Blood Cord Banking

One of the most important things I did to plan for my baby's
arrival was to arrange for his cord blood to be stored. Thank god
my older sister had her baby first as I basically copied everything that
she did...and continue to harrass her with a million questions! We went with CBR, since that is who Gabriela used and they store the cells in
Arizona which seems to be a safe location away from earthquakes,
hurricanes, etc. Other things that I copied from Gabriela included the
hospital where she gave birth (Baptist off of Kendall Drive) and her
doctor, that she was thrilled with. It ended up being a great choice and
towards the end of the pregnancy I met the other two doctors in the
practice, since any one of the three could be there for my baby's
delivery. The only "joke" that I didn't find that hysterical was when one of
the doctors asked if I "ate Haggen Daz for breakfast" with all of
my weight gain.

Nesting - New Home

During the 2nd trimester Andres and I began making preparations for the baby. On March 1st we moved from our direct bayfront condo in the Mark to a single family home in Coral Gables. It was tough to get Andres to agree to leave the conveniences of a condo, but he finally agreed that with a baby it is much more convenient to be able to park right outside, have more privacy and have a back yard to enjoy. Our new home has three bedrooms, including a very large master bdrm, an office and the new nursery. It also has a garage, french doors leading to patio area and lots of closet space.

Amnio

On December 19th 2009, I had my amniocentesis done. Andres and I were told at that appointment, beginning of the 2nd trimester, that we were having a boy! We were very excited. I wasn't nervous about the amnio as both my sister and mom had said that it was no big deal..simply a prick on your belly. The nurses and doctors all told me that it simply wasn't necessary for me to have this proceedure done since I was just about to turn 34 at the time and it is only required of women 35 and over, but I insisted on having it done for peace of mind. I researched that the risk to the fetus was so minimal and many "problems" couldn't be directly linked to the amnio. I was more relieved to be done with the 1st trimester as that is when women face the highest incidence of miscarriage: 1 in 5 - Ouch! I am happy to report that my nausea did get slightly better as well, although I continued to "pray to the porcelain god"..when I made it to the toilet bowl, that is!

Home for the Holidays

The nausea was so debilitating that I decided to spend most of December in New York to be pampered by my parents siblings and my adorable neice, Sofia. I also finally broke down and bought some prego clothes...finally accepting that it would only be a matter of time before I wouldn't be able to fit into any of my regular clothes. In this picture with Sofia I am sporting my first outfit from Kohls with the pants with the stretchy belly. Ooh-la-la! Sofia is sporting a gorgeous dress that I bought her. As I was spoiled with my parents' attention, my Dad's fabulous cooking and my Mom's incredible holiday dinners, I was busy spoiling Sofia. ;-) I bought her a dry erase calender so we could track the days until Christmas and which days she had school. I also bought her an educational clock and workbook to learn how to tell time. We made snowmen together and did art projects together. It was so nice to be able to spend such a long time with my family and at the same time give hubby a break from having to wait on me AND cover most of the business!

Second Ultrasound

I was amazed at how detailed the second ultrasound was! What a difference from the first one that pretty much looked like a little tadpole. This was taken on November 10th 2009 towards the end of the horrid first trimester. It was a nice little reward after all of the nausea and vomiting. I would have never thought that "morning sickness" for some lucky women really lasts the entire day! I tried everything to make it go away and nothing worked for very long: bracelets with pressure points, ginger candy, etc. It was so horrible that my doctor had to prescribe Zofran which, coupled with eating every two hours, was the only thing that helped numb the nausea although it didn't make the vomiting go away completely.

A Life Changing Event

I new that something was amiss when I felt a low grade nausea during my celebratory lunch after a closing with one of my customers. I know my body pretty well and something was definitely different. I picked up a pregnancy test from Walgreens on my way home and you can imagine how surprised my hubby and I were to see the results! I went with the Clear Blue pregnancy test as that states the results in WORDS and doesn't make you fumble for those extra seconds wondering whether it was one line or two that meant pregnant. We were excited and a bit nervous at the same time when the results came in. I honestly couldn't believe how fast it happened! Little did I know that Lucas was conceived the very first day we tried.

Pre-prego

So there's a reason that I didn't start this blog when I was pregnant...and I tried! I really did. But I soon realized that I really didn't want to remember much of my pregnancy or I might never want to have another child. I'm not saying I want to have three or four kids, but possibly two. That might be nice. We haven't really made up our minds yet and kinda want to see how things go with little Lucas first...

So I found out I was pregnant the day before I was set to compete in the Escape to Miami Olympic Triathlon. Yup, that was me before getting pregnant. I competed in my first Triathlon on Sept 12th 2009 and ran my first full marathon in San Diego with Team in Training raising funds for the Leukemia and Lymphomia Society on May 31st 2009 in San Diego. I had already started training and fund raising for the next season as a mentor and signed up for the infamous "Goofy Challenge" in Orlando, FL. Basically you run a full and half marathon all in one weekend. Crazy, huh!