Pregnancy stole my coping mechanism. She stole it, hid it on the highest shelf of the tallest cupboard and there’s no way of getting it back.
It all started when I turned up to my blood test an hour too early and was told to wait. So I did. And then when it was time to do the blood-sucking, I sidled up to the counter and was asked, “Did you do the chicken and carb diet for 3 days?”
Chicken and carb diet? If there’s a high-carb diet I want to be on it, but alas, no I hadn’t. “No… I wasn’t told about the chicken or the carbs. I’ll go away, eat them and come back.” I was assured it was all fine, and I went in for the first blood test with tears welling my eyes.
Later on one of my fellow pregnant women in the waiting room said to me, “If I was you, I probably would have cried.” Thank goodness, I thought, cos I just about did.
***
And then just yesterday I was at my regular hospital check-up appointment. I was handed the open coffee-cup {you might like to read this post if you’re new to the coffee cup ‘thing’} so I took myself to the bathroom, peed in it… and then promptly, and oh-so-accidentally dropped the cup down my jeans. There was no way of hiding it. Right there and then I wanted to die. Or crawl up into a ball. Or be handed a spare outfit.
I stood in that toilet for a while, and came up with no solution. Fun times.
***
At that same appointment I was pulled aside into a small room to be told that I have Gestational Diabetes. Only then to be retold that the nurse had read the results wrong and that I didn’t have Gestational Diabetes. No apology. Just a little roller-coaster ride of emotions, for no damn reason.
So then I made my way to my Obstetrician appointment where all it took was for her to mutter the words, “So how is everything?”
And I lost it there and then. Tears, mascara, tears, blurting out of words and feelings and words, and ugly crying. And then I wiped my face and remarked, “So yeah, I’m all good now.”
I think she may have scribbled in her notes that I am a complete and utter hormonal maniac who smells like urine.
BUT I’M GROWING A BABY AND THAT IS PRETTY AMAZING. Right?
photo credit: Daniel*1977 via photopin cc
Bet your sweet booty it is amazing.
Now breathe…
Breathe I will. x
You have just perfectly described how I’m feeling! I am normally such a coper. I just get on with things. Busy at work? No problem. DIY project at home adding to the mania? Fine. My 4 year old son playing up? We get on with it. Not during this pregnancy! I have been a hormonal, panicky, non coping mess. For the first time ever I have had to ask for help at work, help from my parents to look after my son during holidays when he had chicken pox & I couldn’t have time off to look after him, help from my husband to cook/clean/do everything around the house and I still don’t feel ok. If it wasn’t for this little person wriggling around inside me and making me happy I’d have completely lost it. Now I’m 30 weeks pregnant I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel & it feels so good. I feel better knowing someone else is struggling – sorry but I do! No one said the 2nd pregnancy would be so much harder than the 1st! Here’s hoping the last few weeks are better for both of us!
I am SO glad I’m not alone. Pregnancy looks so rosy and fun from the outside, doesn’t it?
I also learnt yesterday that it’s normal to feel really sort in the second pregnancy earlier than the first. My bones feel like they’re stretching and I’m totally waddling… I was told our bodies know what they’re doing so they just do it earlier this time. Good to know. 🙂
I hope the last 10 weeks are a breeze for you. I’m following just behind you. x
I was told the same thing – the pregnancy symptoms amp up but the second labour is supposed to be a lot easier and faster. I don’t know if I can handle another 6 weeks of not being able to sit for fear / pain of my ribs breaking. At least you have a great support system and tones of sane reasonable comments to help give you a little perspective.
Thank you for sharing too!
You’re growing a baby, raising a little one, being a wife, helping keep a home, Aside from all that you’re also running a highly successful blog and photo challenge among many, many, many other things. My dear, you are a goddess. Hope your week gets drier 🙂
Who says you have to hold it together anyway? Your body is growing bones, heart, brain, arms, legs, organs, eyeballs. FROM NOTHING!!
This stuff is hard work!! So yeah, it’s gonna cause havoc. On your body, on your soul, on your mind and heart.
Rest. Put your feet up. Stop caring about things.
And here. Let me put it into perspective:
At least it’s YOUR pee and not someone else’s.
xo
True that!
I am not a super big fan of the “being” pregnant part of having children. I was never rosy and definitely not much of a coper either! And being told you have GD & then it was a mistake is not at all cool! I would have cried too! xxxx ps. I hope the obstetrician gave you something for the indigestion.
Thanks Cat. Nothing for the indigestion – she said to just use over the counter stuff. Thankfully it’s mostly at night and Gaviscon seems to be settling it for the most part.
