The True Story of a Wonderful First Trimester

Today, I’m beyond excited to share that my husband and I are expecting our first baby! It’s been so hard to keep this joyous news a secret, especially when it’s all I can think about. I’ve been saving up all the details of my first trimester and in this post I’m going to tell you all about it.

The True Story of my First Trimester

I know I usually stick to money-centered posts but I wanted to branch out and share something more personal today. My family is growing, so I figure my blog is bound to grow as well.

Honestly, I’m a little nervous to share my experience here. Mostly because things are going pretty well. I know so many of you have harder journeys and tougher experiences. But I think it’s good to have a variety of experiences out there. Here’s why….

For years, I worried about everything that could go wrong. I was worried that it would take us forever to get pregnant. And I worried that we’d have problem after problem along the way.

What a waste that was! People, please, don’t waste your time worrying until you actually know you have something to worry about. All this worrying about hypothetical situations isn’t helping anyone!

Okay, pep talk over. On to my story…

Hubby and I were originally planning to start growing our last summer. But then I quit my job and our lives adjusted to that change. And we decided that the smart thing to do was to postpone our plans until things felt more steady for us.

By the end of 2016, life was good. We both felt ready. We knew it was time.

I started reading everything I could find about pregnancy and babies.

I went to my OBGYN for a preconception appointment. I have an amazing doctor and that whole appointment (aside from checking on my reproductive health indicators, which all looked good) was like a big pep talk about how to get pregnant. She repeatedly told me that I shouldn’t feel stressed about it and that it could take up to a year for it to happen.

But it didn’t take a year. It hardly took a month. We got very lucky and got pregnant on the first try!

Although, to be completely honest, it wasn’t all luck. We were very strategic about it. I used an awesome app call Ovia to track my cycles and it was really helpful.

We also made every effort to be healthier in general. In the year before we started to try, I lost 15 lbs. We were both eating healthier and avoiding processed food and chemicals. I started adding Maca Powder to my smoothies (they say that promotes fertility). And I read somewhere that if you eat pineapple in the week following fertilization it helps to make the baby stick. That sounds silly, but I totally did it.

Finding out

We got our first positive pregnancy test on February 18th. I was filled with joy as I read the word pregnant on that test. Hubby and I were thrilled.

But, in a way, it also felt too easy. Too good to be true.

I called my doctor to make an appointment. They told me I’d have to wait until I was 7 weeks pregnant before I could come in to “confirm my pregnancy” (doesn’t that sound ominous?)

7 weeks was almost a month away. How could we wait that long? It was agonizing.

So, in the following days, we just kept taking those tests. And being amazed at the result.

The Sickness

About 3 days after that first positive test, I was paralyzed by nausea. It was awful. I went from laying in bed to laying on the bathroom floor.

And I thought to myself, this is it. This is what morning sickness is going to be like for me.

But two days later, I was fine. The nausea went away and I felt pretty normal. By the time I hit for 4 weeks, I was feeling good.

A few smells turned my stomach. Heavy perfume or scrambled eggs. But most of the time I was completely fine.

I waited and waited for the sickness to come back, but it didn’t.

I knew I wanted to do everything I could to avoid morning sickness. Here’s what I did:

• I took an extra B vitamin each day with my prenatal
• I made a probiotic smoothie each day (here’s the recipe)
• I took this probiotic pill with my smoothie
• I tried to walk everyday, although honestly I didn’t get to it every single day
• I tried to eat foods that were gentle on my stomach, avoiding spicy foods etc.

These things really did help. Of course, I don’t know if I would have had morning sickness otherwise. But I do know that in my next pregnancy I’ll be doing these things again!

At 9 weeks I had another day of feeling terrible. I suffered through the day on the couch with my husband waiting on me. And the following day, I was feeling fine again.

I felt so lucky throughout my first trimester, knowing that so many women suffer from terrible morning sickness.

If you haven’t been pregnant before, know that it doesn’t happen to everyone. Everyone’s experience is different. You’ll never know how your body will react until you experience it.

That being said, I’m fully aware that just because I’ve had it easy this time does not mean that I’ll have an easy first trimester in my future pregnancies. We’ll see what happens.

The Exhaustion

While I didn’t have the nausea, I certainly had the exhaustion! I have never felt so tired in my life.

And it didn’t help that I was going without my beloved daily coffee!

Throughout my first trimester, I felt like I was constantly yawning. I’d doze off easily, once even at work!

I tried to sleep as much as I could. I was in bed by 8:30 and in the morning I’d snooze as long as I could. But, of course, I was also waking up at least 5 times a night to pee. So, I wasn’t getting the best sleep.

Doctor, Doctor

When I went to my doctor for my first prenatal appointment I had a routine ultrasound done. The doctors found that my baby measured smaller than expected for the dates of my last cycle.

This didn’t necessarily mean that anything was wrong, but it sure did sound scary. My doctor told me that everything was probably fine but asked me to come back for another ultrasound in 2 weeks.

So 11 days later, I came back for another ultrasound. Baby had grown just the right amount. It turns out that I must have ovulated late in my cycle. No big deal.

I’m glad that my doctors discovered though because as a result I ended up with a more accurate due date. My original due date was October 26th and now it is more accurate at November 2nd.

Also, I loved seeing how much my baby grew in those short 11 days! Take a look at the huge difference in the ultrasounds below. It’s breathtaking!

 

I’ve had the same OBGYN for the past decade, and I love her. She’s a great doctor. I was so excited to find out though that my doctor’s practice includes several midwives that she works closely with.

I get to see all the midwives and my doctor during my pregnancy so I’ll be familiar with the person on call when the big day comes.

I love this model of care and highly recommend that anyone looking for a new care provider consider somewhere like this.

A Pregnant Education

I have just been soaking up all the information I can find about pregnancy and babies. There is so much to learn! I’m personally focusing on healthy pregnancy/natural birth. I wanted to share some of the best stuff I’ve found with you:

The Healthy Pregnancy Book by William and Martha Sears – This is the BEST pregnancy book that I’ve found so far! The beginning section is focused on generally healthy pregnancy information and then there are chapters for each month of pregnancy. This book is easy to understand and isn’t scary like many of the other pregnancy books out there.

Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth – I love Ina May Gaskin. She’s an old-school (kinda hippie) midwife and she is wealth of information about all things birth. I’m just starting into reading this book but I love that it begins with real birth stories!

MamaBaby Birthing – This is a comprehensive fully-online natural childbirth course, and it is awesome! There is so much information included in this course and it extends so much further than birth. There is a ton of helpful information for during pregnancy and after baby is born as well. My favorite part about this course is that you get a weekly question and answer call with the teacher, Kristen. She’s a student midwife and mom of 7, so super knowledgeable about all things pregnancy, birth and baby. I love being about to ask her all of my questions that come up along the way!! You can check out MamaBaby Birthing here, I can’t recommend it enough.

Going forward

I’m feeling confident and excited going into my second trimester. I’m eager to share the excited news with my family and friends (and every single person I know!).

I cannot wait for that burst of energy that everyone keeps telling me is coming soon!

 

Friends, don’t worry! Happy Humble Home isn’t going to become 100% pregnancy and baby. I’ll still share my frugal ideas and tips. And there’s a lot of those to come as my husband and I look forward to becoming a one-income family!

But I will occasionally share some personal posts like this. Because, well, that’s what’s happening with me.

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You can read more about my story here: A Spender and A Saver Fall in Love