PREGNANCY #2: 8 MONTHS

This past month, overall, I have felt great. I really look forward to my workouts, probably because I'm addicted to the endorphins, and I'm eating well. Besides a few things, like spilling boiling water on my belly (!!), having to go to the bathroom so much more (no thanks to all the watermelon I've been eating), and pelvis aches and pains (baby is growing!), I feel grateful for this body doing it's thing like it's supposed to. 

This past week though, I haven't gotten as much sleep and that puts me under in a bad way, I end up fighting sleepiness all day and by the end of the work day it feels as though I've run my face into the wall several times. Must.sleep.more.

Strangely, or maybe not so strangely, the things I crave the most these days are watermelon (We've already bought three this week) and coffee. And what I want is really good coffee and really good watermelon. Since I'm laying low on the caffeine I've resorted to decaf, which isn't the same but as long as it's good decaf, I feel satiated.

Sloane has now felt the baby move several times by putting her hand on my belly and it makes me feel like the luckiest person in the world to be sitting there with my little daughter's hand on my belly, feeling her baby sister kicking and moving around, and watching her face light up and her eyes get big. "Mom, I want baby sister to come out now!" she'll often say. 

I'm brainstorming ways that I can incorporate all of Sloane's big sister tendencies into life with a newborn. She has all the characteristics and inclinations of being a wonderful older sister and I can't wait to have them meet each other, but we are also trying to be sensitive and aware to how much change it will bring to Sloane's world to have a new sister. We've been talking to her about what life might be like, what she is to expect and ways in which she can help out - which she is very eager to do. 

Just yesterday I started trying to imagine and remember what it was like to breastfeed and pump around the clock, and what it was like trying to go to the bathroom those few weeks after giving birth, and I realized I may not be as mentally prepared for that shift back to the newborn stage as I think I am. It's a total surrender of faculties and especially now that I have a toddler, I suspect it will feel even more like a surrender and sacrifice than the first time. I am of two minds - one of assuredness that I am more experienced now and know what to expect, but then the other of anxiety about how to adjust to life with a newborn and toddler and suspense about how things may be different this time around. 

Time seems to be moving excruciatingly slow all of a sudden and I suppose that speaks to how eager I am to meet this baby, but maybe it's also exactly what I need to get my mind and soul ready for this change. In the time I have left, I've decided I will try not to hurry time along but that I will enjoy these last two months as a family of three, reminisce and re-read old journal entries from when Sloane was first born, get out Sloane's newborn outfits, do some organizing, and take a deeeeeep breath.