Maternity clothes/Mommyhood

Today I made my first maternity clothes purchase. I had my heart set on going to old navy and when I called to confirm they still had their maternity section, I was informed they got rid of it. So I ventured out to Target and on my way there I spotted an A&W and quickly pulled over and inhaled a bacon cheeseburger, small fries and a root beer float while sitting in my car in the parking lot. If you know me well, you know that I do not eat a burger without dissecting it first. I remove the bun, wipe the sauce off, throw away the tomato and half the onion, eat the pickles separately and then I eat the patty with a knife and fork. Well, something hormonal and strange came over me and for the first time in my life I ate the entire burger, bun and all, like a regular person.... And I loved it!



Then I finally made it to Target and bought a pair of work pants, 4 tops, 2 pairs of jeans and a dress. That will last me a few days. I'll have to go back for round 2 on pay day next week. Good thing my sister will be in town to help me shop. I'll be buying Lauren some clothes too.


I was thinking recently and I wanted to get something off my chest about the way I have been treated in this pregnancy. I wanted to talk about the different types of women I have encountered. There are two types of moms. Advice moms and pity moms. The advice moms are the ones I usually tend to hate. They are the ones who when engaged in conversation about my pregnancy/labor/babyhood they will literally tear your heart open with horror stories and comments that force even your toes to cringe with disgust and panic. These women seem to think that it is their job to educate you on all of the awful things that will happen to you. They tell you that you're life is over. They tell you how fat you will get. They tell you that you'll never sleep again. They tell you to suck it up because it's utterly impossible to have it worse than they had it....obviously. They seem to want to bring you down because, hmmm I don't know, maybe they were shocked about what they went through and they feel a little Snidely Whiplash about it like now it's their turn to haze a new mommyhood member. I'm not sure I understand these women because most of the time, I don't know these women very well. They seem to just sniff you out just to ruin your day.


Then there are the pity moms. Those are the moms that never tell you any of the bad stuff. They just look at you with their sad pity eyes because they've been there and they know what you're going through and they know better than to piss you off. Because they know that there's nothing they can say to help you and there's no point in telling you what to expect because it may scare you or anger you and no one wants to be on the receiving end of an angry pregnant woman... except the advice moms above. These women are gracious and polite and they are the ones that will hug you and cheer you along when you are feeling at your worst. I hope to be one of these moms after this kid is out. I know I do a lot of complaining about this pregnancy, but underneath all the cynical ramblings lies an amazing gratitude of being given this responsibility. I posses a very real appreciation for the beauty of this experience because I have lived through the pain of having had it taken away. So after this baby is born and it's my turn to pass the torch, I will be sure to approach the next woman with dignity and support. I will answer her questions honestly but I will never intend to gross her out or make her cry like women have done to me. And for that reason I will not be reading any literature on labor or delivery and I will not be making a birth plan. I don’t want to know what it will be like and I don’t want to try to prepare myself because it will just make me anxious and nervous and cry and neither of us need that now do we?


