First Trimester

So since I am playing catch up here is a wrap-up on the first trimester…

Finding Out

We found out that I was pregnant on May 18th. Chase was studying for a test and I made a quick run to Wal-Mart (sidenote: This almost always proves to be entertaining on a Friday night in Lebanon, OR). While I was at Wal-Mart, I had a thought pop in my head that I was pregnant and should buy a pregnancy test. Who knew you could receive inspiration while shopping at Wal-Mart.

So I went to that aisle and looked at all the options for pregnancy tests… and man are there a lot! I stared at them for a while, being no pregnancy test expert, and decided to pick one that was in the middle price range. I went home unloaded the car and went to take the pregnancy test… for being such an exciting thing to be finding out, peeing on a stick isn’t all that glorious. I stood there waiting and bam… two lines!

Sharing the Great News

I ran up the stairs to interrupt Chase’s studying and let him know the great news. We both were so excited!! We talked about whether or not we should call our parents since it was around 1 am in Utah and 2 am in Texas. We decided we should wait until the morning.

We sent our parents a text in the morning with a picture of the pregnancy test. I don’t think it was even a minute later when my mom called me. Then Chase got a call from his mom. Of course everyone was excited! This is the first grandbaby on my side of the family and will be the second on Chase’s side of the family.

After talking to my parents, I texted the picture to my sisters and Jordan… who were equally excited. My mom had told me that Austin was still sleeping and so I called him to wake him up. When he first picked up the phone he sounded very sleepy then I told him he was going to be an uncle and he woke right up and said “Are you serious!?!” I wish I could have been there to see his face. Cami texted me multiple times throughout the day telling me how excited she was and how I was killing her by making it a secret.

Chase and I decided we would wait a little bit to tell our close friends. But that didn’t last long. We participated in the HeartChase Saturday morning. My friend Katie rode with us there. Chase hadn’t been able to get ahold of his dad yet to tell him the news and then his phone started ringing. Thinking it was his dad, I was like guess we need to tell Katie. So I told Katie, then it actually wasn’t even Chase’s dad… whoops.

After the HeartChase was over, Chase came up to me and said “I may have told Kevin”. So our whole “wait a little while plan” wasn’t working out too well.

So I told Kevin that I wanted to be the one to tell his wife Amanda. I went with Amanda to pick up dinner at KFC. (A little back story, every time Amanda would see me instead of saying hi she would say, “You pregnant?”) So after going through the drive through and on the way back to her house Amanda said her usual, “You pregnant?” and this time I got to say “Yes!”. She responded with “Are you serious?!” (like Austin did) and then squealed and did an awkward keep-driving-with-one-hand-hug-with-the-other-thing.

So we ended up telling our close medical school friend group and our other close friends from back home. We waited for the first trimester to be over before making it “facebook official” and announcing it at work.

How I Felt During the “Dreaded” First Trimester

The first trimester came and went quickly for me. I was lucky enough to one of “those” pregnant woman who didn’t have morning sickness or nausea. My doctor told me not to tell other moms because they would be mad at me. But I am not complaining!

In the beginning, I was so tired. I couldn’t believe how tired I was. I remember sitting at the front desk at work and thinking I am going to fall asleep on the job. It took everything I had to stay awake.

Starting around the end of the second month, I would get headaches almost every day. During this time, I would also get these “hunger attacks” where I all of a sudden would feel like I could eat a whole cow.

Cravings

In the very beginning, I craved orange juice, lots and lots of orange juice. I also craved tortillas, the ones from Costco that you cook up yourself, with a little butter.

After about a month, my drink craving turned from orange juice to chocolate milk. I was at the Lebanon Wal-Mart again and passed by the Hersey’s chocolate syrup when I was like OMGOSH I need that. I had a little fight with myself and in the end deciding I didn’t need those “empty calories”. But just like every other pregnant woman… I couldn’t resist the craving! I ended up going to the grocery store the next day and getting some Hersey’s chocolate syrup.

During the chocolate milk cravings, I also craved Gushers… you know the things you eat when you are like 5 years old.

More about Food

There have been some food that I usually love that I haven’t been able to eat. In the beginning, it was Mexican food. Thankfully that phase has passed. I can’t really stand to eat burgers… which is a shame since its BBQ season.

One day I opened up a pack of chicken, it wasn’t supposed to expire for over a week but it stunk so bad. I threw it in the trash with the intentions of taking the trash bag out right then… Chase was out-of-town or he would have done it. Well after I threw it in the trash I had to get out of the kitchen… I couldn’t go in it… I couldn’t even look at the kitchen. The next day I finally got enough nerve to take the trash out and gagged the whole time. Every time I thought of chicken for the next couple weeks I felt nauseous. And feeling that way for just that little while made me so glad that I didn’t have morning sickness and I felt so bad for the rest of the pregnant woman in the world.

Weird Dream

Everyone kept asking me if I thought the baby was a boy or girl… and I didn’t have a feeling either way. So maybe all those questions sparked this dream. In the dream I was able to take the baby out of my belly… which in the dream was more like a pouch. So I took the baby out found out it was a girl and then decided I should put her back in so she could keep developing. So I put her back in the belly/pouch and sealed it up. So when I woke up, I was like hmmm… is that supposed to be my clue that I am having a girl. And come to find out, I am having a boy… so the dream was just a crazy-prego-dream.

Nicknames

Baby Nelson received some nicknames during the first trimester. In the beginning, Chase and the other med students called him Gummybear. Other names included: Baby, Da Baby,  Fetus, Bean, Leech, Peanut, It, and Avocado (or whatever other fruit or veggie he was the size of that week).

First Time

Chase was out-of-town for the first ultrasound so I promised I would video the heartbeat for him. Well I failed… I thought that I had recorded it. Turns out I recorded right after and right before, somehow I had pressed the record button on my phone before, so when I thought I was turning it on I was actually turning it off and vice versa. But I did get to send him pictures.

 

In the second one he is waving hello to the world/doing the Dr. Evil pose.

See… pretty close.

Showing?

I didn’t start showing during the first trimester. I thought I felt and looked thicker… but no one else could tell I was prego. Here are pictures from the first and second month. Neither pictures are great… and for some reason I didn’t take on in the third month.

 

I think I will be caught up with one more post.