June 2014 -Thread 8- 20 week scans, gender reveals... Halfway through!

[GillyBillyWilly]

Jump in the new thread ladies!!!!

Marlena omg 4am you must be knackered by lunchtime. Your DH with the iPad though reminds me of me during the first 12weeks when my 6 year old started waking during the night all of a sudden. Giving her the iPad probably kept me from falling asleep at my desk! Hope it's rectified soon, what time is her bedtime?
Congrats Clever....Marlena looks like its boy 201!
Bee hope the nutritionist was okay.
Is there Anybody else with a high BMI that needs to take aspirin every day?
Mitchell stay strong for tomorrow!
Lmf - 58 days, I'm so jealous!

Clever another (active) boy! :) Glad everything looked fine.

Mitchell how rude of your colleague

Marlena 4am? How do you survive? I get very grumpy when DS wakes up at 6.

Bee how was your appointment?

Lmf I still have 75 days to go!! 58 sounds much better :)

Is anyone having braxton hicks? I had a couple on Sunday evening and I was getting scared. I am better now but I still get a couple during the day. I have been trying to read but information does not seem very reliable on what is normal, how many are "okay".

Urck, I'm back - everybody was really lovely, first had a chat with a really nice midwife and then with a nutritionist.

But after a rather emotional afternoon emailing back and forth with work ending in a slightly tense phonecall wasn't in the best frame of mind, and given my weight and how it's connected to my mental health I had a cry all over the nutritionist and felt really stupid afterwards.

The programme itself is fine, it's very low key and not at all about telling you what to eat or admonishing you - to be honest, if knew so much about the subject and my screwy eating patterns already, she only gave me some better coping patterns. Might get CBT out of it.

Now an engineer will rock up early next week with my magical monitoring scales - I have nightmares of a van pulling up that has 'Fatties R Us' written on it, but that's my anxiety talking!

Sorry to hear about the tears BEE but sounds like there are some positives like CBT.

sareva hahaha 201 boys clever congratulations! Funny how DS cried though! Sure he will love him in the end.

And I am so used to the early wakings now. I hate them but once I am at my desk and busy the day is over quickly. I did nearly bite two heads off this morning, so really it is my colleagues who suffer thanks to DD! She goes to bed at 7:30. And she does actually really need her 12 hours for school! She leaves at 8 for school. She wasn't that grumpy tonight thankfully. She usually has a meltdown at bed time when she has woken so early!

4 am! Can't imagine how horrible that must be! My DS used to wake up at 6 which was bad enough. We got him a clock and a star chart for staying in bed and it did the trick. Good luck.

Bee - I bet your not the first or last person to cry - food can be a very emotional subject. i have a meeting with a nutritionist in a couple of weeks - I hope s/he is as nice as yours.

What's a 'normal' wake up time for a little one then? I'd have thought 6am was okay? (We get up 630am anyway and lots of people I work with get up earlier)

I think it depends on the age Sarah.

Slightly off topic - but something I learnt this week for any other first timers out there......

Definition of "sleeping through the night" for babies is midnight through to 5am. I've now read two very different books that define it in this way.

DH has a similar sleep pattern (it kills me) - but just thought it might help some people set their expectations!
(And anyone who's baby sleeps longer is a bonus! )

Liquid I've had a some, I really don't know how many are normal though. It just feels so early to have them

Congratulations clever and everyone else that has had their scans!

Not sure if I can tell the difference between baby movement, pregnancy aches and pains, and braxton hicks. How do you know?

my bump gets really hard and tense for some seconds and then it gets back to normal. not painful but very uncomfortable.

My DD is nearly 6 and mostly sleeps 7:30 - 7 for school. I am happy with anything after 6 as I am a morning person.

But randomly she will wake at 4 and is miserable and not ready to wake up but it is so hard to get her back to sleep. I used to be able to rock her but impossible with baby bump and sore back. Dh has no patience so just gets annoyed and shouts which is very productive.

Some people prefer later bedtimes with later wake ups but as she has always had nursery or school at 8 means for us bedtime was 7 and morning usually 7 if she ever slept that late!

Liquid, I'm having this too. Some days it's happening a lot and some days it's not too bad. I asked the consultant and she said its perfectly normal, unless regular and/or painful.

Sarah mine sleeps 7pm - 6 when he is well & then happily plays (even if v noisily) for at least 10 mins to an hour. If he's teething needs changing feeling grizzly etc then he wakes at 4am & we have to get up. Had 3 4ams in a row but this morning he was back to 6 not complaining about teeth so fingers crossed that stays a while - he's 19 months.

Tbh everyone labelled him as a 'bad sleeper' when he was a newborn & the number of ppl trying to guilt me into formula (seriously piss off I'd think while smiling) was unbearable. But he always slept 3 hours & always went to sleep easily. So 7pm bed 10pm feed 1am 4am 7am every night like clockwork till he was 6 months. Ok some get dream babies that sleep through really young but he always went to sleep easily after change or feed or whatever so although I was knackered it wasn't as emotionally draining as friends with colic babies etc. Then one day he slept 7 - 4 (my breasts hurt like hell) & that was it. Sleeping baby!!!

I'm not worried about the sleepless nights etc I'm more worried about a baby that can't be consoled whether it's in eve or middle of night - now that is hard going!!

