24 Weeks pregnant with Twins

We made it to our first mini-goal…viability!  Babies born this early will likely spend at least 3 months in the NICU and a third of them survive with no long term problems.  Don’t get any bright ideas, Beans!  I’m not wishing you out of your luxury apartments at this point.  But should you have to come early, it’s comforting to know that measures will be taken to save your lives.

Next mini-goal, 28 weeks.

   

perwhattoexpect.com

Baby’s Face Is Formed
Your baby is about eight-and-a-half inches long (standard letter size!) and weighs one-and-a-half pounds, gaining steadily at a rate of about six ounces per week. Much of that weight comes from growing organs, bones, muscle and accumulating baby fat. Wondering what (and who) your baby will look like? If you had a baby cam at 24 weeks pregnant, you’d almost be able to tell by now. That beautiful face (though still tiny) is almost fully formed, complete with eyelashes, eyebrows and hair. Is your baby a brunette, a blonde or a redhead? Actually, right now her locks are white since there’s no pigment yet. The fat that will be piled on under baby’s skin is also missing from the picture right now. Until those fat deposits are made, that very tender skin is still very transparent, which means a close look would let you see clear through to all the organs, bones and blood vessels. Fortunately, that see-through look won’t last much longer.

Fetal Hearing
What’s been playing on your little rocker’s stereo system these days? All kinds of sounds can be heard by your baby in your womb: air exhaling from your lungs (deep breath now), those gastric gurgles produced by your stomach and intestines, your voice and your partner’s (which your baby will be able to recognize at birth) and even very loud sounds such as honking horns, barking dogs or a wailing fire truck.

Bump – 24w5d

Here’s what I look like from the inside.

source

And me from the outside.

Bumptastic!

Weight Gain

Not the 24 lbs by 24 weeks that they recommend.  I’m +16 from my pre-pregnancy weight (at home scale).  I’ve never been too hung up with the number on the scale.  I’ve always weighed more than my pants size would indicate.  But I’m seeing numbers that I’ve never seen before and I’ll admit, it’s a bit freaky.  Still, I’m 100% ok with however much I gain…healthy Beans are the only goal right now!

How I’m feeling

Pretty fantastic, overall.  I’m choosing to look at what I don’t have at this point…heartburn, nausea, headaches, back pain…please continue to stay away!

Joint pain is my biggest complaint.  Achy knees and hips.  Mostly knees.  Even when I sleep.  I need to brace myself to stand up and it’s not due to my increasing size.  :(.  Just my dumb knees.

I’m getting some weird pelvic pressure.  Not painful, just heavy.  I’m guessing it’s one or both of the cantaloupes that are sitting low in that region.  I’m going to invest in a support belt and see if that helps.

Food

Feed me.  Feed me RIGHT NOW!  Holy geez…this hunger is crazy.  And it’s a scary kind of hungry that makes me feel really light headed and weak…we’re talking tunnel-vision, near passing out.  I need to start eating something small when I first wake up and not wait 2-3 hours.  I have designated times during the day where I allow myself to eat…otherwise, it would be all day long.  Every 2 hours or so, I eat something small, with a bigger portion at breakfast/lunch/dinner times.

Like…peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, greek yogurt guacamole, cereal, spinach, chocolate molten lava cakes (sorry Jerry), pasta, BERRIES!

Every. single. day.

Don’t like care about…meat, veggies.  I’m fine if they’re mixed into something like stir fry or this awesome pasta I made (chicken sausage, spinach, crushed tomatoes and cheese tortellini)

But just a plain grilled chicken breast or roasted broccoli…barf.

Mood

Less emotional this week and pretty much happy as hell.  I was thinking the other day…this might be the happiest I’ve ever been in my whole life.  I need to bottle up these pregnancy hormones!  I’m fully aware this is totally WTF? territory.  I’m just unbelievably content.  It’s a very good place to be.

