Bit By The Baby Bug, Now What?

(How I Found Out I Was Expecting)

The baby bug? What’s that? Well it seems as though every way you turn your head someone is announcing a pregnancy, has just had a baby, or going through the fever. While some are just running in the complete opposite direction. Wherever you fall on the spectrum this one is for my mama’s to be, curious friends, and those who are just, well… curious….

So you’ve just found out your pregnant, or maybe you have a best friend, sister, or cousin who’s expecting and after the initial shock and wave of emotions you now have a ton of questions. What’s going to happen? Ohhh so that was a symptom I was experiencing? Will I gain weight? What do I do? What can I expect? And the list goes on. Pregnancy is something that no one has all the answers to because your experience will depend on you and your body. Ultimately, besides your body doing all of the work, the mental experience is what you make of it. As I entered week 16 yesterday I still had/have a ton of questions myself but I can shed some light on my experiences thus far.

Now, the question a lot of people tend to have is “How do I know if I’m pregnant?” While some people are in tune with their bodies, some don’t find out until they are months along. I was that person who knew something was off, I am in tune with my body but an app made me skeptical that something might’ve been going on. I have two apps (Glow & Period Tracker Lite) I was using to track my cycle and my cycle was approaching. Well one app said it was due on September 12th, and the other said the 13th give or take a day because it may have been the 11th and 12th but anyway, it didn’t come on either of those days. This is when I became a little skeptical because both apps are never off, sometimes one would be wrong and the other would make up for it but BOTH were wrong!? It didn’t make sense to me. Yet and still I was calm, I drove to the dollar store and picked up two test (don’t sleep on the dollar store test they work). I was nonchalant as I took the first one because I honestly expected to see a negative, well boy was I wrong, two lines popped up within seconds.Shook was not the word, after I calmed down and stopped saying omg, crying, and yelling in my sister’s ear, I took the second and duh it was a no-brainer, I was indeed pregnant. I’ve never been pregnant before, never got a positive so I was floored to be honest. I wasn’t trying for a baby, but keeping it real I obviously wasn’t taking the necessary precautions to avoid it so here we are. So I found out on a Wednesday and by Friday it was confirmed by a doctor I was 4 weeks and 4 days along so I found out relatively early. Symptoms? I had none, I had my regular PMS cramping, and the only thing that was different was my boob gave me hell but I still thought it was because my cycle was due. I don’t know if it was a mental thing or what, but the day after I found out, BOOM morning sickness. Me and my toilet bowl have become besties these last couple of months but guess what? It’s not only morning sickness, I got morning, noon, evening, and night sickness. Some mama’s are lucky enough to escape the wrath and some are well, not so lucky. My nausea and throwing up did subside after week 12 but every now and then I will throw up my flag and greet the bowl with open arms (cough cough, like this morning). But hey, it’s all  apart of the process. And in a way it let’s me know that baby bean is in there still kicking around and doing it’s thing. Sleep will become your everything, for me I slept a lot around my earlier weeks. I still get tired fast now but I have regained some energy to where I can skip a nap some days and be fine. Some days you will straight up want to bum it out because you just don’t feel like doing anything. I also had insomnia at night in my earlier weeks which some people tend to get later on in their pregnancy and the dreams? Let’s not get started on the dreams, they will become very weird, very vivid, and very questionable. Your boobs? Yes they will itch. Your back? Yeah it’ll probably hurt. I only weigh 106 right now and I get out of breath quickly so yeah, prepare yourself.

A lot of things change once you find out you’re pregnant, your life choices change, your activities change, and your mindset changes. You realize it’s not only you now, now there’s a little person who’s depending on you to nurture, take care of, and feed it. You find out you can’t eat or drink certain things like hoagies and soda (I’m still not thrilled about this) especially because I crave Coke’s, it’s ridiculous. You will sometimes crave unhealthy foods you don’t need, in my earlier weeks I wanted nothing but buffalo wings, then it moved to ice cream, ice-cream cakes and now I always want pizza. Everything is all still so new to me and then it hits me that in just a few months there will be a little human staring me in my face and expecting me to wait on hand and foot and it’s all just scary. It’s exciting but it can also get overwhelming, emotional, and some days you just don’t know what to expect. The mood swings are real; some days you will find yourself a mixture of happy, sad, irritated, excited, confused, and just everything all in one. And I know they hate it but the baby’s dad (if he’s in the picture- at the edge, in the middle, or wherever he stands) gets most of the frustration you feel, it becomes a love-hate relationship because most days you will probably hate his guts and his face, and just everything about him. They’re just an easy target, sorry dad’s it’s all love (insert sad but not really face).

It’s important that you don’t compare your journey too closely to anyone else’s because more than likely nothing will be the same. Your timeline won’t necessarily look like someone else’s because you go to different doctors/midwives/OBGYN’s, etc. who do things differently. You will have to learn to be patient. I didn’t get my first Ultrasound until week 12 so imagine how anxious I was seeing people get one as early as week 5 and 6 (you don’t see much at those stages) but they were still getting them for confirmation and other reasons. I also don’t find out the gender until week 20 so I’m almost there but people are already finding out what they are having. But again, patience is key. You learn to appreciate the little things and go with the flow when you’re growing something so delicate inside of you. Don’t rush anything and take it easy. Although I am really anxious to feel my baby kick I just stare at my stomach some days and say “do a flip” but little baby is stubborn and moves at its own pace like its mama. But the time shall come so I count my blessings and stay thankful for the experience.

A tip I will leave you with for today is: try not to stress and overwhelm yourself with the “what-ifs” what if something goes wrong? What if this? What if that? Take a deep breath and relax, you will find you will never stop worrying or having questions. You just have to take it day by day and as I said appreciate the little things, every week is a milestone for me because it’s one week down and one less week to go. If you have concerns, talk to your support system, people who have experience, and most importantly, talk to your doctor, they will guide you in the right direction and do what they can to ease your worries. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and don’t freak yourself out by watching birth videos.

Questions, comments, or concerns? Interested in sharing your own experiences or tips? Drop a comment or shoot me an email (breyanaijae@gmail.com).

Thanks for reading, Be Blessed & Stay Humble. As always Choose You Always!

Interested in checking out my first two self-published books? Head over to my site: $elf – choose you always.