Hospital bags and getting prepared

It's been pretty non event up until now.

Oscar is on his school holidays now, the summer sun has come and gone and Sh*t is starting to hit the fan!

I'm 35 weeks now and it was about this time In my last pregnancy that everything started going belly up. I'm anaemic, have varicose veins, chronic heartburn and my blood pressure has sneakily started creeping up. 

I was 36 weeks last time when my blood pressure started going up and it resulted in quite a scary labour and afterbirth experience. I'm more prepared (as is my consultant OBGYN) for it all this time though so hopefully it won't be as horrific!

So, with a baby coming out of me fairly blooming soon I've started getting my hospital bag ready, and I've found that there really is no list anywhere of everything you may need when going in for a hospital birth. I've had to scour several sites to get a full list of everything I need to pack. Here's what I have;

Nightie

Dressing Gown

Socks

Slippers

Hair Bands

Hair Brush

BB Cream & mascara (so I don't look TOO awful for the baby pics after!)

Chapstick

A Small blanket for me

Nursing Pillow

Going home outfit

Towel

Disposable Undies/Granny Pants

Supportive Vest Top

Deodorant

Hand Sanitiser

Breast Pads

Muslin Cloth/s

Nursing Cover

Baby's Towel

Baby Shampoo

Maternity Pads

Swaddle Blanket

Baby booties

Baby Hat

Baby Socks

Baby's Going Home Outfit

Vests (x2-3)

Sleepsuits (x2-3)

Cotton Wool

Disposable Nappies

Shampoo

Conditioner

Shower Gel

Toothbrush

Toothpaste

Mini Fan

TENS machine

Mobile Phone & Charger

Change for Car Park

Camera

Birth Plan & Hospital Notes

Energy Drink (for the partner)

Biscuits & Energy Bars (for the partner)

And that's what I have so far!

All of it being divided into my Mia Tui bags.(and they're overflowing, may have to buy another bag!)

Last time, I was in hospital for just over a week and he came out 2 weeks early, so I was very unprepared for everything. I'd taken out the sleepsuits to give one last wash and forgot to put them back in, forgot to put in my going home clothes and a towel...my partner ended up bring in a lot of stuff I needed over the course of the week which was quite difficult for him. (bless him he had to find me clothes to wear and ended up bringing me jeans two sizes too small!), so I'm maybe overcompensating this time by having everything ready early.

I'm sure I've still forgotten something though!

Karate

Oscar completed his Keon Kata to get his yellow belt!
And then we celebrated with a picnic and footy with Daddy and Grandad :)

Everythings HUGE

My boobs are huge.
my belly is huge
my ankles are huge
my arse is huge.

It's 23degrees out so i have boob sweatage.

I have too much to clean and too little time.

too tired to make any real sense...

Isn't it funny...

It's rant day today.

I don't know whether i'm all antsy because of my hormones (like lovely hubs suggested) or if I'm actually rightfully angry but it does seem like a lot of my "friends" have changed since I've become pregnant.

I have one friend pretty much ignoring me. She has a 3 year old girl and says that its just not the same because i'm having a boy and she thinks I'm jealous of her. I mean, It was no secret I thought it would be nice to have a girl but I really couldn't give a stuff about gender at the end of the day. I'm excited to be having my little boy and I hate that she's now trying to ruin it for me by saying those things. It's my last baby, I'm trying to enjoy it and screw you if you try to make me feel bad!

My other "friend" is the worst though. She no longer wants to be my friend because...

I'm not married.

She's told me before that I should get married to Andy before I have another baby. I've been with him for about 8 years now and although I do agree that it's about time...It's money we can't afford. Even going for a quickie down the registry office would set us back by just over £100...I can use that £100 for much better things at the moment. I'm £2k in debt that I'm trying to pay off and a baby on the way. It's been 8 years...so what's another 8?!

She doesn't seem to agree though. She had her wedding not long after she found out she was pregnant because she didn't want to "raise the baby alone", and doesn't agree with anyone raising a baby out of wedlock.

I'm not alone. Andy's there. We're as good as married without the bloody piece of paper to prove it.

I'm lucky in that I have one or two friends who are actually there for me and don't judge me for being an unmarried mother or for having a boy. To the rest of you fuckers making my life hell...jog on.

26+6 Weeks

I am 26+6 now, everything still hunky dorey and just waiting for time to pass.

It was Oscar's 5th birthday on Tuesday, and it being half term we decided to try to fit in as much as we possibly can this week.

On Saturday we went shopping for picnic food, toys and just general town shopping things. I treated him to a McDonalds and spent a little over a tenner on CAKE! We bought a M&S Colin the Caterpillar one-delish-plus a few cupcakes from the cupcake shop. Then we went home and packed his bag ready to go to Granny and Grandads in Cornwall for the night.

