Turkey Day.

I was sitting on the couch talking to my mom this morning when I realized I haven't really blogged in awhile. To give a slight update on what's been going on, I went to the doctor for my first appointment on the 23rd. To my surprise, my insurance doesn't cover any kind of pregnancy-related stuff. I wasn't able to get my bloodwork done, however I was at least able to speak with someone and get alot of booklets and information from her. Once my other insurance kicks in, i'll be able to go back in to get my bloodwork done and also meet with one of the doctors they have there in December. I'll be getting my first ultrasound at about 20 weeks. On the upside, I will be able to see the gender by that point. So that will be a nice surprise.

The woman I spoke with estimated that my due date would be June 8th, making me 12 weeks pregnant as of yesterday. But until the ultrasound, I don't want to trust that guess too much. All I can think of now is how excited I am. I just hope that everything is okay. I received samples of prenatal vitamins while I was there and was finally able to really look at them yesterday. After being blown away by the size of them, I decided to search online to see if there was any smaller ones that they offered. I saw there was one brand in particular everyone seemed to like that sold smaller pills, and there was also an alternative I read for taking the larger ones. Some people suggested grinding them into powder and then mixing them into something like a banana smoothie. Sounds like an awesome idea to me. But unfortunately, I don't have a blender! So I think for now, i'm just going to look into purchasing the smaller pills.

A few new things i've been experiencing the past week and a half was having extreme lower back pains and feeling quite over-emotional when watching upsetting or amazing movies & shows on the television. It's quite pitiful honestly. I've never been one to cry watching something as simple as someone else crying over a tragic thing happening in their life. I feel like a big baby. And as far as the back pain goes, i've discovered that alot of the pain is coming from pressure on my sciatic nerve. Unfortunately, it could last all the way until I give birth. But on the upside, sitting down for awhile seems to relieve alot of the pain for awhile. It just seems to happen at random moments, really. But usually when i'm working for long periods of time. I haven't spoke with Chris in probably a week now. I don't know how California is treating him and I don't know if any more of his family knows yet. One thing I do know is i'm beginning to feel very alone in this situation. All I can keep reminding myself is if it comes down to it, my baby is all I need right now to keep it together.

Happy Thanksgiving. This is probably the first turkey day I will be able to really take advantage of with my new, big appetite. Everyone better be prepared for me to devour everything! I'm off to help my mom make the peanut butter pie now. Hopefully more updates soon..

Moving Forward.

Well, it looks like i'll be starting this blog out with a rumbling tummy. I ate dinner about two hours ago at a mexican restaurant right down the road from my mother's house and amazingly, i've somehow managed to go back in time. One thing's for sure: I can't wait to go home and exfoliate my face. I suddenly feel the typical monthly "period" break-out that I used to get coming on. How exciting, one more annoying thing to deal with right now. On the upside, only six more days before I get to see the baby for the first time! I am just ecstatic about the whole thing. I'll have to scan the picture(s) and post them as soon as I can.

I seem to be talking more and more about the pregnancy to my mom much more comfortably then before. I think this whole thing will actually be what brings us closer together. She seems to always guess what the grandchildren are going to be and it's always right. She guessed both of my sister's kids that came out as girls, and she guessed my brother's which came out as a girl aswell. And she said she has a gut feeling that mine is going to be a boy. Which is actually.. very funny because i've always said I wanted a boy. It's really going to be interesting to find out considering girls seem to run my entire family.

So, i've decided to cut my hair again. I've been growing it back out for months now, trying to get it back to what it was. But i've finally come to the conclusion that I just simply look a million times better with an angled dark brown bob that I can mess up and make it look good easily. Short hair just seems to fit me alot better than long hair. Plus it is much more manageable and easy to maintain, which could be good in this time in my life where I have hardly any energy or desire to put alot of work into getting ready. Therefor, I think i'm going to go ahead and color it back dark again and go get it snipped off pretty soon. I'm actually pretty excited about it because I feel like it might help me regain more confidence after feeling so miserable here lately.

I go back to work tomorrow after having a few days off. I can't figure out if i'm looking forward to it or not haha! The people I work with seem to be making the days go by alot smoother since they found out I was pregnant and i've found myself talking more to some coworkers than ever before. The only thing I do wish is that customers had more common sense than to put heavy items on the belt. My supervisor Stacey said that I really need to watch whenever people do it and tell them to please keep it in the cart so I can come around. Up until now, i've always lifted stuff perfectly fine. Big cases of water bottles, dog food, and sometimes massive boxes in carts that people perfectly capable of helping me out just stand there and watch as I struggle to flip it upside down to get to the barcode. After finding out that it's crucial especially in the first trimester not to do things like that, I guess i'm going to have to change those habits. I told Stacey my only thing is when I tell them to leave it in the cart or ask them to help me, I don't want them to look at me like i'm some weak person that can't hardly lift anything because i'm not. So she told me just to simply throw in the fact that i'm pregnant and they should be more understanding. Sometimes I wish I was showing more than I already am so I wouldn't HAVE to explain..

