24 weeks

We hit the 24-week mark, which is significant because the baby could live outside the womb if born too early. I'm not planning on that happening, but it's comforting to know.

Fortunately, I have stopped expanding at an exponential rate; my weight (and belly circumference) have remained stable for the last couple weeks.

Unfortunately, I've had a terrible bout with a gastrointestinal virus this last weekend. Saturday I woke up feeling lousy, but insisted on going hiking with the family anyway. As the day progressed, I felt worse and worse, and woke up Sunday morning around 3:00 am feeling like I was really, truly going to die. Tim had fallen asleep on the sofa, so I went and told him that I thought I thought something felt very, seriously wrong. A few minutes later, I figured out why when I started vomiting quite violently. This continued well into Sunday. I tried to eat and drink a bit, but that was a big joke.

I started getting pretty worried because when I was pregnant with Amelia I got a food-born illness that made me so dehydrated that I went into labor and delivered 6 weeks early. So this time I decided not to take any chances and went to the ER to get rehydrated. While I was there, they did an ultrasound to make sure the baby was okay. We could see her heart beating and she wiggled a lot when they were trying to get a better look, so that was very reassuring. When they were getting ready to discharge me, they took my pulse. It was 102, which is a bit high, so they kept me a little longer to see if it would go down. Finally, they told me it was probably no big deal and that I could go home, but to call my OB in the morning.

I'm starting to get a little worried about the tachycardia. My pulse is almost always right around 100, and I feel like I'm almost always struggling to get a good breath of air. I think this is all normal, but I'm getting worried that I'm going to end up on bed rest. That would make me insane!!!

I'm getting super excited to meet this little gal, though. The other day when Tim was putting Squiggles to bed, he asked her what she thought we should name the baby. She said, "Piggy." Then she said, "Pretty." So maybe her name will be Pretty Piggy.