Pregnancy Sucks: What to Do When Your Miracle Makes You Miserable
276
Pregnancy Sucks: What to Do When Your Miracle Makes You Miserable
276eBook
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Overview
Did you know that:
- Farm-fresh butter, or petroleum jelly, works just as well for your itchy belly as a fancy and overpriced "pregnancy" product?
- If you're put on bedrest, walkie-talkies will allow you to yell at your husband-no matter where he is in the house!
- Surrounding yourself with regular pillows (don't forget to swipe your husband's) is just as good as buying a special large "pregnancy pillow"-and more adaptable to giving support where you personally need it?
- Doing the hokey pokey, or taking a warm shower, can ease Braxton Hicks contractions?
Full of insight, hilarity, and practical solutions on every page, Pregnancy Sucks shows how, through it all, you can survive with your health, dignity, and sanity intact!
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781440501951 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Simon & Schuster |
| Publication date: | 02/13/2024 |
| Series: | Life Sucks Series |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 276 |
| Sales rank: | 975,296 |
| File size: | 1 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER TWOThe Second Month
One down, eight more to go! I know that one month isn't much in terms of gestation, but it was plenty of time for me to learn the number one rule of pregnancy: Don't complain! I remember my second month as a blur of nausea. But whenever I uttered a word of despair, people glared at me with eyes filled with disappointment and shock. I learned my lesson quickly that discussing pregnancy misery is thought to be unwomanly. Maybe even sinful.
I know what they were thinking. That here I was, being given one of the greatest gifts a woman can receive, and all I could do was complain. Well...they were right. But just because you're given a nice gift doesn't mean that it's necessarily "you". Don't get me wrong. I know how lucky I was to be able to give birth to a healthy beautiful baby. I don't take that for granted for one minute. But I learned an important lesson from Mike Brady, who told Jan: "Find something that you're good at, and be good at it", and the thing that I'm quite good at doing is complaining. And being pregnant gave me so many opportunities to use my God given talent.
Whenever I discussed my bodies' increased state of woe, people said "Aw, c'mon, it's not really that bad. Besides, look what you're getting in return."
Yes, I knew that I was getting a baby in return for all of this agony. But it still didn't seem right. How come being blessed with a child meant having to suffer through so much discomfort? It's like being offered a great promotion at work that's conditional on a bout of Montezuma's Revenge. Sure, you're grateful for the promotion, but should one be expected to enjoy the cramping and diarrhea?
In the scheme of things, I didn't have that unusual a pregnancy. I was never hospitalized for morning sickness. I wasn't bedridden for months at a time. I never got hemorrhoids or toxemia. I didn't even poop on the delivery room table (or so I choose to believe). But even without these experiences, I consider my pregnancy to be a miserable journey, and this first trimester to be the worst trek.
If you're not feeling sick by now, chances are that you're not going to be. For whatever cosmic reason, your body will bypass this horrific aspect of pregnancy. You are the gold medal winner of the Olympics games of procreation. But be warned, there are many more games to be played. And, in the words of Caesar, "Let the games begin!"
HELL HATH NO FURY LIKE A WOMAN WITH CHILD
We've all seen the stereotypical pregnant woman portrayed in movies. She can go from angel to devil with one fallopian tube tied behind her back. In real life, things are much different. There is no "angel" stage of a mood swing. At least there wasn't for me. It's pretty safe to assume that whenever a mood hits, you'll become quite an unpleasant person. It's not surprising though. It's hard to feel all warm and fuzzy when you lie in bed moaning in morning sickness agony. Just like morning sickness, the mood swings that hit during pregnancy hit hard and fast. They're very similar to PMS in that they're both caused by hormones. But if PMS is like the irritating sound of a jack hammer, pregnancy mood swings are like that jack hammer pounding away during a Metallica concert.
