This Time 'Round' (Pregnancy Perks and Pains)

And I do mean 'round' :)

Last time 'round

(I wrote this when I was pregnant with baby number 3.)  

I do not sail gracefully and beautifully and glowingly through my entire pregnancy.  I think I do that for maybe a week somewhere around month 5.  The other 39 weeks are more of a challenge.

Here's how pregnancy #3 has gone for me... 

The first trimester:

• I thought that I would die.  Morning sickness feels like death.  Or at the very least, like you're heading that way!
• How did I do this twice already?
• It must be much worse this time!!! (James assuring me it was exactly the same)
• I can't eat ANYTHING!!! - wait, except an Aussie burger from Hungry Jacks... right now.. I'm not kidding James, right now.  Why am I not eating it right now?  Sob, sick.
• My poor children!  I'm putting on that Hi-5 DVD again!
• Yes, I'm pregnant - but you're not meant to be asking me that yet, I'm only 8 weeks, we're trying to keep it under wraps!  The weight I'm putting on isn't 'baby' yet - I just can't stop eating or I'll be sick! Yes, I know I look 14 weeks.  It's the 14 Aussie Burgers I've eaten in the last 2 weeks, that's all.
• James, don't get uni holiday work! - We'll survive without money!  I just can't get out of bed to look after the girls!  Or get myself food to cover my cravings and make me not be sick for 2 minutes   Skip class while you're at it please!  And skip basketball!  Skip everything - just stay home and help me not die!  You really have to go to that exam today?!  Okay, okay, I understand... Can you drop me at Mum and Dad's on the way??

The second trimester:

• When James asked me what I wanted for dinner, I didn't burst into tears! - I think I'm okay with anything!  I'm healed!!! :)
• Sick again.  Pregnancy feels like death!
• Better again today!  Finally pulling out of it!  :)  
• Wow, the world is a happy place!  A lot has happened while I've been 'under' for the last 4 months!!  I am so, SO excited to be pregnant!  YAY!!! :)  Wow, I put on SO much weight eating 24/7 to help me get through that!  But I'm still a little feeling fragile, and still can't stop eating.  That's okay - it's about survival right now... I wonder what we're having!  Bet it's another girl! :)
• It's a boy!!!  I can't wait to buy something blue!!!  It feels so real!!  I can't believe it!!!
• Come on time, hurry up - I want to meet this little guy!! :)  This trimester is taking a whiiiiile!!!

The third trimester:

• I have 12 weeks to go!!!  I'm not going to fit into any of my maternity clothes if I keep growing at this rate - cut junk food, feel HEAPS better!
• This is so exciting!  Planning, planning - ordering new bassinet, picking up bits of blue here and there :) 
• The girls and I are SUPER excited!  They can't wait to meet 'the baby brother' - we talk about him all the time, they give him lots of hugs.
• Lots of cramping, lots of sciatic nerve pain, lots of random pains, feel faint a lot.  Am assured by the doctors with a smile that this is all completely normal.  Reassured, but still in pain.  Again I say - I must be MUCH worse this pregnancy.  James telling friends I'm doing much BETTER this pregnancy.  Really?  It was this bad the other times?!  
• Am barely getting bigger since cutting junk food - think the baby must be eating the fat I'd already grown.  I feel good about this! :)
• Baby's too small!  Booked in for ultrasounds to plot growth!
• False alarm - baby's a great size.
• But baby's breach!  Unless he turns will have to try painful procedure with 60% chance of success to turn him, or book me in for a caesarean!  
• Prayers.  He turned!  Yay!! :)
• 12 days to go.  Over the moon, SO EXCITED!!!  Getting excited and gooey looking through 'the day Ana was born' photos.  Hospital bags packed.
• Falling asleep halfway through sentences at 6:30pm - barely making it from the dinner table with my eyes open.  Roll my eyes anytime poor James mentions in passing that he's feeling tired or sore from something.
• "Oh, you've dropped!  You'll be having this baby any day now!!!"
  "Wow you're still carrying really high! - Baby must still be a long way away!!"
  Obviously nobody as a clue when he'll really get here :)
• I can't believe we get to meet this boy soon!  Praying that everything will go 'well' with this labour.  Sick of leaning forward, but terror of posterior childbirth (first pregnancy) keeping me at it.  Dreaming of lying on my back within the month!
• Mixture of indescribable excitement and terror waiting for 'something' to happen!  Trying not to be afraid of labour.  It's not working.  
• Made dinner last night.  James surprised and grateful.  He is practically Mum and Dad while I'm pregnant.  I think he may be looking forward to baby's birth as much as I am! :)
• I really, really love my children.  I can't think of anything in the world I'd do this for, aside for another beautiful, perfect little addition to our family.  

After giving birth to Maggie after a 3 day posterior ordeal that was worse than any of the nightmares I had imagined (and childbirth has always been a huge fear - I imagined as bad as I could!), the first thing I remember saying, was "Oh James I would do it all again right now!  I love her SO MUCH!!!".  I was deliriously happy.  There is NOTHING like that feeling in the whole world.  And there is NOBODY like your child!!  Someone you can cuddle, and teach, and love and look after!!  And you get to watch them grow, and learn, and 'try you', and no matter how badly they're misbehaving, every day is full of perfect moments :)

So despite the last 9 months, and the very huge ordeal of childbirth, which will spring itself upon me any day in the next 4 weeks, there's nothing in the world that makes me happier than this:  

We're having another baby!!! :)

By Abby Easthope