8 weeks.

Dear bean in my belly,

This week you are truly a bean! The size of a kidney bean! You are six weeks old and I am eight weeks pregnant. You have webbed fingers and webbed toes poking out of your hands and feet. You have eyelids, breathing tubes connecting throat to lungs, primitive neural pathways, and your tail is just about gone. (Huzzah!) You are constantly moving and shifting around in my uterus, but I can't feel you yet. You will have to get a bit bigger yet for that.

This has been a rough week, little bean. I have officially joined the legions of pregnant women who suffer from morning sickness. Two is the number of times I threw up in my garbage can at work. Countless is the number of times I have gagged and dry heaved all over the greater Fresno area. The only consistent remedy I have found is to eat whatever sounds good whenever it sounds good. And, yes, this resulted in Shane and I making an emergency run to the grocery store to buy all the ingredients for a ham dinner with all the fixings... mustard sauce, funeral potatoes, green bean casserole... it was random and delicious and kept me from feeling sick for two whole days.

Work has been exceptionally busy this week, little bean, and so I have not been as obsessed with you as usual. I was also called to be the Gospel Doctrine co-teacher in our ward, so I don't suppose I will be able to continue pouring over my pregnancy books and consulting Dr. Google on an hourly basis as I have been. I suppose this will be good for you and me in the long run... obsessive compulsive behavior is generally frowned upon and crazy pregnant women are never taken seriously...

Love,
Suzanne

7 weeks.

Dear bean in my belly,

I am 7 weeks pregnant today. You are a 5 week-old bean. You are the size of a small blueberry. You have arms and legs and soon will have hands and feet. Your brain is growing, your eyes have color, and you have an appendix, a pancreas, and intestines. You have lots of human parts, little bean, but you still look like an alien. Or a manatee.

You doubled in size this week, little bean. And I could tell. To say I have been "tired" would be like saying the ocean is "big." I feel as if I could sleep for three weeks. I fight to keep my eyes open at work, and sometimes I loose that fight. I go to bed before 10:00 pm and have a hard time getting up by 8:00 am. I spent the weekend with your Aunt Lyndsey in Sacramento, and felt terribly that the only thing I could muster the energy to do was recline on her couch and watch movies. (But I also partially blame this on the fact that your Aunt Lyndsey has the most comfortable couch my bum has ever sat upon.)

New this week were the first inklings of morning sickness. If my stomach gets all the way empty, I feel nauseated. But if I eat a full-sized meal, I feel nauseated. So if I can manage to keep a slow, steady stream of food entering my body throughout the day, I pretty much feel normal. Also new this week: ADVENTURES IN HEARTBURN! I have never suffered from heartburn before, and so I had no idea just how annoying it is! Eating makes it worse, of course, but I have to eat to keep from feeling sick. And it mostly hits at night, just as I'm laying down to sleep, of course. I try to sleep on an incline, but that hasn't happened yet. I suppose this is when overwhelming fatigue comes in handy, because thus far I have been so tired that I can fall asleep despite the heartburn.

But by far the most exciting occurrence this week: yesterday Shane and I saw your heartbeat. Tiny and fast. Like a gnat flapping its wings. We also confirmed that you are a "you" and not a "them." (We breathed a collective sigh of relief about this; I was terrified you were three beans, we would have been okay with two, but one was our number of choice.) I no longer think you are a figment of my imagination, little bean, because I have seen you. You are real. And although the following image shows nothing even remotely baby-like, Nurse Practitioner Missy assured us it is indeed a picture of the bean in my belly.


Love,
Suzanne

6 weeks.

Dear bean in my belly,

Today you are a four-week old bean and I am six weeks pregnant. (Does this math confuse you, too?) You are the size of a lentil, and this make me happy because I do love lentils.

Your heart has formed and is pumping blood through your little lentil body at 100-160 beats per minute, twice the speed of mine. You still look like an alien, but your head is starting to grow and your eyes and nose and ears are starting to form. You have little buds where your arms and legs will sprout. Some of your other parts -- brain, lungs, bones, muscles -- are also starting to form. You are a busy little bean!

Last night Shane made the first -- of what I can only assume will be many -- late night craving runs. Around 10:30 pm I felt I could not live another moment without eating a baked potato. Shane cheerfully hopped in the car and procured said baked potato from the Wendy's drive-thru. I think the novelty of this made it kind of fun for both of us, but I don't think the novelty will last long, and I am predicting that within the next month or two, I will hear the words, "Go get your own damn baked potato."

