March 2016 #4 - entering the second trimester at last and (hopefully) waving goodbye to sickness

[marmitemofo]

started a new thread as the old one was getting full up. Thought I would post the link to stats here too so people can update if they want!

docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CWO_z74sygCKB3cdMb7jXf2VP1TwJB8KCTF-M5XbTyY/edit#gid=0

Just back from Mothercare... bought a bunch of mat clothes and they were all in the sale it's worth a dig if you've got one near you.

The sales assistant also mentioned that they've got an event on from 29th so a few deals to be had - gonna drag DH along so he can decide on the pram/travel system.

Ooh good tip paper!

Missikat, my MW said you can get your matB from 24 weeks. She said she'd give it to me at my 24 week appt, but if I needed it before I could get it from my GP.

Sorry, that should say you can get it from 20 weeks...

Urrrrrgh am wide awake! Ds wet the bed at 4 and I've been awake ever since today is not going to go well!

missikat that's a good point re mat B1 form. My next midwife appointment isn't till 28 weeks! I will probably ring the GPs surgery after my 20 week scan and ask them.

Woke up at 6.30 today and DD has only just started complaining! Positively a lie in, I think it's been about a month since she's woken up later than 6. Hopefully means her canines have all cut through now. I live in hope....

Early up in our house too...no idea why as dc#1 is not yet born

I don't wake up this early in the week so it's a bit unfair to wake up this early on a Sunday!

Blurgh... every time I almost got back to sleep, he woke me up again! He's going to be terrible later, we've got a fairly busy day...

I was thinking the same about my mat b1 marmite, I'm so forgetful and there are a few things we need to arrange before the next midwife appointment, flu jabs and such, I know I'll forget something! Think she said something about blood but can't quite remember...

For those of you waiting for the new app to arrive - ITS HERE!!!

I just felt my baby move (I think). I'm bed with a coffee (this is DC1 so making the most of these child free weekends!) and it felt like fluttering really low down. Hope it wasn't just wind! My dog was lying with her head on my belly and looked quite alarmed!

doc that's so exciting! I still haven't felt a thing at 17+2.

Definitely making the most of the chilled out child free weekends too. Had a late night last night as we went to a party which obviously I had to drive back from (!) so had an amazing lie in this morning, lunch out with friends and now just chilling on the sofa having put the last wash on so nothing left to do for the rest of the day

Morning all! Third day in a row DD has slept till 6.30 so hopefully the dreaded teething hell of early waking is over can't believe I've reached a stage in my life where half 6 is considered a luxury haha.

Felt the baby move last night (I'm 16+6 today). I've felt flutterings before but haven't been 100% it was baby, but last night in bed it was unmistakably small baby moving around! So exciting!

So in a very good mood due to that and finally getting some sleep. Going to use that positive energy to have a cycle this morning. On a less positive note, I was at pregnancy yoga on Saturday and my teacher told me she could she I've already got stomach muscles separation I had it really bad with DD as had quite a large bump by the end, and it took me 18 months or so to get the gap as small as possible (1cm) but stopped doing my stomach exercises when trying to conceive so looks like that plus ever expanding bump means its back kinda depressing as I found it so hard to fix last time. Oh well, was bound to happen as I'd read it gets worse with subsequent pregnancies. If anyones not aware of it (I wasn't until post partum) its a condition called diastasis recti and its very common post pregnancy! A little way off in the future to think of but there are certain exercises you're not supposed to do that can make it worse so thought I'd give people a heads up in advance

Marmite - I managed to close mine too after lots of corrective exercises and am pretty sure mine is back !! I bet it wil be harder to repair after a third child . If this is your second child I wouldn't be so worried - had a huge bump with dd2 and managed to close it but feel third time round I'm beyond repair !

Morning all,

Quiet weekend on here as was out shopping all day with dp (he wanted the new iphone) and spent all day yesterday cleaning the house, windows, oven etc all the jobs I hate!

Woke up 3 times in the night and each time was laid on my back, oops. Keep panicking that I'm harming the baby somehow. 16 week appt. is this Thursday (when I'll actually be 17 weeks exactly) can't wait.

and Working out if I finish mid Feb-ish gives me 19 more weeks at work how scary/exciting.

I finally bought some maternity bras at the weekend, wearing for the first time today. It's lovely not to have the underwire digging into my rib cage but these babies are feeling rather unsupported! I am a DD verging on E cup so haven't worn a non-underwired bra in several years!

DH and I made a list last night of all the things we need to buy which we consider to be "essentials" and priced it up. It came to almost £4,000! Admittedly DH in particular has expensive tastes ... we are getting some help from grandparents on the big ticket items (pram, cot and nursery furniture) but still ...

Had my 16 week midwife appt this morning and got to hear baby's heartbeat which was amazing! It was 140 exactly, so not giving much away in the gender guessing game. I was at the consultant clinic on Friday (when I was 16+1) and she scanned me as said it would be quicker than trying to just find heartbeat with doppler so got to see baby kicking away too. She didn't say whether it was a boy or girl and as DH wasn't with me I didn't ask, but secretly wishing I had done now!

20 week scan finally booked for 23rd October and a nice early 8.30am slot - can't wait!

No movements felt yet.

Q I haven't got a pregnancy pillow yet so the last two nights tried sleeping with a squishy draught excluder along side me to try to stop me rolling onto my back - it hasn't worked! Think I need to get one of those ginormous U-shaped pillows but it looks like it takes up so much space and DH already gets pushed off the edge by the dog

I had my 16 week apt this morning too. Heartbeat was 150 so does that mean girl? Everyone thinks I'm having a girl this time round so we'll see. So lovely to hear it and know that for now, everything is ok. Going to treat myself to some cake to celebrate

I'm 16+4 and can't feel any definite movements as yet. This is baby 2, so hoping to feel something soon.

