Pregnancy is not for the faint of heart. Thankfully however, the second trimester has been considerably easier than the initial few months and from what I understand, it is for most people. 24/7 nausea is, put simply, one of the most tortuous sensations one can experience. Picture having the flu -  all the time. And while I haven’t ever felt completely normal, anything is better than never-ending flu.

So, with my new-found energy and growing excitement (and belly), I present you with the biggest surprises of pregnancy, 2^nd trimester edition.

1)      How much there is to learn about baby “stuff”

By “stuff,” I am referring to literal “stuff”… car seats, adapters, strollers and the like. So, last week we started registering. Our first surprise was learning we will need two car seats. In our ignorance, we assumed our kiddo would use the same car seat from infancy through year 5. At least. But no, car seats are based on the weight and length of the child. So when they are really little they need the rear-facing infant kind and then later when they outgrow that, they transition to the front-facing older person kind. Who knew? After about an hour and a half of car seat education with the nice lady at Buy Buy Baby, we moved on to strollers. It was there that we learned all about the base, adaptor and various other attachments. Oh and about the stroller itself. All in all, our first trip registering took two and a half hours and we barely made it out of the first aisle.

2)      Nausea has been replaced with other weird aches and pains. Sleeping has been replaced with… not sleeping.

I can’t even imagine what it’s going to feel like when I am all big in a few months. Because right now I feel like a house even though most people say I am all belly. Every time I wake up (which 60% of the time is at 3:37am to pee), my back and hips are stiff as boards. I literally limp to the bathroom, pee and do a stretching regime in the dark. If I don’t stretch I can’t go back to sleep. None of this has been too disturbing so far but the surprise is, I expected this towards the end of the pregnancy not in the middle!

3)      The anatomy scan was incredible

Remember in the 1^st trimester edition I mentioned how shocked we were to breeze through our first ultrasound, unable to fully revel in the miracle we were witnessing on the screen? Well this one was the opposite. We were there for over an hour. It was ah-mazing. Despite the fact that our little munchkin was only the length of a bell pepper that week, we were able to see the valves of the heart, vertebrae of the spine and so much more. Half the time we had no idea what we were looking at but still, those black and white splotches were beautiful.

4)      Knowing the gender makes everything so much more real

The ultrasound tech said she had a feeling she knew what the gender was throughout the entire ultrasound but she just needed the money shot to confirm. That made us think boy for sure. If it was that obvious, I mean. But as it turned out, the money shot revealed GIRL, which, while she apparently knew all along, was very much NOT obvious to us. (Since that day I have seen the ultrasounds of friends’ babies and yes, it actually is pretty obvious what’s what, if you catch my drift). For us though, finding out it was a girl, somehow felt right. I can’t explain it. I wonder if it would have felt the same if we found out it was a boy. I don’t know… But somehow knowing the gender made everything right in the world. We are having a daughter. Our very own, female, mini-us. That day, the bell pepper became a human and we became parents.

5)      Her first kick upped the “realness factor” even more

She has been kicking for a while I’m sure. But I have not felt it. Then last week, for the first time, I felt two distinct twitches in my lower belly that somehow I knew were my baby girl. It was unbelievable. One of the biggest oddities in pregnancy is feeling so physically different, with the nausea and aches and pains, and yet not feeling the baby itself. In a way, it was reassuring in the beginning just to feel anything as a tangible reminder that the baby was still in there. But the kicks took away that fear and reminded me that there is a real, live, squirmy person being sustained somehow inside my body. Whaaa?!

Last night my husband and I had dinner with one of our favorite couples, who also happened to have twins 13 months ago. We still remember meeting the twins for the first time in the hospital and now they are over a year old! We picked their brains for hours about pregnancy, the baby “stuff” and parenting girls. They both agreed that while some days are so tiring and feel like they will never end, the year has flown by. I totally get that. I feel the same about pregnancy. Even though some days have felt long and consistently uncomfortable, it is halfway over and in a way that’s kinda sad. This will be my only first pregnancy. So I continue to live each day with gratitude. Thankful to be this girl’s mama.

What surprised you in the 2^nd trimester?

Pregnancy has been full of surprises… one after another. I thought I’d document a few here so the rest of you can let me know if I am completely crazy, or if this stuff surprised you too. Also, for anyone who is not preggo yet, here’s a heads up so maybe you can be more informed than I have been when you are!

1) Maternity clothes

I have been saying for years that maternity pants have to be some of the nerdiest, least fashionable articles of clothing ever invented and yet, the time has come for me to wear said pants. To say I have been resistant is an understatement – not because I have any personal experience with them or can vouch for their quality, comfort or style from a firsthand perspective. My concerns have to do with the big elastic waistband and not much else. I never thought I’d be an elastic waistband kinda girl. The problem is, for the past week or two my regular jeans and work pants have gotten increasingly tight. They dig into my stomach when I am sitting (which is 99% of my life these days. I laugh in the face of physical activity) and after I eat, when my stomach puffs out like a helium balloon. So I borrowed a bag of maternity clothes from a friend of mine and in it was a pair of maternity leggings. They are a pair of cotton wonderfulness, bunchy in all the wrong places (especially because I don’t fill them in completely yet) but full of heavenly comfort in all the right places. They are my new favorite pants and I even went online yesterday to look for more. I have a feeling I will be living in these the next six months. And I am not sure if it is my new found tolerance for maternity waistbands or if I misjudged them to begin with, but I have been pleasantly surprised to discover that maternity clothes are not as bad as I thought.