The insatiable hunger and the unrelenting need to urinate continue. New this week is overwhelming fatigue. I could not get myself out of bed this morning until 10:00 am, and since I had to run to the lab for another set of blood work, I didn't get into the office until 11:00 am. (OOoops!) Since I am not really what you would consider a "high-energy" individual, I am starting to worry that adding pregnancy fatigue to my natural constitution will result in something like hibernation for the next eight months. The good news seems to be, when I am able to remove myself from the bed and start the day, I can usually build up enough momentum to last me into the evening. Until around 11:00 pm, when I curl up in bed with a baked potato and promptly slip into a coma.

Love,
Suzanne

Knock knock, are you there, little bean?

Dear bean in my belly,

Today I was feeling very unpregnant; I started to wonder if Shane and I hallucinated the extra pink line on our pregnancy test. (It was very faint...) But then I ate half a bag of potato chips for a mid-afternoon snack, which confirmed, yes, something is happening in my body.

Apparently you are desperately in need of potato chips, kalamata olives, grape tomatoes, strawberry shortcake, and string cheese, because nothing has ever tasted so delicious. (Not eaten all at once, mind you... although I haven't ruled it out as a viable option...) It's like I'm tasting for the first time. Just wait until those potato chips make their way to you, little bean! They are GLORIOUS!

I spent this weekend in bed, trying to recover from a sore throat and a fever that hit at the end of last week. Usually, when the thought even crosses my mind that I might be getting sick, I run for the medicine cabinet and start shoving whatever I can find down my throat. This was a different experience, just riding it out. I didn't want to take a even Tylenol, even though Shane broke the Sabbath to buy me some and Dr. Google seems to think it's okay. But I couldn't bring myself to take it. You are still so small and vulnerable, little bean!

And it is very strange to feel protective of something that 75% of the time you are certain is a figment of your imagination.

I have another blood test on Wednesday and an ultrasound in 8 days, and then maybe you will be cemented into reality, little bean.

Love,
Suzanne

5 weeks.

Dear bean in my belly,

Yesterday I turned five weeks pregnant. That makes you a three-week old bean. Dr. Google tells me you are the size of a sesame seed, you look more tadpole than human, you have a neural tube now, and your teeny tiny heart has formed and will start to pump this week.

Shane and I have known for one week that we are pregnant. We waited so long and have gone through much to get you snuggled deep into my belly, little bean. We tried to get pregnant for a year and a half before we sought the opinion of a reproductive endocrinologist and his staff. After a battery of tests, Nurse Practitioner Missy told us that we should consider using intrauterine insemination to overcome some of the problems that were keeping you from us.

After taking clomiphene to stimulate ovulation (which produced three follicles, so we still don't know if you are "bean" or "beans") and having an intramuscular hCG shot (administered lovingly and painfully by Shane) to trigger ovulation, an insemination was performed on January 14, 2009. A home pregnancy test on January 28 came out positive, and a blood test the next day confirmed pregnancy. Another blood test one week later, February 4, told us everything was right on track. I have a third blood test next week, and our first ultrasound is scheduled for February 17. (During which, I hope you and your beating heart make a vivid appearance, little bean.)

I have not (yet) been overwhelmed by pregnancy symptoms. During weeks 3 and 4, I experienced some cramping and a few shooting pains in the abdomen, which worried me considerably, but the medical professionals say it is normal and is indicative of the uterus growing and the surrounding ligaments stretching. (It is difficult to believe that anything is growing and stretching already!) For the past few days I have been exceedingly tired, but I'm kind of a tired person, so I haven't decided whether this is a pregnancy symptom or just the status quo.

Two changes I have noticed: the need to eat and the need to pee. I have never experienced such hunger. I feel as if I eat constantly, all day long, and still go to bed famished. The hunger even woke me in the middle of the night once. Another thing waking me in the middle of the night: trips to the bathroom. It's hard to believe that you are putting any pressure on my bladder yet, and indeed, Dr. Google says the frequent need to urinate this early in pregnancy is due to increased blood volume and therefore increased kidney activity. What a demanding little bean you already are!

I still have to convince myself daily that you are real, little bean. I can not feel you and I have not seen you, and sometimes this all feels like a very carefully orchestrated practical joke. It is so strange to want something so badly for so long and then receive it. I'm sure the joy and excitement will follow shortly, but forgive me little bean, because for now there is a lot of overwhelm and trepidation.

Love,
Suzanne