Pregnancy Blog – Update 6

Week 32: Day 2
227 days down; 54 days to go

I want to express my gratitude, and appreciation to those individuals who check in on me, and how things are going with this pregnancy. I am more than willing to share my experience, anything about me, and my training, views, positive or negative, and am very open about how I feel in the moment or otherwise.   I know the emotional rollercoaster that a pregnant woman embarks on is not an easy one, or (at times) for the people around her.

I want to say, ‘Thank you’, in advance, in case I happen to ever forget to mention, or seem self-absorbed. Your support, written verbal or in personal message mean the world to me, and help me on those days when all I really wish to do is lay in bed.

Thank you.

After last blog post, the time has passed quite quickly. I was in Mexico at the time, vacationing with the family, and friends, and had an amazing time. The resort we stayed at was very family friendly and there were lots of babies (like really new babies – 4 weeks old etc), and many pregnant ladies. I did not feel alone or even concerned about my belly. My son, however, had a different response to my growing belly and told me in not so many words to ‘cover up’. I obviously ignored him, but it is interested how he has experienced probably his first but not the last ‘moment of embarrassment’ when it comes to his parents.

I am proud of my belly, and really am not overly big.  Things are still tight where they need be. It was hot in Mexico – so most of the time I was under an umbrella. Full sun does not agree with me (even though I love the sun), yet, my skin reacts poorly to direct sun, and even more poorly now since my hormones are all over the place.  My last pregnancy left me with rosacea, and when I get too much sun or even large amounts of humidity, even with a good sunscreen, it flares up.

Before I went on Christmas vacation I had my 26-28 weeks glucose tolerance test. They give you 50g of glucose, you sit for one hour, and then re-test your blood sugar.

The results were inconclusive to whether or not I had gestational diabetes, meaning they were in a grey range. The grey range is between 8mmol/L and 11mmol/L.  The outcome of this ‘grey range’ is that for one week, I had to test my blood sugar 4x per day (when I remember) for a total of 28 samples. All of my data have been below the given range, and I don’t expect to have to make any dietary adjustments, (like eating less carbs). I submitted my results, and they called me back, saying that I do not have gestational diabetes, and good luck with the rest of my pregnancy.

I was surprised that I had to do this, however, I just took it as a learning situation, and now I am well informed on gestational diabetes, and testing my glucose. I consider it a bonus that I ended up with a free glucose meter. The testing strips however, would be a separate purchase if I needed them in the future.  I did see one time that my blood glucose was low, and had an actual reading for it, but I know when I have low blood sugar as I can feel it. But it is just interesting none the less.

Update: I asked my doctor what exactly was my result after 1 hour and she reported 7.2mmol/L.

Training:

Since my last post, I managed 3 workouts during the vacation, one pole fitness class, and two other workouts at my gym upon my return. On average 2x per week training. I am not proud of my lack of work done in the gym.  However, I go with how I feel on the day, and at times when I am up at 4am for clients, by mid day I have very little energy to continue with a workout.  At this point I put my recovery ahead of my training.

Every time I train my client or see others who compete, in person or online, I realize how much I miss training hard. After my last training, I felt my glutes were sore for two days (awesome!), and started to feel quite a bit of hip pain/joint pain, so the rest of this week, there was very little weight training. My goal is to get in 2x training next week, and if I do, I will feel accomplished.

The hip pain (which is believe to be in the normal range) is worse when I sit working on the computer, and have to get up and walk around. It is like everything is seizing, rusting, and I have to take the time to ‘work out’ the stiffness that comes from sitting at a desk. This blog is being written standing up, as I have to save my ‘sitting’ for hockey games, and transition from place to place in the car for my son’s activities. I am starting to feel ‘feet’ in my ribs, and this was a constant with my son the first time. His feet hit me right in the sternum and I will probably feel something similar by the end of this pregnancy. It is intermittent right now, but as the baby grows, I expect near the end to be more constant.

