Pregnancy
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Monday, September 3rd, 2007I’m lying on the sofa, nauseous, eating, eating, eating - even though the nausea tells me food is wrong - when I feel it. Small flutters, which if I were pregnant for the first time I would say were wind, but remembering Ben kicking from eleven weeks I know are the beginning of months of the only thing about pregnancy I enjoy. Over the next few days I feel it more clearly, the fluttering, kicking, reminding me not only is there something worthwhile resulting from all this sickness but also that I have the most lax stomach muscles of any pregnant woman anywhere.
But I figure I have the rest of my life to re-tone those muscles but only a few precious months to enjoy the signs that my baby is growing inside me and that there will - eventually - be another child in our family. I will be a mother of four. And I can’t help but feel a tiny bit thrilled. And maybe also just a bit terrified.
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Ten weeks pregnant
Monday, August 27th, 2007I’m feeling really low. The sickness, constant nausea, lack of sleep and early pregnancy fatigue are taking their toll on me physically and mentally.
I’m doing my best to sleep when I can, eat little and often and rest while the boys play. The days are just passing me by. The house looks like a bomb has hit but I feel so unwell that I just don’t care. The washing machine has broken and so I am facing mountains of dirty laundry piling up around us. Family and friends are helping me out but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t struggling to cope just now.
So, yeah, I’m feeling really low.
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Nine weeks pregnant
Monday, August 20th, 2007So I got around to working it out and I’m nine weeks pregnant. With my first pregnancy I knew how many weeks, days, probably even minutes I was pregnant but this time I’m lucky if I can remember to take all the children with me when we go out somewhere.
At nine weeks, I’m visibly pregnant. The maternity clothes are out and waiting to be laundered because one more cake and I’m going to be needing them. But I’m starting to feel really run down by the lack of nutrition and lack of sleep (Harry has developed an obsession with flies in his bedroom at night and no amount of cajoling will get him back to sleep. Once in our bed there is a great deal of tossing and turning and often nervous giggling which doesn’t improve my mood towards him. Then there’s the teething baby. And the same one that screams for fun in the middle of the night. And finally there’s the getting up to pee. Which is why you will hear me muttering at three o’clock in the morning my mantra: sleep is for the weak, sleep is for the weak.)
But in the morning Harry asks, ‘how are you feeling today, Mummy?’ with such sweetness and concern that there is a millisecond where I actually think the sickness is worth it.
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I recently found out that my cousin is expecting twins. Oh how lovely! I thought.
A few days later it finally occurred to me that my cousin - ON MY MATERNAL SIDE - is expecting twins. Conceived naturally.
So now I wait to hear whether they are identical or not. Because if they’re not, that means that twins might run on my mother’s side of the family. Which means I am at higher risk of having twins myself. Which would be? Well, lovely is NOT the word that springs to mind.
Fraternal twins, which occur when two separate eggs are fertilized, are the more common type of twins. Your chances of having fraternal twins appear to increase with your age and the number of children you have and if you are tall. In addition, your chance of having a multiple birth also increases if fraternal twins run in your family.
So let’s see: I’m old, I’m tall, I already have three children and now twins may run in my family. (And yes, I know theoretically they may also run on her partner’s side of the family, but where’s the story in that?)
Anyway, after the little scare we had with the last pregnancy and already having three boys under six, it’s just a risk I could do without.
Nuchal scan in a couple of weeks. I’m counting the days. Or at least I would be if I weren’t already counting the days - and hours and minutes - until I stop throwing up (I’m pregnant; I can’t be expected to count both).
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Seven weeks pregnant. Or possibly eight weeks pregnant. (Can you tell this is my fourth baby?)
Wednesday, August 15th, 2007This
is what is standing between me and this
And when I tell you I am eating a cake a day, I am not kidding (which is why I make two at a time.) The cake stops me throwing up. It gives me some quality of life because I am at last off the sofa. If I don’t feel so nauseated I can at least attempt to eat something healthy at mealtimes. And most importantly, it’s keeping me out of hospital.
So when it was reported on the news today that pregnant and nursing mothers who eat junk food can ‘programme’ their babies to prefer junk food I thought I can’t win.
“Future mothers should be aware that pregnancy and lactation are not the time to over-indulge on fatty and sugary treats on the assumption that they are ‘eating for two’.”
I simply laughed because otherwise I might have cried. Because I don’t really have any alternative. And if it’s between this and going back to how I was feeling a couple of weeks ago then I would eat ten cakes every day if I needed to.
And if my unborn child turns out to have weight problems later in life? Well he/she has the perfect excuse. He can blame it on me.
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Holding on to that thought
Friday, August 3rd, 2007The countryside is putrifying, my over-zealous nose tells me as I squelch uneasily through recently flooded land. Returning home, the wet dog fares no better: you stink, I say, as a rub her dry and deftly avoid throwing up directly on her. Getting good at this, I think with a sort of inverse pride. I close the door from the boot room behind me and lean against it momentarily, wondering what I can eat now to ease the storm in my stomach. But as I stand there I am overwhelmed by the smell of bacon fat from the grill pan, even though it’s clean. My stomach heaves again.
One week down, seven or eight more to go. I can do this. The end result is absolutely worth every moment.
It’s just hard to remember that right now.
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