Yall, the past few weeks have been rough. First there was the miscarriage and the diagnosis of an abnormal uterus. I mean, that was enough for me. But there's been something else going on, too, that has made it a particularly rough time lately.

My little L has been having these "episodes" during which she seems to lose muscle control. At first, they were very few and far between and she would literally fall to the ground and be unable to stand or walk for a minute or two. Talk about scary! During the last three months or so, though, L has been experiencing these episodes more often than she was before, although they seem to be a little bit less severe.

So, we've been making the rounds to the pediatrician and then the pediatric neurologist to see if we can find out what is happening. Last week we reported to the hospital at the awful hour of 7:45 am to hook my darling up and have an EEG done. I'll write more about that experience later, but the short story is that when we met with the neurologist again last Thursday we found out her EEG came back normal (praise God!).

That sounds really great, right? Well it is, except it doesn't really tell us anything. They thought she might be experiencing seizures and have epilepsy. According to the neurologist, an EEG will pick up about 80% of pediatric epilepsy cases, so there is quite a bit of room for error. So, we're having a second EEG done in about a month since apparently a repeat EEG can sometimes pick up something a previous one might have missed. If that comes back normal and the episodes continue, we will have to do a day-stay EEG in which we get to hang out at the hospital all day with L hooked up.

Other things we talked about that could be the cause of these episodes are low blood sugar, an auto-immune disorder, something going on with her nervous system - either some kind of disorder or it could just be an overload of the system because she is growing so much (something she might just mature out of), or - and I HATE even writing this possibility down - a brain tumor. That last one there scares the pants off of me.

During this last appointment the neurologist said that he doesn't think she's having seizures. We're going to continue testing in case she does since seizures can manifest in many different ways, but, he really doesn't think that's the problem. So, if both the next regular EEG and the day-stay EEG come back normal then we're going to talk about having an MRI done to rule out anything like a (gulp) tumor. We also had to buy a blood glucose monitor this weekend so we can attempt to test her blood sugar during the next episode.

So, yea, this has been super stressful. Last week was especially stressful with the EEG and the neurologist appointments and she had an episode on Tuesday. For two weeks before last week we had out of town company and right before that was my diagnosis and right before that was the miscarriage and by the end of last week I felt like I was ready to lose it. But, after a wonderful "stay-cation" this past weekend I feel a lot better today. Much less stressed, much more happy.

Please forgive me for not stopping by your blogs and commenting very much - my time at the computer has been limited and when I am able to get online I find myself spending the time googling things about pediatric epilepsy and hypoglycemia in toddlers. I hope all has been well with you guys lately.

Another hard thing, which started out as a wonderful thing, is that both of my sister in laws happen to be pregnant. All three of us were due within about a month and a half of each other. I can't tell you how excited I was about that - three cousins so close in age, growing up together, a pack of ready-made friends is what I imagined. Plus, it was so much fun to be pregnant together! One sister in law of mine, T, and I spend quite a bit of time together, and it was fabulous to be pregnant at the same time again (her son and L are just a few months apart).

But now, that whole pregnant sister in law thing sucks. I mean, of course I'm happy for them and am excited about the impending new arrivals, but for me, this sucks. They are both a very real reminder of what we have lost. It hurts to just think about T's baby belly and the fact that I should have one about now, too. I hate thinking about the fall, when those two babies will be born, and the fact that there will be no new baby coming home to this house. It feels to me as if there will forever be a cousin missing from that little gang.

Plus, it's not like these ladies are mere acquaintances that I can just manage to avoid. These ladies are family. Almost every week or so T and I get together during the day to see each other and let the kiddos play and we get together with the hubby's in tow at least a few times a month. My other sister in law and I usually see each other at least once or twice a month at a family dinner.

