i dont feel so good. im all achy and crampy like im about to get my period. i have a headache too, but whats new? i dont want to be at work right now.

i'm scared.

**update - feeling a bit better. cramps have subsided but i have terrible lower back pain. oy vey.

(soon we will attach stupid belly pictures to these posts)

How our baby's growing:

The big news this week: Hands and feet are emerging from developing arms and legs — although they look more like paddles at this point than the tiny, pudgy extremities we imagine playing with. Technically, our baby is still considered an embryo and has something of a small tail, which is an extension of her tailbone. The tail will disappear within a few weeks, but that's the only thing getting smaller. Our baby has doubled in size since last week and now measures half an inch long, about the size of a blueberry.

If I could see inside my womb, I'd spot eyelid folds partially covering her peepers, which already have some color, as well as the tip of her nose and tiny veins beneath parchment-thin skin. Both hemispheres of the baby's brain are growing, and her liver is churning out red blood cells until her bone marrow forms and takes over this role. She also has an appendix and a pancreas, which will eventually produce the hormone insulin to aid in digestion. A loop in the baby's growing intestines is bulging into her umbilical cord, which now has distinct blood vessels to carry oxygen and nutrients to and from her tiny body.

How Mom's life is changing:

My uterus has doubled in size in the past five weeks, and well, I'm a bit uncomfortable. There is no word or description I could tell you in order to understand anything that I am feeling. One thing that is easy to describe is exhaustion. I feel very drained around 1 pm and also around the time I get home. and yes, I'm cranky.

I pee more than usual, thanks to my increasing blood volume and the extra fluid being processed through my kidneys. By now, I already have about 10 percent more blood than I did before I was pregnant. And by the end of my pregnancy, I'll have 40 to 45 percent more blood running through my veins to meet the demands of my full-term baby. Oh yeah and there is also my bladder being pushed out from my growing uterus. All my organs will soon be vying for space. Also, since I have to get up a few times at night, I also suffer from lack of sleep. Gee, this is so fun right now. Apparently the 2nd trimester (which I will be in 5 weeks!) is the honeymoon phase, so I can't wait for that! and actually start showing so I can look as if I have a legitimate reason to be so tired, grumpy and achy all the time, and be able to reap the benefits of pregnancy..hahahaha.

i can't think of anything really clever... me-doula oblongata? i don't know, i saw the blog we follow a few days ago and it was titled epi-doula or something and i thought i could one-up them, but i can't. mid-wife? how bout the whole wife? ... uh yeah, sorry.

so we decided to have a homebirth.
i don't think there was any doubt really in mama's mind. just seemed natural, like that's the way it's supposed to happen. i guess i just didn't think about it all that much. i figured whatever works is cool. but then we watched the Business of being Born, and it really made it very clear to me that homebirth is the way to go, if you're into that sort of thing. if you're a take me to the hospital kind of person, or if you're "at-risk" then by all means, go to the hospital. but we think it's safer and cooler to do it at home. you're more in control, you're more in touch with what's happening. and i'm kinda spooked by all the drugs they pump into you to try and get you to pop the sucker out in time for the doctor to go home and have dinner. no drugs!
we've interviewed two midwifes, and i think we've made our choice.
now we have to come up with the 4 Gs to pay her.
time for papa to get a jobbyjob.

7:20 am - woke up feeling sick. like as in flu sick. oh wait, im pregnant. had my morning fresh veggie juice that cw makes for baby and me, felt a bit better.
7:53 am - got to work, still felt icky but didnt want to use my pregnancy as an excuse and reap the benefits. not just yet anyway.
8:40 am - had a bagel with extra cream cheese. felt better.
9:00 am - started to feel icky again and when i mean icky, i dont mean morning sickness icky. just icky. uncomfortable really.
9:05 am - headache makes itself known
9:10 am - i drink some decaf.
9:15 am - brain not fooled, gives me more pain. get an email from dad acting like a child.
9:30 am - finish typing email to dad acting as if i am his parent.
10:00 am - snack on cheese its. and drank a 16 oz. glass of water
12:00 pm - walked to safeway to get some fried chicken
12:30 pm - arrive back at the office and eat 2 drumsticks, 1 thigh and 4 buffalo wings dipped in ranch sauce. had a bit of diet coke, then felt guilty and threw it away.
1:00 pm - emailed mom about trip to LA
1:10 pm - actually worked. worked hard hard.
4:40 pm - closing time. cw met me at work, peeled a tangerine, and later two hard boiled eggs, then he made dinner while i napped. im so lucky.
7:35 pm - replied to the reply of my moms email and acted like i was her parent and cried and told her that i cant wait to come to LA to give her a big hug, tell her i love her and that everything will be okay.

