The symptoms are here

OK, so now the symptoms are more clearly here. And yes, I’m very grateful for the time I didn’t have them.

For the past few days my appetite has been low. I can function moderately well during the day. But I crash around 3, when I need a nap. After lying in bed and sleeping a bit, I might get up for a little TV or to have a bit of dinner. Then I go back to the supine position for a few more hours until it’s time for bed.

It feels as though my mind is awake and alert, but that’s about it. Every other cell has been drained of energy. My hands don’t have enough energy to want to deal with the computer or to hold a book. The best I can do is watch a bit of TV, but I usually run out of recorded shows quickly. This weekend I stared out the window and took joy in watching the trees shiver in the wind.

Luckily, Mark has been great about letting me lie around from 3 p.m. until bedtime over the weekend. I’m trying to make peace with my lack of productivity. Part of me enjoyed watching the effects of the wind and the niceness of Mark caring for River, cooking me dinner and making me hot chocolate. Another part thinks that lying there motionless, without even reading a book, is a supremely useless waste of time.

I’m trying to accept that this is just the reality, remember that it won’t last forever, and that this thing (it’s still a thing) growing instead me is currently taking up all my cellular energy. But another part of me is counting ahead. Is this going to put a damper on our upcoming trip to Spain and the four-day bike ride we have planned there? Will it be done by the end of June?

The positive side is that the increased symptoms, plus the normal hormonal blood work, make me think that perhaps things are progressing normally. In nine days I’ll find out if there is a heartbeat and then will have a more definitive answer.

Good news

The doctor called. My blood work is normal. Hormones are in the right place. Progesterone is good. He said this means that a sonogram should be able to see the baby and detect a heartbeat. So I guess it’s time to schedule a sonogram appointment. The doctor told me congratulations, which kind of brought the situation more to life. Yikes.

At the same time, after gaining weight for five days straight, I’ve now lost weight for five days straight and am back to about where I started, a little over 3 pounds over my average weight. I’m not sure what to attribute this strange pattern to. I haven’t been exercising quite as much as I’d like, largely due to being tired in the mornings and evenings. But that same fatigue results in me eating less. And I’ve been making an effort to eat smaller breakfasts and to have to have at least one salad a day.

Last pregnancy I couldn’t have touched salad at this point. All I could stomach was French fries and Snickers. This time around, I think I’m over the Snickers, due to the high fructose corn syrup. But I get unreasonably excited at the prospect of French fries. Which reassures me that I’m still pregnant.

Can I please relax?

I still have no morning sickness and it’s a fantastic thing. It makes being pregnant infinitely easier. But I’m having a hard time accepting my luck. A little voice tells me that no, I can’t just be one of the 20% of lucky women who don’t get it. Perhaps there is something wrong.

This is week 6, when the websites say morning sickness is supposed to start. It may start any day. So I put off making any plans – like scheduling a brunch for Mother’s Day. I don’t want to pay $50 if I can’t eat a good meal.

This morning I went back and looked at my chart from my first pregnancy. I had nausea from the day of implantation. By this point, I had already been sick for weeks and the little x’s stretch across the sheet indicating day after day after neverending day of nausea.

What a joy to not experience that. It makes dealing with work and living life so much easier. Aside from a little extra fatigue and an increased appetite, I can almost forget I’m pregnant. It makes the weight issue more of a challenge and I’ll have to pay more attention to that.

I saw one mention on a forum that the older a woman is, the less likely she is to suffer morning sickness. I have no idea whether or not there is any validity to that. If so, it’s a great benefit to “advanced maternal age,” as I expect I’ll be categorized. But miscarriages also rise with advanced maternal age and I hear the voice of a friend who miscarried recently at 8 weeks and felt no morning sickness leading up to it. She’s pregnant again now and nauseous.

Is this easy ride a sign of bad things to come, or am I just luckier this time around?