Baby dances

Now, for people trying to get pregnant, the term "baby dance" refers to intercourse. This post is not about that. Sorry.

This post is about the little dance that my Pumpkin baby is doing in my uterus. Which I can now feel, and which is wonderful. I first felt a definite poke behind my belly button last week, while I was sitting at my computer. I'm almost 17 weeks along (as of tomrrow) and feeling Pumpkin move just made her all the more real. Feeling a baby move inside of you is a very surreal experience -- it's moving completely independent of you, and the fact that you are carrying a separate human being inside of you becomes a concrete fact.

I'm very excited that I've felt Pumpkin so early. With Eliza, I didn't feel anything (or at least didn't realize that I was feeling anything) until 20 weeks. So I feel like I have an extra 4 weeks with Pumpkin that I didn't have with Eliza. I'm treasuring every day.

I'm trying not to think about the fact that I'm only 8 weeks away from the stage when I lost Eliza. I'm trying to just enjoy every day, which is easier now that I can feel Pumpkin. I'm really only looking ahead a few weeks -- it just makes it easier to set minor milestones, instead of looking months ahead. The next three weeks should be golden. A diagnosis of preeclampsia very rarely comes before 20 weeks, so I feel like I have a grace period. And on March 21, we have another ultrasound, and we'll get another look at Pumpkin, and hopefully be able to definitively tell which gender she is (the doctor said last month that he *thinks* Pumpkin is a girl, but couldn't promise).

So, for now, I have a dancing baby in my uterus, and I am absolutely thrilled.