Welcome back, guys!
So we know the beginning story of my pregnancy. It very much started with confusion and drama, but that’s alright because there was life growing inside of me. I would say I had a somewhat easy pregnancy. As I stated in the previous blog, I didn’t get the obvious symptoms. But I was hit with some new, unexpected symptoms. I’m going to put them in order of appearance! LET’S GET INTO IT.
As we all know, pregnancy hormones are mad! My emotions were all over the place. I was crying over the most ridiculous things. One evening during early pregnancy, my family of 7 were having fajitas. You know how it goes, all the different fillings were on the table so we could create our wraps ourselves. My two younger brothers, 8 & 9 at the time, helped themselves to their fajitas. They both decided to cause chaos that day! One of them heaped spoonfuls of chicken onto his tortilla and the other, spoonfuls of guacamole. 🥑 My brain was losing it. THEN one of them knocked an empty carton of apple juice onto the floor. I caught eyes with my dad and before he could try to keep me calm, I burst into tears! I don’t know why but I was just super overwhelmed. If you know me, you know I’m an emotional person as it is but pregnancy really turned the volume up by another 7 notches.
On another occasion, I was trying to find something appropriate to wear when meeting my partner’s parents (yes! I met them whilst I was pregnant. I told you everything was done backwards and upside down). I had put on weight, of course, being nearly 3 months pregnant, so I didn’t have anything to wear, that was both cute but still modest. PLUS I was meeting the parents! PREGNANT. My brain just couldn’t handle it. I emotionally combusted, failing to zip up a size 12 dress. 😭😭😭
I really had no clothes! I said to myself that I wouldn’t spend money on maternity clothes because spending money on clothes that I would only wear for the 7/8 months, just made no financial sense for me. But I did do a bit of shopping, for the Summer. I practically lived in maxi summer dresses and long cardigans! Wearing the same clothes on repeat, week in, week out. I knew that being pregnant meant I was going to get bigger, but I had just started to properly love myself and my body. I had to accept that my body wasn’t mine anymore; it had become a container for the child (big ups to you, if you get the reference) and it would never be the same as it was pre-pregnancy. 😔
Here are a few other pregnancy symptoms I experienced:
DEHYDRATION
Obviously, I didn't do my research prior to getting pregnant so I was very much unaware that I needed to increase my water intake during pregnancy. I learned this lesson the hard way. I was super thirsty all the time! Which ended up getting on my damn nerves. I was having really intense headaches every day for about a month during month 3. And then oh my gosh, my lips got so dry during month 7 to 8. My water bottle and Vaseline (when I knew where it was) became my bestie during those dry seasons!!! 🏜
TIREDNESS
I, Was. Tired. All. The. Bloody. Time.
That’s it.
STOMACH SIZE
So you know when people say that you eat for two when you’re pregnant? WHAT A LIE! I could barely eat for one. From month 4 all the way to the very end, I had to gauge when I was bloody full! So I would eat my “normal” sized portion and then realise that I overate… AFTERWARDS. I had to eat small portions and then wait a while otherwise I would feel gross. And I love food so much, so this became a real pain! Especially where I was drinking so much water 🙄
DISCHARGE
Yeah. We’re going there! Nobody told me that discharge would increase like that! I was having to change my underwear during the day because it was so uncomfortable. It’s apparently supposed to help preventing infections or something but ooh wee. It was definitely something. I’d definitely recommend panty liners ladies!
BLADDER SIZE
One of the obvious ones. Little human growing inside of body = no space for organs = squashed bladder. Towards the end of pregnancy, it got to a point where I was always thirsty, but I had to question whether or not I could be asked to go to the toilet in the next half an hour. I was crawling out of bed at around 5, 6, 7am every night or so just to pee! And then during the day, I’d be using the bathroom every hour or so!!
MY HAIR
ON A PLUS! I honestly didn’t realise how much my hair flourished during pregnancy until after 😭 (again, we’ll get into that a bit later). My hair grew so much it was lovelyyyyy! To be fair I didn’t have the energy or patience to do it the majority of the time, so it was in protective styles. So thank you bubba and pregnancy vitamins 👍🏾
Overall, I really can’t complain about my pregnancy symptoms/ changes. I know that a lot of women have awful pregnancies, so hats off to you amazing humans. Going through these changes in itself is life-changing and can be extremely traumatic. I don’t think we women get enough recognition and appreciation for carrying and growing life inside of our bodies. Like, hello? It’s a pretty big deal!!!
So to all the women, that have carried life, props to you mama.
Signed,
A Young Mum
x
Feel free to ask questions down below!
Next post, Friday 19th March…
or maybe sooner? 😉