A Day of First's

Sunday was a big day for me! Mostly because I went to my first mom's club event. I found this group online that seems pretty great. It's a Meetup group, which has been great for me so far because they have message boards and whatnot that I was able to participate in before we even got to Kansas (in addition to all of the real-life get-together activities they have). So, I've emailed with a couple people in the group (one's from Chicago originally) and put some posts on the message boards, but Sunday was my day to actually meet real people. They have a monthly book club, so I figured that was a good thing to go to without a kid. :) The people I met were great, so welcoming and really encouraged me to come to the playdates even before the baby is born. They said they ususally spend most of the time socializing while the kids play, anyway, so it would probably be more fun for me pre-baby, since I won't have to worry about keeping an eye on my kid.

The other first was that I believe I had my first Braxton Hicks contractions during church on Sunday. The doctor said anything that comes on suddenly, takes your breath away, but doesn't increase in frequency or intensity is probably BH. The first one definitely took my breath away! We're at the end of the 2nd trimester now and I'm feeling the baby move a ton. It's interesting how this is such a positive thing, but also makes me way more paranoid than before. :) Before I could feel her, we just had to trust that everything was developing as it should. Now there are all sorts of new and different sensations all the time and the more intense ones make me a little nervous that something's wrong. Ian and I were saying the other day that it's good that I'm going to start seeing the doctor every 2 weeks (now that I'm in the 3rd trimester) instead of every 4 like I had been throughout the pregnancy. I used to be totally fine for the first 3 weeks, but completely convinced something was wrong with the baby by the day of my appointment. I just went to the dr. last week and kinda wish my next appointment were a little sooner than next week!

We have discovered one other first in the past several weeks that isn't so fun... it looks like I have my first real negative pregnancy symptom. Apparently, my gallbladder has had it with being pregnant and has decided to make its protest loud and clear. It could be from the overabundance of fast food we ate during our move, but that's around when I started noticing regular pain in my right side. It's gotten a lot worse in the past few weeks and I'm loosely back to my first trimester diet - rice, crackers, bread, oatmeal... anything without much flavor, basically. We've determined that there isn't an infection that could hurt the baby - just obnoxious pain for me - so I've rebelled against my new diet a couple times. Somehow, I decided it would be fine if we went out for Mexican food one night. Not so smart, really. It would have been worth it if it were fabulous Mexican food, though. :) I'm too far along now for them to consider surgery (although they sometimes do during 2nd trimester) and all the medical treatments are a no-go for pregnant women. So basically, I just have to suck it up for a few more months. We'll probably end up having the surgery done about 6 weeks after the baby's born. So, it's certainly not the worst thing that could happen and I'm so thankful it's nothing that will bother the baby, but it's probably not going to help this last trimester go by very quickly. Boo.