**WARNING: THIS WILL CROSS THE T.M.I. LINE, SO PLEASE DO NOT CONTINUE TO READ IF YOU THINK YOU MIGHT END UP COMMENTING, AT ANY POINT, WITH ANYTHING SIMILAR TO "WISH I DIDN'T KNOW THAT NOW". I AM NOT ASHAMED. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED.**
There are many things that people don't tell you, this includes friends, family, websites, reference books....there are some things that I guess no one really wants to admit. They'll tell you all about morning sickness and back labor and tiredness and sore boobs and crazy constipation. Not that all of that information wasn't a good "forewarning" but it's nothing compared to the things I wish I would've known.
I've been lucky so far. I never had morning sickness. I've only gained 25 pounds and I've only got 5 more weeks to go. I haven't had any swelling. I tested great for iron levels and glucose levels, therefore avoiding the constipation issues from iron pills or other medication. I've had no issues with my pre-natal vitamins because they're the gummy ones. Back pain? Yeah. Boobs hurt? Yeah. Fatigue? Yeah. My back pain is mostly due to pre-pregnancy issues, though, because of scoliosis and bulging disc issues. My boobs hurting are just a natural part of them getting bigger, which SK would tell you is a positive more than a negative. The fatigue....well...the extra weight all in one place seems to be what does the trick there.
The things I wish I'd known:
- Shaving my legs would be as much of an adventure (chore) as it is
- Bending over, for no matter how long, sucks
- The image you get of a balloon blown up as far as it possibly could be, is how my belly feels at this point
- No matter what bra I'm wearing, after a couple of hours, I want to take it off. Then about 30 minutes later, my boobs hurt so bad from hanging down, I have to put a bra back on to hold them up.
- Breathing is REALLY hard most of the time and only gets more difficult the closer to the end I get
- No matter how I sit or lay or position myself, sometimes I just can't get comfortable
- No matter how I sit or lay or position myself, sometimes I just can't get comfortable
- When a girlfriend tells you a story about the baby being "in her ribcage" or "stomping on her bladder", it's NOT a figure of speech...that shits for real
- Pre-natal vitamins may make the hair on your head longer and healthier and grow faster, but it also makes the hair EVERYWHERE ELSE do the same. Ain't nothing sexy about belly hair and toe hair
- When boobs get bigger, nipples do too
- Your gums can bleed and bleed and bleed EVERY time you brush your teeth, and it's apparently "normal"
- Your intestines and stomach and other organs get pushed up to where your heart should be, so the things I thought were stomach pains or gas in the beginning, were actually the baby moving around because my organs were someplace else entirely.
- It's really hard to concentrate on anything when you feel like an alien is trying to escape through your belly button
- There is nothing cooler and/or creepier than watching your stomach move around by itself
- You may not feel excited about the baby right away or be able to picture yourself with a baby, and that's okay because eventually the feeling passes
No one wants to talk about what happens to your relationship either.
- Things like wearing makeup, plucking your eyebrows, shaving your legs, and 'maintaining' certain important areas become less likely to happen because you don't have the energy, can't reach, or can't see to do it. And yes, there is a certain point at which this becomes VERY depressing.
- There are times when, without warning, you become sad that you don't spend much time talking, but it's mostly because you're both brain dead from the day and just have to zone out
- Every speck of dirt on any inch of the house will annoy you and not him, or him and not you, regardless of how either of you deal with housework pre-pregnancy. Nesting instincts rears their ugly head and can cause a lot of discourse. There may or may not be anything you can do about it. Talking and trying to stay calm help...most of the time.
- Talking too much about the baby moving around and kicking you in the rib cage, is apparently a big turn off. However, apparently you can't help but talk about it out loud and will still get upset that it's a turn off, even when you know it is. It's like pregnant brain can't help itself.
- Even if you seemed like a perfectly sane female prior to being pregnant, you WILL become insane and emotional while you're pregnant. You will say and do things that you wouldn't normally and feel things that you wouldn't normally. It might manifest itself as anger, frustration, but most often, crying. I never knew I could cry so hard or so much about things that I would have never logically cared about before.
- Certain other hygienic things like bathing and brushing your teeth every day become less of a priority because you're just too damn tired to. Not bathing/brushing teeth = smelly = turn off = no sex. This is unfortunate for both of you because this leads the pregnant female brain to think that this behavior is tantamount to not caring enough to try to impress each other and manifests feelings of unattractiveness, which leads to more crying.
- The woman may be carrying the weight of the child, but the man (if he is a good one), is carrying the weight of the relationship. He has to know what the woman needs without her having to ask. He has to be willing to do everything with a smile or risk the previously mentioned "insanity". No matter how independent a woman is, having the father be there for every little thing she needs and to offer without her having to ask is the most important relationship saving thing there can be. This takes a very strong-willed man to stomach this and a strong-willed woman to be able to handle it when it just realistically can't happen. This is perhaps the hardest thing to get through.
