37 weeks

Week: 37
Baby length: 19.25 inches
Baby weight: 6.3 lbs. - the weight of a mini-watermelon
Bump size: 42.5 inches (down half an inch from last week)
Weight: +34 pounds (+.5 lbs. from last week)
Cravings: Pumpkin spice cookies - yum!

I'm glad this isn't a full length picture so you can pretend that I didn't wear high water pants and flip flops to work on the day this picture was taken.

But the truth is, I did. Oh, and my hair looked exactly like that, too. Obviously, I have completely stopped caring about my appearance.

Maternity Lessons

Something you should never tell an emotional pregnant woman is that they are emotional. Completely disregard the fact that it may be true, no hormonal pregnant woman wants to hear you say this.

Instead, please let me pretend that even though I have no control over anything happening to my body anymore, I at least have control over my emotions (even though we both know that I don't).

I'm not one of those pregnant women that you look at wrong and I will start to cry. I don't get upset about things that normally wouldn't upset me. What is happening is that things that would normally upset me and make me cry are sending me into a state of sobbing so hard I can hardly catch my breath (this happened twice this week).

So maybe I'm a bit emotional - but you're not allowed to say it to my face.

Let's revisit maternity clothes. In the beginning, I thought I was sticking it to the maternity clothes "man" by making it through my entire pregnancy without purchasing a pair of maternity dress pants or maternity jeans.

But now that I'm almost 9 1/2 months pregnant, and accepting the reality that I will still be wearing maternity clothes after the baby is born, I'm realizing that I may have totally screwed myself.

I also continued to buy small shirts and I felt really good about myself that I could still fit in them. But again, now that I'm 9 1/2 months pregnant and all my small shirts are too short, I'm realizing that I should have bought all mediums.

So my advice to all of you future mammas-to-be, don't skimp on the maternity clothes. Comfort is key. Buy a pair of maternity jeans and maternity dress pants, even if you can still fit into some of your old ones. And even though you can still fit into your regular size shirts, buy a size up so you are still comfortable in them even at the very end of your pregnancy. You will thank me someday.

Baby Movements

It's starting to get uncomfortable in my belly. Where I used to only feel stretching and tightening when I was experiencing a Braxton Hicks contraction, I now feel it most of the time. It feels like my stomach is constantly being stretched and sometimes based on its position, the baby actually pushes out on my belly enough to cause discomfort. Not pain, just an uncomfortable feeling.

The baby is still getting hiccups most days and sometimes a few times a day.

Symptoms

The surge of energy I was hoping to get this weekend did happen. Sort of. But we spent most of our free day on Sunday finishing the nursery (click here if you haven't seen it yet) and I got all of my fall/Halloween decorations out. Not quite the cleaning I had hoped to accomplish, but important tasks nonetheless.

My energy is still not quite what it used to be but I'm getting by.

I am still sleeping pretty well through the night until about 4:30 a.m. when I am suddenly wide awake and can't turn my brain off. By the time I fall back asleep, my alarm clock goes off. Not fun. But considering a lot of women don't even sleep for six hours straight, I will not complain about this.

I only had one night this week where my heartburn was bad enough to wake me up at night and I didn't really have any bad back days. Yay!

All in all, I would say I am MUCH less miserable than I was at this time last week. The thought of going to my due date or even a few days late, doesn't make me want to cry (today at least). But the thought of dropping something and having to bend over to pick it up, still does.

Weight Gain

I made it through the week with only a half pound of weight gain. This gives me one more pound until I've reached the doctor's recommended 35 pounds. Something tells me I'm not going to make it, but at least I should be close.

That being said, I've completely stopped caring about what I eat. If I want an ice cream sunday, I will make one (like I did tonight - and it was delicious). 

Gender Prediction

Have you made your gender prediction yet? Click here to enter the pool and pick when you think the baby will be born, how much it will weigh and whether it will be a boy or a girl. You just might be running out of time (I hope!) or you may have at least two weeks left. Time will tell....