I am Back

So, long time no talk.  I have really missed blogging and have thought about it a lot.  I have so many stories and thoughts to share and so many things have happened (a trip to Albania, two Greek Orthodox christenings, fun travel plans in the making, a cat man, a crazy man, A NEW WASHING MACHINE ((cue the hallelujah chorus...I swear, at times a beam of light shines directly into my bathroom window casting an angelic glow on that glorious white machine)) the grape harvest and wine making, and many random happenings and daily ramblings.)  I find myself thinking about my posts all the time, but I have had neither the motivation nor the energy to actually sit down and post.

I do, however, have a fairly valid excuse. 


It is the same reason I practically consumed my body weight in cream crackers and ginger ale during the month of July.

I AM PREGNANT!!!!

So, I am really happy to be able to share this at last!  I am about 17 and a half weeks pregnant and due during the early days of March!  We are really really happy, and has all started to seem real  at last and like it is all actually happening. 

I know blogging (or the lack thereof) would not seem to have much to do with pregnancy, but, for some reason it has.  For one, for a while, the heat that my computer puts off alone would not allow me to sit at it.  Between the heat radiating from my body (see below,) the fact that I could bake cookies on the floor of my house, and the fact that I swear I can see actual hazy waves of heat coming from my computer monitor, I just could not justify making myself sit down to write.  I did not want to risk us all going up in flames.....or the mood that feeling like I am about to go up in flames puts me in (for my husband's sake as well as my own).....  I also had little inspiration or concentration to do anything at all creative.  On top of that, I spent almost every spare moment of the day at the beach where there was a breeze and water.  Sometimes, having the cool salt water on the back of my neck was all that I could think about from the time I awoke.  So, I was on blogging hiatus.


But, I am back now, and so happy to be.  I have lots I want to write about, and I will.  This post will be kind of long, and maybe boring for most.  But, since I haven't talked at all about my pregnancy yet, I wanted to go ahead and answer some of the most commonly asked questions all at once....and get it all down for my sake as well.  So, here goes.......

No, this was not AT ALL PLANNED.  We both knew that we wanted a family, and we talked about it a lot in the abstract.  We had no real plans as to when we thought we would start that family, and we never imagined it would all happen so fast.  You may recall, we were only married April 24.  The day we found out we were going to have a baby, you would have thought that we were two scared teenagers who had spent a little too much time under the bleachers rather than an adult married couple.  I promise, the way we both reacted you would have thought that we had absolutely no idea how babies are made. 


We do not know the sex yet, but we ARE planning to find out.  I love surprises, and I have never once peaked at my Christmas presents, but this is a whole 'nuther ball game.  There is absolutely NO WAY I could stand not to find out if we are having a boy or a girl.  It would make me crazy, and my sanity is precious at the moment.  I am sure that Christos wants to take all possible precautions to preserve my "fragile" mental state.


I am feeling okay.  I am have not really felt that great, but I have not been awful either.  I am certainly not at all like some of the horror stories I have heard.  I am well into my 2nd trimester, so I am praying the bad days are past once and for all.

In my first weeks of pregnancy, I scavenged friend's blogs, chat rooms, and pregnancy websites looking for details and stories about women's pregnancy symptoms.  We did not tell anybody about the baby until 12 weeks, so I had nobody to talk to about it, and I was so hungry for details about what was normal, what was possible, and what I could maybe expect.  As I appreciated any and all information I could come by, I thought I would share a bit how I have been feeling and what I have experienced so far for any poor gals out there now doing the same.  I also think it will be fun to look back on. If this is not your cup of tea, feel free to skip the rest....won't hurt my feelings at all....come back and see me soon though...I have A LOT to talk about!!!!

My main symptoms have been headaches and insomnia.  And they are the only two symptoms that are still hanging around.  The headaches usually come on in the late afternoon and evening.  So far, with all of my symptoms, mornings and midday are usually good, it is the afternoons and evenings when I crash....just in time for Christos to get home to hear me complain, lay around and be useless, and make him massage me.  Just to be safe, I have not taken any medication at all, so the only real treatment is a good massage.  I have actually wondered if Christos has become suspicious of these "headaches" as a reason for some hands-on therapy.  For the record, they are real.

The insomia has been constant since the beginning.  I am usually awake the majority of hours between 1am and 7am.  There is really nothing I can do about it, so I have learned to embrace it.  It has actually been pretty convenient, as the time difference makes these optimum hours to catch up with friends and family back in the States.

