Wow, your belly just popped!

18 Weeks
Dragon Fruit (or, if you are boring, Sweet Potato)
My exotic little dude is kicking a lot more now. I can't quite make out a pattern to it yet, so kick-counting might not happen for another week or two. The fantastic news is, I will get to see him on ultrasound in just a few days!!! Pics will be posted. No worries. Everyone loves ultrasound pics, right? Right??


My workouts have had to adjust. I'm now to the point where my center of gravity is shifting up and forward, so I can't dart all over the place in multiple directions. I also can't be on my back anymore (so no more bicycle kicks). Sad as it may seem, someone who was working out near me asked me why I wasn't showing yet (at 16w, 5d). Someone who was with the asker (who also happened to be a family medicine doc) replied, "Oh, she shouldn't be showing yet." How little he knew! Even as a health care provider, he evidently didn't know that there's a wide range of when the "bump" appears. I'm short in stature and have had two kids before, so there's really no surprise that I had a little "beer gut" by then.


However, in the past few days, I have noticed a rapid progression to roundness. I lamented to some colleagues at the gym that I might need to start bringing a beach towel instead of a regular bath towel for my post-workout showers. The bath towel doesn't quite cover all the naked real estate anymore. It sort of happened suddenly, which is just as I remember it before. Moving toward the fifth month of pregnancy, it's about time he decided to get large! Right now, Blueberry (the size of a dragon fruit) is about 5.6 inches long (from the top of his head to his little bum) and weighs about 6.7 ounces. I switched to my maternity ACU this week as well. I couldn't button the trousers anymore, so... here we are, elastic.


I have decided, however, that my next mission will be to redesign the maternity uniforms. One major flaw in all of them (dress uniforms or no) is that they are almost entirely devoid of pockets. I dreaded switching over to the maternity gear, not because I was ashamed of my growing midsection, but because I didn't want to be without pockets. Where will I keep my keys, wallet, lip balm, cell phone, ID badge, and all the other junk I carry around? I certainly can't use a PURSE. Obviously, whoever designed the maternity uniforms (a) is a man, (b) has never had children, (c) lacks practical thinking, or (d) all of the above.