Week 11

The pooch.  It's coming.  I mean...it's kind of already here.  And with the joys of hormonal fluctuations, it's basically THERE for all to view by dinnertime.  I'm still able to squeeze into my regular pants, especially in the morning.  But I've been doing this by post-lunch:

Still getting into my Gap skinnies!

and by dinner I basically need to switch to sweats.  Ah yes - giving up my body for my child.  What all women do.  But we don't have to love it.  I'm allowed a little venting.

How far along: 11 weeks, 1 day
What did baby do this week: Baby is the size of a fig or small lime and is between 1 3/4" - 2" long.  Its head is the same size as its body and will stay that way for a while.  S/he is going to start growing quickly now and goes through a growth spurt over the next three weeks.  The ears are moving to the side of the head.  Fingernails are beginning to form!
Total weight gain: 5.6 pounds
Symptoms: Same as I've had which really hasn't been a lot (*thankful*).  I've been noticing that my breasts and belly (and my lower back just above my butt) have been really itchy the last week or so.  I don't know what's going on with my lower back, but I was guessing that the itchiness on my breasts/belly was because of my skin stretching.  I haven't noticed much growth in my breasts - my bras feel fine, but my belly has definitely gotten bigger as I mentioned above.  A good friend gave me some oil to keep stretchmarks at bay.  I'll talk more about it at the end of this post.  :)
Queasy or Sick: I think it's getting better, even though it was never too bad to begin with.  Essentially I started noticing slight queasiness a little past 7 weeks and here I am a month later thinking the queasiness is subsiding slightly.  That's really not a bad deal at all.
Sleep: Haven't been very tired.  In fact I feel like I'm back to my pre-pregnant self going to bed around midnight.  I do get at least 8 hours of sleep since I've been getting into work a tad later while I tend to my slight morning queasiness.  And I haven't had much trouble sleeping other than the same peeing all night...
Best moment this week: Telling more friends and family!  After we got the MaterniT21 test results back mid-week (read more about this below) I felt VERY comfortable sharing our news with some close family and friends.  We plan to tell some more family at a 4th of July party this weekend!
Hardest part of the week: This week was good!  No complaints.  :)
Looking forward to: When my butt no longer hurts and my upper-outside thigh is no longer numb from the progesterone shots.  We stopped the shots a week and a half ago, but it’s still recovering, I guess.  Dr. A said this can take a while to go back to normal.  I keep waiting...

Movement: I keep reading that there is LOTS of movement going on just like we saw in our ultrasound last week.  I can't wait until I can feel it!
Food cravings: Basically the same as I've been having.  Carbs are AMAZING.  Lately I've really been craving Rice Krispy treats but trying not to give in.  I'm trying not to eat too much sugar (I know...I've been eating carbs and that turns to sugar) in order to avoid gestational diabetes if possible.  There's a slight family history of diabetes (occurring late in life) so I feel that I should try to be cognizant of this.
Happy or moody: Just feeling normal.  And lazy...still with the lazy.  Not even always directly associated with queasiness.
Labor signs: No
Maternity clothes: I've come to the conclusion that I do need maternity pants/shorts.  I went shopping this past weekend thinking I could just get away with the next size up in pants.  But that's not the case.  I guess (it's a good thing) the size increase is really just in my midsection, so a size up in pants is way too big around my butt and legs even if it fits my waist.  It feels too soon for me to buy maternity pants - but I guess I'll have to do it.  I bought some maternity lounge pants/shorts but just couldn't bring myself to buy any work pants.  I don't know what my problem is.  So I keep doing the rubber-band trick I shared above.  Maybe I'll bite the bullet and buy some maternity work pants in the next couple weeks.  At least it'll let me feel like I made it out of my first trimester in regular clothes!
Belly button in or out: In
Wedding rings on or off: On
Stretch marks: No
Learnings from the week: A good friend gave me a bottle of this as a "pregnancy gift".  She used it all through her pregnancy and had zero stretchmarks.  Her sister had twins and had the same results.  In fact, my friend said, in addition to reading the reviews on the website, everyone she's given the oil to has avoided stretchmarks.  Now maybe everyone has amazing genes and oily/moisturized skin and it's just a coincidence.  But I'm planning to use it every night starting this week and will likely keep up through pregnancy.  It has a very strong herbal smell, but I can tolerate it even with my heightened olfactory system!
Final Thoughts:  I mentioned above that we did the MaterniT21 test.  It's a blood test taken at week 10 and takes about a week for the results to come back.  Now obviously we did the PGS on all of our embryos and were about 99% confident both on the gender of our baby and that there were no chromosomal abnormalities.  But there is always that small margin of error.  MaterniT21 is inexpensive ($165 with my insurance) and gave us another confidence that our baby was Negative for abnormalities in chromosomes 21, 18 and 13.  It also confirmed our baby's gender.  So no surprises at all for us and we now feel 100% (ok I have to admit: 99.9%) comfortable sharing our news with more and more of the world in the next weeks.  It's a fun time being near the end of the first trimester and about ready to start letting the cat out of the bag!!