Friday 25 January 2008

5 weeks, 1 day

I’ve booked my appointment with the midwife for 5 February so I will be just under 7 weeks. God, it feels like so long to wait until I can tell people with so many events in the meantime where I have to lie or hide it to people.

I think I am in a weird denial phase. I know I am pregnant but because I haven’t really got any symptoms I don’t feel pregnant. I feel like we are just pretending.

Now, of course, I don’t want to wish the symptoms/side effects on myself and it would be great to go through the whole pregnancy feeling great etc, but in a strange way, a very small part of me (about the size of my little toe) almost wants to feel something. Just so I know it is really happening. Although, like I said, I don’t want to wish that on myself as that could cause me even more problems trying to hide it.
Apparently, the 5-6th week is when the symptoms often start so may be I’ll be eating my words in a couple of days – not sure how you do that when the words are technically the binary kind!! I guess I’ll have to print them out first…

Monday 21 January 2008

4 weeks, 4 days

We told our first people over the weekend. I know it is far too early to start telling people but it was more out of necessity. The first two friends, Dan and Lou, (who are a couple) we told because they knew we were trying. I was pretty sure that Lou would ask me during the week whether I was pregnant and I wouldn’t be able to lie, so we decided we would prefer to tell them both together. The third person, Clare, was coming to visit for a drunken weekend and needed to know why, all of a sudden, I wasn’t going to be drinking.

It was nice to be able to speak to people openly about it and to see their excitement for us. However, it made it difficult to stay grounded and not to get caught up in the excitement too early.

Lou is pregnant now with her second child. I spoke to her about wanting to exercise and go to classes while pregnant. She reckons I will run out of energy and will find it too difficult to keep up too much exercise within the next couple of weeks. I guess she knows, having the experience of being pregnant twice but I am hoping that the more exercise you do the more energy you will have – that being the usual theory. I guess we will see how that goes over the next couple of weeks.

I am feeling really rubbish today though. Nothing to do with being pregnant, I’m just fed up with a cold I have. My left nostril has been completely blocked for the past 3 days and I am very fed up with it!!!! It also means I’m not getting to do any exercise at all.

I still have no real symptoms. I did feel sick after dinner out on Saturday night. Nothing to do with the food and I think it was more because I was so tired that I felt sick. I still managed to keep going until 1-1.30am.

There was a report on the news this morning about the risks of drinking coffee (consuming caffeine) while pregnant. Apparently, drinking more than 2 large cups of coffee a day could double you chances of miscarriage. Thankfully, for the last few months I have already moved to decaf diet coke and decaf tea, where possible. What concerned me was the caffeine levels in chocolate. I was very pleased to discover that, unless I eat 12 dark chocolate bars a day (which is equivalent to one cup of coffee), that I needn’t worry.

Saturday 19 January 2008

4 weeks, 1 day

First full day of knowing I am pregnant.

Stuart and I did a test last night and I was fully expecting it to come back negative. The first test I’ve ever done was the previous month and I felt quite disappointed, or perhaps more deflated, when it came back negative that I had prepared myself for the same result this time.

I had just been to the loo when we decided to do the test so I drank two large glasses of water in the hope that there would be a waterfall, just to be able to manage a spring! However, surprisingly, it was enough and after about 40 seconds it came up in clear letters ‘pregnant’. I wasn’t even looking but just heard Stuart give a little cheer.

We were going out to dinner so decided to make it a celebratory dinner. The trying to work out what I can and can’t eat (on top of my normal fussiness) began. The main question this time was whether I could eat cream cheese? Does that count as a banned soft cheese? I did chance it but must look it up. Also, I had a glass of red wine as I was celebrating but fully expect it to be one of very few. Not really an issue at the moment though as we have been alcohol free since New Year.

Had a really bad nights sleep. Was absolutely exhausted but when I got to bed I was wide awake with everything going through my mind! Then I woke up at 5am needing the toilet. So, today is the start of wondering whether everything is because of pregnancy or whether it would have happened anyway. I read today that 78% of women get insomnia when pregnant. Also, you start to need the toilet more often (not really surprising when they are recommending you drink 8-10 glasses of water). And of course, the post-Christmas bulge is no longer chocolate, cheese and alcohol but has now become baby bulge of course!!! ;o)

What is really difficult is the fear that I am only 4 weeks and have another 8 weeks to go where I am still at risk. It is very real that it is quite possible something could happen before then with the high statistic of one in five pregnancies result in miscarriage.

But to finish on a positive note – come on big boobs! I am confident their growth has begun and am absolutely delighted my boobs are going to be bigger for at least 8 more months!