With any luck, my pregnancy will be over in a week or so and of course my top priority is delivering a healthy baby. But as I am reflecting back on the last months I thought I would write down the good and the bad of carrying a child.

I think the best part is feeling a little person growing inside of you every day. Knowing that you and you alone are responsible for making sure they have everything they need. I don’t mean to diminish the role of Dads or the rest of the the supporting cast, because without Michael, I would be a disaster right now, but his job has been to indulge my cravings and mood swings, rub my cankles, and generally do whatever I say… not a lot different than his normal role! But I just can’t get enough of the kicks, rolls and punches – each one feels like a little miracle. It is just amazing to think that your body just knows what to do, and the baby just knows how to grow into a proper little person, with a heart and a brain. How does that work exactly???
Something I didn’t appreciate until a few weeks ago is how much I love knowing where the baby is at all times. I have just realized that in a few days I am going to have to let other people touch and hold MY BABY!!!! I guess I don’t mind that so much (yes I do), but I know it is going to be really hard to let him out of my sight.
The 3rd best thing is all the attention. I love attention, I admit it. I love that everyone wants to talk to you and about you, and everyone has something nice to say. A giant belly is a great conversation starter, and you’re not boring anyone by talking about how great your kid is. There is a kind of mutual admiration society, especially among women and really especially among pregnant women, where we see a pregnant woman and we just start to gush about the amazing glow and beauty of pregnancy. It IS beautiful, so I get it, but the constant and overwhelming positive reinforcement will be missed.
And the last best thing is a whole bunch of little things. I love eating whatever I want. I have been pretty good nutrition-wise, and have definitely had my share of treats, but unlike normal days when you regret your ever expanding pouch, now you embrace it. I love taking 2 hour naps, playing video games, reading, and watching TV without feeling guilty about wasting time, and the speed with which my hair and nails have grown. I haven’t broken out since becoming pregnant, and the hair stopped growing on my legs to such an extent that I have only shaved about once a month! I’ll miss my big belly, especially since I know it is going to look like bread dough, at least for awhile. And finally, as hot as I have been lately, this winter I will miss my little furnace, keeping me warm and toasty.
Now for the bad things. I am a clothes hound. I love buying and wearing cute outfits and I have worn the same 5 outfits for the past 6 months. I am going to burn them, environment and charity be damned.
I didn’t have morning sickness or over tiredness at the very beginning. Of course, I didn’t find out I was pregnant until I was about 15 weeks along, so I might have had some symptoms, but they were mild enough for me to not notice. In fact, the whole pregnancy has been pretty easy. The only real complaint I have is that my feet have swollen a lot. We went to Belgium 2 months ago and my feet turned into water balloons from doing a lot of walking. And now I can walk around for about an hour before they become uncomfortable. I definitely won’t miss that. In the last few weeks my hands and wrists have also become quite sore and bloated. I had to take off my wedding ring and now I have to do special exercises so my hands are not killing me in the morning.
Skin tags! Ewww. I know. I have never had them in my life and while I don’t care about them on other people, I hate them on myself. Some people say they fall off after pregnancy. We’ll see.
I won’t miss feeling off balance or the pretty much constant backache I have had the last 2 weeks. I won’t miss the delightful feeling of a baby’s head lodged in a most sensitive area, pinching off nerves and pressing on my bladder. And on the note of the bladder, I won’t miss having to pee 20 times a day. And another 20 times each night.
And lastly, I won’t miss thinking and worrying about the baby all the time, ’cause that will stop as soon as I know he is healthy and happy, right?

* By the way, those aren’t my feet. That’s MIchael thinking he is funny. Besides mine are worse.