More of the same

I had a doctor visit today. I'm still off work/working from home. Now the difference is, given the cramping/spotting that occurred last week (which was very likely stress induced) if there's no improvement there, I will be taken off work completely. So I really have to learn to relax and not push so hard at working, and not get so stressed when things aren't working right.

On other news, the glucose challenge is tomorrow. This is going to be particularly nasty as I can't drink the usual icky orange syrup. I get a special mix of straight sucrose solution with saline. Yum. Hurray for corn allergies. So hopefully that will be uneventful and I'll pass first go.

Otherwise, da Babi is doing great. His heart sounds great and I'm measuring right on target. There's another ultrasound being scheduled and I go back to the doctor in two weeks.

In yet other baby news, we did the childbirth class last Saturday. It was an interesting time. We learned a lot, and honestly wasn't freaked out by a lot of the stuff. Facts given straight up tend not to bother me, whereas hearing the stories do. The tour of the facilities was totally worth it. I was surprised that the hospital doesn't staff the nursery. They encourage the baby to be in the room as much as possible. Dads don't have to abide by the visiting rules (YAY!!). The one thing that totally sucks is that kids have to be over 12 to visit. :( That part I was totally annoyed with. But the other side is if it's a normal birth and I can get out of bed, I can go to the lounge and visit with little folks. The rooms are very homey and nice, so that won't be bad. They have 5 private rooms and they fill those first then there are 3 double rooms. So here's hoping I will be in a private. :)

I've signed up for a baby CPR class, a mother/baby class and a breastfeeding class. I'm looking forward to them actually. There are people from the childbirth class signed up for them, so I'll get to see them again, which will also be nice.

And for the record, I have never seen such hellacious, bratty, out of control kids as I did at the doctor office today. OMFG, they were awful. Screaming, yelling, one was grabbing their baby sister and trying to wrestle. And the parents did NOTHING. I so appreciate our friends with well behaved kids and great parenting.

Vaccine?

I was checking my mail today when I noticed a message from one of the CD boards I'm on. Here's the message:

"Apparently Dr. Anderson in Australia (Nexpep) is starting Phase 1
clinical trials early 2009 on a vaccine for Celiac Disease. Every
indication is that this will work on 80% of Celiacs worldwide.

If this is true, in 3 to 5 years the majority of us (fingers crossed I
and my family are in the 80%) will be drinking a real beer and having
our favorite meals again!

Though GF food has gotten better, it hasn't gotten much cheaper and it
still isn't very nutritious either - high in fats, sugars and starches.

So this might be the "hope" we have been waiting for?

In any case if you haven't read about it this will be your heads up to
start reading on the vaccine...."

My first reaction is total disbelief. I've not heard of many auto-immune diseases being "cured" by a simple vaccine. Treated, yes, but not cured. So let's assume this is for treatment.

What boggled my mind was in one breath the poster was talking about drinking beer and eating favorite meals again, and in the next talking about how GF foods are high in fats, sugars and starches. What do you think fast food is?? What is beer? I'm sure those "favorite meals" weren't Healthy Choice meals.

I've found I don't miss most of the glutened stuff, and most healthy, natural foods, like meats, fruits and veggies are naturally gluten free anyway. So what exactly is missing? Oh yes, all the fats, starches and sugars of pre-packaged convenience foods.

Anything that I have found myself missing, I can usually duplicate in a pretty tasty facsimile. All these people in mourning for glutened food could too, but it takes some determination and willingness to experiment. I mean, I just made dairy-free, egg-free Yorkshire puddings, which in theory shouldn't be possible, since it's made of eggs, milk and flour. That's it. But I did it and they were really tasty. Other people have done it, so it's not like I had to re-invent the wheel. A few minutes on Google for inspiration and then went to work modifying. That's it.

So I think it's safe to say I will be taking a pass on this vaccine. Good luck to those who want it, but I think I'm ok the way I am. :)

Good bye 2008!

2008 is on it's way out, and 2009 is nearly here. What did the year bring?

I could go back through my posts here and on other forums, and give you the recap, but you likely read it all yourself.

Really, there are a few of major stand out things for me for 2008 -

We're pregnant! Dancer is going to be giving birth to our baby boy next April. Even though she spent some time on bed rest (and still is), things are going well and on track. It's going to be a roller coaster for sure.

