Calhoun or Clementine?

As soon as you tell people you are pregnant besides the normal "Congrats" the next logical question is :

"Do you think it is a boy or a girl?"

Or in our case a Calhoun (founder of Clemson) or Clementine (Clemson in a feminine way)? 

I promise you these will not be there names!

Clemson will have nothing to do with their names.

Though I can not make any promises about dressing them in Clemson clothing!

Yes, Joe and I are counting down the days till we find out and are amused by people predictions and theories.  As a midwife I know all the rumors and have seen them all disproved. 

So what do we think we are having? 

Theories siding with Clementine:

1) Really Bad Morning Sickness- in fact all day sickness. 
Still going strong at 17 weeks.  =0)

2) Girls suck your beauty from you-  Pimples gallor. 

     Keep in mind that I maybe have 4-6 pimples a year when not pregnant. 

3) Chinese Gender Calendar- Yes GIRL GIRL GIRL

4) Based on the fetal Heart Rate-  Elevated at 12 week nuchal at 175,  now at 15 wks 160

High heart rate = girl. 

Even both of my midwife friends predicted it was going to be a girl!

5) Craving sweets!  Yes yes I am!

     Hating anything protein related- loving protein would indicate a boy!

6) Pendant myth- yeap it swung back and forth!

7) Everyone is having girls and everyone thinks it is a girl!

8) Joe thinks it is a girl. 
In fact he keeps referring to as a "She" and me a "he". 

Theories siding with Calhoun:

1)Nada.... =0) 

I really have nothing except for the fact that I have never been more calm in my whole life! 

Which means it is going to be a boy! 

I do not know why, but I think despite everything above that we will be having a little Calhoun. 

The preppiest Calhoun ever I would like to state! 

I guess only time will tell but I would be willing to put money on it!

Less than 2-3 weeks until we find out thanks to people at work volunteering to scan me early, if not I would have to wait until 21+ weeks because that was the only time I could get an Ultrasound appointment on a Monday.  =0)

First thing is first!

There is no guide book to being pregnant or expecting a baby. 

In fact I think the books are all overwhelming and there is no book that has everything. 

Thank GOD for friends. 

I would have never thought that looking for day care would have to start in the 1st trimester-
but it does!

I am not going to lie- I spent 1 total day devoted to daycare. 

Again one of the benefits of being the last kid on the block. 

Fortunately, I have three daycare recommendations which made my job super easy. 

One was the day care at work.  

Yes I have daycare at work which would be the best scenario for us but the catch is because I am civilian I am the lowest priority.  Yeap sucks to be me!

Day at work rocks because:

1) ALOT CHEAPER!!! OMG! 

2) Hours are from 6 am to 8 pm which is great with my schedule

3) Ability to visit bug whenever I have a second in between patients or during my admin time.

4) Ability to not have to worry about being late to pick bug up because of traffic. 

That being said it was the second thing I did was not put my name on the waiting list after we saw the heartbeat.  Our hope is that one day bug will get in but for now I had to look into other options. 

So I moved on to looking into the other two daycare options that were recommended to us from friends.  One was literally less than 1 mile from our house and the second one was less than 1 mile from Joe's work. 

I went for the tours last Monday by myself because Joe had a meeting. 

What questions do you ask? 

Hours? 

Pick up late policy?

Security policy?

Inclument Weather policy?

Program structure?

Ratio of care providers to infants?

Schedule of the day?

Vaccinations Policy both for infants and caregivers?

Sick policy?

Reuseable diaper policy?

Prices? 

Discount offerred?

Flexible Days? 

Add an additional Day? 

Application fee?
Mandated by the State?
References?
There are so many questions.

So after about 30 minutes at each place, I had pretty much all the information I needed. 

Furthermore, both places praised me for being on the ball and looking so early. 

For the most part I was reassured that bug would be fine at either place. 

However, it was very interesting to see how different the two places were. 

One offer much more structure, while the other one was more relaxed. 

Obviously, as soon as I work out with work my leave,

I will putting my application in and the deposit in as well. 

One more thing I will be glad to be done with!

Breaking it down...

14.5 weeks was when it hit me!

I kind of felt like Miranda on Sex and the City when everyone is excited about her pregnancy and she is just kind of pregnant and did not get what all the fuss was about .  

I was pregnant and everything up to this point was going fine.

We had told our family and our friends. 

I had just work left to tell. 

So on an average Thursday night while sitting in traffic I starting crying.

Why?

Because I was pregnant and was going to be a mom!

It finally hit me- because seeing the stick turn or seeing the baby move on the Ultrasound did not do it.  Don't get me wrong, I was excited but it still did not make it real. 

But telling people did- this was real.  

Hopefully if everything went well, we would have our little bug in March.  

I got home and just cried and cried to my husband.

This was weird because I am not an emotional one at all. 
Thank you from inheriting that from my mother!

I cried about the changes that were going to happen,

the decisions that I had to make as a woman and would ultimately be judged for them,

the worry I already had.....

