Able to indulge a whinge...?

[Lizzieee2727]

I don't know if it's hormones, lack of sleep or something else but I just cannot stop crying this morning. Lunchtime today is my works daytime Christmas thing (lunch buffet, fancy drinks bit of fun etc) and was organised when I was about 20 something weeks and I'm 36 today. I work in a small team of 10 but work is 60ish miles away and though we all put down availability, as my pregnancy progressed I physically was struggling more and asked if it could be made earlier in December but apparently not (even though I did see availability earlier in first week of the month). One of my colleagues has been in the team for a year and over the past 6 months or so I've felt pushed out, me doing the back and forth to schedule meetings with people to see that she will then confirm and 'I'll see you on x date' taking over the meeting. This is part of our job we're BOTH meant to do but tasks that were traditionally mine have been trickled away and I'd been left feeling invisible. My lovely boss has been off sick for most of those 6 months and her acting up replacement is very close to other colleague and not as approachable. I did lightheartedly say to the colleague a while ago 'oi thief, leave me some of the meetings' and she did for a while and I had moved some of those emails to my inbox but then its happened multiple times since and I just got fed up with it. Anywaaaaaay, I've now got a midwife appointment this afternoon and because the roads are crap it'd take 90 mins on a good day (I used to get the train) to get to work and then obvs 90 mins back. I'm already the last session of the day at 2.30 and I just can't realistically make it. Just feels like another thing I'm not a part of because the evening do was at a location impractical to get a cab too and up countless steps (I have SPD and am on crutches). I've also just developed GD and the Dr's surgery hasn't passed on my prescription so I only have enough testing strips for a few days and have to head down south for husband's medical appointments and I don't want to run the risk of going into labour on my own (we have no family up here) so we need to go this afternoon. Apologies for the rant, just a bit of an emotional mess at the moment!

Sorry to hear you're struggling emotionally at the moment!

Although they are different circumstances, I have felt similar during my pregnancy at work and felt very pushed out at times. It can be really hard emotionally to deal with some of the work changes, I felt at times that I was being forgotten about and my feelings/needs ignored because I wouldn't be there soon as I would be on maternity.

The only thing that helped me was to spend a lot of time switching my priorities over early to the baby and essentially go on holiday mode in work before my maternity leave began. This allowed me to not waste emotions and get myself stressed over things that were essentially beyond my control. You're not going to be able to influence anything once your maternity leave begins and you have to accept that change and go with it and then reassess the situation again once your mat leave is over. If you still feel the same then you are in a good position to fight for change as anything you do before mat leave will be forgotten about once you're on it.

As for making the Christmas stuff, don't worry about it just don't go. It's never going to be that fun at 36 weeks pregnant and to be honest it sounds like a lot to stress for little reward. Don't see it as missing out, see it as making a choice that benefits you more because that's what you're doing by not going through hell trying to get there.

I really do hope you start to feel better soon, pregnancy emotions are so difficult to deal with and I always find people are very dismissive of them because of 'hormones' which makes everything feel even worse!

Take care of yourself first, nothing else really matters x

Thanks Tillysnuggles, I went on maternity at the beginning of December as the SPD was getting worse and my commute getting slower and slower!
I appreciate that you've been through similar, it just feels like you're becoming more and more invisible doesn't it? I know I'm going to have to go part time when I go back as we won't be able to afford the childcare and commuting costs but might insist on scheduled days for meetings, say a Tuesday so if I'm there I can do them... That's a concern for another day though!
Had a nice long cathartic cry and then my husband made me food which helped 😊

It really does! Speaking to a lot of people it seems very common to feel that way going into maternity so although it's not great to go through at least we aren't alone in our feelings! I think it seems to affect people less if they weren't enjoying their job and have stayed for the maternity allowance.

There's so much change for women not only physically and emotionally in pregnancy but everything else that goes with it. Your life as you know it goes out of the window, you can't do everything you once could and all your normal routines and certainties in life no longer seem to be the same. Lets be honest even simple things like putting a sock on is difficult at the best of times and that's never normally a big issue in life!
It's a lot to deal with it and I think we all put a lot of pressure on ourselves to try and glide through it all when actually sometimes you need to step back and have a bit of a cry and blow off some steam - we're only human still at the end of the day! I know we are all super lucky to be having this experience but that doesn't mean there aren't bad days!

Glad you managed to have a good cry and let it all out, I really hope you feel happier x