Weight loss - I got into the local gyms "Biggest Loser" program weighing around 255lbs in January, and today I weight 201lbs, can run 4 - 5 miles and am fitter and healthier than I can ever remember being. January 2009 I will also be team captain for the *next* "Biggest Loser" event. I've spoken at seminar's at the gym, and run their Team page on a weight loss forum.

Photography - I finally got seriously into photography - took some classes, bough some equipment and started reading as much as I could get my hands on. I'm launching a small business (http://www.rt2photo.com) to pay off that equipment too :)

None of this will matter once our son is born in 2009 though - this will an awesome year!

26th Dec - Boxing day

26th Dec - Boxing day

Merry Christmas from our home to yours this year!

Refugees

We had a massive ice storm on Thursday. The weather had been weird. It wasn't cold enough to snow, but not warm enough to be pure rain, so it froze. We lost internet and cable first, but didn't really think much about it. However, around 2:30am on Friday we lost power. Ok again, not really a biggie. It will be back on soon, right?

So we get up on Friday morning and the whole side of the house (where the garages are) was a solid sheet of ice. The garage doors were frozen shut. Around 11:00 Geek was able to get them open and clear off the drive. We realized we'd lost cell phone service. Still no sign of power. He was able to make it to a friend's house who had been listening to the radio. They said no power til at least Sunday at the earliest. Our friend was taking his kids to his parents to hunker down. So now what do we do?

It was bad. They were setting up emergency shelters. The whole area (almost 350,000 people) were without power. The last place I wanted to go was to a shelter. No way.

We packed up the boys and make the trek to Salem to our friend Mike's. The boys are happy since they get to see their friend Reggie. It wasn't pleasant - the car ride was rough (tells me I'm still not entirely ready to come off bedrest yet. Bum) But we're here and warm.

We had to leave the bunny, so I'm worried about him being in the house with no heat, but hopefully he'll be ok. We gave him lots of hay and water, and added a blanket to his tunnel, so I'm hoping that will be enough. I'm worried about a couple of our friends who are having a time of it. One of our friends went to a house where the generator ran out of fuel and the cars were out of fuel. Another went to her dad's in NH (the part that did still have power) but her husband was at a funeral and didn't know what was happening. So I'm definitely thinking of them right now (both have small kids, so I really feel for them here.)

Looks like we're here through the weekend.

Christmas tree 2008

Christmas tree 2008

Christmas has arrived at the Jones home.

Presents haven't been bought, but Christmas is here - so that helps :)

Pregnancy update again

For those of you bored of this topic, feel free to skip. :)

I'm still on bedrest for this week and at least Tuesday next week. There's an ultrasound scheduled for Friday and a doctor's appointment for next Tuesday. With any luck things are moving as they should, up. I honestly don't know how other women cope with being laid up like this. It's driven me nuts!! I was able to sit up and direct my kitchen this weekend which helped a lot. I simplified the menu, so there wasn't a huge amount for Paul to cook. Even so, there's still a lot for one person to do. I over-did it a bit on Friday to try to help him out. It didn't seem like much (empty and reload dishwasher, trash out the fridge for new food arriving) but apparently it was, as I felt a bit off Saturday. However, that was nothing compared to Saturday evening.

I'm usually very careful about where I let the dogs sit on me. They need to stay off my stomach. Buddy was in a spot that I thought was ok, until Paul made a noise and he launched himself off me to go see. All his weight launched into my lower abdomen and then he launched himself off like it was a springboard. OUCH!! It started some of the worst cramps yet and I seriously thought it was time for the ER. I was also afraid the babi got hurt as there wasn't much movement that evening compared to the day before. However I decided that since there was no blood to wait and see how I felt. Sunday was still not the best but I still wanted to wait and see how things were going. The cramping wasn't as bad, still no blood and some movement. We also had folks coming for a photoshoot, and I didn't want to cancel.

The shoot went well, which made us all very happy, and things seemed to simmer down for me. After some chocolate cake, lots of movement and kicking was felt, so I'm not as concerned. The "cramping" that started last night was in fact pain from muscles not really wanting to stretch in my midsection. That I can live with. :)

To save what's left of my sanity I started working remotely last week. I'm quite happy about that, as at least I'm no longer chewing up sick time. Now the trick is to stay stress-free. Even with the bit of the job I'm doing it can be stressful. The good news is it's hard to be stresed out when there are warm pugs snoring happily in your lap. I will still need to sort out my time off and get the doctor to fax over documentation, but that should be relatively easy.