I keep wanting to post a baby calendar of how far along I am and when i'm due but I want to wait until the actual doctor examines me and determines an accurate estimation versus what other people have been guessing due to when I think my last period was. They've been guessing i'm probably about 10 weeks now and my due date is June 13th but i'd like to be pretty sure before I tell everybody one thing and find out it's another later on.

Ohh, I need fooood.. I'm getting off here and heading home. Rojo probably misses me after being gone the last couple days.

3 Days of Freedom!

I figured I would type up a quick post before heading to bed. Lately i've been cherishing my sleep and crashing earlier than normal, but the last few days work and other distracting things have kept me up pretty late.

Chris arrived in California this morning. I suspect his mother still doesn't know about the pregnancy, unless of course his brother told her or he finally owned up to it and told her himself. I don't think i'm quite prepared to explain to Chris my still contemplative decision to stay in North Carolina. I might want to wait just a little longer for him to get settled in and see how our relationship towards eachother is then. It would be such a different situation if we were just head-over-heels in love with eachother. But unfortunately, that's not the case so it makes everything a little more complicated.

I get to see the baby for the first time in eight days. I am just ecstatic about it. I have the bloodwork appointment the day before, which freaks me out a little bit since i'm terrified of getting my blood taken but i'll have to just suck it up for the sake of getting to see my little one the next day. My brother still doesn't know, as far as I know. Unless of course my mother has said something to him, but i'm pretty sure she hasn't since none of us have even seen him since before we went on the Maryland trip. My stepfather knows now, and it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. He hasn't said anything to me about it actually. And when confronted about it from my mother about him knowing via text message, he seemed to be laughing at how terrified I was about him finding out. I guess it's not as big of a deal as I thought it would be. Packing up and moving to Canada must not be the number one priority anymore.

I'm so hungry. I'm staying at my mother's tonight and there's nothing really to make here without making a lot of noise so i'm trying to stay away from the kitchen since it's right next to their open bedroom. I'm sure I could probably devour something the size of a cow right about now though. I'm going to eat a few snack crackers and take myself to bed. I've got to get up super early in the morning to run some errands with my mother to get myself a little more prepared for the rest of the pregnancy and beyond.

Gah, I miss Rojo. I'm sure he's probably curled up in my blankets at home right now wishing I was there to use me for my body heat. He's such a cutie. I'm off work for the next three days. Woohoo! Oh, but I also get to enjoy a nice long shift on black friday beginning at 4:45 in the freaking morning. FML.

Anyway, i'm off.

Looking Up.

Things seem a lot nicer now that I was able to speak with my mother about things that are going on. I don't feel quite as.. stuck in the situation I thought I would be forced into. If I can just apply for the necessary things that I will need help with in the next few months, I can move out from living with my sister to try and get a cheap little one-bedroom apartment on my own here without moving out to California. I already have a cradle and crib that's passed around in the family for all of my mother's grandchildren as they grow older that I can use. All I would really need to supply is the mattress and of course the other basics. But it's nice that I already have help with the BIG major things that i'll need right away. Now my main focus needs to be buying the baby clothes, bottles, burp cloths, and other things.

I'm very excited to start getting things now, but I should probably wait a little bit on some things before I find out the gender. I just want everything to be perfect and prepared for when he or she gets here.

Today, my back hurts more than it's ever hurt in my life. I went into work lastnight for a 7:30 to midnight shift and when I first went in, it wasn't hurting at all. By eleven, I was cringing. I was hoping sleep lastnight would help it go away a little bit but it feels just as bad as it did when I got off work. I wish I had some kind of muscle rub or something to help it. Today I go in from 2:30 to eleven. It's probably going to kill me. So far I have told roughly ten people I work with about it. But in a store that big, it practically amounts to nothing. Everyone seems to be extremely happy for me. In fact, I have some of the women up there wanting to exchange numbers with me now to keep in touch about everything.. as if I don't already see them almost every day haha! That store is practically my second home. Almost everyone in the family knows about the pregnancy now except my brother, his girlfriend, and my stepdad's family. My biological father in Florida found out on facebook and of course instead of questioning me, runs to my mother like i'm five years old and asks her if i'm joking. Really? It would be nice if I could be taken seriously as an adult for once in his eyes.

