Belly Update

{ Friday, January 30, 2009 }
I've said it before and I'll say it again--I can't believe how quickly this pregnancy is going! Where did the last 21 weeks go? Our bean is now officially a little over halfway cooked. Lately, I've been walking by the ultrasound pictures on the fridge and wondering, "Who's baby is that?" Its unbelievable to me that there's a real baby in my belly. Even now that I'm feeling her move around every day, I still have to remind myself that those kicks are coming from baby arms and legs.

I think that she may be going through a growth spurt the last couple weeks. At the very least, my stomach is going through one. Every morning I look at myself in the mirror and I look bigger than the day before. When my mother left the other day, she told me I looked bigger to her than I had when she arrived four days earlier and people at work have started noticing. Today, someone I don't see everyday looked down at my belly and then quickly looked away. I wanted to tell him, "Its OK, I'm pregnant." You know that uncomfortable "is she or isn't she, should I say something or not" feeling? I wish there was some way, short of wearing a sign on my stomach, that I could let people know so they didn't have to go through that.

I read somewhere that at this stage in the pregnancy, the baby's waking and sleeping patterns are very similar to what they'll be when she's a newborn, which concerned me a little bit. It feels like she's awake all the time but, being the scientist that I am, I decided to do a study. I, obviously, am not sure what she does at night, but I was up from 1:30 am - 3 am and she wasn't moving around then. I woke up again at 6 am and nothing until 8:30. After that, she was up from 8:30 until 9, from noon to 2, from 3:30 to 4 and from 5:30 to 9 pm.

OK, well that's hardly being up all day. What a relief. I'm actually excited to see if this really does end up being her waking pattern after she's born. I plan to track her movements again closer to delivery and after she's born and compare the three, big nerd that I am.

Finally, would you like to see the belly? I myself am shocked at how big I am, and we still have most of the growing yet to go.



3 comments:

Val said...

It's truly amazing how another being is actually growing inside of you! And my belly is bigger than yours and I'm not pregnant... and no, I'm not showing you!

Landlady of Fat said...

Awwwwwwwwww wook at the bewwy!

Ehem.

Yeah.. yay baby! :)

Anonymous said...

I hear you on the movement thing. Our baby started moving around 19 weeks and has not stopped since. We're both a little freaked out about how active he'll be outside the womb! Hopefully he just doesn't like being confined.