30 weeks Baby Gallagher is a Cucumber

So last Wednesday 11/21 we hit 30 weeks. Wow that still seems weird to me because that means in just weeks our little girl will be here soon. Bryan keeps telling me that he is ready for her. I am mostly ready, but still have things I want to accomplish before she arrives. Also, there are only a few weeks left of just Bryan and I before we will always be a family of 3 and it would be nice to just soak that in as long as possible. Hoping to find some energy to spend quality and valuable time with my wonderful husband. Also, I am getting more and more nervous of the birth process and trying to just focus the end result, but lets be honest is does scare the shit out of me. So not really ready for that, but then again who is.

How far along?30 weeks

Total weight gain: Not sure right now last time I was hovering around 30. I am positive it is more :(. Sleep? Depends on the day. Some times I sleep really well and other times not at all. I have a natural back sleeper, but you are supposed to sleep on your sides, which is hard because my hips will start to go numb after a while.

Best moment this week: Not one moment, but just in general having an awesome and supportive husband!!! He has picked up the slack so much with all the household chores, dinners, shopping and all with out me ever asking. He is amazing and it means so much to me to have his support, love and affection. 

Ohhh wait just thought of a particular moment too. When Bryan told me the other night how beautiful I am and even more beautiful right now because I am carrying his baby and telling me I will be a wonderful mom. I really just melted! Hearing that just meant so much to me. 
Miss Anything? lunch meat!! I have been wanting a bologna and cheese sandwich with doritos crunched on them.  My ENERGY
Movement:She is getting much bigger and stronger. Her kicks can be subtle, but there are those big ones all the time and even if they are uncomfortable they make me smile knowing she is getting stronger and healthier every day. I can also feel/see when she flips over it is so cool.

Food cravings: lunch meat and sandwiches.

Anything making you queasy or sick: Being in the car for long periods of time is really difficult and makes me very queasy.

Gender: Sweet little Baby Girl
Labor Signs:  No
Symptoms: A general feeling of heaviness and I am getting slower by the day. It is harder to get up from the couch or off the floor. Things that I never thought twice about like cleaning, running errands/shopping and decorating take so much energy and have me burnt out. I get very frustrated with this. I want to be able to clean our house and cook my husband a nice dinner or even just go out on a date in the middle of the week with Bryan with out feeling overwhelmed and exhausted. I never thought I would take those things for granted. I know I am hard on myself, but it is hard to not miss these little things. Even the simplest of task are very daunting to me.
Belly Button in or out? in
Wedding rings on or off?  I can put them on, but they seem tight. So lately I haven't been wearing them since I dont want to risk it.

Baby Shower

So a few weeks ago my wonderful family and friends decided to throw me a baby shower in honor of our soon to arrive baby girl. It was beyond words. We had it at one of my favorite Italian restaurants Buca Di Beppo. There were so many family and friends who came to share in this special day and I never felt so loved and showered with generous blessings by so many wonderful women.

I would like to say a special thanks to my Mom, Eve, sisters; Mary Ellen, Carla, and Becky, Aunt June, Jenny and Mary Linder for all their hard work in making my shower such a special day. Everything was so beautiful from the invitations, venue/food, the delicious cake, the games, the wonderful and colorful centerpieces and diaper cake and the yummy and too adorable treat boxes. Every detail was just perfect and I am so grateful to have so many loving family and friends in my life.

Baby Gallagher is already loved and spoiled so much!

27 Weeks Baby is the size of Rutabaga! And Happy 1st Anniversary!

27 week work picture

First of all let me say I am so HAPPY and ELATED to make it to a 27 week post. With everything that happened in the prior week and the major possibility and fear of delivery at 26 weeks I am BEYOND grateful to make this post. HAPPY 27 WEEKS BABY GIRL WE LOVE YOU! And here's to many more happy weeks getting big and strong in my tummy!

On Wed. Baby Girl Gallagher turned 27 weeks. And coincidentally it was also Halloween :)  I had gotten this cute shirt of ETSY and was happy to be able to wear it proudly. This is as Halloween as it gets for me this year.

We are also celebrating our 1 year anniversary tomorrow, Nov. 5th! So much has changed in a year. Had anyone asked me if I thought I would be pregnant with a little one on the way last year I would have thought they were crazy, but I wouldn't change anything at all. We had planned a night out to celebrate at a murder mystery dinner on Friday. And through the fabulous-ness of groupon we got a good deal on it.

They put you at a "wedding style" table with a bunch of other guest and then your table became your team. I had been to a murder mystery dinner once before with my Mom and Sister for my birthday and I think that one was done better. This was fun, but it was way too big of a room with too many characters and people and was a bit chaotic. However, it was still fun. I was tired and sat mostly, but still enjoyed myself. And our table WON! We figured out who did it. Now to be fair the character of the murderer was actually one of the people sitting at our table and none of us really had any other clue of who it could be so we just guessed her luckily.

The rest of my weekend was spent resting and relaxing too. And I finally was able to get my haircut! It had been about 6months since I last had a haircut. I can't even tell you how much a haircut makes me feel good about myself. And then Bryan also treated me to get a pedicure it was really nice. We are planning on a nice anniversary dinner tomorrow too to round out the festivities. I am so happy and blessed to have a wonderful, loving, caring, handsome husband who makes me feel like the luckiest woman. He is my rock, my soulmate, my best friend and I love him more and more each and every day. Bryan I love you thank you for all that you do and all that you are!

