Chaim performs his second fatherly duty

Lots of assembly required...about two hours worth, to put together a pack and play for Baby H. A lot of cursing while looking at directions with pictures. "You'd think that since your life !#@$# depended on all this &#^@%# Velcro, the directions would be a bit more straight forward!"

After it was all set up we concluded that it was way too low for ergonomic diaper changing purposes, so I will end up retrofitting the pieces to the dresser in the bedroom by adding some more Velcro and snaps, etc... The mobile is also useless, in that it isn't mobile, even with our fan turned on to high. The three stuffed animals (with huge warning tags, bigger than the animals themselves) just hang there stiff.

Now we have a co-sleeper set up along with this new contraption. Our living room is beginning to look like a small petting zoo with all these small cages and habitats. Now we are just waiting for the little one to fill them.

Yesterday's Stats:

Fasting Glucose Level 79
After Breakfast Level 87
After Lunch Level- 150 oops
After Dinner Level 104
Ketones: Negative
night time insulin 25 units

didn't ride the train yesterday.

Food consumed:
Breakfast:
eggs with onions, peppers and cheese
coffee with half & half

AM Snack:
PBJ on cracker

Lunch:
pasta with pesto
tasted peach preserves I was making.....
too much raw sugar!

PM Snack:
peanuts

Dinner:
Greek @ Uncle George
Greek salad, fried calamari, grilled porgy, escarole

PM Snack:
chocolate/vanilla ice cream

No more Swimming?

Yesterday morning I went swimming as usual, then began to worry a little bit.
At my non-stress test, I asked one of the nurses her opinion about if I could still continue swimming? I remember Peggy from the Lamaze class telling us that she swam up to two days before delivering. But the nurse told me I'd probably better not swim anymore.

So now we are counting down, to a number, we are not sure exactly what, since Dr. Sylvestre definitely thinks that I will not make it till the 21st. This is agonizing..... It doesn't seem as I'm even having fake contractions and this process is not happening fast enough, and today's weather is just miserable... hot and very muggy and now that I'm not going swimming, totally unbearable. I was going to spend the weekend making peach pies, preserves and jam, but it is just too hot to do that.

Yesterday's Stats:

Fasting Glucose Level 89
After Breakfast Level 107
After Lunch Level- 100-two hours later since I was doing errands and didn't have my monitor.
After Dinner Level 125
Ketones: Negative
night time insulin 20 units

6 Train: A miracle!!! on a crowded train, a young well dressed black man gave me his seat

Food consumed:
Breakfast:
eggs with onions, peppers and cheese
tea with milk

AM Snack:
Kashi TLC bar

Lunch:
Italian Sausage with onions and peppers on pita from a cart guy on the street.

PM Snack:
peanuts, 1/8th of quiche

Dinner:
Thai at PaOun
chicken Laab, grilled squid, mussels and a little sticky rice.
salad

PM Snack:
none

Weekley Doctors Visit

Yesterday's visit was very exciting. We found out that I am now 2 centimeters dilated and 100% effaced. He definately thinks that I won't make it to my due date. Before we left Dr. Sylvestre's office he says to me. "See you next week, if you are still pregnant!"

Very scary. I've been waiting for all this to be over, but now that the end is near, I'm having some fears about the pain that's to come. I'm still not clear about what a contraction feels like; could it feel similar to food poisoning? or PMS cramps? or having to take a big shit? or all of them rolled into one.......

And by the way, 10 centimeters is 4 inches. That's about the size of an opening of a mayonnaise bottle. Can a little head fit through that opening? very scary.

Yesterday's Stats:

Fasting Glucose Level 84
After Breakfast Level 111
After Lunch Level- forgot to take since I was picking peaches with Lalena
After Dinner Level 98
Ketones: Negative
night time insulin 25 units

7 train: Young white woman offers her seat to me
(still everyone on the 6 train ignores the pregnant woman)

Food consumed:
Breakfast:
cracker with swiss cheese
coffee with half-and-half

AM Snack:
Kashi TLC bar

Lunch:
grilled cheese with avocado

PM Snack:
yogert with berries

Dinner:
whole wheat spaghetti with meat sauce
broccoli

PM Snack:
homemade vanilla peach ice cream

Baby Care

At our baby care class, we learned how to hold the baby like a football, give baths, diaper and heard about a lot of products we should and should not use.





For two weeks I've been on night time insulin, slowly upping the dosage from 6 units to 25 and counting. At first I was scared of the whole idea of shooting up every evening, with visions of druggies hypodermic needles, and that rubber band that you have to use to tourniquet your arm. After going to see the insulin counselor, she made me feel more at ease with the whole process, when she showed me the sharpie-like pen I would be using every night. It also doesn't hurt at all, except when I sometimes put it in my thigh at the wrong angle. The first few weeks, there was not much difference in the morning fasting glucose levels, so slowly Dr. Sinha upped the dosage. This morning, finally I awoke and took a BG level of 77. Yippee.

This week Chaim and I get the house ready for our House warming, baby shower.








