Side by Side

Shoutout to all my Top Gun-lovin’ 80′s hipsters.  We were called “hipsters” back then, weren’t we?  Maybe that was before my time.  Anypoo, as you may or may not have surmised from my ever-so-creative title, we’re FULL TERM!  That doesn’t mean the baby’s due quite yet… just that if it decided now was the time, odds are everything would be ok.  This is both very exciting and ridiculously unnerving for us.  We’re not parents… we’re not ready to BE parents… we’re just Ross and Jen.  But that’s all about to change, and honestly, bring it on.  [Ok, pumping myself up... check.]

So Jennifer has been doing really well, all things considered.  She’s only had a few not-so-great nights, but has been sleeping well on the whole.  I don’t think I’ve announced this on my blog yet, but (surprise!) we’re having a home birth… so our midwife and her doula/assistant were here last week for a home visit to check things out, consider where we might be during labor, etc.  So that was fun.  What else… not much really… we’re just getting all of our i’s dotted and t’s crossed.

I didn’t run last week… probably could have near the end of the week, but I had the flu and just decided to pull that card and use it to its fullest.  Started back yesterday morning and hope to continue.  So anyway, here’s the latest photo… not half bad for 37 weeks pregnant, eh?  Yeah boy.

Let’s be honest with ourselves, folks.  Half of this blog has failed to live up to what it was advertised to be.  For three and a half months now, I’ve posted the same photo of myself, “Photoshopping” it each week into various weird and rather unflattering contortions.  It’s been fun, but as they always say, all fun things must end on March 14th.  That’s why today, for the first time ever on Side by Side, Jennifer steals the show with her very own, exclusive, independent, free-of-distraction photo!  Behold, Jennifer and B-dubs at 36 weeks… and then keep reading.

Isn’t it much better that way?  Why laugh at me when you can marvel at her?  So anypoo, what’s been going on, you ask.  Well as you might have observed, Jennifer’s thumbs are in an upright position.  That generally denotes something positive and happy, correct?  Correct.  As of this morning, with confirmation coming via ultrasound at 11:45ish, our baby is right where it should be… head down, butt up, back out, all that good stuff!  Here’s the story, as briefly as I can tell it:

Since my last post, we’ve done a myriad of things to encourage the baby to move.  We’ve tried inversion (Jennifer’s head is lower than the rest of her), massaging the belly, shining a flashlight where we want the head to be, putting headphones playing music in that same spot, multiple visits to a chiropractor, acupuncture (which basically involved setting her pinky toe on fire… Google “moxibustion”), talking to the baby, laying on an ironing board… you get the point.  These things were attempted with great frequency and with no result.  As a next-to-last resort (last resort being a c-section), we scheduled a consultation with a local doctor who has had great success performing external cephalic versions (basically firmly pressing the belly to manually turn the baby).  So… appointment scheduled… but before we get there, a few other important details.

After church yesterday, our pastor and his wife prayed over Jennifer and our baby, and it was very special to us… Jennifer said she felt much more at peace afterward.  Last night, Jennifer went upstairs to listen to one of our birthing class CDs (I won’t explain those because you’ll think we smoke weed and compost our own feces if I did).  However, she sensed that she should instead spend that time in prayer and worship… so she did.  She specifically asked God to turn the baby before 11:15 this morning (the scheduled time of the appointment).  Fast forward to our appointment.  The doctor calls us back, and says, “Hopefully the baby will be in the right position and I can send you on your merry way.”  We laugh and say, “Wouldn’t that be great!”  Five seconds into the ultrasound, doctor says, “Yep, there it is.  You’re good to go!”  WOW… we were definitely speechless.  We’re very excited and relieved, and we’re obviously in awe of how clearly and directly God answered our (and your) prayers.  Feel free to continue to pray for all three of us, especially that the baby gets comfortable in its new position.

Oh, and I’ve been running… need to up the distance a little, but at least I’ve been fairly consistent!  That’s all for now… I’ll try to keep you updated!

