Teaming Up To
Raise Awesome Kids
Image description (alt text unavailable feature): Pregnant belly eclipsing sun forming a halo.
Pregnancy is both wonderful and absolutely awful. This is a post about the most awful parts for me. Because each pregnancy is special, what's awful for you might be different. 5. Frequent Urination I'm sure this is a symptom every woman knows about and is expecting. Frequent urination is very real during pregnancy. It's just super inconvenient. I generally can't go longer than an hour, sometimes less. I can almost never go out anywhere without having to visit a public bathroom. Road trips are awful, it feels like you're constantly stopping. Early pregnancy and very late pregnancy are the worst times because that's when the baby is literally sitting on your bladder. However, once baby starts kicking, be prepared for bladder kicks. A direct kick on a partially full bladder can send you running. This is much worse with baby #2, and I'd assume if I have a third it'll be even worse. Pelvic floor exercises are supposed to help, but I haven't noticed a difference. 4. Pressure for Perfect Pregnancy There is way too much pressure on women to be perfect mothers. That pressure starts before pregnancy: we're supposed to be as healthy as possible preconception. I'm pretty sure there's a "What To Expect When You're Expecting to Expect" book. During pregnancy, the pressure kicks into high gear. Imperfection can feel like total failure, and it's no wonder with what-all is on our plates. A few of the things you feel like you must do:
3. Edema Lower extremity swelling during pregnancy is a very common symptom. With my first pregnancy, it was pretty bad. It started at around 20 weeks and got progressively worse. My feet were so swollen I could barely wear shoes. I found some adjustable flip flops that were a lifesaver. It got so bad at around 36 weeks that I started getting an itchy rash from the skin stretching. Having very itchy ankles when your belly is so huge you can't really reach to scratch is terrible. Both swimming and compression stockings helped, though the relief was temporary. For my second pregnancy, edema hasn't been an issue at all. I can still see the bones in my feet! The difference is that for my first pregnancy I was working in an office, sitting at a desk. I propped my feet up and took walking breaks as much as possible, but all that sitting just wasn't good for my circulation. Now, I stay at home with my older son. My day is split between chasing him around and taking breaks with my feet propped up. So far, I haven't had to use compression stockings at all. 2. Painful Kicks I don't think this is a symptom every woman has, and it's one I wasn't really prepared for. But babies kick hard. I have woken up with my ribs sore because my baby was seemingly kicking the exact same spot all night long. On my belly there are a cluster of stretch marks over a spot that my older son repeatedly kicked for about 2 months. During my first pregnancy, my son seemed to get angry when I had a Braxton-Hicks contraction. Almost as soon as one started, he would begin kicking or punching the spot. Not fun! This symptom has been significantly worse for my second pregnancy for a couple of reasons. First, I have a medical condition that amplifies pain. During my first pregnancy, it was in remission. After I gave birth, it flared up again. The flare up didn't stop before I got pregnant again. So for this pregnancy, every single normal ache and pain is significantly worse. This definitely includes kicks! Second, I had a c-section with my first birth. The scar tissue formed after a c-section stretches painfully during the second trimester. Now that I'm in the third trimester, the scar pain is much less severe. However, when baby kicks, punches or rolls and presses against the scar, it is super painful. Unfortunately, there's not really anything to do for painful kicks. Sometimes I can rub the area and get the baby to stop, but kids don't always do what you ask. 1. Rampant Paranoia Definitely the worst symptom, and one I think every parent experiences. While this is worse with the first pregnancy, it definitely still exists for the second.
What do I mean by paranoia? I mean that you worry about your child, sometimes to an irrational degree. This is part of parenthood, and it doesn't really stop at birth. But at least after the baby is born you can actually check and make sure they're OK. Some examples: when my c-section scar first started hurting, I was worried that it was going to rupture and that I would lose the baby. I knew that the statistical likelihood of this happening was pretty much nothing, but the thought gets into your head. During my first pregnancy, once my son dropped I worried about getting into a car accident and the seatbelt crushing him. We lived in a third floor apartment during the first pregnancy, and I constantly worried I would fall down the stairs. If I drink unfiltered water, I worry about the lead content. For my first pregnancy, the paranoia bled over into terribly vivid dreams. Pretty much every horrible thing you can imagine happening during a pregnancy or with a newborn occurred in my dreams. I don't know if it's the hormones or the stress, but the dreams were incredibly real. During this pregnancy, I haven't really had an issue with vivid dreams or nightmares about things that can go wrong with a newborn. I think this is at least partially because now I've taken care of a newborn and I know I can do it. I feel like the dreams I was having during my first pregnancy were partially me working through my fears of being a new parent. The paranoia about the wellbeing of your child in utero is really just prep for parenthood. Parents worry about their child's health and wellbeing. For me, and I think for most, the most paranoid time is the newborn period. We worry about SIDS, feeding routines, whether poops are normal, slight variations in temperature, etc. The most comforting thing to me is to go look at the statistics. During pregnancy, this means that once I reach 32 weeks I relax a bit. At 32 weeks, there is a jump in the likelihood that if there's a problem the baby will survive and will have less development complications. Obviously, the longer your pregnancy lasts, the better. But knowing that I've reached a point where statistically we get through it OK is very helpful. Be forewarned: some statistics suck and do not assuage the paranoia. If you've run into a statistic like that, to me the best thing to do is push the odds in your favor. For instance, you can reduce the risk for SIDS by using a pacifier, making sure the crib is empty, not using bumpers and using a low fan to circulate air. Every action that reduces the odds of harm is a comfort. While parental paranoia doesn't go away, you do get used to it. To me, even though it can be stressful or even disturbing, it is necessary. The better I can foresee possible dangers, the better I can protect my kids from those dangers. I don't know that it makes me at all calmer when there's actually a problem, but at least I can act.
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Disclaimer: All opinions are our own. We are not scientists or doctors or experts. We're just regular parents.
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