There are very few things in life that we have to actually wait for. If I wanted to take a spur-of-the-moment trip for the weekend (and had the finances to do so) I could buy a plane ticket and be airborne within a couple hours. Between Hulu and Netflix, I can watch a plethora of television and movies "on-demand." With a wi-fi connection and computer (or even just a smartphone on its own), I can go from wondering something to finding the answer in mere minutes. I can purchase almost anything I'd want and have it within two days with Amazon Prime.
So this whole notion of waiting 9 months for our baby is a little . . . uncomfortable.
Even when I tell myself, "You're halfway through!" or "Only 20 more weeks!" I still think, "Seriously? 20 more weeks? We still have months left to go?"
Even when I remember that we're creating a human being from very little raw materials (that 16 weeks ago the baby was the size of a poppyseed and now it's the size of a banana, etc), it still feels like a terribly slow process. For realsies? The baby isn't even a pound yet? After 18 weeks of gestation? What's it been doing all this time? There's really nothing else I can do to grow this baby faster?
I spend too much time looking ahead to what will happen in the coming weeks. There's a vlogger that I like who had her baby in the summer of 2011. I enjoy watching all her videos and had thought that I would watch her weekly vlogs in accordance with my own weeks (watching her 13 weeks pregnant video when I was 13 weeks pregnant, etc). Of course, since her baby was born over a year ago, I know how the story "turns out" but it's still fun. But . . . it's pretty hard to stick to just one at a time. I find myself saying, "Well, I'm 20 weeks pregnant now, but in her vlog she was talking about what happened during the timeframe from week 19-week 20, so if I want a preview of what I can expect in this coming week, I should really go ahead and watch her 21 weeks vlog . . ." And it just snowballs from there. Suddenly, each week I'm watching three weeks ahead, and at this rate I'm going to be watching her 6-month postpartum update by the end of my pregnancy.
I feel like it's the second trimester doldrums around here. After the anatomy scan on Friday, there won't be many big developments for awhile. But what's tough is knowing that the waiting is going to get so much harder! I'm already having trouble sleeping and feeling sore all the time. And I feel huge. Being uncomfortable as I get bigger is only going to make me more impatient for Bambin@ to arrive.
Sigh.
I'd even pay for the one-day shipping, if I could.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Halfway to Bambin@!
Today I am 20 weeks pregnant! 20 down and 20 to go. I'm not positive about how I feel about this milestone.
Reasons I feel like this isn't such an accomplishment:
Reasons I feel like this is a really big deal:
It's hard not to be impatient, though. Especially since we're here in Florida visiting with Amanda, who is so much closer to the end than I am.
Speaking of which, we're having oodles of fun down here, and this is perhaps the best way to celebrate 20 weeks. Just hanging out, lounging at the beach . . .
. . . and putting together baby gear! While Mandi was at work yesterday, we put together her swing and bouncer, which are adorable. I can't stop patting the soft fabrics.
We also got to visit her birth center and a baby consignment sale where we both picked up some good finds. Can't wait to meet both our babies!
 |
| A 20 week baby bump (plus a steak dinner). |
Reasons I feel like this isn't such an accomplishment:
- Because pregnancy is measured from the last menstrual period, I don't feel like I am "halfway" through my pregnancy quite yet. In another week, I will be halfway through gestation (since conception didn't occur until about two weeks into the "pregnancy.") And since the positive pregnancy test didn't come until I was 4 weeks pregnant, I don't feel like I'll really be halfway through until I'm 22 weeks or so. Is that crazy? I guess I just feel like I'm somehow "cheating" by counting the weeks when I didn't even know I was pregnant -- or the weeks before Bambin@ had even been conceived. I guess it's a little silly, since the baby could come late or early . . . there's nothing to actually say that any of these milestones are really the halfway mark.
- Ever since about 17 weeks, I've already been thinking of myself as "about 20 weeks along." So to actually make it to 20 weeks feels like it should have happened awhile ago.