As sick as you are with morning sickness, you'll no doubt manage to have enough energy to pull off several mood swings. You'll probably get upset with your husband over anything and everything. Either he isn't being considerate, or he's being too considerate, which is even worse.
"I didn't know I was pregnant. All I knew was that everything my husband did bugged the hell out of me. When I found out, I was so happy to be pregnant and not headed for divorce court." Beverly
I have a two bits of advice, one for you and one for the horrid beast you may now consider your husband to be. For you, I suggest that you make a blanket apology to cover any atrocious words that may spew from your lips in the upcoming months. For him: leave her alone whenever possible. And for God's sake, don't just discount your wife's attitude as a mood swing. Remember what used to happen when you told her she was cranky because she had PMS? It's going to get her even madder now. If you feel you must speak, don't argue, don't react, don't say anything at all except, "Yes, dear" or "Whatever you say, dear". My husband repeated these phrases so often that it became second nature. I'm tempted to tell him that he doesn't have say them so often anymore, but then again, why ruin a good thing.
YOUR SUPERHERO NOSE
A funny thing happened to me on my way to becoming pregnant. I became a super hero. Or at least I developed a super hero sense of smell. Just as Superman can leap tall buildings in a single bound, I could smell small bulldogs at the local pound. One day, I opened my front door and was able to smell Chinese food cooking from a restaurant several blocks away. Same restaurant. Same location. Super hero nose.
I don't know why it happens, but for some strange reason, every pregnant woman develops a super human sense of smell. It's like the "Gilligan's Island" episode where the castaways eat radioactive food that intensified their senses. One of them ate carrots and could see a ship miles off shore. If I had been on the island, I could have smelled the varnish on the poop deck.
It may sound like a cool thing to experience, sort of like being able to lift a car over your head during an emergency, but most times, this talent wasn't at all enjoyable. It was actually quite awful. You take a woman who is nauseated by the mere thought of food, and give her the power to smell every meal cooking in the neighborhood. It was yet another cruel trick of Mother Nature.
"I thought my husband was having an affair because he'd come home smelling of perfume. He's a high school teacher and said that his students were wearing it. Even though I believed him, he made his kids promise never to wear it in class again." Allison
I have no advice on how to lessen your sense of smell (short of clamping a clothes hook on your nose), but I will point out some interesting advantages.
1. You can kiss your husband hello when he comes home from work, and tell him what he had for lunch that day.
2. You can walk past your coworker and notice that she's changed her brand of fabric softener.
3. You could get a job sniffing luggage for drugs at your local international airport.
4. You can offer your assistance to rescue teams scaling mountains and hillsides looking for missing hikers.
Table of Contents
| Acknowledgments | xiii | |
| Introduction: A Book Is Born | xv | |
| Chapter 1 | The First Month | 1 |
| Choosing an O.B. | 2 | |
| The No-No List | 5 | |
| Sore Boobs | 8 | |
| Morning, Noon, and Night Sickness | 10 | |
| Gas! | 16 | |
| Resentment Toward Your Hubby | 17 | |