Hello again and welcome back.  Long time no… write/read.  So while I haven’t quite taken a photo of Jennifer every week, I have taken some… I simply haven’t posted them.  I have three to post, so I’ll do it all in this one.  Things have been going great as far as B-dubs goes.  The only minor issue we’ve run into is that the baby may not be positioned head-down.  It becomes more important each day at this point that it IS head-down because as it continues to grow, it has less room to maneuver itself into the correct position.  In about a week, Jennifer will have another midwife appointment, so it’ll be reassessed at that point.  Definitely nothing to be too concerned about at the moment.  Oh, and something she’s been trying (as suggested by our midwife) is putting an ice pack on the top part of her belly and a Camelbak filled with warm water at the lower part of her belly to encourage the baby to move toward the warmth.  We can’t quite tell if that has helped… we feel PLENTY of body parts, we just can’t tell what’s what at this point.  Today, however, Jennifer said she was fairly sure she felt hiccups and that they were at the lower part of her belly, so that’s probably good news.  She’s still feeling very well, exercising regularly, sleeping fine, etc.  We feel very blessed at this point!

As far as my exercising stuff goes, well, believe it or not, I started running this week.  I ran on Monday and Tuesday mornings before work.  I had planned to also run this morning, but I came down with a bit of a cold yesterday and felt a little like poo this morning.   But yeah, I think I’ll enjoy the running thing.  I’ve even downloaded an app on my Droid that allows me to map routes for me to run, and it can even follow me using GPS to give me my time, average speed, etc.  Fun stuff.  Once I get into it, I’ll add in some sit-ups and push-ups.  Enough about me, onto what you’re all here to see… the photos!

31 WEEKS:

32 WEEKS:

33 WEEKS:

So there you have it!  Hope it was worth the wait.  In case you’d forgotten, the due date is April 11th, so we have less than a month and a half left!

Welcome back!  I hope you’ve all been able to find some way to bide your time since my last post.  I know it’s difficult.  Things have been great in the Wilsie household.  Bdubs is getting bigger and more active all the time!  Jennifer has been amazed that her belly can contort and become disfigured as much as it has lately.  She’s still feeling well and, to my surprise, still sleeps on her stomach.  I haven’t started the running thing.  Failure, nincompoop, lazy-butt… yes, those all describe me.  Good times.  Here’s the latest photo… it was taken late last week.  We’ll be taking another one in the next day or two.

Well hey everybody.  Hope you all had a very nice Christmas and New Year and all that fun stuff.  People keep asking me when I plan on posting again (sometimes with more of a demanding and disappointed tone)… it’s like no one knew I was planning on taking off the entire month of December as a nice long holiday break.  Sheesh.  No matter, I’m back now for all you lovely loyal literary enthusiasts.  Truth be told, exercising and I did not spend much time with each other in December.  At this point, I’m considering canning P90X for now and trying something a little less intense and less time consuming.  I’m thinking running 4-5 times per week with sit-ups and push-ups thrown in there.  My main goal in this whole thing is to be regularly exercising.  Sure, I’d love to bulk up a little and be in the best shape of my life, but I think I’ll start by simply maintaining a healthy lifestyle.  Thoughts?  Criticisms?  Jokes?

My wife and unborn child have been progressing beautifully together.  Jennifer is feeling very well, and we sometimes wonder if our child thinks it has a punching bag in there… it’s definitely an active little booger!  More on pregnancy stuff later… here’s the latest photo!

Here’s the weekly Sunday post on a Monday!  As always, Jennifer has been looking amazing lately.  I never really knew what people meant when they said pregnant women glowed, looked beautiful, etc.  But yeah, I definitely know now.  Maybe part of it is knowing that our child is growing in an amazing and perfect way inside of her… or that she’s stronger than anyone I know, and she’ll surely show that even more so as things progress.  Whatever it is, you can’t deny it.  Behold (just ignore the right side):