Yesterday's Stats:

Fasting Glucose Level 73
After Breakfast Level 89
After Lunch Level 113
After Dinner Level 130
Ketones: Negative

7 train: Young Hispanic woman offers her seat to me
(so far everyone on the 6 train ignores the pregnant woman)

Food consumed:
Breakfast:
tofu/egg scramble with bacon, cheese, peppers & onions
glass of milk
coffee with half-and-half

AM Snack:
Kashi TLC bar

Lunch:
Korean: JapJae, brown rice, spicy tofu soup, green salad

PM Snack:
plumb
ww bread w/ cream cheese and Ajvar

Dinner:
beef stew with carrots, parsnips, yams
green salad

PM Snack:
Edy's vanilla fudge swirl ice cream

Shower Cap Aerobics

Having gained about 25lbs so far, my calves are in great shape, due to the extra weight I'm toting around. Otherwise, it's pretty miserable, it's like I'm carrying a book-bag filled with my computer and a gallon of water everywhere I go. Climbing up the 3 flights of stairs to the 7 train is the worst. My only saving grace is going to the Y every day for a swim, where I can be weightless and cool.

Every day at 10am, half of the pool turns into an Aqua Aerobics class for Seniors. Since I came late for my swim, the lifeguard suggested I join them, for a change of pace. So there I was, all big-bellied, wading around with about twenty 70 year old women wearing shower caps. It is the Y's rule to have a swim cap on at all times while in the pool, and since these ladies were not going to go under, they figured a shower cap would be the same as a swim cap.

The instructor came in and immediately spotted the pregnant interloper and asked how many weeks I was, not wanting to be responsible if I were to go into early labor I suppose. Then she told me of the exercises I could not do, the stomach straining moves, which were about half of them. After all the explanations, she lifted her gaze and looked around the pool worried and asked the rest of the class: "is anyone else here pregnant?" This got a round of laughter, and we all began the one hour class.

Usually a person of advanced age, such as this class, has not participated in many aerobics classes in their 70 plus life, so they had a hard time following directions and would end up in a logjam at one end of the pool or another. Most of the class was spent trying to spread out the flower capped masses along the Olympic size pool, while I dodged them left and right.

Needless to say, this was my first and last time participating in Shower Cap Aerobics class, as I realized I'd get more exercise just doing laps.


Yesterday's Stats:

Fasting Glucose Level 97
After Breakfast Level 116
After Lunch Level 94
After Dinner Level 101
Ketones: Negative

7 train: Young white guy offers his seat to me

Food consumed:
Breakfast:
veggie (left over from last weekend's bbq) fritatta w/ cheese
glass of milk
coffee with half-and-half

AM Snack:
PB &J on WW bread

Lunch:
Greek Salad with chicken and avocados
shot of OJ with Iron supplament.

PM Snack:
TLC Kashi granola bar

Dinner:
Veggie Lasagna with WW pasta noodles
green salad

PM Snack:
PB and chocolate ice cream

Lamaze Class

Last Night Chaim and I attended the first of our five week Lamaze Class, which was really like a group couple's therapy session; about 15 or so couples sitting in an over chilled room discussing our fears and body parts. The instructor, who Chaim has already named "Nurse Ratchet", I thought was great. She really stressed that the coach does a lot of the work and that pain can be managed.

Three weeks ago, I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes, and since then, I've been measuring and weighing out every bit of food that goes into my mouth. I'm a walking science project. My blood sugar level is all over the place. It fluctuates over 20 points throughout the day. I prick my finger to get a blood sample four times a day, to get a reading and chart the course. Eating fatty ice cream at night sometimes helps the morning numbers but it's not consistent. We spent last weekend at Art Luekers on Shelter Island and chowed on a lot of sea food. Clams, steamers, lobster, which were all delicious, and according to the carb charts should not be so bad, but again the numbers were high. It looks like I'll be going on insulin soon.

Back from a 7 month hiatus

Unemployed and sweaty, I now have some time to update the goings on here in Woodside Queens. Barefoot and pregnant, we are selling stuff on E-bay, living a white trash existence these days.

I've gained about 25 lbs, and there's a dance party that occurs every afternoon and night in my belly.

My ObGyn is French Canadian, which means that Chaim gets to discuss the finer points of Pine Soda and Poutine at our monthly visits.

We tend to do the big things in life around the start of the year so it's easy to count and keep track... Just as we got hitched on New Years eve, Baby H was conceived around New Years....and his due date is on the Fall Equinox, September 21st.

The first trimester was hell...for many reasons. We couldn't tell anyone about why I was so tired and throwing up twice a day. We would get invited to Sushi restaurant openings, Film Premiers parties and other fun get togethers with premium food and liquor and I would have to make excuses for why I couldn't drink the champagne or eat the raw fish/oysters. After a while, I just stopped going out.

The second trimester was great, as all the books and friends tell you. I was energized enough to resume some building in the shop, and the last thing I constructed before I got banned from the table saw was this shed.
This green (left over paint) parallelogram shaped shed sits on the back corner of the garden and is now aptly titled Hillbilly Hills. The back sliver of the yard definitely has that certain shack-livin' atmosphere, especially when we drag out the BBQ grill that Chaim's father gave us. Its a family heirloom from Buffalo, with a steer painted on it. Here's our first July 4th BBQ in Hillbilly Hills.