Not because I was unhappy but because it hit me that I had to start processing all of this
which I had been putting off!

And after about 15 minutes, I was fine!

I just need to air everything out.

I am going to be a pregnant woman and hopefully soon a mom!

It only took 14.5 weeks to hit me.

=0) 

Of course my loving husband asked two day later if I wrote about my breakdown in my baby journal.
"You might want to record that..."
Got to love him.

To Jump Ship?

As previous stated the fortunate thing about being one of the last to be pregnant is, you can rely on people and friends for advice or just seeing what they did in their pregnancy/postpartum period that worked.   Therefore, I already have the skinny on daycare's, pediatricians, etc.  So when it came to me considering what I wanted to do if we did have a baby and what I would like to do for maternity leave, the answer for me was simple….

I was not quitting work.  

Yes, my child will be in day care and I will be one of those terrible moms that works and that means that I do not love my child- I am mentally prepared to hear it all.  To be honest, I have worked really hard to put myself thru grad school and want to keep working.   I have a dream job that no matter how much I hate the politics, my schedule is set and I never have to work nights or weeks- pretty much unheard of for midwives. 

Furthermore, me working means saving for our future and also our bugs education, which is so important to both Joe and I! If i quit, basically it would decrease our savings and the money we could put away for bug for school/college. 

So I will keep working. 

As a government worker- my maternity leave is non-existent. 
This is something I knew from day one and because of that have been saving my sick leave over the last 4 years.  I currently have 12 weeks of paid leave saved– either sick or regular.  I hope to have 14-16 weeks saved by the time the bug actually arrives, but we will see.   

 After having a long discussion with Joe and both our financial planner- I came to the conclusion that I would like to take 6 months off.  3 paid, 3 unpaid.  Fortunately for us, all of our bills can be met on Joe’s salary, it will mean not putting money into savings or investing money for three months, but I think it is worth it.    Joe has totally been supportive in this decision! 

Then came into the discussion that fact that Joe is working on his PHD and going to school full time.  While walking Clemson one day he asked if I would consider going down to part time- and I think my answer was.  “It would be the ideal solution- I could keep working and be home with bug a little.”  So I will be asking to go from working four 10 hour days to three 10 hour days.  So 30 hours a week instead of 40.  I am holding my breath that my work is going to approve this request.   I am hoping so since I have been there for more than 4 years and also since I am a hard worker.   

This is the part that has me nervous- I am asking for a lot but I also have given a lot over the last 4 years.  Covering while people have been deployed, or out on their maternity leave, or out on their drill leave.  It is my turn Damit!!!

More important I do not want to be one of those women who can't handle a newborn and work.  I want 6 months to get my act together, breastfeed, and get my head on straight so when I come back to work I can work and not be occupied.  I also want to give time to bug to develop more an immune system.  Better developed immune system means less calling out sick for me. 

So I had my meeting with my boss last week and it went better than I could have planned. 
I had a written letter with my wishes regarding my maternity plans and was just honest with what I needed to make our new family work and still be a contributing employee.    He was actually very receptive and was suprised that I had already talked to human resources and knew more than he did about maternity leave.  I am the first civilian, not military, that he has had.
I will not know for a couple weeks if they can work with me on my requests, but I am hopeful.

What I learned from my meeting were a couple things:
1) Be honest and ask for what you would like
2) Be specific
3) Do your research before
4) Put everything in writting that way they have something to refer to
5) Be polite and thankful

So think good thoughts !

 

You are my Sunshine.....

As previously stated, I am not one of those women who has had my child nursery designed for the last year. 

In fact, the whole thought of it overwhelms me.
So much that I am having my two besties help me because just thinking about it give me heartburn!
And yes, I already have people asking me about it.
Crazy!

So when we were getting down our baby stuff and I found my yellow baby blanket, I spark flew in my brain.  I had a yellow nursery and a yellow room as a child. 
Hmmm...

A week later when I was looking at art work to put in the new guest room down stairs which is Grey/Yellow and I came accross a "You are my sunshine" wall decel- Joe and I decided quickly agreed it would be a cute idea of a nursery since this was a song both of us identified with as a child. 

So I asked Joe when we were cleaning out the soon to be nursery-
 "What about Grey and Yellow?" 

I showed him my baby blanket and we decided it was meant to be. 

Grey and Yellow is the perfect color combination because it is gender neutral! 

Yes, we are finding out what we are having but we are going to purchase/register for alot of gender neutral items because our hope one day is to maybe have another little bug. 
I am a practical person and it just makes the most sense. 

Green was out of the question because that was the color for our room and I wanted something different.
Blue is already in the majority of the house.
Orange I would never live down. 

So Grey and Yellow it is. 

Joe only protest was he would like a more grey nursery with Yellow accents if it is a boy,

and more yellow with grey accents if it is a girl. 

Totally funny that he has an opinion on this but I love it! 

So bug...

You will for always be ...

Our little sunshine

=0)