Graduated Elerberries - 30+ and expecting DC1 (thread no 4)

[HazleNutt]

Welcome old and new graduates and everybody else who wants to join us, elderly primigravidas aka Elderberries.

I think it goes though varying stages too - so a friend with a two year old is really struggling as he seems to cry for aaages at the moment but she seemed to have it easier and coped better for the first year or so. I'm telling myself it will all be great, helps me cope with the symptoms to look forward to it

Quod my tiredness, nausea and bloodhound sense of smell lasted until 16/17 weeks, which I know is really not what you want to hear. It did gradually start to get better after 12 weeks though. Unless you're really really unlucky you will get a reprieve in the middle where you feel quite normal again so it's not like you will have to go straight from feeling like shit to having a baby to look after. Even now with my third trimester gripes I still feel a million times better than I did at 7-16 weeks, they really were the blackest weeks of my life even though I was pleased about being pregnant.

Another one for the boob leakage brigade Brave? It's quite a shock when it happens isn't it? Mine was exactly the same with fluid all over the inside of my arm while lying on my side. I now sleep in a stretchy crop top style bra with thin breast pads in.

Alex I also have totally unrealistic high expectations of maternity leave of spending my mornings in baby classes and Summer afternoons in beer gardens chatting with my maternity buds (have my Sis and two friends on mat leave at the same time and two other friends with toddlers who are SAHM's). Having worked continuously since 16 (went to college and Uni but also worked 25 hours in a shop at the same time) I can't bloody well wait!

Anybody else getting the "You're still working??" comments yet? Daily here, and I feel fine, even planning to teach the classes for another week or so. I actually feel better when I'm running around doing things - once I'm on that sofa, getting me up again is like trying to peel a snail off a window.

About 4 weeks to go now and getting those small panic attacks again - OMG what are we doing? There will be a baby! We have such a nice, pleasant life with DH, what if this ruins everything? That's normal, right? And most people don't actually regret having kids, even if they are the horrible non-sleeping screaming kind?

Haven't you told them you're superwoman hazle? I think loads of people work to 38 weeks or so don't they if they're pregnancy is relatively risk/problem free? I have seen people adapting to it differently and some seem to enjoy/cope better than others (and like you say some babies are easier than others) but not one has said they regretted it! oh apart from DH's friends with two under two years old who told me not to do it and looked a bit manically tired but I'm telling myself they were just having a bad day!

Their not they're pregnancy, I am def thicker in pregnancy!!

I was just reading a that some doctors refuse to do vasectomies when the baby is under a year old - because this could be just a knee-jerk reaction. That does not sound too reassuring - so the first year is so horrible that men will do anything not to have another?

I am also getting mini panic attacks Hazle. Mainly about labour and birth though rather than the enormity of having a baby permanently in our lives, but I think that's because it's still not properly dawned on me that we're having one. I have no idea when this realisation will happen but I would imagine it will be accompanied by me sitting bolt upright in the middle of the night screaming, 'Fuuuucccckkkkk!'
But in the meantime my panics are about me not coping with labour very well which I know will prolong it and make intervention more likely. I really want to cope well with labour. I keep dreaming about my waters breaking which I hope is still at least a month away. My other panic is about something being wrong with the baby which wasn't picked up at any scans, or even something non-problematic but cosmetic like her being born with a big birthmark on her face.

I haven't got anybody making comments about still working because with my compact bump they still think i'm in my second trimester

Ha they're traumatised! Oh I don't know, a few of DH's friends and colleagues have said "mate you'll love it, best thing you'll ever do" so DH is walking around with a big on his face.

For me personally, I was very down about ttc and I was living like I was missing something in my life (despite having never been particularly broody, it was the fear of feeling infertile and never having kids, I felt quite panicky) - so I just say bring it on!

Can I just ask a bingo card question - has anyone dealt with or heard about gestational diabetes? My midwife said I'm at risk because of poly cystic ovaries and I decided not to listen but I had an dream last night that at my 20 week scan, they told me my baby was huge because I'd developed that! Wondering if I should cut down on sugar but am loving my choccie milkshakes!

I don't really know anything about GD Alex but there seem to be some really active threads on MN about it so it might be worth popping on one of them to ask?

Cross post but snap cavort on labour/something wrong with baby panics!

yes you still look ridiculously tiny Cavort

I am very worried about anything being wrong, of course I now keep seeing articles and stories everywhere about parents not being able to cope with special needs children.
For some reason I'm not too terrified of birth - so many people do it, many several times, can't be that bad, right? This opinion will probably come back and bite me in the arse, I bet I'll have one of those 5-day labours with all interventions possible and a crash CS..

alex I've had some sugar found in my latest tests, which could be a sign of GD, guess I'll hear more next week when I have another doctor's appointment. As far as I've understood, you can't really avoid GD and if you are high risk, you should simply be tested earlier. Even if you do develop it, I doubt the baby will have time to get massive by your 20-week scan, I think the excessive growth would happen during the last few months.

cavort I am HUGE and very jealous of you. Harrumph.