- There hasn't been any real change in baby movement for the last three weeks or so. I'm still just feeling the little taps and flutters here and there. I feel like, by now, I should really be feeling some more pronounced movement. :-(
Reasons I feel like this is a really big deal:
- I'm halfway through my pregnancy! Because both of our parents have "countdown" plaques, it's kind of exciting to know that, from this point forward, the numbers for the weeks remaining will all be lower than the numbers we've already hit as "pregnancy milestones." So for example, last week I was 19 weeks along and 21 weeks to go and next week I will be 21 weeks along and have 19 weeks to go. That's pretty spiffy.
- I'm starting to feel more comfortable with having the belly. When I think of myself as being in the middle of the pregnancy, rather than early pregnancy, I feel more okay with the fact that I have a protruding bump.
- Our mid-pregnancy ultrasound is next week!
It's hard not to be impatient, though. Especially since we're here in Florida visiting with Amanda, who is so much closer to the end than I am.
 |
| Mandi looking adorably pregnant. |
Speaking of which, we're having oodles of fun down here, and this is perhaps the best way to celebrate 20 weeks. Just hanging out, lounging at the beach . . .
 |
| Ben and Mandi enjoying the ocean. |
. . . and putting together baby gear! While Mandi was at work yesterday, we put together her swing and bouncer, which are adorable. I can't stop patting the soft fabrics.
 |
| Our grand accomplishments! |
We also got to visit her birth center and a baby consignment sale where we both picked up some good finds. Can't wait to meet both our babies!
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Rough day?
Yesterday was a bit tough on us.
It started on Tuesday evening actually. I was talking on the phone with my sister when I started coughing. And coughing led to throwing up. Needless to say, I had to hang up on her and make a break for the bathroom.
It wasn't a pleasant experience and when I looked in the mirror, I saw that I had lots of little red dots around my eyes and on my cheeks. This was not unusual. Burst blood vessels with vomiting has been an unfortunate side effect of the morning sickness.
But the next morning was a bit more unusual. While I was getting ready for parent-teacher conferences, putting on my cute maternity dress and smiling in the mirror, I saw that I had a dark red splotch across the sclera of my eye. Apparently I'd suffered from a subconjunctival hemorrhage (a broken blood vessel in the eye) as well as the red spots on my face. I was going to be spending the entire day making eye contact with parents and students during face-to-face meetings . . . and I looked like I belonged in the haunted house that had been constructed in my classroom the previous week.
So then I showed the eye to Ben and he started researching what (if anything) I needed to do.
Ben has what's called recurrent vasovagal syncope, which causes him to faint when confronted with certain types of stressful situations (like feeling pain, seeing someone in pain, reading about medical phenomena . . . you may have some idea of where I'm going with this, and yes, we've already decided that we will be hiring a doula to help us through labor). Usually he recovers in about 15 seconds, but it's always a little scary to see someone lose consciousness like that.
When Ben fainted yesterday, I didn't realize right away what was happening. I thought he was just a little dizzy. And unresponsive. And then I ran over to see if he was okay, started shaking his arm, tapping at his face, calling his name.
To make a long (it felt like an eternity) story short, he didn't recover in the usual amount of time and so I started to fear that he was having trouble breathing, or was having a seizure, or . . . I don't know. In a few more seconds, I was on the phone with 911 -- and I was a mess.
I had always assumed that I would be awesome in a crisis. That I would be the one who clearly and concisely yelled to the accident victim, "Can you hear me?" and then called to a passerby, "You call 911, I will check vitals and begin first aid!" Or, better yet, who put 911 on my speakerphone while I simultaneously delivered top-notch first aid and communicated effectively with the emergency dispatcher.
In real life, I was simultaneously trying to revive Ben by propping up his head (apparently the exact opposite of what I should be doing) and asking him if he could hear me while the emergency dispatcher was trying to ask me for my address. In response to her question (which I had not heard at all over my own voice), I began to tell her what was happening with updates every three seconds to let her know what new noises he was making or colors he was changing to.
I learned an important lesson about myself. I am an absolute basketcase when someone I love is in trouble.
As you may have gathered from the tone of this post, my husband did recover. In fact, he recovered while I was still in my minute-long conversation with the dispatcher. And despite the fact that the second thing he said after, "I'm fine, I just fainted," was "I can't see!" (which was not at all reassuring to me) within a few more moments he was almost back to his normal self and his vision was restored.
