People have been curious so here is 8,11,13 & 16 weeks. The ..

People have been curious so here is 8,11,13 & 16 weeks. The last picture is tonight which is nearly 17 weeks. My mood seems chill n easy in those first trimester pics but i guess I only took photos when I felt like faking it. LET THE RECORD SHOW I WAS HAPPY. My brain felt the dissonance between what I “should” feel and what i did feel. “Lying to your future self is an important part of self preservation. TAKE THE HAPPY PIC. LOOK LIKE A PREGNANT MOM SHOULD”. But quite frankly the instant I became pregnant I lost a piece of myself I forgot I’d get back. The laughy happy piece. My favorite piece. Everyone else’s favorite piece too. You’d think I would have remembered that the pregnancy “glow” isnt always so glowy, especially in the beginning. This being my THIRD baby, how could I STILL be so unprepared for the first trimester emo swamp crawl. I wanted to get pregnant (it’s gonna be great!), I did get pregnant (I’m so lucky!!!)...but then that hormone shoe drops SAME DAY AS THE + STICK (at least for me) and it’s a 3 month rainy day with no Gene Kelly in sight. Some people don’t tell friends and family until 14 weeks because they don’t wanna jinx the pregnancy or discuss a potential loss but for me it’s more because for those weeks I don’t want to hear “congratulations” or celebrate in ANY sense of the word. And i DEFINITELY don’t want to answer “how I’m feeling”. Why do casual acquaintances incessantly ask that? Are you dramamine in human form? An undercover professionally trained therapist who I hired in my sleep? I know it’s a lot to ask but try to dig deep and find a new cliche question you don’t care about the answer to. (Sry too mean? Too mean.) But hey, to put it casually, my main desire in the first trimester was to scream into a cave then go live inside it with only the reverberations of my own despair to keep me company for all eternity. (**Of course I checked “feels fine” on the doctor screener bc they can’t fool me into being on their “bad mother” list**)

But, ya know, time happens even when you don’t notice it. The second trimester hit and the world felt bright again. SO BRIGHT. Like while I was screaming in my pitch black cave, god (if you believe in god) or maybe just someone with really great taste and an interest in vintage lamps came in and redecorated. Quick flip of a switch and BAM. Suddenly my whole pregnant sad girl schtick (cuz the second it’s over it ceases to feel real) is suddenly a distant memory I’m soon to forget. I wasnt a useless piece of human void! NO! I just lost my favorite rose-colored glasses in a crumb-filled couch. All I ever needed was a dollar store dust-buster to dig em out and wash em and WOW YES. The world is clearer and more beautiful than ever. (I just wish it were actually that simple.) Thankfully for me, my hormones took pity on me & my...depression? Melancholy? Malaise? ...was short-lived. It’s not that way for everyone.

When you finally tell people you’re pregnant the first question (after sex and due date) is usually “Were you nauseous?” The short answer is, no, no i wasn’t. As if not being nauseous makes me some kind of first trimester superhero. A bricK! A tank! MADE FOR PROCREATION. “This here woman is invincible!!” (I wasn’t invincible, obviously) . But maybe I was still somebody’s hero. My baby’s? Maybe the time for moms to stop being so hard on ourselves and each other shouldn’t be saved for baby milestones and play date etiquette, maybe it should start a little bit earlier. Like DAY ONE. Being crabby and miserable is part of the ride. But it’s far from the whole ride. Hang in there everybody. Pregnant or not, this life is a real loop-di-loop. I’m with you. The good, the bad and the ugly cry. ❤️

But yep, 17 weeks is a great place to be. (And look at me now! Fake poutin’. Ha. Funny how that works)