So, T has been out of town since before my miscarriage and is due back tomorrow. Her hubby wants everybody to meet her at the airport to welcome her back to town. I would love to. I seriously would. I've missed her and would like to see her - but when I think about being faced with her burgeoning belly and people talking about her pregnancy, well, it kind of makes me cry. I can't help but thinking "that should be me, too". I should be greeting her at the airport with a baby belly, we should be commiserating about our pregnancies, we should still be doing this together.

And that is hard. Really hard.

Thanks for the kind words, I appreciate it. I really do.

I said I would write later about the other issues that are playing into this miscarriage, so here I am keeping my word and writing about one of these issues - my extra special uterus.

During our first ultrasound with this pregnancy it was discovered that there was something wrong with my uterus. After the miscarriage we had another ultrasound done in which my OB told me I either had a septum or a bicornuate uterus. Determining which it was couldn't be done reliably with my OB's regular old ultrasound machine, so I was scheduled for a fancier, 3-D ultrasound which was done last week. I have been diagnosed with having a bicornuate uterus, and there is essentially nothing that can be done about it. At least if I had a septum it could be fixed surgically.

Basically, a bicornuate uterus is a uterus which isn't shaped normally. It kind of looks like a heart (so much so that it's often called a "heart shaped uterus"), where as a normal uterus looks like a balloon. As one type of mullerian anomaly, it is part of a group of uterine abnormalities that occurs in about 3% of the population. My specific anomaly occurs in about .5% of the population, so I'm amazingly unique. Aren't I lucky?

With that diagnosis comes these associated risks - an increased risk of premature labor, an increased risk of recurrent miscarriage, an increased risk of an incompetent cervix, an increased risk of intra-uterine growth restriction, an increased risk of trouble getting pregnant, an increased risk of placental problems and an increased chance of having a breech or transverse baby. So, all that sucks. Like, a lot.

The whole increased risk of preterm labor and an incompetent cervix worry me a lot because of my mother's history - 7 pregnancies, 2 living children (my brother and I). Out of 7 pregnancies, 1 was a miscarriage, 1 was a blighted ovum, and the other 5 had complications from preterm labor and incompetent cervix issues. I have a sister who lived about 45 minutes after being born when my mother's cervix just gave way far too early.

The increased risk of recurrent miscarriage frankly just scares the crap out of me. I mean, miscarriages already scared the crap out of me, and now I find out I have an even higher chance than I thought of having another one. Ugh and also, no thanks. Miscarriages suck and I really, really, really would like to never have another one, like ever.

So, there you have it folks, my uterus is so incredibly special that I get to worry about all kinds of things on top of all the things I already worried about in relation to pregnancy. And I'm a top-notch pregnancy worrier, so I can't even imagine how super awesome my next go round is going to be. I mean, like, I get to worry even more than I do already? Wow, how utterly crap-tastic!

Well, hello there. Yes, it's been awhile. I'm sorry, I've just been in a funk and haven't felt much like writing.

The pregnancy went south about a week ago and I miscarried. I have a ton of emotions about it, I am mixed up, I am all over the place and I am up and down. A lot.

During the day, I hold it together very well. I do my usual stuff and take care of L (although the house is obviously lacking in some much needed TLC), we play outside, read books, snuggle and laugh. During the day, I am sad but okay. L is very healing and this miscarriage has been much easier to deal with. I watch her laughing and singing and dancing and think that it's pretty hard to be depressed with her around.

At night, once I can unwind a bit, my mind begins to race and to really think on this pregnancy, the miscarriages, the losses, our future, our family. Many nights I have a very hard time falling asleep as I just cannot seem to shut off the stream of thoughts related to this miscarriage. There are other issues I'll write about later that add to this, but let's just say that there is a lot my brain has been forcing me to think about.

I'm sorry this is such a bummer post, what a way to come back, eh? But, this is where I am right now. I debated all week about whether or not to even keep writing here, but ultimately I decided it's my blog and I can write about feeling sad and miscarriages and unhappy stuff if that's what I want to do. Hopefully yall won't mind sticking with me through all this. If it's too much doom and gloom for you though, I understand.

