Our Journey... Part 9, It's A...

Wow!  It has been quite the ride the last 21 weeks!

You heard that right, 21 weeks!!! HOLY GUACAMOLE!  We found out we were pregnant at 4 weeks and I can say that for the most part it has flown by!  Quick update on my pregnancy...

First Trimester...

Honestly for the most part was a breeze in regards to morning sickness, I only had minor nausea (thank the lord!).  I feel terrible for any of you mama's that have had morning sickness and all the yuck that comes along with that!  I was extremely exhausted and hungry all the time, but definitely had some pretty strong food aversions...  the smell of ground beef cooking was enough to make me want to run for the hills!  Oofta, nope, nada, no thank you, I will stick with chicken!  I didn't gain much weight in the first trimester either, about 4 lbs total.  The other symptom that I suffered from was constipation and let me tell ya, might not believe me, but at times I think I would've rather had the morning sickness. 

When we found out that we were pregnant, one of the first things that they did was to determine what my progesterone levels were.  If you remember right, my levels were low prior to becoming pregnant and I needed supplementation in order to achieve pregnancy.  Well we found that my levels were low yet so we had to supplement progesterone in the form of IM injections twice a week.  My hubby stepped up (without a single complaint) and has given me all but 2 injections throughout the last 17 weeks, he is pretty much a pro at this point!  (Keep an eye out for another post soon regarding progesterone levels in pregnancy and more info about supplementation...) 

Second Trimester...

Baby has been growing like a champ almost as soon as we hit the 2nd trimester!  Crazy how I would start to have some new symptoms and the next day my baby tracking app would state that those symptoms would start soon.  Makes you really feel like you are on the right track!  Again we continued the progesterone injections and even had to add vaginal suppositories for a week as my levels dropped by almost half.  That was a very scary time for me and emotionally I was an absolute wreck.  Once my levels got back into range I truly started to feel more like myself.  We also found that I needed to add Synthroid to my daily intake.  I basically rely on my fitbit alarms to tell me when I have to do what!  

My food aversions went away almost immediately in the 2nd trimester and my appetite came back, which was both good and bad!  I haven't been as "strict" with my diet that Dr. Pakiz put me on thinking that now that I was pregnant, I didn't need to worry about it so much... WRONG!!!!  Dairy and gluten especially bother me still, sometimes worse than before.  I'd be lying if I said I learned my lesson...  Damn CRAVINGS!!!  Mentally food has been a huge struggle for me.  I can't say that I have any "weird" cravings... But, when I want something, I want it... RIGHT NOW!  Ha!  Chinese food?  Now.  Tacos?  Now.  Donuts?  Now, now NOW!  But other strong cravings have been for fruit of all kinds, which is great, because this is the best time of year for that!

Dr. Pakiz approved our move from Omaha to someone local at week 12.  We struggled with the decision, wanting to be sure that we chose the right place and Dr. for us.  Hubby made the comment "do you feel like we are cheating on Dr. Pakiz?"  I mean, yeah... She is our saving grace!  After seeing doctors since I was 12 years old with no answers to any of my complaints, she gave us exactly what we needed to heal my body so that we could finally have a chance at having our baby.  On top of that she gave me my life back... so yeah... we basically wanted to either steal her and bring her to Iowa or even contemplated me staying in Omaha the month of September to be ready when baby was.  That shows how much we are indebted to her, I can not even begin to thank her enough for what an amazing job she does.  She will ALWAYS hold a special place in our hearts. 

So what did we decide to do???  We decided that Orange City was where we started on our Creighton Model and NaPro journey, so maybe it should be where we finish it!  We decided to visit with Dr. Moeller there and are so happy we did!  She is amazing and we are so happy that we have found 2 great doctors after all these years!  We started with Dr. Moeller at 16 weeks and as of today we had our 21 week appointment and ultrasound!!!!  So what did we find out?  

Well Baby Rupp is growing PERFECTLY!  We got to see everything, heart, diaphragm, legs, feet, arms, hands, brain, face... all of it, and all of it is absolutely perfect.  Honestly, I was so incredibly nervous for this visit, I couldn't even cry, I just stared at the screen in awe of what we have created... this perfect little 1 pound person.  It felt surreal, it still does.  I honestly was also very shocked, because I just kept having this crazy feeling that we would be having a boy... 

Well this mama was WRONG!  

We are so excited to announce that we will be welcoming a beautiful baby GIRL in September!!