alex - don't know much about it except that it's relatively common (with up to 1 in 20 pregnant women getting it). Just looking on an NHS site I've seen that they say you are more likely to get it if:

"your body mass index (BMI) is 30 or more ? you can use the healthy weight calculator to work out your BMI
you have previously had a baby who weighed 4.5kg (10lbs) or more at birth ? the medical term for a birth weight of more than 4kg (8.8lbs) is macrosomic
you had gestational diabetes in a previous pregnancy
you have a family history of diabetes ? one of your parents or siblings has diabetes
your family origins are South Asian, black Caribbean or Middle Eastern"

I therefore wonder if people with PCOS are more likely to get it because a symptom of PCOS is being overweight? If so, might not affect you given you have the more rare "skinny version"?

I'd carry on with your milkshake - the milk is good for iodine plus you have SUCH a healthy diet anyway. On the NHS site they do say that even if you have it you don't have to cut out all sugar...

Alex I know 3 people who had GD and you really shouldnt worry, they pick it up easily from the standars tests and from what I heard the diet isnt too restrictive and varies for each case. One of the people I kno actually had a 8lb something baby, so not exactly huge.

I am aching lots from my class last night, eeek. It's good for me right? I still only have a tiny bump, kind of ready for it to pop now, I want people to be able to see I'm pregnant.

I've not had any major panic moments....yet. It did dawn on me that we will never have the 'traditional' honeymoon if/when we get married though as our wee one would be their, that was an odd realisation.

That's what I was just thinking janey maybe me being a skinny pcos'er puts me at less risk (yay!) I'm opening a milkshake right now as I have given myself a craving thinking about it! I was a huge baby so wondered if my mum had GD, might ask. She doesn't like talking about my birth (unsurprising really as I was ten and a half pounds!) think it was just because I was late though.

I keep telling myself there is absolutely no need to panic about the birth, in fact feeling relaxed and able to cope is probably one of the best possible ways of coping, but it's just the unknown of having never done it before and I don't know my own limits and might have a really low pain threshold which leads to hysteria in the early stages of labour.

Another slightly comical concern comes of the back of my Sister's experience. As you know she ended up having EMCS after a 4 day labour. There was a radio on in the operating theatre while they were getting baby out and my poor old nephew ended up making his appearance in the world to the sound of Ant & Dec singing 'Let's Get Ready to Rumble.' Now, this is undoubtedly hilarious but it's not really what you would choose as the song that will always remind you of the birth of your PFB!

I'm so sorry cavort I can't stop laughing Of all the people to welcome you to the world - PJ and Duncan!

Mother I think your romantic post-baby honeymoon might depend on your support network. When my Step-Sis got married both sets of parents were squabbling over who was going to look after her 2 year old while they went on honeymoon as they both wanted him and ended up sharing him half each while they were away.

Cavort I don't remember your plans for the birth - you are not totally opposed to the idea of pain relief?

It is very funny Alex and we all laugh about it but it does make me wonder if I should be taking in my own playlist of more credible birthing music!

No Hazle, absolutely not opposed to anything. I will be demanding anything I think I need at the time. It's just me being ridiculous as ususal.

Now do you think it would be a bit of an overkill if I just asked for the epidural some time around the due date, just in case?

Nope, YADNBU Hazle in fact I was thinking I should do the same.

Lol at Lets get ready to rumble! Poor DSis!

Could the PCOS link thing be due to the body processing sugars differently (which leads to the vast majority of sufferers being overweight)? May be talking out of my behind, but sure I absorbed that info from somewhere once... either way, it's easy to treat, especially if they pick it up fairly quickly.

Not quite at breast pad stage yet Cavort but may need to consider it. What with that and the nightsweats and occasional hip pains, night times are beginning to be really crap.

And now I have a new one to throw into the mix (look away Quod and any other morning sickness people). Woke up in the middle of the night, choking... on my own vomit [gross emoticon]. Had gone to bed a bit acidy as I'd run out of Gaviscon and couldn't get my nightly hit, but thought I'd be fine.

Eventually managed to roll away from DP and somewhow didn't actually throw up despite 'bits' arriving in my mouth every time I coughed, swallowed, or gas came up. Was horrendous - ended up lying there for nearly an hour, too scared to get up in case I was sick (would never have made the bathroom) and was in a lot of discomfort. Definitely a lesson to sleep on your side though.

Grim grim grim. Am completely knackered today now!

You can look again now Quod et al. MS and nausea does get better, for me it was around 16-17 weeks, tho was easier from around 13... Second trimester wasn't as tired, and now I'm definitely starting to feel it again.

Told DP about the early hours episode this morning when I woke up and he said 'not long to go now'. He really has gotten good at saying the right thing...!

Oh and my on-off birth paranoia has been distracted by the arrival of a fab book about breastfeeding. It's called The Food Of Love by Kate Evans and is great... definitely an improvement on the usual fingers in perineum ears lalalala approach to distraction

X-post - lol at just-in-case epidural plans ... nice!