Six Months, into week 25!

Peanut, you're 24 weeks, or six months, and a day.  You've reached what's called an "age of viability", meaning if you were born now, you'd have a 50-70% chance of surviving, although you would also have a 50-60% chance of a severe disability.  We want for you to stay in for as long as you can!  Head to heels, you measure about 13 1/2 inches.  If we were still measuring crown to rump, you might be about nine inches long.  You weigh about a pound and a half and are putting on baby fat, so your skin will begin to smooth and fill out.  The skin's also becoming opaque.  We could now discern your hair color and texture if we saw it.  Your nostrils are unplugging and your vocal cords are functioning, which means possible hiccups.  By the end of this week, your finger and toe prints are visible and your eyelids begin to part and the eyes open.  We love you very much.

Jared saw you moving tonight and it was very exciting for him--he loved it.  I haven't actually taken the time to watch my belly, so I haven't seen your movements, but I do feel them on and off through the day.  Occasionally it hurts a little.  Otherwise, the acid reflux is still very bothersome.  I started Prilosec for it, which doesn't work completely but works much better than Pepcid, Zantac, etc.  I am far from graceful and have lost a lot of self-awareness when it comes to hitching up my maternity jeans, etc. 

I wanted a calm and joyful type of pregnancy, but work is more or less a hellhole, currently.  Between defiant, non-compliant, and/or disrespectful students....a non-supportive--even malicious--administration....and constant additions to all my regular duties, I dread going to work, deal with blood pressure spikes and feelings of anger/hopelessness while I'm there, and feel discouraged and crabby, or weepy, when I am home.  I have no reason to think things will change in the near future.  

It's another three weeks until the third trimester starts.  I'll have an ultrasound in three days and a birth center appointment in about 11 days.  We'll share Peanut's name sometime in the next month!