Birthing

I don't really like hospitals...they give me the creeps so thinking about giving birth in a hospital bed is not my favorite image. We are hoping that this pregnancy goes well and we can plan for a birth in a birthing center so that we can have a more homey feeling with the extra security of a hospital close by just in case.

Ray and I watched a documentary produced by Ricki Lake called the Business of Being Born that made us think about a home birth. We think if we had actually been through a birth before we might be tempted to do it at home. Since we really have no idea what to expect, we're even more excited about the Roosevelt birthing center. So we switched from our very nice doctor with an even nicer ultrasound lady to a doctor across from the birthing center who has two midwives in her office. We went for an initial meet and greet appointment where we waited for 45 minutes and I got sad. Both doctor and midwife were nice but waiting that long was very annoying. Our next appointment is this week and I hope it is smoother.

The midwife recommended we read Ina May Gaskin's Guide to Childbirth. So we went to Barnes & Noble to get it and ended up leaving with around 10 books. Ray got a book he really likes, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Fatherhood, after finding lots of books with titles that made being around a pregnant wife sound very scary. Maybe he'll blog about it :). I have been completely distracted and laugh out loud entertained by Anne Lamott's book Operating Instructions. She makes being miserable and tired during her son's first year sound like an amazing experience that everyone should have :).

13 weeks 3 days sonograms

The hitchhiker was supposed to be 12 weeks 8 days in these photos. The ultrasound lady says by size the age is more like 13 weeks 3 days....already tall :). There was a lot of swimming around going on. The hitchhiker was cheesing it up in the upper left...see the jaws open for a smile? Lower left shows thumb sucking we think :). The first trimester is officially behind us so we have started telling people that we are expecting our newest Velez family member on February 14, 2009...yay!

9 and half week sonogram

This is our first picture of our little hitchhiker. I wasn't showing any belly bumps but felt a little bloated and sometimes a bit nauseated. Guacamole is one of my favorite foods....guacamole appears to trigger my nausea.....grrr.