After he was gone, I made up the picnic food, cut Andys hair, made dinner and cleaned the house - which brought us to about 10pm so I went straight to bed!

Then on Sunday,  Granny and Grandad came and picked us up and we went to Paignton Zoo. We met Andys brother Rob and his girlfriend & her kid there too and spent all day walking around checking out the animals and stopping for a picnic next to the croc enclosure.

I have very slight SPD/PGP (which basically means by pubic area will KILL occasionally) so going across the swinging bridge hurt like hell and I spent most of the rest of the day hobbling about ten paces behind everyone else. I was so glad when we got home but it was a really good day.

On Monday, I spent the day cleaning up the house after its total neglect over the busy weekend and we took a quick walk to the shops to get some fresh air and to buy some balloons for the mini birthday party.

So, Tuesday was actual birthday boys birthday. Grandparents came over again to give him his presents and we ate some cake. Then when they left I took Oscar off to go swimming then toy shopping to spend his birthday money. I bought him a sneaky bag of chips while we were out and about but he decided the pigeons begging at his feet needed to eat more than he did. 

Now I need another 4 days to recover from all that hoohaa. I am ZONKED!

23 Weeks

It's been both boring and eventful the last couple of weeks.

I have the usual pregnancy things going on, gingivitis, infections, heartburn, braxton hicks...

but on the whole there's not a whole lot of baby stuff going down!

Squid is kicking away quite a lot. I like to put objects on my belly and Andy and Ozzy sit and watch my as the object is kicked and prodded and bounces around all over! He's quite low down and every now and then i'll get a punch or kick in my downstairs area! Not all that fun. It also means he's using my bladder as a punch bag which means I have to pee sooooo much more often, which amuses Andy... watching me trying to lift myself off our couch (the thing sucks you in so you can't get back up!) and wobble my way to the toilet.

We've also bought quite a few baby things. We're pretty much done on clothes-except for the cute outfits! Our only real expense before christmas will be cloth nappies, which we're hoping friends and family can contribute to. Then after christmas will be the bigger car seat, a cot, and the point where we start to run out of clothes.

And lastly, we have picked his name. It has been another compromise where we both like the first name, but Andy got to pick the middle name...which at the moment, i'm not too sure on BUT it's the first name that counts and we're happy with it so we're not telling ANYONE! We've had too many people already tell us that they don't like our ideas for his name or trying to offer/push names onto us. This way they can't say anything that can put us off.

Pregnancy essential

The 20 week (gender) Scan

Last week was my 20 week scan.
We've known since the test turned pink that we wanted to find out the gender, but most importantly we were nervous about his or her health.
As I had a molar pregnancy last summer and I had hypertension when I was pregnant with Oscar, we were going to be a bit more nervous than normal.
I knew baby was okay to an extent because I've been feeling a lot of movements and even sometimes a good old kick.
It turns out we needn't have worried at all. I'm measuring to my original dates, which is nearly a week bigger than my due date, and all insides are normal. There was one kidney that had a bit too much fluid in it but sonographer lady wasn't worried but I have to have another scan in July just to make sure.

She couldn't get a good look at the spine so I had to jump around for a couple minutes, which only just about worked! And then she gave us the news we'd been waiting for...boy or girl? Phoebe or Phoebo?

I'd been dying for a girl, hubby and son were wanting a boy. Either way, we're all happy that the baby is a healthy little boy :)

I keep getting asked if I'm disappointed because Its my last baby and I wanted a girl.
I hate the word disappointed. It reminds me of when you're a kid and your patents aren't mad at you, they're "disappointed" so you feel 10 times worse.
I'm a little sad that I'll never get to do the girl things but I won't love him any less just because he has a wiener.

We did have baby names sorted but hubs has decided he no longer likes the boy name and now we can't agree on anything!
Queue weeks of arguing!

The baby name fiasco

Since finding out we're having a boy, the one question we're getting is "have you thought of any names yet?."

Well, we did have a name sorted for a boy or a girl, but hubs started changing his mind about the boys name, which turned out to be the only name we could agree on!
Had little one been a girl we would have called her Luna.
So we've been looking at all the names we could find that both of us would like but hubs liked names like Dante, Damien and Adrian. I don't want a demon child name and everyone I think of Adrian I think Mole! But I'm quite the hippy when it comes to names, I like Bodhi, Sawyer and pretty much every celeb baby name ever!

We actually only agreed on naming Oscar when I was about 34 weeks, we couldn't agree on a name so we just randomly picked out a decent enough name out of a baby book! The name suits him now but it wasn't really a name I loved.

I know we still have a while before baby is here but I really want to love the name we pick this time rather than making do!

19 Weeks

well, 18+6 ;)