I was pretty shaken up for the rest of the day. And for the rest of that day I started most of my conferences with a jittery explanation of why I looked like I was bleeding from the eye and also why I was forgetting the names of most of the people around me.
Luckily, everyone is sympathetic to a pregnant lady.
It started on Tuesday evening actually. I was talking on the phone with my sister when I started coughing. And coughing led to throwing up. Needless to say, I had to hang up on her and make a break for the bathroom.
It wasn't a pleasant experience and when I looked in the mirror, I saw that I had lots of little red dots around my eyes and on my cheeks. This was not unusual. Burst blood vessels with vomiting has been an unfortunate side effect of the morning sickness.
But the next morning was a bit more unusual. While I was getting ready for parent-teacher conferences, putting on my cute maternity dress and smiling in the mirror, I saw that I had a dark red splotch across the sclera of my eye. Apparently I'd suffered from a subconjunctival hemorrhage (a broken blood vessel in the eye) as well as the red spots on my face. I was going to be spending the entire day making eye contact with parents and students during face-to-face meetings . . . and I looked like I belonged in the haunted house that had been constructed in my classroom the previous week.
So then I showed the eye to Ben and he started researching what (if anything) I needed to do.
Ben has what's called recurrent vasovagal syncope, which causes him to faint when confronted with certain types of stressful situations (like feeling pain, seeing someone in pain, reading about medical phenomena . . . you may have some idea of where I'm going with this, and yes, we've already decided that we will be hiring a doula to help us through labor). Usually he recovers in about 15 seconds, but it's always a little scary to see someone lose consciousness like that.
When Ben fainted yesterday, I didn't realize right away what was happening. I thought he was just a little dizzy. And unresponsive. And then I ran over to see if he was okay, started shaking his arm, tapping at his face, calling his name.
To make a long (it felt like an eternity) story short, he didn't recover in the usual amount of time and so I started to fear that he was having trouble breathing, or was having a seizure, or . . . I don't know. In a few more seconds, I was on the phone with 911 -- and I was a mess.
I had always assumed that I would be awesome in a crisis. That I would be the one who clearly and concisely yelled to the accident victim, "Can you hear me?" and then called to a passerby, "You call 911, I will check vitals and begin first aid!" Or, better yet, who put 911 on my speakerphone while I simultaneously delivered top-notch first aid and communicated effectively with the emergency dispatcher.
In real life, I was simultaneously trying to revive Ben by propping up his head (apparently the exact opposite of what I should be doing) and asking him if he could hear me while the emergency dispatcher was trying to ask me for my address. In response to her question (which I had not heard at all over my own voice), I began to tell her what was happening with updates every three seconds to let her know what new noises he was making or colors he was changing to.
I learned an important lesson about myself. I am an absolute basketcase when someone I love is in trouble.
As you may have gathered from the tone of this post, my husband did recover. In fact, he recovered while I was still in my minute-long conversation with the dispatcher. And despite the fact that the second thing he said after, "I'm fine, I just fainted," was "I can't see!" (which was not at all reassuring to me) within a few more moments he was almost back to his normal self and his vision was restored.
I was pretty shaken up for the rest of the day. And for the rest of that day I started most of my conferences with a jittery explanation of why I looked like I was bleeding from the eye and also why I was forgetting the names of most of the people around me.
Luckily, everyone is sympathetic to a pregnant lady.
Saturday, October 13, 2012
Slow Ride
One of my current goals, on par with "keep the house clean" and "eat your vegetables" is to spend time on us as a couple. I give the other two examples because it's something I always know is a priority and it does happen most of the time, but it often slips when anything big is going on.
As we talk about the fact that we're starting a family, and that we're the process of aquiring these new identities as family members, more specifically as parents, I really do want to keep the spirit of what made our time together as "just us."
Last night, I met up with Arden after her shift ended, and we checked out the new Egypt exhibit at the Science Museum. It was not as significant as the big touring exhibits that have come through, but it was a lot of fun and had some good info. We wandered around, chatting together, then splitting up, and so on.