i told my work today. well, i wrote an email to my boss and supervisor and in the midst of writing the emails i was in tears. 1) because its still really early in the pregnancy and i am terrified that i will have to take it all back from all the people we told and it will be heart wrenching. 2) i was terrified that their reaction would be far from what I had hoped for. and 3) doing so kind of makes this all more real and scary. oh my goodness, I am having a baby! but wait, why does anything have to change? oh, yeah right..im gonna be huge not too many months from now and pop a baby the size of a watermelon out of a hole a size of a lemon, great, wonderful.

i was eagerly anticipating their replies. and sure enough there they were sitting in my inbox. and my boss was great, so supportive. he is also father to a 10 year old. and he told me to tell charles (thats what he calls him) to enjoy sleeping while he can cause after the next few months there will be a gap of 18 to 20 years where a full night's sleep is only a memory. he said that not to worry about work and that the only thing that was important was my well being. it was a wonderful reply. then there was my supervisor's his was supportive too but a lot less emotional than my boss' but that is just typical of my supervisor. he congratulated me and told me not to worry about how work will be because of the news, but thanked me for letting him know earlier on so that we can prepare for it better.

i love my job, i love the people i work with and work for so it was important to me to have that support especially with the economy these days. and cw and i already knew i would be the bread winner so being a stay at home mom wasn't an option for us, and it isn't something i would have been completely happy with, not that being home with my baby isn't appealing to me or that my career is more important, it's just i'm too independent to stay at home. but if it paid well, damn straight i would be at home. don't get me wrong, i know very well that taking care of a baby is a lot of work, like a whole lot, work that you can not be completely prepared for nor is their training or diplomas to get to do this sort of work. but lucky for baby and me, cw has decided to be the one to stay at home to do the work while i'm at work (which is a mere 2 miles away). and its not like i work ridiculous hours and would be unable to spend time with my family. i usually get home at 5 and have plenty of time to catch up. this would only be until we could put the kid to a preschool and daddy would be able to get back to getting his teaching credentials. after much talk with cw, he has assured me that this is what he wants to do, what is best and what we can afford. after all the most expensive thing about a baby is childcare.

anyway, so we had a lot of blood work done today as cw stated. our real first prenatal visit will be on February 11th - i will be about 9.5 weeks by then! we also interviewed a midwife today, 1 of 2 we will be interviewing. I liked her and so did cw, despite the fact that she was a few minutes late, she was mellow.

okay that was enough excitement for one day, i'm off for another nap or a little csi:ny.

Cherlyn got out early today to go to the doctor. i got there a couple minutes late, cuz i'm a lazy bastard, but i did bring her a hard boiled egg and some fruit to snack on. she filled out the paperwork, and i told her to check no for drug and alcohol addicts cuz that's none of their business and just cuz i was a lush doesn't mean i'm going to be a bad parent. well, maybe, but anyway, it's too late now. they gave us some more dates for future appointments and i wrote them down, even though Cherlyn was writing them down too. the books i'm reading say that i'm supposed to show up to the doctor's visits with questions prepared and note taking shit and i don't know what the fuck is going on. they just ask her a bunch of questions and look at me like i'm in the wrong building. then they sent us to the lab and they drew 4 tubes of blood from the preggers and sent us home. we're interviewing a midwife this afternoon too. i guess i'm supposed to have a barrage of questions ready to show her i'm involved. better start reading the chapter in Dude's Guide To Pregnancy, "What the $^%& do you ask the Midwife chick, bro?"

So what's up with our little teeny tiny baby?

Well the embryo is in it's second month! This is going to be a busy week for our little one. Their brain is still growing and remarkably fast; miniature hand plates are starting to develop and the early formations of what will be their fingers are already visible. Also, the lower limbs do not develop quite as fast, so they’re pretty much still flippers. Up until this point, our baby has been very curled up with the head and tail in close proximity, but this week their trunk and neck are beginning to grow and straighten as their tail recedes into its resting position in the back. Even though the little babe is only 6 weeks old, they’re already capable of demonstrating reflex responses to touch!

And how's mom doing? No morning sickness (yet!), but supposedly if I were going to have morning sickness, I'd have the unpleasantries starting some time this week.

Apparently to lessen the symptoms I need to not eat fatty foods, drink lots of fluids, eat several small meals throughout the day, take plenty of naps, and continue to take the prenatal vitamins (although in most pregnant women, the prenatal vitamins themselves cause a bit of nausea).

statistically, 20% of pregnant women never actually experience morning sickness. - lets hope I am one of the lucky few. but i would be lying if i didn't wish i was suffering from morning sickness, just to make this pregnancy more real to me. im just afraid that not having this famous pregnancy symptom is like finding out that im not actually pregnant.

anyway, I'm a tad sleepy and really wish i could crash and take a nap somewhere.