As far as nausea, I have been relatively okay.  I spent a fair amount of time with a small amount of  nausea, but have only actually gotten sick one day.  If you are familiar with my fear and utter disgust of toilets, and the fact that I am more likely  turn into one than to stick my face into one, you know that this is a really good thing.  The one day that I was actually sick, it was all day long...morning to night.

During the "bad days," to prevent actually getting sick, I did try to keep something on my stomach at all times.  At least for me, it was much worse if I allowed my stomach to be empty, so I ate small bits a lot throughout the day and night.  Also, I learned to think about what I wanted to eat.  If something sounded good, I thought about it.  Then I waited another hour and thought about it again.  After about two hours, if it still sounded good, I went for it.  I learned pretty fast that eating things out of haste and hunger would quickly be regretted. 

Also, my appetite completely changed.  I could not stand the idea of anything I normally love (almonds, yogurt, any green vegetable, mustard, candy, etc.) while I wanted everything I could typically take or leave (pasta, bread, crackers, cheese, cookies......do you see a carb and color category??  Only things brown or white.)  The idea of anything with too much seasoning (such as Italian food) totally gagged me. I am saying all of this in past tense because (knock on wood) for the most part the worst of the nausea seems to have passed.  My stomach does not feel totally normal, but it is not that bad anymore at all. 

I have not really craved too much so far.  One day, I had an all-consuming need for dried beans, which took me 4 stores and setting off a security alarm (thanks to an old bottle of sunscreen in my purse that somehow activated a sensor and led to a fun little game of "I promise I am not a shoplifter") to locate.  I have also (so random) craved meatballs a couple of times.  I craved a birthday cake with icing REAL BAD for about 5 weeks.  I literally thought about it for over a month.  I finally went all over getting the ingredients to make a "birthday cake" one Saturday.  I made a huge and gorgeous cake, complete with candles and flames, ate one gigantic piece, and was cured of my craving.  The rest is sat around for 9 days being slowly eaten piece by piece by Christos until it was gone.  He ate it all.  It did not make him throw up even on day 9.   How long is a cake with icing good when left out at room temperature anyway? 

I also went through food phases.  I went through a pretty intense honeydew phase for a few weeks.  I also went through a soup phase.  I have never been a real soup eater, but I ate A LOT of soup and am still eating a fair amount.  I ate so much that one of the few people that actually knew I was pregnant was the lady at the British supermarket.  She kept laughing at me for buying so much soup, so I told her the reason.  It was so strange to say out loud that I was pregnant that I realized I was shaking after I told her.  (The other person I told was our dog groomer.  He was standing there waiting for me to hoist our 50 pound dog up onto the grooming table.  I figured for a 40-euro, 10-minute haircut, he could pick her up himself, so I played my pregnancy card for the first time.  Worked like a charm!)  I have also eaten a lot of ice cream, eggplant, and Gouda cheese.  And Philadelphia cream cheese is my new best friend.

And, finally, the MACDADDY of all symptoms.  For about 8 weeks, at all times, on all occasions, I think it is safe to say that I was in very close range of spontaneously combusting.  I would not have been at all shocked to open my mouth to speak and see a cloud of smoke pour out, or, more alarming, yet just as likely, to see flames rocketing from my bellybutton.  (By the way, all that soup I ate was at room temperature, straight out of the can....you would have to be crazy to add fuel to that fire in my belly...talk about courting disaster!)


Some other miscellaneous, typical, yet amazing none-the-less symptoms I have experienced have been that my hair and nails have been growing at a freakishly fast rate.  I mean crazy.  And I do have a super-human sense of smell (which was not so nice considering dear Bella's recent tummy trouble due to Christos over-indulging her in rawhide bones.)  Also, for a few weeks there I was a human water faucet.  I cried A LOT.  For no reason and for ridiculous reasons and for a few real reasons (there must be other women out there who have been moved to tears by the fact that their husband CANNOT put his dirty clothes where they belong...he can manage to put them absolutely everywhere else...on the kitchen table, on the porch, on my glorious new washing machine, on the couch, on the coffee table, you name it...but the dirty clothes basket?  NO WAY!  I think this maybe borders on a valid reason for tears of exasperation and frustration.)  And, I do not have my normal stamina and exhaust fairly easily. 

So, in all, I think I am probably a relatively normal, healthy, pregnant gal.

The unbearable heat has now passed, and my energy levels are much higher than they were (though not exactly normal) so we are full steam ahead.  We have lots of plans for the next couple of months that I cannot wait to share with yall!  Much more to come later!!!!!!!!!!!

Love,
Haley