Week 11 Recap (Rewind)

This is mainly for my benefit as I find time speeding along faster than I'm writing it down.

Since this blog is my only written record of this pregnancy, I'm working backwards a bit.

How Far Along? 11 weeks

Total Weight Gained/Loss? +5lbs

Maternity Clothes: Nope, still in the regular clothes, but nothing tight around the belly and no cute form fitting tshirts anymore. Not showing at all unless I'm naked. But my breasts...oh my they are looking mighty fine. My friends don't rub my belly, they feel me up.

Sleep? I love sleep!!! Sometimes I sleep for 10 hours. I always crash in the afternoon by 4pm. No nap is not an option.

Best Moment of the Week? Realizing after swimming that I'd forgotten to put my acupressure wristbands back on...and that I didn't need them anymore!

The NT scan which revealed that everything is A-OK with the wee ones!

Movement: Do my monster, mammoth, truck driver burps counts cuz they move by themselves?

Food Craving: No cravings, but food in general is all starting to taste good again

Food aversions: No real aversions this week. The worst of that seems to be over. Water must still be ice cold

Morning sickness? Nope, but I have to eat every 2-3 hours to keep feeling good

Gender: If I'm pregnant I must be a woman

Labor Signs: No, thank God

Belly Button: Present and hanging out on my belly

What I miss: The ability to know what I'm hungry for. Energy.

What I'm looking forward to: Telling Chicken's family the big news this weekend

Weekly Wisdom: Swimming and exercise is fabulous! Get moving!

Milestones: Almost out of this dreaded 1st trimester

Belly Shots (weeks 0-14) and Clothing Woes/Gains

OK, I am going to finally post some belly shots! I didn't take one every week, but I have for the last few and I will be taking one every week going forward. And yes, maybe...I will take a morning/evening shot and post it just for shits and giggles.

I'm still wearing all of my normal pants--just with a rubber band as they don't fasten anymore. Although...I think this week (14) may be the last of those pants. I noticed last night when I got home from Sushi Sunday that my zipper wasn't going up all the way. I have gained one pound a week for a total of 9 pounds so it's going somewhere....

Today, I'm going over to a friend's house who is two weeks away from giving birth. She's going to give me all of her maternity clothes that she's outgrown and then the 'bigger' things once she's done with them.

I scored a pair of 'maternity' pants at the most unlikely of places...For.ever.21! They are a linen blend with a cotton stretchy fold over waist. They are mostly like linen yoga pants, but they are going to be great once I get them hemmed. I can wear them for the rest of summer, plus next spring as well. Plus, only $12!

Then, I found two pairs of jeans for a great price on Craig's List, one pair is 7 for All.Man.Kind and the other from Mi.mi.Materni.ty. It's hard to find my size used and even though I have to get these hemmed (grr) I still saved over $150 from what I would've paid in the store.

Last week, I went through my closet and started a box labeled "clothes to wear when I'm skinny again" (think positive!). I was sad to do this as I'm trying not to panic that my hips and thighs (and yes, Shinda, possibly my ass) seem to be expanding along with my belly, but at the same time I was so happy to be moving in a new phase of my life. A phase where I am finally pregnant.

I can still wear a lot of my shirts that are blousy, but Chicken is one size up from me so her shirts have now become mine! I think I'll be able to get away with this for the next month or so?

Also--BRA EXTENDERS. Oh dear god how I love these. One night a couple of weeks ago Chicken and I were getting ready to go out to dinner and I was being bitchy and finally she said "WHAT is wrong with you?" And I almost started to cry as I realized I couldn't breathe because of my bra! My ribcage has already expanded so much, it's incredible.

Chicken's bras are also 32's, but she's a cup size bigger than me...so very soon I'm going to outgrow my bras as I'm about to spill over and then I'll add bra extenders to Chicken's bras and wear those for awhile.

She's both amused and disturbed that her normal wardrobe has become my maternity wardrobe. Hee. Not for long honey, my belly will amaze us both very soon, I'm sure!

OK, here you go, my expanding belly:

One Month Before Starting Egg Donor IVF Cycle, 105

6 weeks pregnant with twins, 106

7 weeks, 1 day pregnant with twins, 107

9 weeks pregnant with twins, 109

11 weeks pregnant with twins, 111

12 weeks pregnant with twins, 112

13 weeks pregnant with twins, 113

14 weeks pregnant with twins, 114

POP!