My feet are freezing. I talked to my ex-boyfriend that I was engaged to marry lastnight. It was nice to hear something from him. We were never able to just talk to eachother and be friends again after everything fell apart a year ago. He somehow discovered my pregnancy, and told me that it felt really strange to him because that was supposed to be us. But he felt like I would be a great mother. To hear that from him of all people, it really meant alot to me. He's supposed to be back in town in December before heading up to New York to visit his friends and family there and wants to meet up. I'm really looking forward to it. I think that him and I being best friends again; repairing a destroyed friendship that was great at one point will really help me to cope with alot of things going on right now.

I suppose I need to get up and get ready for work now. God, I feel like my back is broken. And all I keep hearing from women that have been pregnant before is "it's only going to get worse." Yes. Thinking about that is exactly what's going to get me through the day.

Unresponsive.

Suddenly, i've never been more clueless in my life as to what I need to do. Every problem I am about to face, almost noone will understand nor know what to do in my situation. I saw Chris lastnight. He stayed over before he got on the road this morning to head back to Cali. There was nothing there.

We watched tv shows in bed before we finally fell asleep around 5 AM. But before we fell asleep, I tried to talk to him a little bit about the baby since this was the first time we had seen eachother in a little over a month. Almost anything I said, there was no response. I keep making excuses as to why he's unresponsive to most of my baby comments, blaming it on the fact that it was all so sudden and that he's probably just scared. He might be scared, but that's not all that's wrong. He held me lastnight as we fell asleep, and it felt great. Until this morning. We woke up at 8:30 and he said he needed to be on the road by 9. He remained in bed as I got up to let the dog out and change clothes. I sat down in bed next to him around 8:50 and he told me to lay down with him. We laid down for about fifteen more minutes before he got up to change clothes and get his stuff together. We talked a little bit before we left the bedroom, distant and awkwardly. And he finally asked me to walk him to the door for him to go. I walked him out to the truck, barefoot and cold. After a long time of keeping my thoughts to myself, I couldn't take it anymore.

I told him "I don't want to move to California. I'm not going to know anyone there except your family, and you don't even look at me the same as you used to. You're not even into me anymore." He insisted that if I didn't like his family or get along with them, there was always his brother's girlfriend I could talk to. It's nice to know that I have such a great big selection. But of course, no objection to not being into me anymore. Not at all. I said "I don't want to live with someone who's like a roommate to me, but yet has a child with me." He laughed a little at the truth of how awkward the situation really was, but he insisted that we should at least try it. I started crying, thinking about how much I felt like I was ruining my life. I feel like the waitress in the movie "Waitress" aside from all the abuse she had to put up with. I'm being thrown into a situation where I have no say in anything. I'm forced to move to California with the father of my child that doesn't even want me; just to have help in supporting my baby, i'm unable to name my baby the name i've wanted to name a boy [if it is] for years because he feels it's not a "white baby name," and I can't give birth to my child in the state where all of my family is. After I started crying, he hugged me and told me everything was going to work out and be okay. He said he just wanted to take things one step at a time and just move us to California first to see how things work out. Well, what happens if i'm miserable? Either way, i'm not getting anything that I want! Since when did I lose all rights to what happens to my life anymore? I'll be stuck living with a man who's completely uninterested in me and the only thing that we have in common enough to put up with eachother in a home is a child. That's a BROKEN home and I don't want that. I don't want to bring my child into that. I understand he wants to take things one step at a time and see where it goes, but moving myself all the way across the US to "try this" is a little extreme if you ask me. I feel like i'm going to be wasting my life with someone that's miserable with me when I could be happy with someone else who adores me and accepts that I already have a child.

Before he left, there was no romantic kiss. In fact, there wasn't a kiss the entire time he was here. Just a simple one on the forehead like I was some sort of child to him. It's never been like this before. It's never been so strange between us. And i'm stuck no matter what I want.

Now seems like the best time to officially say "I hate my life" and truly have a valid excuse.

This isn't how it was supposed to happen. This wasn't supposed to be my life. I will never regret having this baby. It will always be the best thing in my life and probably the only thing to keep me sane and happy, but I wish things could have gone differently. For now, this is my outlook on my life. And it probably won't change for awhile. Bluntly put, i'm fucked.

Sleep Deprivation.

