I'm reading today's babycenter email about my pregnancy at 28 weeks. According to them and to most of the other "authorities", my baby should be two pounds and some about now. The size of a cabbage. They also say that my belly should be making me uncomfortable, and want to sell me creams to reduce stretch marks, and reassure me that I will lose all that baby weight after the birth.

Except... what baby weight? What belly? What cabbage? My last appt we did measurements, and I'm measuring just over 23 weeks. Which means that he's more a mango than a cabbage. Just about a pound now. I have to lift up and hold in my boobs to see the makings of a baby belly. I'm almost losing weight from pre-pregnancy at this point. It's a struggle to remind myself that I really am pregnant, and not showing unless I take steps to make that happen, and to the average person on the street I'm going to have adopted this new baby- because obviously I've never been pregnant. I'll be one of those "lucky" women who don't struggle to regain their figure. Again. I'm diabetic, but skinny as a rail and whenever I have to tell someone that I'm on insulin these days to control it they look at me blankly and say "but, you're not overweight!" as if that is some magic reason why I can't possibly be pregnant, or diabetic, or have high blood pressure to these levels. It is possible, people. I'm all of these things.

This weekend we're still nursing colds. The Toddler, the Gram, and me. I'm only having a mild sore throat today though, which is good, but which is not improving my mood. More bed rest. Even more fluids. Even more and more of the monitoring.

I lay in bed at night and whisper "grow big" to my belly and the baby inside. I pray that he grows big and fast and strong. Our time together grows limited- I am giving up all those illusions and delusions of getting even to 32 weeks now. I just want him to grow big and fast and strong so he'll have a fighting chance.

Am I so horribly damaged, that I can't even manage what millions of women do every year? That I cannot sustain my unborn children until they're able to breathe on their own? I'll be spending hours in a chair by another isolette; hours of lonely work cursing at a breast pump with little to show for it. But if God is merciful, we'll both survive these next months.