Weight, weight, don't tell me.

So, remember how I was excited to have gained my first pregnancy pound? I lost it. Plus some.

I asked Paula, the midwife we saw last week (they rotate us through the three midwives at the birthing center so that they all get to know us and us them), about it because I've been eating like a horse lately and haven't been doing any crazy Richard Simmons-like workouts at the gym - you know, things that would warrant weight loss at the beginning of my second trimester, the time when most women have started gaining something. She said not to worry, that everyone is different and that since LBH's heartbeat is so strong and my uterus is growing the right amount and is in the right position then everything else is fine. She said weight really is just a byproduct of being pregnant and doesn't dictate whether or not the baby is healthy (unless, of course, there's extreme weight loss or gain, but that's a medical concern anyway). With a smile, though, she did promise that the weight would come eventually and hang around for a while. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind about that one!

In other, vaguely related news, my appetite has returned to mostly normal. For about three weeks, I was hungry all the freakin' time. I know it was because LBH was going through a major growth spurt, but it still caught me a little off guard because in general I don't eat all that much. The increase in appetite never encouraged me to eat more in one sitting (I was never the pregnant woman grazing the buffet table for hours and hours) but did encourage me to eat more frequently. I got used to it easily and aptly planned for eating breakfast before leaving home and then again after third period, eating one small lunch during fifth period and another during seventh, eating a snack after school, eating dinner and then following it up with another snack before bed. But yesterday I didn't even eat my second lunch or my after school snack. I just didn't need it. It's nice not to feel like I should strap a feed bag around my neck...although I'm sure this, too, will change in a couple weeks (or sooner).

Sometimes I look at my belly in the mirror and exclaim "Oh my gosh! Just look at my belly!" I think that at this point the only people who can tell that I look at all different are me and people who are close to me. To everyone else, I probably look like a totally normal girl with a bit of a belly. But when I make exclamations about my expanding body, it's not because I think I look fat; it's because I'm so amazed at what all is happening right beneath my skin. Sometimes when I say "Holy cow! Look at that!" as I pull up my shirt and run my hand across my abdomen, Kelly follows it up immediately with the standard good husband line, "You look great!" So I have to explain: "I know!" Because there's this amazing little life growing in me and that's crazy cool. I really like being pregnant so far and I feel very fortunate to be able to go through this whole process.