... after a blogging absence

It has been a while since I've posted and I want to apologize for that. I know that it can get addicting to check for new posts and quite annoying when they are not there, (at least that is the way I feel about it when I check the blogs I read). So for those of you who are checking in here from time to time, wondering what is going on, I am committing to posting more often: hopefully at least once a week, but I'm not making promises. There have been some things that I thought I would post about but simply haven't written them. So I may have a few back stories to share, but this post will be about what is going on currently.

Right now I am almost to 20 weeks, marking the midpoint of this pregnancy. In the pregnancy books, they say you typically start to feel the baby move sometime between 16 and 20 weeks. They also say that it is usually easier to discern the baby's movements after you have been through a pregnancy because you know what types of movements to notice and your body has already been "stretched out" and you just feel the movement easier. So I figured that since this is my first pregnancy, I don't know what I'm kind of movement I should be feeling, and my sensation starts being compromised below my belly-button, I won't expect to feel anything until I'm closer to 20 weeks. But people start asking me if I can feel the baby yet. And I start paying attention to what I feel more often. Around 17 weeks I think I may feel something that could be the baby, but I can't be sure or even almost sure. So when people ask me if I feel the baby I say "not yet" even though I might be feeling the baby move. Even though no one is going to call me a liar if I say I feel the baby when I'm not sure if it is the baby or gas (because I have been much more gassy since being pregnant, so that is a very real possibility), I still felt unsure about telling people that I indeed was feeling the baby move.

Then in week 18 I was again trying to figure out if I was feeling the baby moving or if it was wishful thinking as Josh read a chapter of Eragon to me. I was getting a bit frustrated because I really wasn't sure if I was feeling the baby. When he finished the chapter, Josh started feeling my belly and he was more successful that I was. He slowly moved his hand around and said he could feel the little movements of the baby. I wonder if it was because his hands are so much bigger than mine that he was better able to discern the movements for what they were.

Since then, I have been able to feel some of the baby's movements. I still think I'm gassy and probably misinterpret some of the things that I "feel," but I am confident in saying that I do feel the baby move sometimes.
:)