Being pregnant isn't that bad -- actually it is pretty amazing. You can get out of everything; I'm growing a freaking person inside of me is the perfect excuse for eating whatever you want, doing what you want, not doing what you want. You name it. No one can argue the pregnancy excuse. But there are some major downsides to being pregnant. Every pregnancy is different for every woman, but here are a few of the symptoms I'm experiencing in my first trimester that I wasn't warned about.
1) Zits. I haven't had breakouts this bad since high school. My face is greasier than a pepperoni pizza with extra cheese. Is this the "pregnancy glow" that everyone always talks about? And it's not just my face either. I have zits on my back. Seriously. I'm 29 years old. This is embarrassing.
2) Cramps. I get terrible cramps when I have my period. I used to joke that at least when I got pregnant I wouldn't have cramps for nine months. Boy was I wrong.
3) Gag reflex. I gag. A lot. I can't floss my teeth. If I think about gagging, it will make me gag. And it's not just one gag and you're done, it's actual fits of gagging. Sometimes I'll gag when I have food in my mouth and have to spit it out because I'll throw up if I don't. Suffice it to say, I eat at home a lot more now. And taking those mega huge horse pill prenatal vitamins, forget about it. It takes me about five minutes of calming nose breathing to be able to get one of those bad boys down without a scene. And even then, there's sometimes a scene.
4) Exhaustion. I've never been so tired. My eyes burn and my body aches. My brain is a blur. Most days all I want to do is climb back into bed. And it seems like my friends, in-laws and husband aren't really getting it. I tell them I'm tired and they're like, yeah whatever, all you do is stay home all day, how could you really be that tired? I am really that tired. I didn't know it was possible to feel this tired, and I worked all through college while taking massive course loads. Of course, then I could drink coffee in tiny little cans. Now caffeine is a no-no and I've never wanted it so bad in my life.
5) Food aversions. You hear about the cravings, but you never hear about the aversions. I'm so picky now, it's ridiculous. Food I used to love, I can't even stomach the thought of. And it's the healthy foods too, like spinach and un-fried chicken that I can't eat anymore. Yeah, that's right, the only chicken I can stomach is fried chicken. And, of course, I can eat an entire box of Thin Mints but just the thought of cooked spinach is enough to start a gagging fit.
6) Sense of smell. Trust me, you don't ever want a super human sense of smell. There are a lot of bad smelling things out there. This, of course, leads to both gagging and food aversions. It's a tangled web of symptoms causing symptoms. It doesn't help that my husband and I currently live with my sister in-law who leaves open cans of cat food out on the kitchen counter.
7) Pregnancy brain. This was my first symptom. I was watching Jeopardy and couldn't come up with answers that I knew. I've gotten dumber, forgetful and just plain flaky. I don't feel safe driving my car. I have accidentally stolen two cases of bottled water from my grocery store on two separate occasions. I've never stolen a thing in my life until now. And I've done it twice. Either I'm growing a petty criminal inside of me who is negatively influencing my behavior or I've got a bad case of preg-nesia.
8) Gas. I can now officially out fart my husband.
9) Worrying all the time. This one is the worst for me. I worry constantly. I worry about the baby being okay. I worry about what I eat. I worry if I'm getting enough nutrients for the baby. I worry about lotions and other cosmetics I use. I worry about my dogs walking across my stomach. I worry about how much worrying might hurt my baby. I worry about second-hand smoke. I worry about everything. Then I get online and start looking things up, and it just makes me worry even more. As nice as it is to have the handy-dandy Internet at my disposal to look up all of my concerns, sometimes I think it's more a curse than anything, because it usually just leads to more worrying.
But it'll all be worth it in the end when I get to hold my little baby in my arms.