Oh and everyone whether you formula feed or breast feed be prepared for the judgement. People are so bloody rude on this issue & can't help stick their noses in your business. I was made to feel like I was denying my baby sleep because I was selfishly Breastfeeding & know people who formula fed being made to feel similarly failures. I hated Breastfeeding found it v v hard & can't say I'll kill myself to make 6 months again this time but whatever I'm doing I will def be telling people where to shove it haha (ok I really probably won't but at least I'll not worry about it this time) :)

Sorry for ignorant question... Why would breast feeding be denying him sleep?

bumble I'm already getting judgement of that. I am not comfortable with breastfeeding and will probably only do it for a few weeks and then move to expressed milk (yes I know its the worst of both worlds) or ff. There are loads of reasons why I am going down that route both personal, practical, medical and I keep on being told by well wishers that there is help available for me and breast is really best and don't give up.... I'm not bloody giving up. I am making an informed choice!!!

Hi!

I'm just sort of popping in to say hello, find it impossible to keep up with this thread to be honest, tooooo fast and I have a terrible memory, but wanted to say good luck with all the 20 weekish scans, we don't go in til 3rd February.

Also, in case anyone on here is self-employed, there's a very useful thread that I started about maternity allowance and the stupid 'small earnings exception certificate', it's here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/pregnancy/1973499-Are-you-self-employed-maternity-allowance

If it helps even one person not be screwed over on their maternity allowance, that will be a very good thing!

Hear hear! I think bringing up a baby is tough enough without people criticising your decisions. Breastfeeding can be hard and there are loads of reasons - practical, medical and psychological - why women choose not to. I did breastfeed, for a year. I didn't really enjoy it but it worked for me so I did it. I struggled to get ds to stop so will be more proactive with bottles this time. My best friend did not breastfeed once but neither of us judged each other. We had our own routines when we went out and it was fine. There were definitely pros and cons for both of us.

Sadly many people do feel they should have an opinion. The worst of these is usually mother or mother in law, which can be especially difficult.

Stay strong and do what works for you and your baby. And be aware that it might not be what you planned!

I have to say I'm quite grateful for the HCP and midwives I've had so far - about 9 midwives in total now (continuity of care, what's that?). They're not pushy about innoculations, they inform you about breast feeding but don't pressure you either way and part from this research programme about weight I'm in (which was entirely voluntary) no one has really mentioned my BMI too much.

Most of the women in my family haven't been able to breast feed - I want to give it a try, even though I find the thought really... well, almost revolting. I don't know why I feel that way but I've always felt like that and no amount or hormones seem to make it go away. I'll give it my best shot and persevere with it for a while, but 6-8 months and that's it. And I won't beat myself up should it not work out.

I managed to bf DS till 5/6 months, not sure if I'd be able to do it that long with a second DC as it involved hours and hours and hours just sitting there feeding! Think DS spent more time on than off the boob and would feed for 2 hours at a time at night. Saying that, he still likes to be physically close to me as much as possible (sit on my lap/lie on me in bed etc) He particularly likes to lie on me like I am a raft so if we're in bed he'll make sure every part of him is on me and not touching the bed. It's not that he's clingy as he'll happily go off and play all day but if I'm around he'll opt to be in physical contact. I think that is just the way he is made! I love having a cuddly toddler now but it was a little erm, claustrophobic when he was a baby!

Got my 20 week scan this afternoon. I think there are quite a few happening today. So good luck everyone!

BEE - just out of interest, you weren't breast fed? I wasn't - apparently I completely refused to latch on and to be honest its something that on a personal level has never appealed anyway... I wonder if that is linked back to the fact I didn't want the boob myself... hmmm.

Who knows, I may end up with a boob monster and not be able to do it any other way!

I bf DD until 9 months. It certainly wasn't easy. She had a dairy allergy which I suspected but all my HCP denied (until she was finally tested privately at 2 years old) so all my diet was dairy free.

bee my daughter really was a terrible sleeper. 45 minute wake ups from 7-10, then she would be awake for an hour, sleep til 1, awake for an hour, sleep til 4 sometimes (or not at all) and then not sleep much all day. And that was until she was 8 months and we contacted a sleep clinic as I was going back to work and was desperate. They helped a bit but it was only at age 2 after medication she improved.

This time I will be over the moon with one who sleeps and feeds at night! The constant bloody screaming does you in. And it was only at night. She never cried in the day and people used to tell me how lucky I was to have a happy baby!

Mitchell - no, neither me nor my brother were breastfed, we're 11 years apart. I don't think my parents were breastfed, either, my grans were both single parents and my mom and dad were really raised by their respective grandmothers.

Actually, making up bottles and feeding my brother is one of the few things I remember from when he was little, and something I really enjoyed and helped us bond a bit.

It's strange how your background impacts you.. I cannot wait to breastfeed the baby! Absolutely everyone in my family and friends circle were long term breastfeeders and I cannot wait to join them. I imagine it so special.. Honestly cannot wait for the baby to be handed to me and put to my breast.. Feel emotional just to imagine it..

I would be devastated if I wasn't able to do it.,

I was BF for 6 weeks before being put on evaporated milk and solids. No wonder I have every allergy going!