Movement

They are moving and shakin now! We’re definitely getting into some patterns.  6 am and 8 pm are their most active times.  You can really see it from the outside now and it’s super cool and yet, super bizarre.  Still getting lots of kicks but also some sliding movements like they’re moving their arms up and down.  Most of it is concentrated on the right side.  I have zero idea how they are positioned.  But someone loves my belly button…little turkey is already pushing my buttons, literally.

Sleep

Jerry’s been traveling a ton for work the last few weeks so I’ve had the whole bed to myself.  I’ll admit, I’m sleeping pretty well.  I mostly sleep on my side but will flip on my back at some point during the night.  And then I start snoring and wake myself up.  I know the sound of snoring is disruptive to my sleep but my own snoring is the worst offender!  Poor Jerry.

We also had some late nights over the weekend.  We got sucked into a marathon of The Killing on Netflix (so good!) and made it past 10 Friday, Saturday AND Sunday nights.  I noticed I slept through the night and was less tired when I woke up.  Granted. I slept for 9 1/2 hours Friday night but I woke up before the alarm Monday morning @ 5:30 and felt pretty great.

Daycare

We have decided on the daycare facility for the Beans!  Cross a huge thing off our list!  I’m taking the full 12 weeks off for my maternity leave and when I go back to work, the babies will be at Bright Horizons daycare.  And lucky for me, this Bright Horizons facility is right in my building!

A big benefit of working for a very large company is we have onsite daycare.  It can be difficult to get into, but we submitted our application early and we’ll have 2 Beans going  full time.  So this puts us at an advantage, supposedly.  I can go see them every day and even take breaks to feed them, if I’m still breastfeeding.  I’m feeling very fortunate that it’s working out as well as it is!

Start Rant – Of all the comments I’ve had during this pregnancy, I think the ones that are the most offensive are regarding me going back to work. Some people are downright combative.  “You really need to rethink this” “How could you just leave your babies with someone else and miss all of their big milestone??” “Ugh, I could never…I’m sorry but I really wanted children and I don’t want someone else raising them”. Yes, I’ve heard it all! And it’s mostly people that don’t know me or Jerry well.  They don’t know our financial situation or my own personal preferences…but they insist on (aggressively) forcing their opinions on the subject on me.  I didn’t ask for their opinion, nor do I care what they think.  I don’t discuss politics or religion with anyone on purpose…I guess I need to add daycare (and breastfeeding) to that list. – End Rant

Random Thoughts/Observations/Stuff

*  Favorite comment/discussion of the week.
“So are you sticking to all of the crazy rules for pregnant women?”
I’m taking a pretty common sense approach and trying not to stress about it too much.
“Good for you!  I still ate sushi, over easy eggs and even had a few glasses of wine each week.  And my babies were fine”.
Well, I don’t drink alcohol but I do have a small cup of coffee most days.
HUGE frown.  “Oh no honey, don’t drink caffeine.  It’s really bad for your babies”.
Um, Thanks?

*  I have a little countdown app on my phone that I randomly look at from time to time.  We are in double digits people.  Double. Digits.  Yowza!

*  I picked up some full panel maternity leggings over the weekend.  Why didn’t I do this sooner!?!?  I’ve been wearing my favorite non-maternity leggings this whole pregnancy and they are just hitting me in a weird place now.  Full panel is where it’s at!  And at $15 at Old Navy, they don’t break the bank.  I also broke down and bought the dreaded granny panties too.  Ugh…it’s a little disturbing how much I hate this underwear situation right now.  I’m very particular about my undergarments…I exclusively wear thongs because I hate getting a wedgie in bikinis or boy shorts.  Yeah, I know.  I make no sense.

*  Major pregnancy brain moment this weekend.  I got my haircut and was figuring out the tip my head the way I usually do. Take 10 percent of the total and double it.  Easy peasy.  Well my brain calculated wrong and I ended up giving him closer to 30%.  Not that he’s not worth it…because he’s fantastic.  But I felt really dumb and Jerry was appalled.

Stay warm everyone!