It's almost 4:40 AM as I begin to type this, and my sleep schedule tonight has been anything but consistent. I've been waking up constantly either to readjust myself or pee. I went to my appointment yesterday to take a more accurate pregnancy test and behold, the same results I had obtained just eight days ago. So far I have scheduled my first three official doctor's appointments on the 23rd for bloodwork (ick), the 24th for an ultrasound, and December 9th for a routine check-up. I am beyond ecstatic. I can't even put into words how I feel right now because it is indescribable. The woman I saw today explained to me that judging by the information I gave her, she thinks I am probably about 9 weeks pregnant and her estimated due date for me is June 13th. June sounds like a great month to have a baby, and it's only one month before my birthday. She said it's probably about the size of a peanut right now. That's incredibly small to effect my body so hard already. I mean, my stomach's already gotten bigger! On the upside, my nauseous feeling and dizzy spells rarely cause me to have morning sickness. Hopefully it stays that way. But I definitely seem to be screwing up my words alot lately, especially with typing. Two words become one and I suddenly feel like a moron. And I suppose I haven't really experienced much of the "emotional" dramatic changes of getting upset easily. My mother reassured me that having a fits of crying over the simplest things in life will definitely start occuring more often. Super. But I definitely feel like a slob. I mean really, i've never been more clumsy and currently my only purpose in life is to eat, sleep, and pee. Living the easy life of a dog never sounded so unappealing. I want to start baby shopping now! I suppose that's normal?

Chris is coming to see me tomorrow before he drives off to Cali for the next month to a few months without me. It's going to be hard, but we will definitely stay close in contact. And if all goes well, I will be taking a flight out there for us to move in together to start this little family. My oldest niece, Faith told me yesterday she was excited and hoped it was a girl. I asked her if it's a boy, will she love it the same? She said "yep." On one hand, i'd really like to have a boy because we have so many girls in the family that I have yet to actually watch a boy in our family be raised; aside from my brother who is only 4 years older than me. But at the same time, it would be really nice to experience having a baby girl. However, I will be extremely happy no matter what the gender is. It will just help me narrow down the names. :]

So far, i've already been thinking about some. For a girl I was thinking of the names Kayleigh, Hazel, Candace, Autumn, Annaliese and Emery. As far as a boy, Brayden and Levi. I just can't wait to see my baby and astound the world with this amazing life. I'm definitely interested to see the permanent color of his/her eyes considering dark blue rims around the pupil run in my family and icey blue eyes seem to also be abundant in his. One thing's for sure: it's going to be beautiful.

Egh, leaning over without my glasses on is beginning to make me feel a little woozy so I better take this to the bathroom and pick up something to munch on on the way back to the bedroom. My stomach is growling already. More updates coming soon. I'd like to start typing in this thing more often. Sunday will be my first day back to work after the family vacation to tell everybody about my new discovery: a baby in my stomach! ;]

Goodbye.

Edit: I almost forgot to post a recent picture! This probably doesn't look like much to you since i'm very small anyway, but I can already see a difference in the size of my stomach. Perhaps this means i'll get as big as a house? We'll have to see. Anyway, off to bed I go.

Ocean City, MD.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/48719417@N07/sets/72157625231259125/with/5163699209/

Leaving Ocean City, MD to head back home in a couple hours. Here's my new flickr set with a few photos from the past few days of being here. There will be more to come when I get back!

PS: Doctor's pregnancy verifying appointment tomorrow evening at 6 PM.

Positive.

Yesterday, November fourth changed my life forever. I had an extremely early work shift beginning at 7 AM, not scheduled to get off until 3 PM. My first break was around 9 and after experiencing an odd week and a half of feeling like I was coming down with something, I decided to quit ignoring my mother and best friend's comments about possibly being pregnant. I bought a pregnancy test on my 15 minute break that morning because the thought kept driving me insane. So I did it, and I couldn't believe my eyes. Two lines side by side, left one slightly lighter than the other. A million things started rushing through my head while all I could say was a million four letter words. I'm sure everyone outside of the one-room bathroom was wondering what the hell was wrong with me. In my mind the entire rest of the day of work, all I could think was how long has this been going on? What am I going to tell people? I was fighting back tears and racing to the restroom every few hours in fear I was about to get sick the rest of the day. I confronted my mother on my one hour lunch and things are.. better. Today, it was the same exact work schedule. I didn't seem to be as frantic and sick as yesterday, but it probably also helped that I wasn't as stressed out as then either.

Tomorrow I am going on a planned family vacation to Maryland with my family for five days. When I return, i'm going to see a gynecologist with my mother to consult someone about what's going on. I still have some explaining to do to other people. I'm more scared about talking and sharing than living the rest of my life with this baby that's currently growing inside of me. I've never been more excited for anything in my entire life. After all, this is what i've always wanted. It just happened at the complete wrong time. But i'm going to suck it up and i'm going to do what I have to do. I refuse to let anyone's negative comments impact my life. So far the only thing that seems to be disagreeing with everything is perfumes and hot meats. But my god; fruit, salads and crackers has never been so good.

More posts to come of the vacation, photos, and updated information of my pregnancy.