Wow, You're BIG. You Don't Look Normal.

My Chicken has a way of going around with Chicken feet hanging out of her beak.

What she meant was "Wow, you really are pregnant. You don't normally look like this."

I love the Chicken and her blunders. It's quite endearing. And after nine years, I get what she means even if it doesn't quite come out the way she meant.

She's thrilled with the tiny bump and is in awe of my changing body. She's also already mourning the loss of my preggo tits and they've only just begun to grow.

So yes bloggers, I've apparently got a bit of a belly. But only at night really. In the morning it looks nothing like the belly I have at night.

So there are belly shots coming...but I take them all in the morning!

The Telling Of It All

We went upstate and told Chicken's parents and other family members this past weekend.

I thought about all kinds of different ways to tell them--give them a Tshirt, make them an expensive photo book, etc.

In the end, I found the frugal idea of the perfect $2.49 card and some photo copies worked out best.

As luck would have it, Chicken's mom and step dad were coming to the town where Chicken's dad and partner live in order to attend a friend's art gallery opening.

We suggested that we all have dinner together and they agreed. It was stepdad's birthday and on a lovely summer evening over cocktails (the parents, not us) on the patio, as I handed him his birthday card, I said "I didn't want the rest of you to feel left out, so I got you cards, too."

The mom has been suspicious for quite some time, so she immediately got it and squealed with delight. The dad seemed perplexed and confused. The dad's partner (who is also a twin) expressed support and happiness as did the step dad. Of course no one had bothered to actually READ the card or look carefully at the photos so no one figured out we were having twins! That part is always fun.

All around, it was good. But we were surprised that the dad didn't seem that happy.

However, he finally admitted that he was really confused by the card. Get this: somehow by looking at the photos and seeing the word "Future" he thought we were going to take a trip to the moon. Yeah...Oh boy.

People don't read cards!!!

The next morning after he had asked a ton of questions about the procedure, he was feeling much better and happier. I think he was really overwhelmed as he was not suspicious at all whereas the mother was just kinda 'waiting' for us to break the news.

I didn't know this, but when she'd been asking Chicken what was going on, instead of her giving a great canned answer like "oh, you know, we'll still trying", Chicken said "well, even if we knew something we wouldn't tell anyone for 3 months."

Hellll-oooo?? Who says something like that while trying to keep a secret?? Oh Chicken. I love her, but she is not a good little fibber that is for sure.

I'd asked Chicken to make sure to tell her mother not to tell ANYONE until we had a chance to give out the news ourselves, but Chicken forgot and by the next morning her mother had told all family members. This upset me as we were seeing some of those family member the very next day and we'd planned to tell them in person ourselves.

I would never tell news like that if the other person hadn't told me I could--but that's not the way this family works. There are no secrets and everyone is a giant blabbermouth.

It took some of the excitement out of the telling, but her mother was very indignant and unapologetic about it, even when confronted. Sigh. It was unfortunate.

They pressed on with finding out about the sex and the names, but I let them know in no uncertain terms they will find out the sex and the names the same day we do--the day they are born! We are having babies, that's all we know!

The last thing I want to deal with is family drama on the naming and oh! there would be opinions!!

So here we are. 13 weeks and we've told everyone. I wish I felt happier about it all, but instead I just feel a little sad it didn't all go as I thought it would. After nine years in this family you'd think I'd be used to this.

Sigh.

Free Gonal F 900 unit

I have 2 boxes of 900 unit Gonal F sitting in my fridge that is going to expire at the end of September.

Chicken and I were holding on to it until the scary 1st trimester was over in case we needed to start doing drugs again.

Thankfully, I don't think either one of us are going to do drugs for a long time.

If you live in the NYC metro area, we can arrange a pick-up spot in Manhattan--please come prepared with a cooler and ice packs as these must be kept cold.

If you live outside of the NYC metro area, you will have to arrange for cold shipping through UPS/FedEx. I have never done this, but I know they have this service.

Drop me a line in the comments and it's yours. Priority goes to my loyal readers, of course.