Not once did I wonder about where Bambin@ was.
As it was the kind of evening that would be very difficult to have post-partum, I think it was rather perfect.
As we talk about the fact that we're starting a family, and that we're the process of aquiring these new identities as family members, more specifically as parents, I really do want to keep the spirit of what made our time together as "just us."
Last night, I met up with Arden after her shift ended, and we checked out the new Egypt exhibit at the Science Museum. It was not as significant as the big touring exhibits that have come through, but it was a lot of fun and had some good info. We wandered around, chatting together, then splitting up, and so on.
Not once did I wonder about where Bambin@ was.
As it was the kind of evening that would be very difficult to have post-partum, I think it was rather perfect.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Last week's midwife appointment . . .
So today I just set up my next midwife appointment and it made me realize that I'd meant to post about last week's appointment.
Last week was my 14 week appointment. I'd been in the week before because I'd fainted and so I'd gone in to get checked out. At that appointment was the first time that we heard the heartbeat with the regular doppler (as opposed to with the ultrasound).
The heartbeat had sounded really far away and quiet, so a week later when the midwife tried it, I was concerned when it was taking a little while to find it.
Then she said, "I'm having a hard time finding it . . ." I tried not to freak out, but I was worried until she finished her sentence with, "because there's so much movement."
Me: (chuckling with relief) Really? How can you tell?
Midwife: Hear that sound? (She pointed out a few sudden, high-pitched static sounds that reminded me of the sound that cats make in movies when they're startled by something thrown in their direction.) Everytime you hear that noise, that's the baby moving around.
I listened to the weird "wirr! wirr!" noise a few more times, totally content with the fact that I wasn't hearing my baby's heartbeat. A moving baby has to have a good heartbeat, right?
And then all of a sudden, she found it. It was loud. And it felt closer and more thrilling to hear than I'd expected. I wanted to just keep the doppler on my belly all afternoon -- until the "wirr!" noise returned to signal that our bambin@ was no longer interested in sitting still for me.
But the midwife had other appointments. Sigh.
Monday, September 24, 2012
Maternity Pants and Movement
So I'm officially wearing maternity pants now. I don't know how much I'm actually showing a "bump" but I've long since stopped trying to hold my abdominal muscles tightly. I have found that since about 10 weeks, it would just hurt if I tried to hold my stomach in. So as soon as most folks around me knew about the pregnancy, I just stopped trying, leading to a potbelly appearance. I have gained very little, if any weight (sometimes the scale shows a gain of 1-2 pounds and other times it shows me lower than pre-pregnancy), but it wasn't like I started with a flat stomach and now my belly is definitely poking out.
At first, the potbelly look was really embarrassing. Right around 12 weeks, I was picking up some Thai food and the woman who was ringing me up asked me if I was pregnant. I must have blushed over my whole face. I affirmed the pregnancy, but inwardly I was adding, "But you're not supposed to be able to tell yet!" It was especially embarrassing when she asked how much longer I have to go and I had to say "About six months...."
But now, I rather like the belly. It helps that I'm no longer trying to hide it from anyone. I rub it often because of my round ligament pain. My students love it when I absent-mindedly rub my belly.
Back to the pants. My stretchy skirts and one pair of stretchy shorts had been serving me well, but with chilly weather approaching, I was needing to start wearing pants. None of my pants fit anymore, so I bought three pairs of maternity pants at Target a few weeks ago and I've been officially living in them for the last week. I love them.
Of course, they don't quite fit yet. I've been folding over the stretchy belly area to make them a little more comfortable, but they still slide down. I have been told that if I get a "Bella Band" and put it over the maternity pants, it will keep them from sliding down so much. So that's the next item on my shopping list.
As well as a "Snoogle" or a "Preggle" or whatever those crazy body pillows for pregnant ladies are called. I'm hoping to pick one of those up soon, so I can start experimenting with it. Right about now is when I'm supposed to stop sleeping on my back, and I need a little help to keep myself on my side.