To give you an idea of how my training is going nowadays, here is one day in my training log book:

Nutrition:

My nutrition has been the same for the most of the pregnancy. I don’t mind eating the same foods most of the time.   Here is what I am eating this past 3 weeks: Protein pancakes, protein shakes, bananas, milk (lots of milk – I actually crave milk), salads, cheese, avocados, eggs (boiled or scrambled), bread, and oatmeal or granola, blueberries and carrots.

I try not to eat at restaurants too often as the portions are just much to large, and most times they won’t let the adult order the ‘child’s meal’. I also end up with heartburn so bad that I don’t eat big meals on purpose to avoid the heartburn. Soda water does cause me to have worse heartburn as it is carbonated. I have tried to not drink it but I do find it refreshing. Coffee I have cut back significantly and do drink decaf every now and again or half caf.

General Wellness:

Sleeping at night is starting to become intermittent, and very uncomfortable. My belly is at the point when I lay on my back, it crushes me, and I cannot breathe. I try to sleep on left side (recommended) or the right side just to get comfortable but either hip will fall asleep and now at times it is my arms that fall asleep and go numb so of course I have to switch to the other side – if only for a moment.  I tried a pillow between the legs to help with the hip pain and keep things alignment, yet I have found the pillows to be too large, and use folded blankets instead and that seems to help. My hips in general are loosening up which is a good thing, yet, I can feel when they out of alignment, and things need to pop back in. The other night I felt grinding the sacroiliac joint, and if I lay in one position, relax, and then try to get up, things tend to shift (not always in a good way) and as I get up they have to ‘pop’ back in place.  I have to stay relaxed in order help shift things back to a comfortable spot.  I have returned to my chiropractor to make sure that things are moving well, and all is aligned for the day of delivery.

A new pregnancy pain has developed. I now have rib pain. Yes, rib pain. Sitting makes this rib pain worse. I feel as though my ribs are expanding, and extends around to my back. There is less room for the baby as my belly is stretched to its limit (but I am sure there is always more stretching that could happen) but now the baby has decided to grow upwards, or push all my other organs upwards, into the diagram, thus expanding my rib cage. Light foam rolling, and stretching has been a great relief. I understand more what my tighter clients go through when they are mouthing ‘f-bombs’ at me when I get them to do any type of foam rolling.

Heartburn comes and goes.  I have protein shake and get heartburn. But apparently this is completely normal. The hormone relaxin relaxes more than just your joints. It also relaxes the esophageal sphincter, that prevents the backward flow of stomach contents coming back up your esphophagus. They say to stop eating 3 hours before bedtime, however, less food, before bed ensures that I will be up in the night.   I get hungry. I get up anyways 3-4x per night as I have to pee so much, so I make one of the times a midnight snack time.

I turned to ice cream last pregnancy to lessen the burn, and seemed fine during the night, maybe I need to try to this again, and see how it goes?

(Side note: I tried a few bites of ice cream before bed, just vanilla, plus extra time to digest, and well, heartburn seems to be lessened. Whatever works at this time right?)

I have noticed I wake up at regular intervals, and midnight seems to be the regular time. Interesting how little sleep I can go on, and still function normally – however, if you asked me to train hard, and still try to recover – I would not be able to do it. I have discovered over the years, that I am an individual that needs their sleep. No sleep, and every thing else in my life training, food, energy all deteriorate.

This blog is a reflection of how I am feeling in this moment, and to give an overview of the ups and downs that I am going through during this pregnancy.    I am realizing that pregnancy for me, is physically and mentally tough.  I lose control of my body for a period of time, and even though I understand this, accepting it can be tough.  I still have moments when I think I am in my other body, and then I get a reality check that I am not (or a big kick in the belly from the baby).

As you can see, my belly is expanding weekly.  The lack of belly I had in the beginning of the pregnancy is making its way full force into the world now.  I bang into things, not realizing how wide I actually am, end up with food on my shirt, when cooking or eating and have an even smaller selection of ‘bigger’ clothes to choose from.  I don’t remember any of these things from when I had my son.  I guess what they say is correct – – we do all forget once the process is over.

Would love to hear from you.

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