Random Preggo Observations

I’m into month four of my pregnancy and have a few observations on what is different this second time around.

First, with the horrible sleep you get as a preggo – I’m not all dramatic about it this time around because I can appreciate that horrible stomach aches and frequent peeing hold nothing against a screaming baby that won’t settle down. Frankly, I don’t even find it noteworthy. But it’s the sleep disruption patterns that fascinate me because they are so predictable – though I would never have known this as a first time preggo. Essentially since about week 6 or so of my pregnancy, my night time patterns have followed this:

solid sleep from 9:30pm-12:30-1am

Waking every two hours to pee from 1am-5:30-6am, when my day usually starts.

So, I’m easily up peeing 4 times a night.

My point – this is the exact pattern of a newborn – is it not? You know they’ll sleep pretty solidly from 9-10pm until about 1am, and after that, they’re easily up every two-three hours if you’re lucky – certainly for the first 6-8 weeks.

Is this boot camp, or what? I mean – what your body does and how it prepares you really amazes me.

Now, trust me, I’m not getting all Angelina Jolie on you and about to sing the praises of the miracle of the female body. I don’t enjoy getting up all the time, I ache for a long night of sleep that is uninterrupted and I think back to those weeks and days before I got pregnant and desperately wish I had appreciated the long nights of uninterrupted sleep I was getting because I sure as hell wasn’t focusing on how they were about to change already.

The other thing I would like to comment on is the upward weight gain. With my first pregnancy, it really didn’t bother me so much because it was all new and exciting and what was supposed to be happening.

This time, it is bothering me. First – let me state the obvious – I am welcoming the weight gain because it is important for the health of the baby. Setting that aside – I am not the person that loses weight easily. Nor was I the preggo that suddenly returned to my pre-pregnancy body within weeks of giving birth. Those people annoy me, frankly.

It took me almost two full years and a lot of hard work with regular 6am workouts to return to my old body, maybe even a bit thinner. So now, as I step on the scale at the docs office, I’m suddenly thrown back in time to when I last weighed this amount and how hard I had to work to get down to this even higher weight and how much harder I had to work to go down even more. It’s just not lost on me. It’s a long, difficult road and I don’t love it.

I love food. Sure, I could have gone on some crazy strict diet but it seems to me that you are sacrificing enough when adjusting to parenthood, why should you sacrifice a great meal? We only live once, right?

Anyhow – my only point is – adjusting to the weight gain is just different for me in this pregnancy than it was in the last. My approach to food and what I’m eating and drinking is also different – and for the most part – more disciplined – because I also have a greater appreciation for how difficult it is to lose the unnecessary pounds you gain as a preggo. And surely we all can admit that we gained unnecessary pounds.

Lastly, DD has reverted, emotionally, particularly in the mornings. She is very emotional again – it’s similar to separation anxiety. She’ll stand on the other side of the shower door and cry until I get out. When I leave for work, she says “mommy, i don’t want you to go” as she’s crying or “i don’t want you to go to work” (on that one, i was like, “join the club, kiddo”). I most definitely cannot ever be in a different room than she is in the mornings, which as anyone else who has endured long bouts of separation anxiety knows, makes it extremely difficult to get ready and out the door even remotely on time.

It’s been a long time since she has been this emotional in the mornings and you combine that with an already hormonal, somewhat sleep deprived preggo – and it makes it VERY difficult to get out the door without tears on my end just about every morning.

Naturally, I’m left to ponder what is bringing on this behavioral change. Is it because she had 10 days with us on vacation last month and is older now, so she just doesn’t adjust back to being without us as easily as a baby does? She sure can express herself very clearly and she’s very good at that – including the lower lip coming out and the eyes filling with big tears. Is she just feeling sensitive lately? We all have our moments. Or then there is the school of thought that says that some children can intuitively sense when their mom is pregnant and things are changing and they revert.

I’ll be honest, I just don’t buy it. DD isn’t a dog smelling my crotch. I mean – come on. I just can’t really buy into that theory though people are as quick to throw out that theory as they are to predict the sex of your baby.

Who knows. All I know for certain is DD is in an emotional morning phase and like everything else, it will pass.