As far as the second half of my post's title, I have not felt movement yet. At least not officially. Even though I've been awaiting it with great anticipation, I could honestly say that I hadn't felt anything that felt even close to movement until this past week. During this past week, though, I have definitely had some more, "What was that?" moments. They are usually times when I'll feel a little sensation like the Pillsbury Dough Boy being poked in the belly. Or sometimes it will feel like a muscle twitch (but different from the round ligament pain).
Then, on Saturday night, I was lying on my side, eyes closed, before falling asleep. Suddenly, I felt this really quick little feeling that felt like a "pop" kind of sensation. I can't really describe it. My eyes opened and I just laid still for a few moments, trying to think about what it could have been. It didn't feel like gas or a muscle spasm. Just like a little "pop." I told Ben and he said, "I bet it was Bambin@."
I'd like to think that it was, but I am prepared to concede that it's still too early. I don't feel a strong urge to put a label on it just yet. I'm sure that, soon enough, I will be willing my baby to stop kicking me in the liver.
At first, the potbelly look was really embarrassing. Right around 12 weeks, I was picking up some Thai food and the woman who was ringing me up asked me if I was pregnant. I must have blushed over my whole face. I affirmed the pregnancy, but inwardly I was adding, "But you're not supposed to be able to tell yet!" It was especially embarrassing when she asked how much longer I have to go and I had to say "About six months...."
But now, I rather like the belly. It helps that I'm no longer trying to hide it from anyone. I rub it often because of my round ligament pain. My students love it when I absent-mindedly rub my belly.
Back to the pants. My stretchy skirts and one pair of stretchy shorts had been serving me well, but with chilly weather approaching, I was needing to start wearing pants. None of my pants fit anymore, so I bought three pairs of maternity pants at Target a few weeks ago and I've been officially living in them for the last week. I love them.
Of course, they don't quite fit yet. I've been folding over the stretchy belly area to make them a little more comfortable, but they still slide down. I have been told that if I get a "Bella Band" and put it over the maternity pants, it will keep them from sliding down so much. So that's the next item on my shopping list.
As well as a "Snoogle" or a "Preggle" or whatever those crazy body pillows for pregnant ladies are called. I'm hoping to pick one of those up soon, so I can start experimenting with it. Right about now is when I'm supposed to stop sleeping on my back, and I need a little help to keep myself on my side.
As far as the second half of my post's title, I have not felt movement yet. At least not officially. Even though I've been awaiting it with great anticipation, I could honestly say that I hadn't felt anything that felt even close to movement until this past week. During this past week, though, I have definitely had some more, "What was that?" moments. They are usually times when I'll feel a little sensation like the Pillsbury Dough Boy being poked in the belly. Or sometimes it will feel like a muscle twitch (but different from the round ligament pain).
Then, on Saturday night, I was lying on my side, eyes closed, before falling asleep. Suddenly, I felt this really quick little feeling that felt like a "pop" kind of sensation. I can't really describe it. My eyes opened and I just laid still for a few moments, trying to think about what it could have been. It didn't feel like gas or a muscle spasm. Just like a little "pop." I told Ben and he said, "I bet it was Bambin@."
I'd like to think that it was, but I am prepared to concede that it's still too early. I don't feel a strong urge to put a label on it just yet. I'm sure that, soon enough, I will be willing my baby to stop kicking me in the liver.
Sunday, September 16, 2012
The Seven Stages of Morning Sickness
I know that every woman experiences morning sickness differently, and that it is often different for the same woman during different pregnancies. Here's a run-down of how I've experienced morning sickness so far in this pregnancy.
Stage 1: Anticipation
The day after we saw the two lines on the pregnancy test, we had to get up early in the morning and head off to Switzerland. In order to do this, we boarded a vaparetto (a water bus) to go to the train station. To board the vaparetto, you get on this little floating station. The moment that I stepped onto it, I felt a wave of intense nausea. I didn't know whether I would throw up or break out in a cold sweat. I thought to myself, "Oh no, this is it."
Luckily for me, that particular feeling was kind of a one-time deal. I've actually never felt quite like that again through this whole pregnancy. I have felt awful, mind you, but not like the nausea that I experienced in that moment. And it took a good week and a half before I felt noticeable nausea of any sort again.
