It has happened. My once lovely ankles have disappeared and been replaced by something similar to this photo. My normally wide feet also seem to have given new meaning to the word ‘wide’.

Yes, the swollen ankles of the third trimester are here. Today I am officially 33 weeks and officially swollen. From what my girlfriends have told me I need to expect to be like this for the remaining seven (dear Lord don’t let it be more!) weeks.

The other fun thing over the past few weeks has been the middle of the night leg alarm aka leg cramp. I have had two, both in my right calf and they are just as bad as my girlfriends have warned me about. The first one resulted in a calf muscle that was sore for a week. The second one however didn’t cause any residual pain. I believe this is due to the fact that Bill was also awakened by the alarm and massaged my leg at 4am. What a world of difference! Thanks so much for that babe.

Where I work flip flops are not part of the dress code. (Despite what one middle-aged admin thinks.) I however am bringing them mainstream this spring. I have fashionable, but oh-so-comfy ones that are going to be a staple of my wardrobe until June. I seriously doubt anyone will mention a thing to me about it. Instead they’ll talk behind my back, but I could care less. It’s about not being able to fit into anything else at this point and I’m sure that my cool flip flops are more acceptable than showing up barefoot and pregnant. If not, they can suck my swollen big toe!

At my regularly scheduled doctor appointment today I saw a doctor in the practice that I haven’t seen before. When I was originally referred to the practice it was her name I was given, at the time she wasn’t accepting new patients, but is now.

She is extremely thorough, she calls it nosy. Meaning she scoured my file since she hadn’t ever seen me. I was immediately impressed because no other docs I’ve seen have taken the time to do so. Feel free to be as nosy with my file as you want!

As a result she asked me about the two blood clots I had the day after my surgery in 1999. I explained that there was a big one in the left lung and a smaller one in the right one. I was on Coumadin for the standard 6 months afterward and then had extensive testing done to find out that I did not have a predisposition to them. All good stuff.

She then informed me that while pregnant your clotting factor automatically rises and due to my history of not one, but two clots I was an even higher risk. This means that in one visit I went from regular uneventful pregnancy to high risk. Lovely.

I need to see a specialist to find out if I need to be put on a blood thinner and this appointment needs to happen as soon as possible. I’m waiting for them to call me back to schedule an appointment for later in the week.

I am now to go for special appointments every other Tuesday morning until I hit 36 weeks when everyone goes once a week. The good thing about being part of the Tuesday morning groups is that the doctor who sees the high risk patients that day gives report later to all the docs in the group. This is a great thing really. They will all know me and know how my pregnancy is going. This way if they get a call in the middle of the night, they recognize my name as a high risk patient.

So I will be seeing the doctors more often than expected, but it’s a good thing for both Sprout and I.

It’s hard to believe that in less than three months Sprout will be here. Right now she’s very active early in the morning and around 8-9pm. Last night she was practicing her boxing moves. Her opponent? My rib cage. I think she won.

Yesterday I had to get my blood drawn for my Rhogham shot. It wasn’t painful at all, but the process to make it happen is. I had to go to the outpatient lab and have my blood drawn, then I went to the hospital’s central lab to get the shot they created from my blood. Then I took the shot around the corner to my doctor’s office so they could inject me. What a process. But now it’s over and that is the last of the extras that need to be done during this pregnancy.

Now we just sit back and wait for Sprout’s big arrival. I’m hoping that she’s right on time or a few days early as my dad’s birthday is a few days before my due date. I know that he would be over the moon if she shared his big day.

That’s about all that’s new around here. Enjoy your weekend!