2nd Trimester Recap! Weeks 14-27 (Baby’s NAme + Where we plan to give birth)

Week 14 & Week 27

Wow! The second trimester sure FLEW by. I think it’s mainly because I felt lots better than the first trimester, and I wasn’t stuck in quarantine for most of it. While being able to exercise, travel, and fully enjoy life! :) I’ve heard people call it the “honeymoon” trimester, and honestly for me it was! My hormones were great, no crazy mood swings like the first tri. My food aversions went away, and my appetite and energy returned! :) This is also the trimester of big decisions, where we commit to a baby name, and decided to change the location of our labor & delivery from traditional… to a little less traditional!

Weeks 14-20

Exciting things that happened…

At week 14 we had a super fun gender reveal thrown by my sister and brother in law and found out we were having a baby girl! We did a smoke bomb, and my brother in law went above and beyond and figured out a way to get pink fireworks as well. It was such a special moment, and honestly the most surreal feeling learning the gender of the baby in my belly!

At week 17 I felt my first baby flutters! Such a special feeling :) Before experiencing it I read that it felt as if you had “gas bubbles” moving through your digestive tract… and honestly this is the best description I can give as well! However it feels WAY cooler because you know it is more than likely the tiny human you’re growing and not actually gas! ;)

At week 20 we had our anatomy scan (on our 2 year wedding anniversary), which is when you typically find out the gender via ultrasound. Since we did the blood test to find out gender and that is 99% accurate, the ultrasound for us was mostly to confirm that she was in fact looking like a girl! We thought this appointment was really cool because they show you the babies little bones, heart flutter, and you get an idea of how big they are. She was weighing about 14oz, and they get this measurement by measuring the size of their bones…. which is super cool! One thing I found interesting was the nerves you feel going into this appointment. I know I felt it, and found out after the appointment that Trev had felt it too. I think it’s because you just hope that when they show you your little one on the ultrasound screen, that things are going to look okay. Thankfully they did! :)

Weeks 21-27

Exciting things that happened…

At week 21 Trev got to feel her move on the outside for the first time! This made me so excited because from this moment on I got to really share the experience of pregnancy WITH Trev. I also think it made him more excited / nervous because it was all that much more REAL! :) This is also the week we went away for our baby moon / 2 year anniversary trip which you can see all the details here. I’ve heard the second trimester is the best time to take your baby moon because of the fact you typically feel your best, and I am really happy we did!

At week 24 we had our first baby shower (of 3) and it was a SURPRISE! My mother in law threw an outdoor shower on Labor day weekend when we were at our favorite little lake getaway spot. It was a lovely surprise, and tons of our friends were there! With Covid I wasn’t sure how the shower thing was going to go… but I am very happy to say we had 3 in person showers that all took Covid into consideration by social distancing, spending time outside, etc!

Fingers crossed she comes before the new year ;)

At week 26 we had our second baby shower, also hosted by my mother in law, with different people from the first (for the most part) :) Another fully outdoor shower, with good food, games, and company! This is also the week we decided to share our baby girls name with the (social media) world! I honestly wasn’t sure when we were going to share her name on social . For a while I was waiting on Trev to fully commit, and then he did and I wasn’t sure when we would feel the time was right. However, at this point we did start to tell people when they asked, and actually announced it at this shower. Then someone who attended the shower posted on social a picture saying our baby girls name. I saw it and thought well, now is the time! I posted a pic from the shower with her full name that day! :) And it was “Facebook official”…. Shanley Norah DuBois would be the name of our soon to be little girl. I found the name Shanley in a baby book that my sister gave me from when she was pregnant with her kiddos. I was really drawn to french & Irish names so I mainly looked for names of those origins. Shanley, Irish (Meaning: Hero’s Child) was one of the first names I came across back in the first trimester, and it stuck with me through all the other names I discovered from then on. It was great too because when I mentioned it to Trev he also really liked it. He just has trouble committing as quickly as I do to some things. :P After coming up with a nickname for her, he was set. I think it helped him feel more attached to the name, and happy that he could call her something special. For the middle name we thought it would be special to use a family name. So we listed our grandmas names, and settled on Norah, Trev’s grandma’s name. :)

At week 27 we had come to our final decision of where we wanted to give birth. We decided on a local birth center that is 4 mins from the hospital we were originally planning to deliver at. When finding out I was pregnant I knew I wanted to go about the whole process as naturally as possible. Therefore I chose a midwife as my care provider at the hospital as opposed to an OB, and I planned to do an unmedicated birth, and ultimately wanted to deliver vaginally. I felt I was comfortable with those choices…. But then we had an encounter with a couple on our baby moon that made me think more about what I wanted for my labor and delivery. The couple we spoke with found out we were pregnant, and then told us about their experience with a home water birth. They talked about how beautiful it was, how incredible the woman body is and how much it is capable of. They literally RAVED about their experience (where I must add they delivered TWINS many years ago), and recommended we check out the book “The Husband Coached Childbirth”. After this conversation I was so inspired and really wanted to look more into what delivering somewhere other than a hospital would look like. This being our first baby we really didn’t know what we wanted. We knew what was “normal” but ultimately had an open mind about the whole thing! This was another thing that of course I was more ready to commit to than Trev. :P Therefore, I wanted to make sure that while I was educating myself I also helped him educate himself and allowed him to get more comfortable with the idea of delivering outside of a hospital. We watched the documentary “Business of Being Born”, and while this was based on hospital experiences many years back (and a lot I’m sure has changed), it was really eye opening and validated my decision of wanting to deliver somewhere other than the hospital. It also opened Trev’s eyes to how empowering birth can be for us women, and made him more comfortable with the less traditional way of giving birth I was growing much more interested in. We toured the birth center, asked TONS of questions, and decided that this was going to be the best decision for US! :) From then on our prenatal care switched from our midwife at the hospital to the midwives at the birth center. We loved the more homey feel of the rooms, that Trev is able to come to ALL prenatal appointments, the fact we see our midwives at all our appointments and they are guaranteed to be at our birth, that there is less likelihood of interventions, and that we could have BOTH our moms there for our birth as support instead of just one. While this is our ultimate plan…. we do know that birth can be quite unpredictable! Therefore we have our plan in place, but will be sure to keep an open mind and accept whatever happens when the day comes as what was meant to be! :)

Week 27 was also the week I took the glucose tolerance test. At the birth center they do a 2 hour test. So I arrived at the birth center and had my blood drawn after fasting overnight. I then drank the sugar drink (I chose orange flavor, it wasn’t all that bad), had my blood tested at the 1 hour post drink mark, and the 2 hour post drink mark. I then awaited my results, and received them a week later which I will share more about in my 3rd trimester recap soon! :) Stay tuned!