Feeling Positive

Hello :)  Two exciting things this week ... Christmas of course, so quality time with the family and entering the 6th month of pregnancy. I don't know why, but the 6th month has always felt like a milestone of some kind. So I am almost there  :)

I went to urgent care at the end of last week to ask about my chronic fatigue and acid indigestion. The doctor told that I can take pepsid ac rather than tums and that we will only resort to prilosec if the pepsid doesn't work. Well, the pepsid works wonderfully! I take one with breakfast every morning and that one little pill lasts me the whole 24 hours with not a single acid burp  :)  It started working from the very first pill too. So I am very very happy with that. I can now finally eat more than just rice and veggies!
This also means that I am now sleeping through the whole night with the odd bathroom trip around 6am. So guess what ... the fatigue has also gone away. Now I just deal with the regular tiredness of pregnancy. It feels fantastic to be sleeping  :)  It puts me in a better mood for work and with people around me in general and has lessened the stress caused by exhaustion .... so I haven't cried in days!  :)

I am also sleeping better because it seems my body has gotten used to spending the whole night on my left side. I no longer wake up with numb legs and arms. I have also stopped stressing about sleeping on my back because the doctor told me that if its uncomfortable for James, it will also be uncomfortable for me and so I will either roll over or just wake up and change position.

I have a morning routine now that I quite enjoy. I don't really sleep in anymore, so when Josh wakes up around 630am or 7am for work I usually turn on the bedroom TV to watch GMA (Good Morning America) while I slowly wake up. Once I feel alert enough, I start doing my physical therapy stretches which are done lying down. I do those for about 15-20 minutes and then slowly sit up. Once that feels good I get out of bed and do a few rounds of pigeon pose (squat position pushing my hips outwards) and forward fold. All of these stretches are to loosen my hips and strengthen my pelvis floor for birth. By the time I am done with all of that I feel ready to start my day!

I am feeling ready and able to start a little workout routine too, so Josh and I are going to start going to our apartment complexes gym where he will probably jog and I will walk. It will be nice to get moving again ... heck, it feels nice just to have the energy and motivation to want to workout again!

Anyway, I am starting to ramble. I will try to remember to post my 6 months belly picture on here on Thursday so you can see the progress! Have a great day!

Some of the coaches at South Coast Gymnastics here in Irvine, CA on December 17th for the Christmas Party. Pam and I are sitting on the blue block front and center. Can you believe that we are both 6 months along?!?! Pam is just two weeks ahead of me and we are both having boys  :)

Keeping it Simple.

So after a few weeks of not sleeping due to discomfort, indigestion, weird dreams and anxiety, last night I slept amazing!

The indigestion has been getting worse and worse and was starting to occur after things like a glass of water etc. Like the water was re-upsetting what I had eaten before. So after a few nights of waking to feeling like I had just swallowed acid (the flesh eating kind), I decided I needed to change something. Yesterday instead of eating whatever I wanted, as I had been, I just ordered 8oz brown rice, 4oz steamed veggies and 2 vegan chicken skewers with no dressings or sauces etc and it went down very smoothly. It tried to threaten me with indigestion, but that went away very quickly and I went the whole night without an acid-filled burp.

As for the physical discomfort ... my legs going numb, heavy tummy, dead arms etc ... I didn't have any of that either. I started doing my physical therapy stretches before bed which I think helped a lot because it really loosened my hips and legs. So I think I will try to do that from now on.

As for the weird dreams ... I feel like that was probably related to the food I was eating also. Especially the food I would eat right before going to bed. So the relief from the dreams last night is probably also due to the more bland diet I consumed yesterday. Just so you know, I also ate some special k cereal, a piece of corn bread, some chocolate (dark) in the afternoon and noodles as my last meal of the evening around 9pm. And of course because I didn't sleep the night before I had 1/4 cup of coffee (I am allowed 1/2 cup every day) to help me going in the morning and that energy lasted me all day, so I think all the extra moving around would have helped me digest everything before bed also :)

As for the anxiety, I do believe that it hormone related. We all know how when you wake up at night thinking about something, it all seems somehow worse, but then in the morning it doesn't seem half as bad or as urgent? Well, I didn't have any of that either.

It was wonderful to sleep a whole night without waking up to pee or for any other reason. I hope that I can get a few more nights like that before James arrives  :)