1. this blog wont allow my comments on charlie's post. i wanted to comment on the fact that its okay to slack off on the belly pictures not because i will hate you for it later but because its like a weekly thing. and also on the juice, but now after the third attempt to write out a clever comment after being denied, its no longer fun or pertinent.
2. i am sooooooo sleepy. ok may be it isnt a stupid reason but its a stupid thing to be while at work. i also have gone to the bathroom at least 6 times in the last 2 hours. usually i go like 2 times if at all throughout the entire day! maybe the reason i am sleepy is i have completely cut out caffeine. oh yeah, that and im pregnant and a shit load of stuff is going on to my body that i cant even completely comprehend.
3. there are many conflicting things on what is good for you or bad for you during pregnancy.

Oh and so like ive said my first drs appt. is on tuesday the 20th (charlie, remember this, cause youre coming with me), i hope to at least be able to see the baby's heart flutter. it will be difficult to hear it unless i was super thin or they use some special machine called a doppler. i also have an appointment to meet one of the two midwives we are interviewing that day. the other midwife interview is on the 23rd. My dad is no longer coming to visit as he got called on another assignment back in LA so, thats kind of good.

anyway, this is a stupid post. im just trying to stay awake here at work. maybe i'll go for a walk.

see you all in the next couple of days!!

i've told some friends, Cherlyn's told some of her friends, but as mentioned, we haven't spilled the entire can of baby beans to everyone yet. but i think if you were inquisitive enough, you could figure it out. if you click on Cherlyn's profile, this blog is listed. if you click on the link, it shows you "ourbabywagner", but then asks for a password.
slacked today on two crucial items:
1. baby belly documentation
i've taken one picture so far, but ideally i could be taking them every day.
2. juice
i got too caught up in washing last night's dishes and didn't have enough time to make Cherlyn her breakfast juice. the dandelion greens worked fine. i'm going to go away from the simple apples, carrots, beets to more diverse stuff. there'll be that stuff in there too, but it won't be so dominant. more greens. healthy shit.

tiny heat got me some books for dudes whose chicks are preggers. i think she mentioned them already. i've started reading them. also i am researching what kind of stuff i can shove in the juicer in the morning to send her on her healthy way to work. today i bought dandelion greens. that'll go into the mix tomorrow.

it has been a while since i've blogged anything, maybe by the time i get warmed up this will be available for public consumption.

Lately I have just been exhausted. more so than usual, since i am a naturally lazy person. i also get this sense sometimes that i am still going to get my period. you girls will understand this. its that feeling in your insides, your pelvic region and the insides of your thighs - you know that feeling you get right before you are about to get good ol aunt flow? anyway, i get that sometimes and it scares me. then i get nightmares where i wake up with blood all over. i definitely have to get up at night to go pee. and i hate that. i always try and push it off but i cant. and it is always around the same time - like 4 am.

cw and i finished watching the business of being born last night. i had read about it before or merely skimmed it over and heard about it. anyway, even before watching the movie i always knew i wanted a home birth. even though i am totally somewhat anti-hippie, its something i always wanted since the first time i watched a home birth film (from the 70's no less) in college. scary and beautiful at the same time, and all in the comfort of your home surrounded only by the people who will love that baby. anyway, i would suggest that film or even looking into birthing centers if you want to get the low down on it all. i mean just think about it? if you aren't sick, why go to the hospital to give birth? being pregnant is NOT a sickness people. obviously if you have a high risk pregnancy your choice is limited because complications of the birth are expected and the hospital is probably youre only choice. anyway, ill not get into it at the moment.

so, i have contacted 2 midwife practices and a birthing center in oakland. home births cost about $4000 - $5000. All of it, from prenatal visits to even post partum care (except lab work - which can cost a shit load). not bad though, i think cw and i can swing that. we just have a lot of saving up to do.

I have taken the test and depending on how you see it, i either failed it or passed it.

Yep guys, I am preggo, preggers, knocked up, with child and so on and so forth. Cw has successfully inseminated me and his little fuckers can most certainly swim as well as having a particular one penetrate my stubborn egg.

I am 5 weeks and 1 day to be exact. I have my first prenatal doctors appt. on January 20th. Which also happens to be when my Dad flys in and visits us. I am choosing not to tell him until the 31st when we kind of sort of have a mini family reunion because a cousin from the motherland is coming to the states for the first time. anyway, we’ve all told you, and im glad I can share that with you. I wanted to wait until after the first trimester, which is when you are in the clear for miscarriages or something, but I couldn’t wait. You know me, hard to keep a secret like that!!

So hopefully you all can follow along with us and we’ll try and post pictures and keep our family (that’s you guys) updated with the doctor visits and the belly bulge.

I got a whole bunch of (crap) books yesterday. And if I wasn’t so exhausted, Id fucking write a better pregnancy book, or at least the start of one. Most if not all are trying to be funny (which is why I bought them) but they do so by being lame and really unfunny? If that makes sense. Half of the information is scary. The other half is horrific, while a select few are a nice side effect (like pregnancy orgasms? Yeah, its for real- well, I haven’t tried yet).

anyways, i have minor cravings even though im only 5 weeks along but one things for sure, i am always exhausted.

if you are interested in what this week is doing to my body, check this out.