| Tests, Tests, and More Tests | 19 | |
| Dreams and Other Nightmares | 21 | |
| To Tell or Not to Tell | 22 | |
| Pregnancy Math | 25 | |
| How to Eat for Two | 27 | |
| Chapter 2 | The Second Month | 29 |
| Hell Hath No Fury Like a Woman with Child | 30 | |
| Your Superhero Nose | 32 | |
| Pregnancy Junkie | 33 | |
| Spotting | 35 | |
| I Need to Lie Down | 37 | |
| Oh My Achin' Head | 37 | |
| "Urine" for Fun | 39 | |
| Miscarriage | 40 | |
| Sex During the First Trimester | 43 | |
| Chapter 3 | The Third Month | 45 |
| I Can't Breathe! | 46 | |
| Is My Baby Okay in There? | 48 | |
| Here I Grow Again | 49 | |
| A New Wardrobe | 51 | |
| The Name Game | 53 | |
| Your Newfound Celebrity | 56 | |
| Drooling | 57 | |
| My Bloody Nose | 58 | |
| Beware of Your Nipples | 60 | |
| Chapter 4 | The Fourth Month | 63 |
| Hyperemesis | 64 | |
| Sex During the Second Trimester | 66 | |
| The Ultrasound | 68 | |
| I'm Scared! | 71 | |
| Vaginal Discharge | 73 | |
| Toilet Troubles | 75 | |
| Bloody Gums | 77 | |
| Genetic Testing | 78 | |
| Boy or Girl? | 80 | |
| Chapter 5 | The Fifth Month | 83 |
| Pains Under Your Uterus | 84 | |
| Your Cheesy Belly | 86 | |
| You're So Vein | 88 | |
| Who Asked You? | 90 | |
| Third Nipples and Other Gross Things | 92 | |
| That's a Hormone of a Different Color | 94 | |
| Backaches | 96 | |
| Sciatica | 97 | |
| Chapter 6 | The Sixth Month | 101 |
| Dark Back Hair and Other Icky Things | 102 | |
| Leg Cramps | 104 | |
| Belly Touching | 105 | |
| An Itchy Stomach | 106 | |
| Incompetent Cervix | 107 | |
| What, Me Exercise? | 108 | |
| Oops, There She Goes! | 110 | |
| Pains in the Tucchus | 114 | |
| Chapter 7 | The Seventh Month | 117 |
| Swelling Ain't Swell | 118 | |
| Temporary Insanity | 120 | |
| Sex During the Third Trimester | 121 | |
| Toxemia: The Pressure Is On | 123 | |
| Third-Trimester Bleeding | 125 | |
| Braxton Hicks | 128 | |
| I Can't Sleep | 129 | |
| Gestational Diabetes | 131 | |
| Bed Rest | 133 | |
| Chapter 8 | The Eighth Month | 137 |
| Feeling Hot, Hot, Hot | 138 | |
| Yeast Infections | 140 | |
| Stretched to Extremes | 141 | |
| Heartburn | 143 | |
| "Urine" For Even More Fun | 145 | |
| Incontinence: A Condition That's Sure to Piss You Off | 146 | |
| Numb and Number | 149 | |
| Stop That Kicking! | 150 | |
| How the Hell Is This Thing Coming Out? | 152 | |
| Don't Breech to Me | 155 | |
| Chapter 9 | The Ninth Month | 157 |
| Baby Shower 101 | 158 | |
| Nesting Instinct | 164 | |
| Lamaze Class | 166 | |
| Nursing Bras | 169 | |
| Decorating the Baby's Room | 171 | |
| Taking a Tour of the Hospital | 173 | |
| Am I in Labor? | 175 | |
| False Labor | 177 | |
| How to Start Labor | 178 | |
| Chapter 10 | Let the Bloody Show Begin | 183 |
| Inducing | 185 | |
| "Lookie Loos" | 188 | |
| How to Breathe Through a Contraction | 190 | |
| Gimme Drugs | 193 | |
| How to Push with a Passion | 196 | |
| Episiotomy: Let 'er Rip | 199 | |
| The "C" Word | 200 | |
| Bonding | 202 | |
| What to Do When Nature Calls | 203 | |
| Lochia: Who Knew? | 207 | |
| Got Milk? | 208 | |
| Chapter 11 | Home, Bittersweet Home | 211 |
| Baby Blues | 213 | |
| How to Deal with Visitors | 215 | |
| Better Sleep for You and Your Baby | 218 | |
| Baby Hygiene | 219 | |
| Sex after the Last Trimester | 221 | |
| Sleep Deprivation | 224 | |
| Muscle Soreness | 227 | |
| Reconcilable Differences | 229 | |
| How to Deal with a Crying Baby | 231 | |
| The Basics | 233 | |
| About the Third Month | 235 | |
| Appendix | Resources List | 237 |
| Index | 249 |