The Third

Yes, I am 5 months pregnant with our third child. 🙂 It’s the reason why I have been MIA for the first quarter of the year. It’s the reason why I was not able to renew my blog site on time, and had to pay a larger fee for doing so late. Thank you to the kind angel who tweeted me to tell me that she couldn’t access my site anymore. Obviously I have not been checking my emails either.

I am 36 years old, a year late in my plan to have our LAST baby. I had been very fickle about having another for a few valid reasons. Raising and homsechooling two active, strong-willed little girls is no easy task. I wondered if I could handle three children. Our daughters are growing up, becoming more and more independent. I wondered if I was willing to go back to square 1 — breastfeeding, diaper-changing, sleepless nights. King and I had gotten our dating groove back since the girls can more easily be left with a helper, friend or relative. I wondered if I was willing to give our child-free dates up, not to mention our desire to finally have a child-free vacation.

BUT since we don’t use artificial protection, not for any reason other than we are not comfortable doing so, and I am not ligated yet nor has King had (or is ever willing to have) a vasectomy, I could be surprised with a pregnancy in my late 30s and even 40s. I mean no disrespect to those who choose to have children at that age. I just really prefer to be younger to have the last baby, and I prefer not to be surprised. So even though I am already past my so-called deadline, it’s really now or never. Then I will have myself ligated when they open me up for a c-section. I noticed that there’s a baby boom too, and I truly felt we were going to be part of it.

My biggest apprehension, however, has always been the pregnancy. My first was okay. I had nausea, aversion to the smell of cooking, aversion to Chinese food, and I had no cravings during my first trimester. I was able to eat, and I actually threw up only a few times. I lost only about 6 pounds. My second was pretty bad because I threw up more, and it got to a point where I felt so weak that I asked King to take me to the ER. I chose to be confined so that I could get more fluids in me. I don’t remember losing more than 5 pounds since I was still able to eat certain food. Things normalized after the first trimester.

Although thankfully I had no problems with threatened abortion, bleeding or anything like that, I seriously did not want a repeat performance of my previous pregnancies. I asked God to give me a miracle — that when I get pregnant, I will have none of the problems I had before. We found out that I was pregnant a few days before Christmas day! We were so excited! And though I had been feeling bloated, sometimes nauseated and couldn’t eat my normal amounts, I could still eat. I was already thanking God for my miracle.

Sadly, it barely lasted two weeks.

The last day I was out in a mall, before my long hiatus, was January 2 for my nephew’s birthday. I couldn’t even join them inside the pizza place because I couldn’t handle the smell. I walked around, popping mints, and because I liked the smell of pretzels, I bought one and ate that. I was supposed to see my OB-GYN the next day, but I was not at all up for it. My daily battle with smells, vomiting, hyperacidity or acid reflux or whatever you want to call it, and not being able to eat anything began that week. I wasn’t even able to celebrate Noelle’s birthday with her. 😦

Please bear with me. I shall continue tomorrow.