2) I can’t drag myself off the couch to save my life

Speaking of my lack of physical activity, that’s been another big surprise. I have always fancied myself pretty active, but times have changed ever since I saw the blue “pregnant” result on that stick in mid-January. In fact, I distinctly remember the last day I really worked out, like hard. It was MLK day and I remember it because I went to the gym at noon, something I am not usually able to do. Stick turned positive the next day and my dreams of a toned summer bod went down the tubes. The exhaustion you feel while pregnant is unlike anything I have ever experienced before. It is worse than jet lag, it is worse than any all-nighter I pulled in college, it’s worse than the worst kind of tired. I am not exaggerating.

3) Unsolicited advice from friends who have never been pregnant

When you get pregnant, people suddenly have a lot to say about what you should and shouldn’t be eating, doing, thinking, feeling… the problem, for me anyway, is not so much the advice itself, it’s the fact that some of these well-intentioned people have never been pregnant before! (The irony of all of this is that one of my hubby’s pet peeves about me is that I “act like an expert” when talking about subjects I know nothing about. I guess I see where he’s coming from now when he gets frustrated). I get it though. I do. I thought I understood pregnancy before too because it seems that almost everyone I know has 1, 2, 3, or 4 kids with the hopes of a fifth. But I had no idea. I still have no idea what’s to come. All I know is that the past few months of been full of bizarre feelings like being pinched in my lower abdomen, stretched in my upper abdomen, wanting to puke at the thought of lentils (excuse me, I just gagged) and all kinds of other foreign physical sensations. Not to mention wanting to cry at the drop of a hat and fall asleep when stopped at a red light. It’s too unpredictable to understand when you’re in it, let alone when you’re not. And for those of you who endured my unsolicited advice giving the past, oh I don’t know… 10 years, I just want to say thanks for being so forgiving.

4) The first ultrasound

My hubby and I were both surprised about this next one. You know how in movies and TV, they show couples having their first ultrasound appointment and weeping over the beauty that is their bundle of joy? They sit for what you have to assume is at least half an hour listening to the heartbeat, watching the little guy or girl move and marveling at the miracle they created. Well, in real life the first ultrasound is way faster and less romantic. I glanced over at my husband just as it started in an attempt to have a special ultrasound, eyes-locked, omg-we-are-looking-at-our-baby-for-the-first-time-moment and by the time my eyes made it back to the screen, we were halfway done. I would advise (now here I go with the unsolicited advice) that you go into your first ultrasound expecting less romance and more clinical so you are not disappointed.

5) Pregnant besties

Finally, I was surprised and ecstatic to find out that three of my closest friends are on this journey at the exact same time as me (due within days of each other no less)! This has made a huge difference in the not-feeling-alone department. We text daily and ask,”have you experienced (insert weird feeling)?” Sometimes we are going through the same thing and other times we are completely opposite but there is an overall feeling of camaraderie between us soon-to-be-moms and I am hoping it will continue once the babies come too.

What surprised you during your first few months of pregnancy?

First off, I am so sorry I have been MIA lately! Again. The biggest thing going on in my life is the very thing I had to keep under wraps for 12 whole weeks! Hardest secret I’ve ever had to keep! The good news is, the cat’s out of the bag and I can finally share this journey with all of you. Sigh of relief.

Let me just say, pregnancy is hard. Not for everyone maybe but for those of us who have the fun 24/7 sickness (morning sickness my you-know-what – I’m convinced whoever came up with concept that has probably never been pregnant). Anywho, after weeks of queasiness combined with the all-consuming tiredness that can only be described as, other-worldy, the cycle finally broke this past week and I actually had more good days than bad. Could it be that I am entering the much-prefered second trimester? Finally.

For control freaks like myself, pregnancy has brought about a whole slew of uncomfortable emotions and physical experiences. The “what if” questions started about 2.5 seconds after we saw the positive pregnancy test. “What if we are not cut out to be parents?” “What if there are complications during pregnancy?” “What if (insert about 100 other things)”. Being pregnant has forced the reminder that I am not in control to the forefront of my mind. I have had to let go of my fears for the good of myself and my baby, who is growing and forming, susceptible to every little thing I do, think, consume and feel.

Whoa. It is not all about me anymore. Pregnancy has been a beautifully difficult and exciting season so far. I cannot even begin to imagine what the next few months have in store but am so thankful to have others join us on the journey.