I am now 38 weeks preggo.
I was going to name this entry “The Waiting Game”, but lo and behold that’s what I named the last one. ‘Mom Brain’ has apparently kicked in full force… that point where all the blood is detouring straight to your uterus and bypassing your already overworked mind, causing full contact bouts of forgetfulness and generalized DUH. Mom Brain paired with my already low attention span (shiny!) and a job in the radio industry (too much information flying at you everyday!) is a lethal combination. In fact, I have a meme taped to my console in the Lite Rock studio that sums it up succinctly: “I can’t brain today, I have The Dumb.”
Upon self-photographing my bulbous baby bump in the mirror a few days ago, I realized that here we are at 38 weeks which flew by, and I never did take the opportunity to document my pregnancy in a professionally pleasing visual manner. No really great B&W portraits of Anthony and I cradling a bulging belly to hang in the hallway, for baby to be embarrassed of when he’s a teenager. A lost opportunity at that, especially after checking out all the great Pinterest posts I’ve seen of really creative prenatal shots.
Creatively deflated, I put together a few of my self-portrait bump pix from throughout this journey and realized just how much I popped out over the last few months.
Funny, the first ‘bump’ photo I took, I was starting to freak out because I wasn’t fitting into anything. “OMG I am SO big”… HA! Yeah right, looking back I look really skinny at 16 wks… I’ll feel blessed if I can get back to that size in a reasonable amount of time. I guess it didn’t really strike me how large I’d finally become until I kept getting stains on my shirts from the inevitable falling of greasy food (the bump is a catch-all) and continuously opening doors or trying to squeeze by chairs and smacking the poor Buddha on the way by. Sorry baby, mommy is clumsy. 🙁
Mom Brain has given way just a bit to a sense of boredom I guess you could say. I’ve done so much over the past few weeks to prepare myself for this point, that I’m finding that I don’t have as much to do, and I’m getting a little stir crazy. Anthony and I have pretty much gotten the baby’s room together, have gotten the major projects relatively finished and stable, and are keeping the house clean… okay ya caught me – scratch that last part – it’s wishful thinking – the house is a disaster area, and I don’t care to sweep or wipe down the counters anymore. It no longer piques my interest because it’s just gonna get messy again. No sense in being obsessive about it.
So I’ll sit down, start checking work emails, and chill out on the couch – then I’ll feel a twinge…a tightening of the belly… a sort of cramp… and realize that I’m having, and HAVE been having, ye ol’ Braxton Hicks contractions (a false labor of a sorts). Now, in saying that, I don’t want anyone jumping to any conclusions – I’m NOT in labor. Alright? Nix that right now. No panic mode. Trust me, as soon as I am, word will get out quick. Probably on the radio – lol!
Last night I realized that my belly is stretched so tight now that not only has my naval disappeared and flattened out into the landscape of my stomach (as well as my piercing scar), but the skin around that entire area has sort of gone slightly itchy and NUMB. A strange and alarming feeling… like the alien is going to burst through my abdomen at any moment. The only relief I’m getting from this is cupping and lifting up on my stomach as I walk…heck, even as I’m sitting here thinking of what to type next, I lift up on the belly to give myself some relief. I’m thinking I need a belly bra… perhaps I can fashion something out of a back brace and some suspenders. HIGHLY fashionable, especially with my go-to yoga pants. At this point I really don’t care what I look like. I almost came to work with my ratty slippers on this morning, as I couldn’t comfortably bend over to zip up my boots.
I finally know why many moms get to a point of saying “Get this kid OUT!”. His lease is certainly up.
