25 weeks and an eggplant

So apparently today is the last of the (relatively) low stress ob appointments.  Starting in January I have to do another glucose test (doesn’t bother me as I’m not horribly ill as I was last time), and they’ll check my “iron stores”, and then after that it’s coming in every two weeks.  I’m fairly confident about the glucose test, but I’m sure I’ll fail the iron test.  Hopefully it just means supplements and not the dreaded “you have to eat red meat now” discussion.  Somehow I doubt it’ll come to that. 

As usual had a minor freak out while waiting.  This means nothing – it’s just that old creepy stuff about fear of doctors and hospitals, because of my history.  I was able to get over it fairly easily.  But I have to say the idea of spending a lot more time in doctors offices, being poked and prodded a lot more, and more at stake every time, makes me very uncomfortable.  In fact, I hate it.  A big part of me wants to play hooky and just not see anyone again until I go into labor.  Of course I won’t do that, but it is tempting.  Kind of reminds me of the scene in Heartburn where Meryl Streep is in labor and says, “I don’t want to do it, honey, can’t we get someone else to do it?”

One fun thing was the midwife showed me how to feel the baby’s head.  I was surprised at how high up it was – it was this softball-type thing above my belly button to the right.  So right now I have a baby doll inside of me.  Or an eggplant, based on the size on the WTE app.  I guess I can see that – there’s no denying the belly at this point.  I certainly look like I’m heading into the third trimester, absolutely.

Just for fun I thought I’d list some 2^nd trimester pregnancy-related issues I’ve had:

Occasional nosebleeds (due to increased blood volume, apparently)

Heartburn (couple of Tums knocks it out every time – no big whoop)

Small red breakouts on my upper arms, also apparently due to increased blood volume

Other than these, everything else is smooth sailing right now.  Haven’t seen any stretch marks, but I expect these to come later (my mother’s body is positively riddled with them).  Weight gain is still slightly more than normal (it’s about 20 pounds as of today) and I was told again to watch it, but how exactly am I going to do that with four Christmas parties, plus Christmas, plus traveling over New Year’s, in the next two weeks?  Plus the fact that it’s cold and gloomy here and all I want to eat is comfort food.  I’m not eating anymore than usual, but it’s just that time of year.  If it were summer it would be a snap to just eat lots of fresh food, salads, cottage cheese, etc.  But trying to diet right now, a week out from Christmas, and six months pregnant?  Ah…no.  I’m not even going to attempt it.  So I’ve pretty much accepted the fact that this is going to be a 35-40 pounder.  It’s ok – there’s so little time left now, I feel like I can relax a little.  I mean, I’m not going to suddenly put on 20 pounds per month; it’ll just be 5-6 pounds instead of the recommended 4.  Eh, so what.