Baby Dale Bumpdate: Week 15

Happy International Women’s Day, all! I am proudly sporting red today in solidarity to honor the revolutionary love and sacrifice of bold, beautiful, and inspiring women all over the world. I have been beyond lucky to have been surrounded by strong, capable, smart, loving, hard-working, inspiring women for my entire life. They have all taught me to be (and love) myself, fight for what is right, support my neighbor, and fiercely love others with an open heart.

My mother-in-law said to me the other day that one of her favorite things about being pregnant and giving birth was feeling so connected with other women. This is so unbelievably true, and I feel like my experience so far has only been the tip of the iceberg. Whether it is commiserating with and learning from moms that have been through it, or the extra love and support pouring out of mamas and non-mamas alike, I have never felt more connected to the women in my life. I am in awe of how amazing each and every single one of them is.

I am so blessed to be surrounded by the best examples of motherhood, from my absolutely unbelievably wonderful mom, to my magnificent nana and mother-in-law, to the beautiful friends I have grown up with becoming new mothers all around me. I hope that I can follow their examples and be a good mama to our little one on the way. Whether we have a boy or a girl, either way I want to raise our baby to appreciate and support the incredible, strong, talented, motivated, powerful, loving superwomen in this world.

And now onto a recap of week 15!

Week 15: February 28 – March 6

Baby is now the size of: an orange!
Weight Gain: 0 lb.
Belly Measures: +3 inches

I’m Feeling: pretty normal! My appetite is back and symptoms have decreased, so I really feel a lot like my old self.
Physical Symptoms: As if the universe heard me celebrating the demise of my morning sickness last week and decided I was getting too cocky, I ended up with a couple isolated incidences of getting sick at the beginning of the week. I think it was just a reminder that even though I’m feeling better most of the time, these symptoms may take a while to taper off entirely (or may decide to stick around for a while). However, other than those couple moments, I really have been feeling so much better! My belly is looking more bump-like every day (though it is always smaller in the morning than in the evening due to ab muscles that give up throughout the day, as well as water retention… and finally food intake as well I’m sure!). In addition, I noticed this week that my belly button is starting to get wider and shallower. Also, I felt quite a few aches in my abdomen as my uterus expands to make room! Baby is growing! :)
Movement: I think maybe I felt the baby move for the first time on Friday (March 3)!! I am still not sure because I haven’t felt it since, but it felt a little like champagne bubbles popping or like that really annoying muscle twitch you get in your eye when you are tired (but in my abdomen obviously haha!). Many people also describe quickening as feeling like butterflies, and it felt a little like fluttering as well. Time will tell if that was really what I was feeling once I feel it again. Either way, once I thought it might be the baby moving, my heart started racing so hard out of excitement! I could feel my pulse beating throughout my body and it was distracting me from really feeling everything as it was happening. Next time I won’t let myself get so darn excited!! :) It is still really early so it could have been my imagination, but we shall see!
Sleep: I bought a pregnancy pillow this week and immediately got a better night’s sleep! The pillow is enormous, but there are a bunch of ways I can wind it around myself for support. I have definitely been more comfortable while I sleep.
Food Cravings: nothing new this week, just the same lemon, citrus, and fruit flavors… and the colder the better!
Anything Making You Queasy or Sick? just the occasional teeth-brushing session per usual.
Miss Anything? the margaritas at Puebla Taco looked amazing on Friday, but maybe just because I crave cold citrus!

Can’t Live Without: the Snoogle pregnancy pillow! It has allowed me to finally get a decent night’s sleep. It will never replace Walker as my favorite thing to snuggle, but it is pretty great.
Best Moment This Week: Walker and I went to the Cherry Blossom Festival at Descanso Gardens on Sunday and walked around for 2.5 hours! It was so gorgeous and such a cleansing, peaceful experience to enjoy a breath of fresh air.
Looking Forward To/Excited About: looking forward to my doctor’s appointment next week! I’ve been doing lots of reading, so it will be nice to get some of my questions answered! I am also SO excited to find out the gender… only 5 weeks to go!

Notes: nothing noteworthy this week!