My Pregnancies
Three years and two pregnancies that were complete opposites of each other have me wanting to share my experiences! See other blog post on each of their birth stories!
I met my now husband in 2005 as a freshman in high school. I put him in the friend zone for two years (sorry babe) before saying yes to being his girlfriend in 2007. We spent the next 10 years getting to deeply know each other, lived together in several different homes over the years, had ups and downs and grew closer as a couple. Fast forward to June of 2016, we traveled to Cabo San Lucas where he asked me to marry him! Of course I said yes and the wedding plans commenced. We married in September of 2017 and got pregnant on our honeymoon. This is where our new chapter began.
We Are Pregnant!
“We traveled to Cabo San Lucas where he asked me to marry him! Of course I said yes and the wedding plans commenced. We married in September of 2017 and got pregnant on our honeymoon. This is where our new chapter began.”
Leading up to our engagement, my husband and I were not all that sure that we would have an easy time getting pregnant. In fact, I was almost certain that it would be difficult. I had tried several birth controls over the years, all of which completely messed up my body. I had weight gain, horrible acne, mood swings, extended periods (month long periods with one of them).. pretty much the worst experience ever. I finally made the decision to stay off of birth control and honestly that was the best thing that I could have done for my body. I had been off of it for 8 years at the time we got pregnant. My husband also was nervous about being able to reproduce. He had been diagnosed with testicular cancer.. not news that I was in any way prepared for and neither was he. He and the doctors made the decision to completely remove the testicle that the cancer was on to prevent any chance of the cancer spreading to other areas. Thankfully that went really well, he recovered and the cancer has not come back! With all of these fears in mind, we decided that we might as well start trying to conceive on our honeymoon. Once we returned back home, I got to wondering if maybe I could be pregnant. I was not having any symptoms whatsoever. I just had a strong desire to take a test just to see. I was not prepared for what I saw.. two pink lines! I could not believe it! I too two more tests, all of which came back positive. My husband and I just hugged each other and cried out of joy. How amazing it was to see those pink lines on our very first try to conceive! I felt very lucky and could not wait to start our new adventure.
Pregnancy with my Daughter
It was not long after we found out that we were expecting that I started to get symptoms. The nausea soon set in followed by physically getting sick. It was not really just morning sickness for me; it would happen at completely random times and would come on all of a sudden. I found that Preggie Pops (you can find these at target) helped tremendously and they were so delicious as well as ginger ale or cream soda. Once week eleven came around the nausea and throwing up started to go away and into the second trimester I went. This trimester was a BREEZE for me; at times I did not even feel pregnant. When I thought it could not get any better, week 19 came and I felt her kick for the first time. This was the most amazing experience of my entire life. From there she got extremely active which I loved because I got the chance to feel her movements all the time. She especially enjoyed being her most active right as I laid down for bed. I guess this was her way of preparing me for the sleepless nights to come. My third trimester brought on heart burn, which I treated with ginger ale and cream soda (my life saver! Throughout this entire pregnancy I ate better than I ever have in my entire life. I did not drink caffeine of any kind, I ate lean meat, typically would have eggs and toast for breakfast, lots of vegetables and countless greens apples and pineapple. I also did not eat any cold meats such as lunch meat, hot dogs, etc. In a nutshell, if anything was in a publication of any kind that stated not to eat something I did not eat it. I wanted to do things as close to perfect as I could for my baby. Despite my efforts I started to get high blood pressure so I was put on bed rest until her arrival. *Make sure to read my daughter's birth story to hear more!*
Pregnancy with my Son
Once our daughter turned 18 months my husband and I started really talking about having another child. It was important to both of us that our daughter have a sibling. We wanted to try to plan it out as best we could so we decided to start trying the beginning of May 2020, right before our daughter was to turn two in June. Over the next several weeks I took a handful of pregnancy tests, all of which came back negative. This caused me to start to get worried about whether or not we would have trouble this time. I decided to try not to worry about it so much and tried to take the pressure off of myself. I remember sitting with my mother and my sister at my house. We were getting things put together for my sister's upcoming wedding and I just felt so exhausted and overall just did not feel the best. I had a pregnancy test so I went into the bathroom without telling either of them what I was doing because I was just more curious than anything. To my astonishment, there were two pink lines! I could not believe it! I felt bad to interrupt my sister's day but I could not hide the news so I went out and told the both of them. I waited until my husband to get home to tell him in person and he was very shocked but happy! This pregnancy was so much harder than my first. I absolutely LOVED being pregnant with my daughter. Don't get me wrong, I am very lucky that I was able to get pregnant again and loved being able to do that. This pregnancy just gave me new challenges to face. Luckily, I was not working when we found out that I was pregnant so I got to stay home with my daughter and relax as much as possible. I was nauseous constantly my entire first trimester and into my second. I found things that helped calm the nausea, such as the Preggie Pops, ginger ale, cream soda, ginger candy, a pressure point wrist band and Dramamine nausea medication. After awhile I finally got the nausea under control and then Braxton Hicks contractions started to happen pretty often from the end of my second trimester all the way until real labor started. I was very uncomfortable all the time from carrying him so low and from him being a large baby. Thankfully, I found a great pregnancy belt on Amazon that helped me tremendously. In the last several weeks of my pregnancy, I started to get extremely painful contractions out of nowhere. It felt like my son was taking his finger nails to scratch his way out along with the tightening of my belly. This would stop me dead in my tracks and would start contractions but they would not get consistent and were all over the place. Week 37 came and I started to feel terrible. It is so hard to explain but imagine how you feel right before you get really sick. Extreme fatigue, slight body aches, weakness, head aches, just overall your entire body feels ill. I discussed how I was feeling with my doctor at my 38 week appointment and we decided to induce me at 39 weeks. *Make sure to read my son's birth story to hear more!*
