this year – I had my seeds all purchased the day I started digging. HA. I say again, HA.

On the day that “Dig up mint” was on my to-do list, that patch of garden was already half-empty from earlier efforts. I thought I could at least finish in an afternoon. But after at least three hours in the garden working my way through it, I had about two grocery bags full of mint, needed a nap, and still wasn’t finished. On Saturday morning, I filled another grocery bag with mint, and there was still more. At that point I just started ripping everything up and putting it in with the yard waste, which amounted to a full orange garbage bag full. It’s such a small patch of ground. I can’t believe it all came from that one small patch!

But with the mint patch cleaned up, I could concentrate on planting the garden! Piece of cake! And it was a long weekend so I had all day Monday to do it! Except that ‘Plant The Garden’ actually meant:

Buy seedlings
Turn over earth in last year’s garden patch
Turn over earth in 2 new (small) garden patches
Turn over earth in front garden beds
Put flowers in cabana planters
put extra flowers in planters
Plant sunflowers
Plant impatiens
Plant green onions
Plant tomatoes
Plant cucumber
Plant peas
Plant beans
Plant radishes
Plant beans
Plant carrots
Plant squash

Doesn’t look so small  when it’s written out like that! And again, despite several trips outside over the course of the day yesterday, starting at about 10am, and finishing up at about 8pm (with some indoors chores sandwiched in the middle, and with Scott’s help for everything)  it’s not finished. I still haven’t dug up the small patch where I want to plant the squash, I don’t have the zucchini planted (or even purchased: they didn’t have any at the garden centre) and the earth is ready for the carrots and beans but I ran out of time and energy to finish. Oh, and the impatiens are still in their store-bought boxes – I’m keeping them with appropriate amounts of sun and water and I hope they’ll be okay until I get an evening to put them in. Tonight’s probably already spoken for with other errand-running.

The upside of it all is that the more time I spend in the garden, the more I love it. Even when I was tired yesterday and coming inside to cool down and drink lots of water, I didn’t want to stop working. I wanted to do just one more thing… just one more thing. And I’m very much looking forward to having my own fresh vegetables later in the summer.

(The down side is that today everything aches, I’m exhaused, covered in bug bites and have discovered a small patch of sunburn on my lower back – my top was too short and I didn’t realize.)

And now the garden updates may commence! (Because that, pregnancy and my game are the only things I’ve written about this year, so I know you were looking forward to more!)

First, I did an interview with our Community Developer for the Facebook page. (You don’t need a Facebook account to read it.)

And also, there’s another Developer Diary out with a bit more about the story (I’m in this one too. I guess the camera just loves me!) This is actually my favourite of all the dev diaries that we did. I think it’s a great summary of what we did with the game.

Enjoy!