Honestly Pregnant,
Jen

Maternal Instinct

I lost myself a long time ago back when I became obsessed with babies. My overwhelming all consuming maternal instinct to start a family began years and years ago. Something inside me clicked and I immediately knew I would never be ok until I had a child. This was maybe about 5 years ago that it started. I looked around me and hated everything about the way I lived my life. I hated my job. I hated my friends. I hated going out. I hated eating dinner alone. I hated the nothing that my life was. Here I was 22 years old with no education working a dead-end job and I kept saying if I had children then my life would be refocused on that and not my circumstances. I still believe that to be true because more than half of this country hates their job and even more people work jobs outside of the field they studied in. I've never had a desire for my job to be my life. I've always wanted my family to be my life even if we lived in the gutter. Unfortunately my circumstances were that I was flat broke, deeply in debt, friendless, dating a guy who literally worked from morning well into late night so there wasn't any possible way to bring a baby into that situation. I wasn't always like that though. I had good friends and a firm family foundation. I was fun. I was funny. I was really enjoying my life. But even though I was still fairly young, the intrusive thoughts of mommyhood just bombarded me. On top of other reasons, I withdrew and slowly said to myself that this current life doesn't count and I will start over when I have babies. THAT will be my real life. I just kept thinking when I am a mom, this will be different, I will be happy. Now that my baby is on the way....... FINALLY...... I am wondering if all my dreams will come true. I assume the love I feel for her will be the most amazing thing I will ever feel in my life. I also assume she will take over my world with her wants and needs and I will lose more of myself. But my hope is that a new me will emerge. A me called mommy that will live and breathe for my child in ways that I never knew were possible. Good ways overlapping the bad ways. Because I'm aware this part isn't going to be all glittery rainbows and precious furry kittens and unicorns. I just hope she will give me the fulfillment that this wait was all worth it. Going through this pregnancy journey other people seem to want to constantly bring me down by telling me awful things about how my life will be quickly ruined once my baby is born and I will have my feet pulled out from under me and fall flat on my face (in baby poop, no less). Family members, friends and co-workers have gotten right in my face and said once this child arrives my life is over and I will never get to do the fun things I do now. I'm not sure they realize that I don't do anything fun now. Haha! I look at all the adult things I could be doing right now and all I can think is how badly I just don't want to do them. I wish I was at the park or volunteering at school, instead of a friday night out drinking. I wish I was at my daughters school play, video taping and applauding as the most proud parent in the room. I wish everyday that I was in THAT world. I just can't fathom wanting to go out anywhere without my little munchkin daughter connected to me. I know you're probably thinking I'm crazy and that I won't feel that way once I have her and she starts driving me crazy. We'll see because I still want to be with Tom every moment even after 10 years. He never gets to be too much for me.


Honestly,
Jen

20 Weeks

Today I'm at my halfway point, 20 weeks. I never thought I'd make it this far so you can imagine how I feel about giving birth. This pregnancy seems like it's been going on for years. I can't understand why some people tell me it will fly by. Every moment is longer. Every day makes me more impatient. Every doctors visit seems to be light years away. The milestones of pregnancy, the heartbeats, the gender reveal, the first kick, outgrowing your clothes seem to take forever. At first, when people asked how far along I was, I would lie and round up to the next week because I wanted so badly to be farther along. I still feel that way, however I am honest about my dates now. I have to be Honestly Pregnant after all!! But I think it's interesting that before I was pregnant, women would tell me how precious pregnancy was. How they treasured having a life inside them and feeling the bond and the connection with the baby. They thought it was so sweet that I was trying to get pregnant and felt sympathy when it took me so long. But now these same women are finally letting the truth out and revealing how miserable and painful this whole thing is. It's odd that there is some kind of evolutionary conspiracy going on with women that they aren't telling the whole truth until there's no turning back. Of course the child is completely worth all the agony. I just would've appreciated a heads up, ladies.

My heads up on pregnancy would be the things I experienced. I understand every person is different. Here's what I've gone through so far:
You will feel more tired than you have ever felt in your entire life. Your boobs will hurts so bad you will cry. You will be so sick to your stomach that you're positive you will die. You will not start looking pregnant until about halfway or more into your pregnancy and it will piss you off because in general, people assume you can't possibly be sick or uncomfortable unless you are huge. You will have crazy weird dreams. Your hair will get really stringy and lose pigment. Your skin will dry out so bad you will never be able to keep up with enough moisturizer. Your skin will get very bumpy and blotchy and zity. You'll feel dizzy, so dizzy in fact that you will fall down and black out. You'll be so thirsty you can't get enough. Your back will ache and walking will be painful. Your belly will grow dark hair down the middle. You will eat with ravenous hunger or turn down entire meals depending on the moment. You will feel extremely unsexy. You will feel impatient for each doctors appt and each week to go by. You will have crazy wicked gas and heartburn. You will pee so much that sometimes you will turn right back around and go again right after you've finished peeing. And last but not least you will feel very accomplished and proud about the amazing life you are carrying around inside you.

If you are curious as to why these symptoms happen to pregnant women, Dr Oz's book You: having a baby is amazing at explaining it. For instance the nausea is to keep you eating bland safe foods to give you a better chance of survival. This is an evolutionary trait for the times of unsafe spoiled meats and contaminated plants before we became accustomed to the world of generally safe foods we live in today.

I hope you don't suffer all of the things that I did. But if you do, you're not alone. And remember to share those feelings and symptoms with other women. Especially women who haven't had babies so they know what they're in for. It's quite a shock when you aren't expecting it.

Honestly Pregnant,
Jen