The Pains of Pregnancy

In sitting here reflecting over the past week, I can see how child bearing is one of the most beautiful and yet difficult things a woman is asked to do. Granted, God made things this way going back to the garden of Eden, but it literally is a pain in the butt. I also understand that each pregnancy is different, not only for the number of children that you have but from woman to woman. This being our first, is the only thing I have to really go with so I can only make observations of Mimi.

So the most recent difficulty is her sciatica nerve. This has been acting up for the past few days, to the point where she has difficulty walking, sitting, standing, or pretty much doing anything. The pain starts in her butt and appears to radiate outward. A good nights sleep does not seem to do the trick, and there are no pain medications she can take due to the fact that NSAIDS may cause pre-mature labor, and that is not something we want her to do right now. I had this old back brace from when I injured myself in Cabo San Lucas. Good thing I was larger back then because it fits her perfectly with her pregnancy belly. It does provide her with a little bit of support, but the pain still exists. We discussed the possible causes, and we believe that with the extra weight of her belly, most of the weight is distributed to the front of her body causing her to accommodate this with a different walk or stance that has now pinched a nerve. I honestly have never seen Mimi in so much pain and it actually scares me. I even wondered how she would go to work with this kind of pain if she can barely walk up the stairs and around the home. It is a good thing that she is on research right now because she can take it easy, but this is quite concerning.

So let's review the physical difficulties of her pregnancy so far. It started with the nausea and vomiting which lasted into the fourth month. Then there was also the extreme fatigue, which pretty much coincided with the nausea. Now comes the sciatica nerve, which is almost crippling for her. The scary thing is that, we are only at the midway point.

We continue to pray for the pregnancy and the baby, and we know and trust that God will take care of her and the baby. The baby continues to grow in a healthy manner. The last visit with the OBGYN showed that the baby was doing well, strong heartbeat, and we received the results from the testing indicating low risk of an abnormal baby. Everything looks good and we're going to find out the gender of the baby on Wednesday. I know we are both excited for this and look forward to start thinking of names and will reflect our love and hope for this first child of ours.

We met up with He-jung and her boyfriend Christian yesterday. We had mentioned that the baby is due on December 25th and Mimi mentioned that I wanted to make sure the baby came before the new year for a tax break. Even though I do joke about it, I hope that does come true. In any case, He-jung said something very interesting. She said that as the baby comes into this world, he or she has even benefited the well-being of the family not just from a love standpoint but from a wealth standpoint. I guess there is some term for this in the Asian culture which I am not aware of, but I do hope that this does ring true for our child and or children. I do want to invest in them and hope that they will return the favor as well. I know that I want to do the same with our parents, for the sole reason that they gave us years of love, attention, guidance, and sacrifice, and I want to just care for them all the more.

Finally, I had a nice talk with Christina yesterday and we had the chance to talk about having grandparents around, let alone around at the same time. Given that Mimi would have just given birth and things can be a little chaotic as it is, I'm leaning towards having my parents come after the birth of the baby. Something tells me they might want to come before, but I would hate for things to get too chaotic for Mimi and I to the point where it just adds more stress to our lives rather than being helpful. Please don't get me wrong, I would love to have all of our parents and families around, but we would all be under one roof and I would be the only able bodies person to entertain and make sure everything was well, while still working. I just don't think I can handle that. Besides, I want to make sure that the new mother has time to really rest, relax, and do as she pleases during the first few weeks with the baby. This is really important to me.

We have a lot to do still regarding prep. We need to get our name on the list for day care. We need to possibly set up a baby shower. We need to register things. We need to begin thinking about how to set up a room or at least part of the room for the baby. Oh the list gets longer and longer and I even get tired thinking of it. We'll have to revisit these other things another time.