Friday 20 July 2012

What they dont tell you about pregnancy...


Not quite sure who “they” are but whoever takes this title sure has a lot of explaining to do... here are some of the things I wish I had known about pregnancy...
Gas
Gas, wind, farting, however you want to describe it is up to you. But there is no denying that during pregnancy it is rampant! It’s physically painful to hold in and emotionally painful to let out. It will catch you off guard and any sudden movements will result in a quick scurry to another part of the room.  And later in the pregnancy when you are eagerly awaiting the start of labour, a big gas bubble will manage to disguise itself as a contraction...but only for a short time.
Bladder control...or lack of!
Imagine really needing to go to the toilet and having a small child jump on your bladder. Welcome to pregnancy! The only difference is the small child is inside you for a long 40 weeks. You will be punched and kicked in the bladder and later on in pregnancy it will be used as a cushion 24/7. You will become too nervous to laugh, sneeze or make any sudden movements. You will become a master at quickly excusing yourself to the bathroom should any of those occur.
Heartburn
I’m not talking about a little bit of indigestion that you get after a spicy dish; I’m talking drinking gaviscon out of the bottle like water on a hot summer’s day type heartburn. I’m talking sleeping sitting up in an attempt to reduce some of the pain type heartburn.  Where nothing you do eases the burning pain and no matter what you eat or drink you may as well have swallowed a bag of hot chillies. You will Google remedies and try things you never imagined just to try and ease the pain but generally the only thing that works is waiting for the baby to drop and get off your gut!
No sleep before bubs arrive
We all get warned that once bubs arrives we must learn to live with the idea of sleep deprivation but what nobody tells you is that the lack of sleep actually starts way before bubs makes an appearance. If it’s not due to the gas, heartburn or muscle pain it’s your body just waking you up to give you a chance to stress a little. Is the nursery going to be finished, will I make a good mum, will I cope with labour...anything and everything that will worry you will happen at 3am when you can’t do anything about it!
Other people’s stupidity
This is probably the number one thing that nobody thinks about when falling pregnant but I guarantee that unless you are living on another planet for the entire 9 months you will encounter stupidity from someone else. Be it a do gooder who insists they know exactly what you need to eat, do, wear, avoid or be it a funny man that thinks calling you a teletubby is a huge joke. People will assume that your belly is public property and that your every move is up for a public discussion.  The only way to handle all the unwanted attention is either ignore it or come up with some witty retorts very early on. 

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