La pancia

I had promised you a new picture of my mum, and here it is. I’m 31 weeks old now, and although you cannot really see me, then you can see that I’m growing (compare this picture to the one in the blog from a few weeks back) -I’m the one pressing out my mum’s green t-shirt –and her belly! Maybe I should have put here also a picture of my dad’s belly to show you how in shape he is at the moment (running, swimming and doing abdominals has given him his youthful look back). The experts say that this is one of the paternal effects of expecting a baby-boy!! The dads start to keep in shape so that they can beat their sons in football..at least the first few years! But with my fantastic kick (read last blog) there is no doubt that no matter how much he trains I will be the one to beat the old one in football!

The pregnancy seems to be going quite well, at least my mum is very well, and next week when she has her medical controls and the last scheduled ultrasound, she will know if even me is as well. It’s only about 2 months now until the predicted date for my arrival –and if I’m anything like my dad I might even decide to arrive a month earlier than predicted, so there is not much time left. As you could see in the last blog then my parents have started to prepare for my arrival a little bit. They have not prepared a room for me -for if I was to have a room for myself then my parents would either have to sleep in the kitchen or in the garage, but they have bought the first few things that I need. In addition to the travel-trio they've also bought me a bed (and my mum has finished the 6^th sweater!!). They still need to buy a few more things, but these can be bought with calm in the next two months. Then they’ve started to try to imagine how it will be when I arrive, and what I’ll be like!

It’s difficult to predict my looks and character before I arrive (although there's a lot of speculations) -but people start to remind my parents to enjoy the last few months of calm before the thunderstorm (me!!) arrives…! and to enjoy the good night sleep before the onset of the period of sleepless nights. Obviously the second comment comes only from those who haven’t been pregnant, for although I’m not there to wake my parents up with crying and hunger in the night, there’s a lot of things that keep (particularly my mum) awake at night. I believe it’s one of the best kept secrets of pregnancy that the mum’s-to-be don’t get a good night sleep for months…for various reasons. I'll list here a few of the reasons for why my mum has not slept through a whole night since maybe june/july:

• The necessity to go to the bathroom at least once during the night -even if my mum tries not to drink anything for the last few hours before going to sleep it doesn't help...
  
• Leg cramps -now WHAT is that!! Why do pregnant women get cramps in the legs during night…and why not cramps somewhere else? My mum has found out that she mainly gets these cramps when she hasn’t been swimming or walking a lot during the day, but they don’t really make any sense! Sometimes the cramps are so painful that my mum shouts out, waking up my dad -and probably even the next-door neighbours!
  
• Difficulty to turn in bed. Now this is something that is gradually increasing during the pregnancy with the growing belly...my mum wakes up every time she needs to turn in bed
• Blocked nose! The formation of mucous increases during the pregnancy resulting in nose that is often blocked
• My movements...!
  
• Strange dreams! My mum has always had very vivid ad realistic dreams, but this has increased a lot during the pregnancy

This is not a conclusive list, there are other things as well, but it's enough that one of these things wakes up my mum and then she can stay awake even for hours, thinking about all kinds of things related to my arrival -we could call it a mid-night-meditation about XY Sergioson, or about work, or the future or whatever! But in the end she doesn't really mind...she takes it as a normal part of the pregnancy, and maybe as a training before I'll start waking her up with crying and hunger...! For once I'm around she will probably look back with nostalgia to these months of easy insomnia...!