During that week, though, I had a lot of anxiety about whether that feeling would return again when I hit six weeks, whether it would be like that the entire pregnancy, whether I would never want to eat again or whether I would be able to keep any food in my stomach for the next several months. I tried my best to appreciate every day that I felt good and not get too nervous on the days when I'd start to feel bad.
Stage 2: Panic I
The first time I threw up, it was scary. I don't throw up often. More often than not, I think I will throw up and then am wildly unsuccessful at doing so. So it surprised me when I did. And it surprised me even more when I felt a little better after doing so. The process of throwing up is just awful. There is nothing that could make me feel any better in that moment, but there was a definite sense of relief when it was over.
Still, I told myself, perhaps I'd be like other women I've known . . . who experienced bad morning sickness, but only threw up a few times.
Stage 3: Mini-Acceptance
By the end of that weekend, I'd already thrown up three times and I gave up my dream of a low-vomit pregnancy. Throughout the next couple of weeks, I learned that there was little that I could do to prevent myself from throwing up. I figured out how to tell whether I would need to or not and learned that vomiting and nausea often had little to do with one another. I tried to look on the bright side. At least I was able to feel some relief from vomiting, instead of feeling sick all the time. At least I was able to keep most of my food down. At least I wasn't being admitted to the hospital for IV fluids because I was vomiting so much. There were plenty of things to be grateful for, and I still had the end of the first trimester to look forward to.
Stage 4: Panic II
My next wave of panic came when my vomiting started to get worse and more painful. I will spare you the particular details of why this became so, but suffice it to say, I have learned through experience that there are different types of vomit and they result in varying experiences. This also came around the time when everyone around me started to say, "Well, at least this is the worst of it and it should start getting better now." And yet it never seemed to. It was also around the time when several people reacted with surprise when I told them that I had morning sickness. It made me realize that perhaps I had it worse than I'd thought. That perhaps the "norm" is to throw up only occasionally or not at all, and that I didn't have as much to be grateful for as I'd thought.
It didn't help that I got a sinus infection around this time and was suffering from post-nasal drip and coughing. Kinda difficult to avoid vomiting when you're gagging on phlegm.
Stage 5: Pride
I experienced a stage in which I would tell myself, "Yeah! You're a badass mama for throwing up all the time! Look at you, being all hardcore!"
This was, as you might expect, the briefest of stages.
Stage 6: Panic III
As I've entered the second trimester with little change, panic has set in once more. I've passed all the other milestones that folks have reported to me -- that it would get better at 10 weeks, at 12 weeks, at 13 weeks, at 14 weeks. At this point, if it's not better yet, there's no particular reassurance of when it will end. When people find out that I'm still throwing up, there's a sympathetic nod rather than a quick assurance that the end is in sight.
I've also noticed a disturbing lack of relief after vomiting. It used to be that I would feel immediately better (not normal, but better) and now I've started to notice that throwing up makes me feel worse or the same.
I really hate to throw up, but it's not even about that anymore. It's the feeling that the second trimester -- that most blissful of times -- may slip out from under me because I still feel awful. The panic comes from wondering whether this will stay with me throughout what it supposed to be the best part of pregnancy. It comes from worrying that it will stick with me right up until morning sickness turns into labor vomiting.
Stage 7: ?
I don't know what stage 7 holds because I'm not there yet. But I'm hoping it's something like "relief" or "acceptance." Either of those would be okay. Even if it doesn't go away, I'd like to be able to gracefully accept that the second trimester may not be as blissful as I'd imagined and that the third trimester may just be all-around rough. I'll let you know what stage 7 is and what it brings with it when it happens.
I really am grateful for the fact that I'm able to have times when I am nausea-free. I know that some people never get that feeling.
Stage 1: Anticipation
The day after we saw the two lines on the pregnancy test, we had to get up early in the morning and head off to Switzerland. In order to do this, we boarded a vaparetto (a water bus) to go to the train station. To board the vaparetto, you get on this little floating station. The moment that I stepped onto it, I felt a wave of intense nausea. I didn't know whether I would throw up or break out in a cold sweat. I thought to myself, "Oh no, this is it."
