Bump Pictures and Gender Revealed

 Survival Tip #16: A picture really does tell a thousand words.

So, here it is! My bump pictures! In honor of tomorrow marking the half way point of my pregnancy, I thought I would finally share our pictures with you. Vander has been taking a monthly picture of me and I finally uploaded all of them and made a collage. This has been a bit difficult because I hate using the flash on my DSLR because it washes everything out, but it has been SOOOO continually cloudy this spring there was not much sun to help things out. So forgive me for that :). Anyways, let's start with month 1.

Month 1

I had no clue that if you find out you are pregnant the day of your missed period, you are already 1 month along! Crazy. So this is a few days after we found out. Look how happy I am!

Month 2

Ugh. Can you see the look on my face how sick I feel. I tried to smile, but look how pale I am. That is not just Washington weather. That is constant puking for you. I had actually lost 6 lbs at this point. Boo.

Month 3

Okay, feeling a bit better. This was actually a week into the fourth month. I had been on Zofan for one week and it was remarkable! I was finally able to eat and keep food down. At my 3 month appointment I had lost another 5 lbs. so there wasn't any gain in padding, but I had just popped a bit. It was funny because it just happened all of a sudden. I thought it would be a slow, progressive thing, but one day I was really bloated, and then 2 days later the bloated feeling went away and the bump stayed!

Month 4

Remember what I was saying about everything just popping up? Yeah, that continued this month. It feels like every weekend I get a bloated feeling and then I get bigger. I LOVE my bump! It makes me feel more maternal, even though it is a totally physical thing, and it not related to how I interact with the baby. It makes me feel more pregnant, and not just sick.

So here is the collage of all four, to see them side-by-side.

Gender

   And the results are in! We had the best ultrasound appointment. Last Wednesday the anatomy scan took us an hour and we soaked up every minute we got.  Before the scan I had been feeling like we might be having a girl, but I thought that was probably just because I am a girl and I don't understand what it is like to be a little boy :). Then we got the appointment and I started to think we were having a boy. I mentally began to think of the baby using the terms "he" and "his". We found out the gender pretty early in the appointment. I was looking at the screen and thought I saw some boy parts, and started to get a little anxious.  While I was staring at the screen the tech said "See right here (gesturing with the cursor to an area I was not looking at)? That means this is a little Girl."(Did the pictures give it away for any of you?)

    I instantly burst into tears. It was such a primal, out of body urge to cry. Later a second tech came in to confirm the first tech had all the right photos and get a few more. She was looking at Baby and said "Oh yeah, that's a little girl!" At one point I looked over and told Vander that I thought he was going to be the best dad to our little girl. He looked at me with the saddest face and said "I just know she'll break my heart some day." It was so sweet and tender. I really can't wait to see him parent our daughter! 

    We are going to keep her name a surprise for as long as we can, hopefully until she is born, unless we let it slip. Please pray for our daughter as she continues to develop. We cannot wait to meet her!