Oh man.
Oh MAN.
Let's start at the "beginning" I suppose. I guess by saying that, I need to rewind several years for a brief Sarah history lesson. Couple of years ago (more than 5, I think), I hurt my back. We're not exactly sure how it happened but one night I was having this pretty intense leg pain. I simply couldn't get comfortable. I couldn't lay, I couldn't sit, I couldn't stand - pretty much all I could do was pace our tiny little house and do laps around our kitchen & living room. After a few days of this, Nick finally convinced me to go to the emergency room. There was I given this kick ass shot of Demoral, where I proceeded to fall into a blissful sleep while they attempted to talk to me and figure out what was going on. Prognosis: sciatic. They sent me off for scads of tests (x-rays, MRI's, etc) and determined I had a slipped disc in my lower back that was pressing on my sciatic nerve.
Let me tell you, outside of what I barely remember of child birth - that was the most excruciating pain I have ever been in. Nothing helped but really strong pain meds. I went to physical therapy and got several steroid injections in my back for additional treatment. This pretty much worked, I don't have sciatic pain any more and my back bothers me only occasionally (or when I try to do certain things like any sort of Pilates moves). I have some semi-numbness in part of my left calf and some of my left toes. Other than that, no real issues stemming from this.
I worried that carrying a baby inside my tummy would cause more pressure on my back and/or sciatic but to be honest, I don't remember this being the case with Ben. Well, then I got knocked up with baby #2 and almost instantly (right around 12 or so weeks) I noticed by the end of the day, the sciatic running down my right leg was acting up. I couldn't get comfortable on the couch and the only comfortable way to sleep is on my right side.
At my 16 week check up, I mentioned to my OB that I was having this pain (along with this lovely prema-stuffed nose that there's not a lot they can do about), with a lovely bubble dream that I'd be told to go have a prenatal massage. She suggested physical therapy instead. So she sent me off for a referral and they called me Friday afternoon and got me in for an appointment yesterday.
According to the torture worker, I mean physical therapist, my tailbone was out of alignment and that could be causing some sciatic pain. She implemented several torture techniques to loosen my ribs, loosen my fascia (I didn't know we had that, I thought it was an architectural term...) and all that jazz. Holy crap. That was a painful 45 minutes of adjustment and just overall pain. Apparently she corrected the problem and I may have to admit that it helped my sciatic pain as I haven't noticed any. Although, that could be because I've been in nonstop PAIN since I left their office yesterday evening.
I've been complaining all day: I'm pregnant - why would they be so mean to a pregnant lady? How is this helpful? I hurt so much, it's all I can think about. Oh God, I moved again and it hurt.
I'm such a baby.
In other news, I had my 16 week OB check up on Friday. So far for this pregnancy, I've gained 1 pound. I'm sure now that I'm apparently all done throwing up, the weight will creep on faster... so I should probably limit my spaghetti craving to once a week, rather than every day. Baby's heart was great - Ben thought it was an airplane. :) I'm okay to travel in April to visit our family in Florida. Now all we have to do is wait for Nick's work to approve the time off and get our tax refund back and I can book our tickets! I'm so excited! Not at all looking forward to the plane ride but I'm hoping it won't be as awful as our trip home from Chicago was....
The demands for "come, mommy" aren't as intense as they were, which is nice. I'm still trying to figure out how to discourage hitting, biting and hair pulling when he's upset. My biggest thing right now (and my apologies if I've already blogged this, I can't remember) is trying to figure out how to transition from potty training with no pants on to potty training with something on. He does so fantastic when he's naked waist down but when I put something on him - underwear or a pull up, he doesn't get it. He peed through his underwear a few times and then came to tell me he was wet. The pull up is basically ineffective and a waste of money for us. Either the cool sensation isn't that great or Ben just doesn't care.
I think what we'll end up doing is another 3 day boot camp type deal of underwear and get him used to not peeing in it. I'm honestly just not sure what else to do. Any other experienced mama's have tips? What worked for you?
Gosh, there was so much more I wanted to talk about and then I forgot what most of it was. Maybe you'll see another blog post from me later today! :)
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