Hope you all have been doing well lately, I've missed you.

Just really tired and feeling sick all the time. L's naptimes are my usual blogging time, but lately I've been sleeping or resting or feeling awful during naps, so blogging is not getting my attention. Please forgive me if I'm absent for a little while.

Oh! We did have our first OB appointment earlier this week and got to see a beautiful little heart beating away on the ultrasound!

Will you please continue to pray with me for a healthy pregnancy and baby? Thank you so much!

Cause yall, I am so dang tired. And I can't even blame it on L's crappy sleep this time either, as she slept really well last night and so did I. I'm thinking the culprit is the pregnancy - I spent pretty much the entire first trimester of both of my other pregnancies exhausted all the time. In the afternoon, I'd come home from work, fall asleep just about immediately, sleep until hubby got home about two hours later, get up to eat dinner and hang with hubby a little bit, and then hit the sack super early every night. Even with the extra 4-5 hours of sleep everyday, I was still always tired.

As I'm sure you can imagine, I'm not currently getting anywhere near 4-5 extra hours of sleep a day. Although I have begun napping while L naps in the afternoon, which is nice, but I only end up getting about 45 minutes or an hour of sleep.

So, yes, I am so tired. We've been watching far too much tv in this house the past few days because Mommy just really needs to lay in bed for a little while. Generally, I am not a fan of tv, but hey, whatever gets me a few minutes of rest is good with me right now. Hopefully this will pass quickly and I'll be back to my regular, just mildly sleeply all the time, self.

I can't wait to try out this homemade black bean veggie burger recipe. We usually buy the frozen kind anyway, and these would be much healthier. I think if I have time soon I'll make a big batch and freeze a bunch for quick, easy dinners.

Since I'm still nursing L, I've been spending some time reading through this FAQ for nursing during pregnancy and tandem nursing.

The exploding box and mini heart bag are so cute! Take a look at these paper craft ideas from Kaiser Craft.

Over the next few months I'm going to try to whip up a few pairs of these DIY Babylegs for the new baby. We use cloth diapers, which are bulkier than disposables, and it can be hard to find pants that will fit over the cloth - pants these days are cut to fit over the super slim disposables. Having a stash of these will mean baby's legs can still be warm but I don't have to ignore my cloth diapers during the winter.

Any good links you'd like to share? Feel free to post them in the comments section!

Reading is one of my favorite things to do, so I've already started working on a list of the books I want to make sure I read (or read again) during this pregnancy.

Ina May's Guide To Childbirth was by far my favorite read during L's pregnancy and I plan on buying it this time around instead of continuously rechecking it out from the library for six months. I love everything about this book, the practical information, the birth stories, the assuring tone it is written in, just everything. Can't wait to get my hands on it again!

The Baby Book is fantastic - it covers just about anything you could ever want to know about a little baby. This was another one of the books I checked out during L's pregnancy and I ended up buying it. It was a great resource to have around the house after she was born.


This isn't a book (although there is a book that goes with this DVD), but hubby and I really enjoyed watching this DVD while pregnant with L. I've got it somewhere, just have to dig it out so we can watch it again.



Any suggestions for me? Books about pregnancy, labor, childbirth, breastfeeding or babies you recommend?

Emily has graciously asked me to join her in writing over at her fitness blog, come check us out! We'll be chronicling our journey to better health with just 15 minutes a day of exercise.

When I was pregnant with L, I gave up all caffeine until my third trimester, and even then I only had a soda every once in awhile. Sure, it was hard, I did really enjoy a Dr. Pepper on sluggish afternoons at work, but this time around cutting out the caffeine is proving to be much harder already.

Take this morning for example. I'm tired, really tired, after being up with L for quite a bit last night. Which makes the allure of the coffeemaker hard to ignore. There is sits, on my kitchen counter, beckoning to me. It doesn't help that hubby had coffee before he left for work which means I can still smell it, too.