NT Scan/First Trimester Screening for Twins

Chicklet

Shadow Boxer

The results in the words of our perinatologist "Stupendous!"

Whew. I have had nightmare the last two nights thinking about today. If my anxiety of this test were a large balloon, those words were a pinprick that slowly let the tension out. Such a wonderful feeling.

Shadow Boxer--Twin A is measuring exactly 11 weeks, 4 days, heartbeat at 169 bpm and was indeed showing off many baby boxing skills during the scan.

NT Scan: 1.10

Nasal Bone: present

Down Syndrome stats: 1 in 3,434

Trisomy 13/18: 1 in 10,000

Chicklet--Twin B is measuring big at 12 weeks, heartbeat at 169bpm and was once again mostly chilled out through the entire session.

NT Scan: 1.00

Nasal Bone: present

Down Syndrome stats: 1 in 2,880

Trisomy 13/18: 1 in 10,000

I had submitted my blood work last week so these are the adjusted results with the bloodwork as well.

They say the results for twins are not as accurate as the results for a singleton, but we feel great about these numbers and see no need for any further testing.

The ultrasound tech and the Dr both said we should consider ourselves out of the danger zone as we have some awesome looking twins in there. The results are the same as a 20-year-old's!

Yeah!! Words cannot describe how blessed we are feeling right now. I am simply overjoyed.

That Didn't Really Go As Planned.

First of all, there a lot of really uneducated government employees out there and the NYC marriage bureau office is full of the finest of idiots.

We were met with blank stares from the get-go (all caught on camera!) and it really only got worse from there.

They had to call for 'back up' , a woman who proceeded to tell us that health insurance benefits were only available for same sex marriages of government employees. Interesting enough but we are not trying to get health insurance benefits. She was completely confused with what we wanted to do and kept telling us this was the law and she would print out the law for us to see (she never did, because she totally had her information confused).

It seemed simple enough: if NY state honors out-of-state gay marriages--then what is the procedure for them to honor it?

Surely there is a procedure, right? A piece of paper? A legal document?

However we were told time and time again,

"You don't need to do anything."

"Why not?"

"Because it's not necessary."

"How can it not be necessary? You are supposed to recognize this marriage."

"But you don't need to do anything."

HUH??!!

Stumped, they finally decided to 'do us a favor' and we could see the staff attorney. Who was out to lunch, of course. And with rolling eyes, the ever-so-unhelpful attendant told us no, she did not know when he left and no, she did not know when he would be back and no, she did not know how long he took lunch.

Perhaps she could find someone who had more information?

No.

She was lovely, did I mention that? Bitch.

When "Patrick" the condescending staff attorney finally came back (over an hour later) from his leisurely lunch (our tax dollars hard at work), he did his best to make us feel like complete idiots for even asking these questions and wasting his time.

This of course brought out the pit bull in Chicken who attacked right back and it all got off to a rather unpleasant start.

After I gave her a swift kick under the table, things softened up a bit and we were able to have a civil conversation.

And here's how it goes folks: If you have been married in a state that recognizes gay marriage and you want to have it recognized in NY--there's nothing you can do. Seriously, that is the procedure. You simply carry around your marriage license from State X and wave it around to people it times of need claiming that you are legally married and if they don't respect that, then you threaten to sue said party.

I'm serious. THIS was his advice: "Tell people you will sue them if they don't honor your out-of-state marriage certificate."

That seems effective.

Oh and about our legal name change? His assvice was to head up to Connecticut, get married again and write in our new last names on that marriage certificate.

Except....will the NY State DMV honor this name change on the CT marriage license and give us new driver's license's thus setting the ball rolling to get all other forms of new ID? Because you know how smart all the people working at the DMV are....

That sounds like another battle.

And here's where it gets really interesting. When I got home, I decided to do a little research on getting married in CT since Chicken is home now and we thought no better time than the present--let's get things done!

But wait...you can't legally get married in two different states! Even gays can't do that! And since we are legally married in the state of California, then our marriage in CT would be invalid!

Which means: the staff attorney of the NYC Marriage Bureau--the one who should know MARRIAGE LAWS better than anyone else in the NYC Marriage Bureau--gave us completely inaccurate information. Information that would of had us performing an ILLEGAL act.