I know how you feel I wasn’t even pregnant and absolutely broke down in a doctor’s office on my first appointment. I don’t mean a few tears but the whole sobbing, can’t get the words out and more tears. I felt like suh an idiot but in the end the doctor’s advice helped me more than anything. Mind you that was after i had got myself back together 🙂
Oh no you poor lovely!! I can’t believe you wee’d yourself!! 😉 Yes – you are growing a baby and that is TOTALLY amazing… and you are totally amazing too, making malteser cupcakes and looking after a 5 year old, and a blog, being a wife and running a home. I’m 27 weeks pregnant and I have definitely had my moments too. My two year old has been waking up during the night, I woke up at 3.30am today so no doubt I’ll lose my coping mechanism at some point today!! Ps. I totally get the waddling thing, I know pregnancy is amazing but it also sucks a little bit too 🙂
Well technically I didn’t wee myself, but dropped wee on myself. Same, only different! 😛
I did realise that – was trying to be funny (obviously didn’t work!).
Ha ha. I wasn’t sure. I get it. Sorry. I might have lost my sense of humour too. 😛
Yep, yep and yep. I am totally with you and while we think these little beings are just sucking our nutrients, they are also chipping away at our sanity. I am normally a very up front person who will stand her ground. I thought I still was until my husband informed me that the pregnant me wasn’t at all like that. Oh well! We will be sane again one day. Right? Cry away I say! At least we can blame it all on the hormones 😉
One day? I’m hoping for immediately after the birth. They can take the baby out and put my brain and coping mechanism back in. Please.
Chantelle – any embarrassment now is nothing compared to the moment when teams of people that will parade through your delivery room and be looking at your hoo ha. That said, whilst we remember the embarrassing moments and the excruciating pain, all that will really matter is that we created our own little miracle… now what can be more exciting than that! Smelling like pee along the way… oh well. lol. You are great, thanks for the laughs.
Oh the memories – they are so fresh. I would have bawled in every situation above because YES, pregnancy totally stole all my coping mechanisms. Any little roadblock in my day, any little frustration was cause for tears this last pregnancy!
Dropping wee on yourself is just preparing you for the countless times some sort of wet gooey substance will be sprayed across some part of your body and it wont be your own next time. The first few times it happens you wont care – it will be amazing that you have been ‘christened’ with your first poo-splosion, wee, vomit, dribble, snot … then its just gross, then you go full cycle to who cares, no one will notice that smear across my top and finally back to oh my god thats gross when will I get to go out of this house clean ever again.
Yes, you will be hormonal, for a while yet. Yes, you will smell like urine (or other stinky substance), for a while yet. Yes, growing a baby is amazing.Yes, you are amazing. Yes, you can ask for as much reassurance as you need.
hahahah.. this made me laugh out loud for real. You are awesome.
Oh no, that sounds like a day from hell, don’t be too hard on yourself we all have them. One lady came into the diabetes clinic I got to and just burst into tears. All the ladies there looked on very sympathetically as I’m pretty sure we have felt like that at some point. Thankfully the midwife on duty that day took her into a room to give her a bit of privacy to calm down. Bloody hormones, they have a lot to answer for!
We had a lovely kid to play at ours for the first playdate today. When I was taking her home in the car after, she was explaining that Mums REALLY matter, because all of their children are ‘actually’ grown in their bodies!!! My son muttered something about sperm, but was put in his place. ‘The Mum actually grows people in her body!’ Go Charlotte.
Yes! You are amazing and fabulous and brilliant!! And normal. And normal isn’t really bad at all … right?
Omg can totally identify!! Where has my resiliance gone???
I think it’s on holiday with mine.
Please come back. x
Yep im that kinda pregnant lady too, figure its pretty normal! I agree its hard work to grow a baby so people should give us some slack!
When I was pregnant I lost the ability to do our banking, not sure it ever came back, but maybe that was going to happen to me anyway 🙂 Don’t be too hard on yourself Chantelle, pregnancy is hard work, you deserve to cry sometimes 🙂
With my first, I burst into tears after staying 21 minutes in the twenty minutes free hospital carpark (through no fault of my own) and having to pay $5 for the privilege; with my third, I lost it when the guy at the supermarket dumped the bags at my heavily pregnant feet while I had one sick and one grumpy child in the car; and, my proudest moment: I threw up in a job interview, during morning sickness with my second (in front of about 20 people in the main office area). All the young people just stared with disgust and horror as one motherly type helped me out and asked if I was pregnant, to which I kept replying (lying) that I wasn’t.
You are making a baby full stop. If there ever was a time you allowed not to cope it is now. I think coping is a bit overrated. If you are one of those people that ALWAYS copes then people forget to lend a hand or to check to see you are ok. A little bit less super is ok. Letting someone else carry the load is ok. You are more than ok 🙂 xx
All sounds pretty ‘normal’ to me. But then I had several major moments of breakdowns in my pregnancy.