I know lots of pregnant women drink coffee and soda throughout their pregnancies and it's no big deal, but it's something hubby and I decided last time around that would be good to avoid.
Google has shown me that there is conflicting advice out there about caffeine in pregnancy, some recommend you stay under 300 mg a day. Some recommend you switch to decaf. Some recommend you don't drink decaf or any caffeine for that matter. I'm trying hard to follow that last piece of advice, but I'm finding myself pulled toward a cup of decaf, or even a cup of regular coffee on those mornings when I'm really dragging.

What did all of you do when you were pregnant? Did you cut out the caffeine?

So I'm not even sure what to say. I have so many emotions about this pregnancy and it's only been a few days since I found out about it!

Of course I'm excited. Thinking about a new baby, a new little life forming in me, is so amazing. I look at L and think how could I not want to do this again? How could I not want to experience all this again? I think about how nice it will be for L to have a sibling, for our family to grow, for there to be more love in our home.

And then I remember what life was like with a newborn L. The sleep deprivation, the incredible pain I experienced when first breastfeeding, just how hard it was for the first bit with a new baby in the house - I think about all of this and then break out into a cold sweat. How am I going to do this? How am I going to do all of this newborn stuff and take good care of L at the same time? Will I ever sleep again?

Then comes the doubt. The doubt about whether this pregnancy will end with a healthy baby. Sometimes I catch myself pushing away excitement for fear of getting too attached. I know what it's like to be heartbroken from the loss of a pregnancy and I don't want to be in that place again.

But in the end, I decide I've got to celebrate this new little person - no matter how long his life maybe. I truly believe in life at conception, I believe this little person has a soul, I believe this little person is important and I can't ignore that. I'm not the only one who has a stake in this and I shouldn't be so selfish as to think that.

Which takes me back to being excited and then I cycle through all these emotions all over again.

I'm kind of a mess lately. In a good way.

:)

Guess what folks? I'm pregnant!!!!

I just found out this morning, I'm in a bit of a shock, super excited and a little nervous.

Please pray with me for another healthy baby!!

I mentioned in this post that one of the most helpful things I've done on my long journey to good money management skills was to take stock of where all my money was actually going. This was enormously critical for me to do, not that it necessarily changed anything other than my perspective, but because it was such a shock to me that I was so terrible with my money.

What I did was print out my bank statement for the previous three months and sat down with a few different colored highlighters. I then went through my statements highlighting each and every transaction, using the highlighter colors as a way to categorize things. Some of the categories I used were fast food/eating out, bills, clothing, entertainment, etc.

After I highlighted everything I went back and added up the totals for each of my categories, fully expecting that the bills category would end up with the highest total. I mean, that's why I was always broke, right? Cause my bills were so expensive? Ha! Was I ever ashamed of myself. You want to know what category took the cake as the category with the highest total? Fast food and eating out. Yup. Entertainment was second. Groceries were third, even though I was obviously eating out quite a bit.

So taking stock of where I was actually spending my money as opposed to where I thought I was spending my money was the kick in the pants I needed to get more serious about my finances.

Over the years I have gone from being short on cash each and every month to having a bit of a buffer each and every month. Unlike in the past, I no longer have to scrape together enough money to pay the electricity bill in the hopes the company doesn't shut our power off. For years I was a chronically late-paying, always over-spending and never-saving kind of gal.

Hubby has always been excellent with his finances, so after we got married and began to discuss merging our finances I knew I would have to shape up. It's been a long process, but I feel confident enough in my money managing skills to share what I've learned with others.

The two things that have helped me the most were taking stock of where all the money was going (and was that ever an eye-opening and embarrassing shock) and using a few tools to help keep me on the straight and narrow.

I plan on sharing more about this soon in case anybody out there might be helped by it.