And to re-quote a snippet of my vows to you....."You Bryan showed me the meaning of love and how to love fully and my heart has never been so full. I am proud to call you mine and remember I called dibs. For, I choose you, I pick you Bryan Gallagher to be my partner in life, love and my partner in crime. I promise to love, honor and cherish you through whatever life may bring us. And regardless of what obstacles we may face, we’ll face them together as husband and wife. I promise you this, and all of my love, from this day forward until the day that we met again in Heaven. I love you always and forever." 

 

Guest Blog from Bryan

A lot of people have been asking me and Megs what was going on.....well I am here to fill you in....I will try to keep it brief but informative....

The bottom line is we almost lost Megs and the baby last week. It was very very scary and heart-wrenching. On Monday last week, she couldn't move without serious stomach pain. Every time she even rolled over in bed she would wince with pain. She was also very nauseated and had a fever. By Tuesday, the condition worsened and the fever was spiking to 101. I took her to Beaumont emergency on Tuesday night and they checked everything over. They assumed it was the flu and told us to go home after about 6 hours.

Wednesday and Thursday, her condition worsened. Extreme pain in the stomach, Very sick to the stomach, but no vomiting. Extreme chills for a whole hour, to the point she was shaking so bad, the bed would literally shake. Then 2 hours later she would be sweating so bad, the mattress would be soaked. On Thursday morning when her temp hit 102.7, we made an emergency appointment with her OB. She saw Megan and immediately had her admitted to Beaumont. She didn't like the fever, the pain, or anything we were telling her. The OB wanted Megan monitored and wanted Infectious Disease doctors to look at her. (Thank God for this OB thinking that way and calling in Infectious Disease, This literally saved Megan's life)

We got checked in Thursday afternoon and they kept monitoring Megan and the baby....At this point, the baby had a good heartbeat and everything looked ok with the baby. Megan was still in extreme pain and still had the extreme chills and sweats. They drew a bunch of blood for both labs and for Infectious Disease to do cultures.

On Friday morning the cultures were coming back positive. Meaning there was a bacteria infection in Megan's blood. At this point we were very very scared as they were telling us there was a risk to the baby. They were afraid that the infection in Megan's blood had got into the uterus and infected the fluid around the baby. Normally with this kind of blood infection, it presents in urine or uterus. Since it wasn't showing in urine, they assumed it was in the uterus. IF the uterus was infected, they had no choice but to deliver the baby immediately. At 26 weeks, they felt the baby had a better chance of surviving outside the infected uterus than in....However, they weren't giving the baby much chance regardless.....Also, because of the infection in Megan's blood, they could not deliver c-section. They would have had to force a normal delivery. By cutting her open for c section, they would have risked the baby and Megan's life to infection. If we did not do anything and the uterus was infected, Megan would have gone septic and died, so we had no choice but to do the procedure and wait.

Lots of tears, lots of emotions.....We had to do a procedure called amniocentesis .Basically they insert a needle into Megans stomach, into the babies womb, and draw out some fluid to test. We had this procedure done at 4pm on Friday....Now we had to wait to see if our baby was going to make it. In the meantime, infectious disease did not like what they were seeing on the blood culture and started Megan on a broad range antibiotic. They did not know what infection they were fighting, but they knew they had to start fighting it immediately.

At 8pm Friday night, we got the call. The uterus was NOT infected. The baby could stay inside. Great news. We are so happy and it was the best news all week. We were so confident that Megan sent me home that night.......However, through the night, Megan's symptoms all came back harder than ever. I rushed back to the hospital to be by her side and wait for the antibiotics to do their job. During the day Saturday, they scheduled another ultrasound....our 4th while being here, but this time to look at the kidneys, liver, etc.

Sunday morning, the doctors come in and inform us they had found the source of the infection.....Salmonella......Now normally salmonella isnt all that dangerous....its a stomach issue, diarehaa, a few days it goes away, most people get it at least once in their life......However in 1-2% of the cases, the Salmonella gets into the blood stream and causes a very serious infection. This is what happened to Megan. When it gets in the blood, you usually have 3-4 days before it gets into the heart valves, the spinal fluid, and the brain etc. This causes the body to go septic, and when that happens and it goes too far, there is no turning back.

They feel the infection got into Megans blood on Monday. Had the OB not got infectious disease doctors involved, had not admitted Megan....Megan would have died. Thankfully the infectious disease docs put her on a antibiotic even though they did not know what they were treating...again, that saved her life.
The smallest decisions saved Megan and the baby.....Even though we didnt know it at the time, on Friday night, we came very very close to losing both Megan AND the baby. Another 12-24 hours without treatment would have sent Megan's body into full septic shock and she would have been gone.

Thankfully, she is home now. Antibiotics for the next 10 days. She is tired, and run down, but no fevers, no stomach pains, so we think they caught it just in time...barely. The docs dont feel there will be any risk to the baby, nor any damage caused by the ordeal. We still have a lot more tests and unknown answers so we have our fingers crossed that she is ok.

Well there it is, I am sure I have forgotten some, or skipped over something. Not on purpose, it was just a whirlwind weekend with a lot of emotional ups and downs....More downs than ups, but its over for now. Hopefully we are done with this for good and everyone remains healthy. We have a lot more doctor's and tests to still follow up with and Megan need to rest, heal and just focus on staying healthy. The big part is over, but there is still a lot more road to her recovery.

Bryan