27 Weeks

The baby now weighs nearly 2 pounds and is about 14.5 inches long, from head to toe. It's eyes are opening and closing, it sleeps and wakes up at regular intervals and may be sucking his or her thumbs. Some experts believe that babies begin to dream by the 28th week, although noone knows what they may dream about! There are more characteristic grooves forming on the baby's brain's surface, more brain tissue is developing.

At this point, any rythmic movement I may be feeling can be attributed to the baby having the hiccups - they are common at this point in the pregnancy. The episodes usually only last moments and the sensation may be strange, but not unpleasant.

Since my uterus is now up by my ribcage, I may find that I'm short of breath. And beginning now and continuing through the last 3 months of pregnancy, I may be plagued with leg cramps, varicose veins and an itchy abdomen, among other things. Keep in mind that there is a light at the end of the tunnel!


Ok, so I haven't felt the hiccups yet, although I think that would be really neat! But the problem I'm having is with this crazy feeling that I can NEVER, and I mean NEVER get comfortable at night. I would give my left arm to get a decent nights sleep, and yet, I know that for the next couple years, I'm out of luck.

A typical night goes a little like this: I go for a bath, to try and relax my muscles and sooth my back. I attempt to haul myself out of our deep soaker tub (great idea for the NON whales...) and generally become short of breath. As I attempt to lift my legs out of the tub to dry off, I notice a shooting pain through one or both of my hip/legs that causes me to grunt in pain. After drying off, I waddle slowly off to bed. Once I manage to get myself into the bed, I must attempt to get comfortable - ha.
If I choose to start on my left side, I ask Rob to grab my right arm, and pull me over - this way I use little muscles at all, and there is little chance of pain. Once on my side, I wedge part of a pillow under my belly - this minimizes the heavy, pulling feeling that is quite uncomfortable. Now, I try and fall asleep, lying completely perpendicular to the bed on my side. This lasts for about an hour, before I'm either woken up to go to the bathroom, or because I've rolled slightly in my sleep, and am now in pain. Either way, I start from scratch - I either get up and waddle in pain to the bathroom or I attempt to roll over on my own to the right side. This causes me to, again, grunt in pain and be out of breath.

Lather, rinse, repeat.