Things they don't tell you before you get pregnant

[AnguaVonUberwald]

I know this has been done before, and that there are lots of bad things they don't tell you before you get pregnant.

But also, everyone goes on about how once you have the baby your life will never be the same again - they don't mention that you will love the baby so much, you will really like the new way, and not mind that everything you once enjoyed about your life has changed, because you have your baby instead.

OK, and then there is:

That you might never get the second trimester energy rush, and in fact might be exhausted all the way through!

That you will get instant attention from the NHS, until you get to 36 weeks pregnant, and then they will ignore you unless you can prove you are in labour (something that is impossible to do)

That you will never see the same midwife twice

That they will make you take home your wee, clean out the tub, and wee in it again a month later!

That after pushing for 6 and a half hours, your bladder will retreat and refuse to let you wee for almost 24 hours!

Seriously....hurt worse than the labour.

Oh and that you instantly develop super-human strength during your contractions and can rip your husband's pocket off his jeans. Yeah he moaned about it. I told him to count his blessings...you could have been facing me!

That they take away the gas and air when it is time to push, and make you do it completely without drugs.

No-one had told me this would happen. I was very indignant.

@ kekouan - I just thought that I was unlucky that I kept having another contraction whilst sitting on the loo, and had to be winched off by dh...

That your DP/DH will still fancy you for some reason and that you will find this annoying and clingy and resent him for it.

That you will be terrified that he won't fancy you and will leave you and the baby for a younger, thinner, less unreasonable version.

That you will be very clumsy and drop things all the time but ironically be too huge to pick them up again and that this will make you far more angry than you would have thought possible.

That after about 20 weeks you suddenly become aware of being 2 separate people in 1 body, which is a bit weird but kind of cool.

That not long after this the baby will piss you off and that other people will be horrified if you say this out loud.

That the baby is ace and far more interesting than most people realise and that they need to hear all about it.

That you will smell, having always been quite fragrant and in control of armpits and pants up til now.

That you have no control over your shopping urge. And that tiny socks in Mothercare will make you weep.

That when they use the ventouse, it can come off and fly through the air, spraying the blinds on the ward with nasty fluids from your fanjo - but you just don't care! Then they bring in the salad tongs and you feel like saying, pull me out a tomato whilst you are there - just just want to GET IT OUT !!!

Then you get the piles that they have to poke back into your bum with a large crowd of student doctors watching.

Then again not everyone has a 9lb 3oz er naturally (followed by a 10lb 14oz er the second time round - now have a prolapse that I can wipe the floor with !)

DP does not understand why you turn in to a lazy slob and tells you so, not realising that every other pg person in the world is just the same.

That the hairy belly does not go away.

Not to have a fringe because after your hair falls out and starts to grow back your hairdresser will laugh because he thinks someone butchered it when it is really new growth hence why it is so short!

That Hyperemesis is NOT "just morning sickness". It will not pass "in a couple of weeks" and you can't just "pull yourself together".

Oh and when your first baby is 12lbs 9.5oz the next ones will not always be smaller >.

Great thread.

Don't want to be a complete downer but Boolean - you should see someone about ithcy souls of your feet. That is a characteristic symptom of obstetric cholestasis and should not be ignored.

That DH takes a while to understand why you don't want to lift heavy furniture.

That you can fart and fart and fart so much that you don't even bother to run away any more when it's in public...

That you poo during labour...

and about the agony of breastfeeding.

I was calm but my boyfriend panicked so much tried to get me to look for his slippers when I was contracting every two and a half minutes.

That taking too much co-codamol will give you the worst constipation ever, and that this combined with a recent caesarean can be the worst pain in the world.

That even if you are a cool, cynical funky media babe you will be reduced to a pile of soggy tissues blubbing over Andrex ads and that kid that stands up in the cot wanting more milk in the NSCPPC ad FOR EVER..... seriously, it just never stops...

That your hb tells you to move your "fat arse" as you are taking up sofa space. grrrr

That your hips feel like those of a pensioner and your inner thighs feel like you've done a 2 hour spinning class?

The worst one is feeling awkward and uncomfortable talking about babies and pregnancy in front of friends with fertility issues. Even after 2 miscarriages "at least you can get pregnant".

That your baby sleeps at night and kicks in the day, the opposite of what they tell you.

Now 23 weeks and fighting!

I have to confess to not having read ALL of these but has anybody mentioned the horrible inner thigh chafing you get from having a sweaty crutch after the least amount of exertion? I have been known to apply cream in public places to avoid the agony...

Its just glamour glamour glamour all the way....

OMG the flatulence, I burped and farted more in 9 months than I had in my entire pre-pregnancy life

Also, someone should warn you that clots the size of chicken nuggets and looking like raw liver can fall out of your fanjo after the birth (luckily a friend had)

...also that you will never be so glad to see a glycerin suppository (sp??) as you will three days after the birth and the need to poo is all you can think about.....
Nice.

That after a C section, your tummy can remain numb for up to a year!
It's so reassuring to read these and whilst I had many of the symptoms listed, I absolutely loved being pregnant.

That the first 16 weeks can make you feel like you are waking up with a hangover all day, every day, the sickness is like nothing else and when you tell people that the only thing you can do is eat to get rid of the sickness they tell you to enjoy it although you are explaining that you aren't hungry and no one would enjoy being force fed an extra 3500 calories a day!

That the sickness can come back after a month or so reprieve

Its an effort putting socks, knicker, in fact anything on your bottom half because you can't bend over.

That people think its perfectly acceptable to tell you that you are "very big for six months" intonating that you are eating too much.

That the concept of blooming is complete fiction.

That you will only scare yourself silly if you look up your sypmtoms on the internet.

That your parents don't take kindly to being told "that's not how they do things these days" and sulk.

That NHS ante-natal classes are actually kind of fun and you don't have to watch the video if you don't want to - after all, no-one's making you!

That you can get pregnancy Acne! Lovely!

that going to the toilet for the first time can be much more painful than the birth

never posted to MN before, but wanted to add to this epic thread.

That you get restless legs that just make you want to take a sledgehammer to your thighs, whilst randomly kicking DH like your having some sort of lower body seizure. Sort of like a horizontal Riverdance.

At least that's what you tell him...

Lol, Well, does his arse REALLY have to intrude over my side so much.