Also had my 16 week appt to day, but no doppler for me! Kind of wishing I'd asked to hear now. Also still no 20 week scan date!!! My midwife said it's not unusual to get them this late. I'm 16+4 today, so I should get a date within the next 2 weeks....sigh. So impatient.

Also having trouble with sleeping....I keep waking up on my back, rolling over to my side, then waking up on my back 10 minutes later! Argh! Have tried the big cushions, and having a spoon with DH but nothing seems to help. Even with pillows between my legs I manage to roll onto my back. Hopefully no harm will come of it....right?? I do worry about that....

me i keep being tempted by maternity bras but am scared my boobs will look like they're round my waist now they've grown so much.
and £4k?! ouch! We've calculated under £1000 for all we are getting, granted cot bed is being given from BIL and FIL is paying £400 towards the £590 travel system so that's saved a lot.

I will be on SMP only so need to save more for my time off really than spend on baby things. I'd like to take the full year but unless we can save enough to cover the 3 unpaid months then I'm doubtful I'll be able to.

Been sleeping with a thick pillow between my knees but waking up on my back, it's crazy as I've never slept on my back pre-pregnancy.

Booked in 3 days annual leave next week as DP is off too so we are going to strip what will be baby's room and make a start on getting it looking less of a dump and more of a bedroom

I sleep on my side, glad I don't have to worry about being on my back.

The separating muscles thing sounds grim. My Pilates instructor is adapting exercises for me and there are some she is making me avoid completely as she said they can contribute to the separating thing.

Q my DH does rather like to go for the most expensive things and he also has a strange phobia of anything second hand! I think I'll be able to persuade him to spend a by less though! We are lucky in that we both earn good money but I do not get good maternity benefits so we will be taking a massive hit when I'm off and we also need to save. I'm planning on going back after 10 months (after Christmas) though and taking all my accrued holiday as the last month at full pay, so should escape the dreaded unpaid bit.

OOoooo I forgot about annual leave accrual while off - i can stick a month so only 2 months unpaid to cover! just done the maths and that's certainly do-able. Might even be able to do 2 weeks one month and 2 weeks the other.

Working in the construction industry in a male dominated office is proving to be a nightmare for maternity benefits, standard 6 weeks 90% and 33 weeks smp. Going to look around for another job for after maternity purely based on the fact I work in a portacabin and will be nowhere to express if i manage to be able to breastfeed. It's making me uncomfortable already.

I had to google the muscle separation - how awful for you ladies, not something I was aware of. There is so much information in pregnancy that you just don't think about in day to day non baby life.

congrats thepug and rhubarb on hearing the HB today - I found it really amazing when I heard mine last week and it really made things feel more real. Sorry you didn't get a chance to hear it hayley its unfortunately one of those things that varies from place to place.

Me wow £4k !!! What are you buying for that much?!? (Though if you can afford it and are comfortable doing it then fair play.) We didn't count up how much we spent with DD but was prob just over £1k. we are pretty stingy though and got a lot of clothes given to us at my baby shower and the rest we bought second hand from NCT nearly new sales/ebay so we spent basically nothing on clothes. we had grandparents buy us the bednest (£250) and maxi cosi car seat + iso fix base (~£250 I guess?). Then we bought a cot for £150 from play.com, and got the Mamas and Papas sola from pramworld.co.uk for a really good price (£200) - with rain cover etc. I bought the carry cot attachment from ebay second hand for £20, and the travel adapters were £30 from pramworld? So we had a complete travel system for reasonably cheap. I think if you shop around you can get stuff for cheaper, and I would really recommend pramworld as they do occasionally have really good deals on certain items. I guess we spent money on other random things but there weren't any other big ticket items as such.

this time round DP won't let me buy anything new unless it's a boy, and even then we'll get hand me downs from my sister (who had DS2 three weeks ago) so expect we won't buy much. to be honest as much as I'd love to splash out on lovely new clothes, I have to accept that I'm taking 9 months off and only 4 months of those will be on full pay , so we need to save as much money beforehand as possible!

Yep Q muscle separation is awful, and very common. A lot of women just recover naturally, though for some of us a little bit of work is needed! I have always had a weak core, never even thought about my core strength before getting pregnant with DD to be honest, and discovered the separation problem quite late on (maybe 4 months post partum). This time I am much more prepared and know exactly which exercises to do from the beginning! Hoping it's not such a pain in the arse to get some semblance of stomach muscles back, but resigned myself to the fact that I have a weak core and I may be damaged irrevocably

marmite I'll post my list when I get home and you experienced mums can tell me where we are overspending!

Q I'm the same, statutory minimum, 6 weeks at 90% and then SMP for 33 weeks it will be equivalent to about an 80% pay cut for me! Thank goodness DH still earns a decent salary

16 week appointment today, videoed the heartbeat, was so nice. Also uterus seems to have grown loads since yesterday!

16+6, no movements, but anterior placenta.

Finally, finally the worst bit of the sickness seems to be over... touch wood...

I'm really lucky regarding maternity benefits in work, I have 16 weeks of full salary before dropping to SMP. First time mum though so need to buy everything (particularly because my whole family is in Ireland), but we might get some small baby hand-me-downs from my brother who has a one year old girl.