You poor thing! Look, I’ve just had my second baby (ok, he just turned 1 but I still tell people I “just” had my second, partly because i still think “i baked a baby, bet you cant top that” and also do avoid the (completely imagined) judgmental stares where I can practically hear them thinking “the kids a year old and you’re still wearing that maternity top!! FYI, they’re comfy, don’t judge). Anyway, I digress. I was the queen of ugly crying. I say milk it for all its worth because you’re growing a whole human so you should be allowed to do whatever you like. I too had a “wee” incident – turns out Doctors would prefer you do the lid up properly on your “special cup” to avoid the clumsy pregnant woman who talks with her hands to much to knock it over his desk, keyboard and lap…. Awkward much? I was also told I had gestational diabetes (I didn’t) and that my child had Down Syndrome, a heart and kidney defect and missing fingers – several appointments, tests and an amniocentesis later – they got it all wrong. So, I ugly cried, spilt cups of wee, ate too much, ugly cried and shopped. Why? Because I was growing my second man child sized baby, that’s why. xx
That sounds like a plot of a Hollywood drama. Holy smokes. Thank you a million times over for making me feel better. x
You are a total Superwoman, you’re capable and lovely and will be awesome 🙂 Take care of you xx (and seriously, while you can, take advantage of the ugly crying 😉
Kate
@Katie_every_day
Oh no! When you’ve got all those emotions running wild, you don’t need wee down your jeans! My worry is, were you able to refill that cup? Double-trouble! You sound pretty normal to me, Chantelle! I never did lose my suddenly discovered soft heart (I cry at everything now, and I can’t read news stories about horrible things that happen to children), but I did get my brain back… after a couple of years. 😉
Well, I didn’t want to mention it – but it fell INTO the toilet, so I had to grab it, and muster up a lame refill. TMI. Sorry.
I like my new soft side {which I kept from pregnancy with Lacey}, same as you.
xx
You know, there is something about the doctor’s office. I’m NOT pregnant and haven’t been for…..16 years but. If there is anything bothering me. If I’ve been bottling up some frustration or stress for a while and I somehow end up in my doctor’s office…there is something about the way she looks at me and asks me if everything is ok that just sends me over the edge. Tears, snot, hiccups – she gets it all. It must have something to do with the fact that we, as mothers, are always so concerned about everyone else and the minute anyone shows any interest in the way we are feeling, it’s just all too much.
Having said that, it sounds like you have had a couple of rocky days and I hope the next ones turn out to be stress-free and crossing my fingers for no more pee down your pants.
Hehe first of all FMS I love your stories!!
This one in particular made me giggle loudly! Lucky I’m at home or I would have looked like a nutcase to strangers! Don’t worry I probably would have done the same thing I was one very emotional person in my first pregnancy lol.
I haven’t got any words of comfort unfortunately as I’ve never been pregnant, however, my younger sister is with her 2nd and she’s just been through something very similar. I showed her this post and she now feels 10 times better about her experience as I think she thought she was alone. So thank you very much 🙂
I’ve read this, & I read it 3 times just TRYING to understand what on Earth the chicken & carbs reference could mean?
Am I just … stupid?! Or seriously naive?!
I can’t believe that nurse took you from the terror of gestational diabetes & back again without so much as an apology 🙁 This was something I was always SO acutely aware of when I was a Registered Nurse (i.e the emotional rollercoaster you’re often managing with patients, & how to NOT disturb it as best you can!).
In 2011, Dave & I were pregnant. And then we weren’t. We were taken into an ultrasound room to have it confirmed that we had in fact, miscarried. When we walked in, the screen was still up from the couple before who very obviously had a lovely, healthy baby.
They kept that image up as we were told we had lost ours.
I never said anything, but it just … completely GUTTED me that a hospital (a popular WOMEN’S hospital) could be so … inconsiderate.
Congrats on NOT having GD, & being able to sneak in a sneaky sugar-y treat now & then 🙂 My weapon of choice this pregnancy? … skittles! x
Cherie (raising master Max)
I still have no idea what the chicken and carbs is about. Thankfully my head Obs said I don’t need to have another GTT but I am going for an ultrasound tomorrow to check the size of the baby.
I am so sorry that you went through that. It’s those things that matter so much. So heartbreaking. 🙁
I’d be OK with having GD, I really would. I have friends {and readers} that have had it and coped beautifully, but it was more a matter of principal and health that I didn’t want to get it. And obviously for the baby, foremost.
I’ve been so proactive, and trying dispel the fat pregnant woman beliefs of the carers. I went to the Diabetes Educator at 13 weeks on my own accord to educate myself and she said to me over and over again “When you get GD” and “When you get GD” until I said that I just might not get it… and then she said, “Well, when you do just remember it’s not your fault.”
So I’ve eaten really well, not put on any weight at all, kept active and stayed positive. It’s been on my mind a lot. So to be told that I did… oh it just upset me so much.
Anyways… so spilling my guts here.
I hope you’ve been keeping well and rested.
Oh my gosh, I understand! It’s not the diagnosis, at all; it’s just the effort you’ve gone to in order to avoid it, & the principal & health thing, absolutely.
I hope you pop in & say hello to that educator & tell her about your NON GD 🙂
Oh, for the record, I get HUGE during pregnancy, & I birth HUGE babies, & I never let anyone tell me it’s anything to do with my body weight/what I eat, because I just know it has EVERYTHING to do with who I chose to marry & his being 6’3″.
WHY didn’t I marry a shorty?! 😉
I’m keeping well here + very rested, doctor’s orders 😉
Much love x
Aww sweetie its ok hugs