Luckily for me, that particular feeling was kind of a one-time deal. I've actually never felt quite like that again through this whole pregnancy. I have felt awful, mind you, but not like the nausea that I experienced in that moment. And it took a good week and a half before I felt noticeable nausea of any sort again.
During that week, though, I had a lot of anxiety about whether that feeling would return again when I hit six weeks, whether it would be like that the entire pregnancy, whether I would never want to eat again or whether I would be able to keep any food in my stomach for the next several months. I tried my best to appreciate every day that I felt good and not get too nervous on the days when I'd start to feel bad.
Stage 2: Panic I
The first time I threw up, it was scary. I don't throw up often. More often than not, I think I will throw up and then am wildly unsuccessful at doing so. So it surprised me when I did. And it surprised me even more when I felt a little better after doing so. The process of throwing up is just awful. There is nothing that could make me feel any better in that moment, but there was a definite sense of relief when it was over.
Still, I told myself, perhaps I'd be like other women I've known . . . who experienced bad morning sickness, but only threw up a few times.
Stage 3: Mini-Acceptance
By the end of that weekend, I'd already thrown up three times and I gave up my dream of a low-vomit pregnancy. Throughout the next couple of weeks, I learned that there was little that I could do to prevent myself from throwing up. I figured out how to tell whether I would need to or not and learned that vomiting and nausea often had little to do with one another. I tried to look on the bright side. At least I was able to feel some relief from vomiting, instead of feeling sick all the time. At least I was able to keep most of my food down. At least I wasn't being admitted to the hospital for IV fluids because I was vomiting so much. There were plenty of things to be grateful for, and I still had the end of the first trimester to look forward to.
Stage 4: Panic II
My next wave of panic came when my vomiting started to get worse and more painful. I will spare you the particular details of why this became so, but suffice it to say, I have learned through experience that there are different types of vomit and they result in varying experiences. This also came around the time when everyone around me started to say, "Well, at least this is the worst of it and it should start getting better now." And yet it never seemed to. It was also around the time when several people reacted with surprise when I told them that I had morning sickness. It made me realize that perhaps I had it worse than I'd thought. That perhaps the "norm" is to throw up only occasionally or not at all, and that I didn't have as much to be grateful for as I'd thought.
It didn't help that I got a sinus infection around this time and was suffering from post-nasal drip and coughing. Kinda difficult to avoid vomiting when you're gagging on phlegm.
Stage 5: Pride
I experienced a stage in which I would tell myself, "Yeah! You're a badass mama for throwing up all the time! Look at you, being all hardcore!"
This was, as you might expect, the briefest of stages.
Stage 6: Panic III
As I've entered the second trimester with little change, panic has set in once more. I've passed all the other milestones that folks have reported to me -- that it would get better at 10 weeks, at 12 weeks, at 13 weeks, at 14 weeks. At this point, if it's not better yet, there's no particular reassurance of when it will end. When people find out that I'm still throwing up, there's a sympathetic nod rather than a quick assurance that the end is in sight.
I've also noticed a disturbing lack of relief after vomiting. It used to be that I would feel immediately better (not normal, but better) and now I've started to notice that throwing up makes me feel worse or the same.
I really hate to throw up, but it's not even about that anymore. It's the feeling that the second trimester -- that most blissful of times -- may slip out from under me because I still feel awful. The panic comes from wondering whether this will stay with me throughout what it supposed to be the best part of pregnancy. It comes from worrying that it will stick with me right up until morning sickness turns into labor vomiting.
Stage 7: ?
I don't know what stage 7 holds because I'm not there yet. But I'm hoping it's something like "relief" or "acceptance." Either of those would be okay. Even if it doesn't go away, I'd like to be able to gracefully accept that the second trimester may not be as blissful as I'd imagined and that the third trimester may just be all-around rough. I'll let you know what stage 7 is and what it brings with it when it happens.
I really am grateful for the fact that I'm able to have times when I am nausea-free. I know that some people never get that feeling.
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