Twin Pregnancy: 13 Weeks

Well, we made it . . . the dreaded 13 week mark came and went yesterday. I'm honestly so relieved to be past that. This certainly doesn't mean that all my anxiety and concerns about this pregnancy have suddenly washed away, but just getting past the gestational age that we lost B3 is a big deal to me.

Here I am at 13 weeks pregnant with twins:

In the photo, I'm wearing a non-maternity top with maternity pants. That's pretty much my wardrobe combination of choice these days. I do still have a few pairs of regular jeans that fit, but only one is comfortable enough to really wear. They sit very low and therefore below the baby belly. The top I'm wearing is nice and flowy, so I'm hoping it will continue to fit for a few more weeks. 

Brianna drew a family portrait of our family this past week. She's not much into drawing (no patience for it and she would MUCH rather paint), but I thought this was cute. 

In the closer version, you can see me (I'm pink). She drew a little belly on me and told me that the babies were in my belly so that's why she drew it. Her daddy is blue. Initially, she drew a little belly on him, too, but went back and drew a large belly. I asked her why daddy has a large belly, and she said, "Well, because he just does." Hahaha! When I was pregnant with Brenson, I gained 30 pounds and Chris gained about 20 pounds, so I'm anxious to see what happens with him this time :-). He did lose all of his baby weight right along with me after Bren was born.

Speaking of weight, I'm up about 8-10 ounces this week . . . so  not quite a pound. This puts me at 2 pounds below pre-pregnancy weight, which I think is not too bad for being pregnant with two! The day I found out I was pregnant, I weighed 4 pounds more than my starting weight with Brianna, but after losing 3 pounds I was only 1 pound more than where I was when I got pregnant with her. When I got pregnant with Brenson, I had just put on some weight, so I weighed 15 pounds more than with Brianna and about 11 pounds more than with this pregnancy. When I got pregnant with B3, I was the exact same weight as when I got pregnant with Brianna, and had lost a little over a pound when we lost that baby. So, I'm hanging in there right about where my "normal" weight is. I'm anticipating gaining quite a bit with this pregnancy, but we'll see.

One reason that I've put a bit of weight back on is that my appetite is BACK! And, I get hungry frequently. I wake up in the morning starving, am very hungry again by lunchtime, have been eating an afternoon snack with the kids, and a normal portion for dinner. This is a huge change from where we were 3 weeks ago when I could barely choke anything down. I'm not snacking before bed, but around 9:30pm, I start to get really hungry again so I may have to start squeezing in one more snack for the day. I'm trying to be really reasonable with what I eat and my portions. For snacks, I'm eating fruit (sometimes with peanut butter), or a handful of almonds, or a cheese stick, etc. Sweets are still not appealing (which is good), so that makes good snack choices a bit easier for me.

With Brenson at this point, I remember that my skin and hair were very oily, and I had some bad breakouts (namely, along my hairline in the back). With Brianna, I didn't experience the oiliness and my skin was very clear during pregnancy. This time, I would say it's much more like it was when I was pregnant with Brianna. Especially my skin. It's so clear right now (yay!). This (combined with those high heart rates) really makes me think that we have at least one girl in there. I'll be SHOCKED if the babies are both boys.

I'm still having about one gagging episode a day, but my energy is definitely higher and much of the nausea is gone. I really, really don't mind the gagging episodes. I need something to reassure me that I am still pregnant. Silly, yes?

I did have about three bad headaches this week, so we aren't out of that zone quite yet. Sometimes, they are bad enough that I have a pretty hard time functioning, but an ice pack, Tylenol, and rest will generally ease them enough for me to resume normal activities. I have felt great with no headaches the past several days, though!

One last thing: Pregnancy dreams are in full force! Unfortunately for me, that means frequent nightmares. I dreamed the other night that Brenson was drowning in murky water, but we couldn't find him to rescue him. It was horrible. I also dreamed one night that Chris beat me up! Like left bruises on my face and everything. Ugh . . . these dreams can go away at any time.

Okay, we are now all caught up on pregnancy talk! I'll continue to do weekly updates which will be on Mondays. Hopefully, I can get them posted mostly on time :-).