23 Weeks

23 weeks. Remy is getting stronger and more active every day. A few times this week I experienced some jabs to the bladder - that's an interesting experience! He also seems to let me know when he wants me to sit up straighter in my chair or roll over in bed. Sometimes his movements are leisurely and sometimes they are furious. Ross hasn't felt him kick yet, but I'm sure he will any day now.

Moving around is getting more uncomfortable. When I stand up I sometimes get the unpleasant feeling that my protruding belly is not strong enough to support everything it's holding. Flipping over in the night is also getting trickier. Getting out of the bed or the bathtub now requires some upper body strength. It's making me wish I had kept up some kind of exercise during the first trimester. I can't even imagine what moving around will be like at 8 months.

I've started clearing out the nursery. We are using the L-shaped room with the half bath that has been my office/guest room. I've got one and a half closets clear and half a book case. Once everything is boxed up the desk will go into Ross's office, the book case will go into the basement, and the boxes will probably end up in the garage where they are less likely to get water damage.

After that the next step will be painting but I haven't figured out what color to go with yet. The bedding I've picked out is sage, espresso brown, and white. Right now I'm thinking maybe a soft, subtle yellow?

And the fun part will be putting in all the baby stuff! I haven't officially started my registry yet but I've started doing the research and I already have a lot of the big things picked out. We're going with a woodland animals theme and here is pic from the bedroom collection that I like.

Each new phase of pregnancy seems to bring its own worries. I don't worry about miscarriage anymore, but I do worry about preterm labor, and umbilical cord mishaps. Oh, and I had weird nightmare last night about amniotic fluid leaking out of my belly button. But with all this waiting, the worrying is inevitable and I think I am getting better about not letting it steal my joy.

And having my thyroid behave itself certainly helps me stay calm! I saw the endocrinologist this week and he said that everything seems to be going well. He said that I have Toxic Multinodular Goiter, also called Plummer's disease, and that it is so mild at the moment that it poses no real risk to me or the baby. In a couple of years he advises surgery because of the size of the lumps, but that is a long way off.

The next milestone with the medical stuff will be the Glucose Challenge Test for Gestational Diabetes in a couple of weeks. I'm hoping I'll get word about our Medicaid application before then, but I'm not holding my breath.