The whole afternoon was filmed, with the exception of the lawyer's office where our camera man was denied entry. It should be put up as a PSA on the website when he's done editing, so I'll let you know when that hits.

I hope that this saves other people the frustration of what we had to go through and wasting an entire afternoon.

All was not lost....we were on the edge of Chinatown, so we walked up and feasted on Vietnamese food afterwards. At least we ended on a high note!

Shotgun Wedding!

So we're going to try to get hitched (again, for the third time!) this afternoon down at the NYC marriage bureau.
There's a story behind all of this....

New York state is 'supposed' to legally recognize gay marriage performed by other states. Chicken and I were legally married in Santa Cruz, California last August. We were told we could take our license to NY and 'fill in' our new last names on that license...and voila! We would be legal and have our new last name legal as well.

Then....out came Prop 8. And no one knew what was going to happen so we were advised to wait...and wait...

By the time the news came that our marriage was indeed still legal, we were too busy and/or out of the country, to go down to the courthouse and test this.

A few weeks ago, I happened to meet with the director of the Marriage Equality NY and explained our situation. She was intrigued and said she hadn't heard of anyone trying to do this before (with the legal name change added). She asked if she could send a cameraman with us to do a documentary of the entire process when we were ready to go down there.

Cue the Chicken finishing her project, coming home and having time to make a trip to the courthouse! Woohoo Chicken is on a little break from traveling (only 2 weeks).

So off we go today at 1pm to see if we can get our marriage recognized and change our last names to our new-and-improved same last name.

It would be great if this works. Wish us luck!

Chicklet and Shadow Boxer Go to Miami (a better late than never post) (with photos!)

At the ungodly hour of 4am Friday before last, I got up for my 6am flight to Miami. The twins were not so happy with this change in the sleeptime routine, but other than a bit of saltine scarfing on the plane following by a drooling, jerky-headed nap, all went well.

As most of you know, Chicken travels every week for a living. While it sucks that she's gone, she accumulates a lot of Starwood hotel points and frequent flier miles which makes it easy and (almost) free to get away for weekends like this.

The W hotel in South Beach, Miami just opened two weeks ago and let me tell you....that is one nice hotel! Due to Chicken's 'status' we were upgraded to an ocean view suite! SWEET!! My jaw dropped when I saw the rack rate posted in the room--2 grand a night. Holy Sweet Jesus. And we were getting it for FREE!! This 'apartment' was bigger than our own apartment in NYC. It had 2 balconies, a bedroom, a living room, a den, 2 bathroom, a full size W/D, and a kitchen and dining room.
I felt like a princess. I never wanted to come home!!

But this hotel was way too fabulous for us! It was Miami fashion week and they had a catwalk and runway set up in the pool on Friday for some huge party that night. It was so crowded that I didn't even want to deal with it. Plus, talk about a jet set fashion-forward crowd! We were sooo underdressed!! I think our 'style' is a bit more laid-back California!

Friday and Saturday night we went out to dinner and when we came back to the W, they were letting all of the fabulously dressed ladies in the door with a smile but we got stopped BOTH nights and had to show our room key!! Ai yi yi! Combine that with the fact that neither of us drink...well, we were at THE party hotel and not really the type of hotel guest they usually get! There was more blingitty bling bling going on pool side than I have ever seen. It was mad.

We have a good friend from Bschool we hadn't seen in ages who gave us the full Miami tour one afternoon: North Miami Beach, the Design District, Little Havana, Downtown. It was great to have a tour guide. Chicken and I also explored Coral Gables for the Biltmore Hotel and the Venetian Pool and Key Biscayne where we went bike riding.

All and all much time was spent both poolside and beachside and we had a great time.
We did alot of swimming and body surfing which my body seems to really dig. My 'morning sickness' is only around about 10% of the time if that, so I feel really lucky. Food is actually starting to appeal again and I'm finding myself hungry for certain things which is great.
We found out the babies LOVE tacos, but babies NO LIKE Cuban food.

I got home Monday night and am now catching up on all your blogs as I had NO computer OR phone the entire 4 days! Totally unplugged!! Love it!

Here are some photos! Enjoy! (They may take a little while to load...seems to be slow on my Mac)

Make a Smilebox scrapbook