Woman in the last days of pregnancy is not a pretty sight.
I, for example, have just thrown up the sole thing I have eaten today-a fried egg sandwich-and after three hours sleep it's all I can do to move off the sofa in order to search the cupboards for stray crisps. That is, if I can allow myself to eat anything at all, as I have also convinced myself that I have a terrible liver condition which is slowly poisoning the baby.
It all started last night. I had been itchy, on and off, for quite a while, but last night's itching was on a whole new level. My mother had kindly given up her bed and allowed me to sleep in her double while she suffered in the single bed which for reasons of storage has two mattresses and lives in "my" teenage bedroom, but it was all to no avail. I tossed and turned, scratching away and peering at the internet on my phone in the darkness. Unfortunately, Dr Internet's diagnosis was that I had something called obstetric cholestasis, and that my baby was going to die. There was even an accompanying article from the Daily Mail about someone this had Really Happened To, to prove the point. It took until 3.30am for me to finally get to sleep, only to awake at 6.30, just in time for me to confess my fears to Mother before she went to work. Mother has now taken to addressing frequent stern grandmotherly rebukes to the baby within, urging him that it is "time to come out now and meet your grandmother." I'm starting to think that's why he's staying in. It was all I could do to point, sobbing, to the relevant section in What to Expect When You're Expecting and wail, "Mum, I have this. And the baby is GOING TO DIE."
And what if the baby did die? What would I do? How would the news be shared on Facebook? How would I go back to work and face all the puzzled teenagers wondering what I was doing there? How would I put myself through it all again? And some people actually have to do that. It's too hideous to contemplate.
Anyway, I have spoken to the midwife this morning and they are going to do some tests today to establish if I do have This Horrible Itchy Disease. Hopefully the results will be quick. And at least the baby won't be premature. Which is pretty much all I have to comfort myself with at this point, given that EVERYONE in my antenatal class (even the ones who weren't due until mid-August) has managed to miraculously pop out their babies already, leaving me as the bottom of the class loser who's a bit slow and holding everyone else up. All I have to feel smug about is that hopefully, if my baby is born alive as planned, he will be so advanced that he'll probably walk straight out of the womb and off to university, and I'll never have to worry about getting the hang of breastfeeding, weaning or toilet training as he'll pretty much already be a fully formed adult.
I wish the Internet had never been invented.
Showing posts with label Disgusting Pregnancy Symptoms. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Disgusting Pregnancy Symptoms. Show all posts
Monday, 28 July 2014
Wednesday, 9 July 2014
Baby Still Not Here. I Feel Sick. Probably Because it's my Birthday
Summary of my day so far: Got up, realised it was my birthday, threw up, returned to bed.
That pretty much says it all. Thirty-four just has such a great ring to it.
Just exactly what last night's mushroom omelette and chips were still doing in my system ten hours after they were eaten is anyone's guess. Does food just never get digested anymore? Does being pregnant mean that one no longer has intestines and food just sits there in the stomach, gradually congealing forever? The levels of acid reflux I am experiencing would suggest that it is so.
See, I told you this blog would be a veritable goldmine of Too Much Information.
In other news, the baby shows precisely no signs of wanting to come out yet, but then this is probably a good thing, since one would hardly want the prediction of one of my Year 11s "but miss, what if the baby comes on your birthday?" to come true, since that would mean never having a birthday ever again, but being condemned to spend own birthday in perpetuity stone-cold sober, trying to direct children's birthday party complete with overpriced party bags and screaming hordes of other people's children baying for cake. Even at 34, I'm not sure I'm ready for that kind of self-sacrifice.
Also, mercifully the fact that the baby has not come yet has allowed me some time to prepare. Preparing in this case means trekking to London and picking up piles of baby clothes, along with the few remaining threads that I can fit into, and organising an appointment with the midwife here in order to change hospitals, which I am feeling much better about now, as nobody within the NHS has sent out a lynch mob just yet. My brother has amusingly referred to the whole process as me being like a salmon, returning to the land of its birth in order to breed. Hopefully this doesn't mean I will not at some point in the future get away again, rather than be trapped forever as a house guest in single bed in my teenage bedroom which still has pink shelves on the wall which I adorned with glitter, and a door which, in a moment of arbitrary teenage madness and overexcitement at opening of local Ikea store, I painted purple, and which most tellingly of all still bears the blu-tac scars from the eighty-three pictures of Alessandro Del Piero I once festooned upon it. At least the pictures themselves-lovingly cut out of the pages of the Gazetta Dello Sport no less-are not still there.
Where exactly the baby is going to sleep at this point remains something of a mystery. My mother has kindly purchased a Moses basket, so he may well have to sit in it in the middle of the room like a bit of furniture or a suitcase no one quite knows where to put. Alternatively there's his car seat, which I have to admit looks very comfortable from where I'm sitting. Many's the time I've been tempted to park my expanding posterior in there, but I doubt I'd ever get out again and I'm not sure the safety tests are quite rigorous enough to see if the contraption will withstand overexcited parents trying to climb in with the-probably erroneous-belief that it might be more comfortable than a trip in the front seat with a neck pillow. Come to think of it, babies do have pretty nice lives. My brother has even expressed an interest in borrowing some of the Little One's clothes, although quite how he will look in a woollen sailor onesie from Le Petit Bateau is a matter of some debate.
Lastly, the only other noteworthy thing that has happened (it's been a slow day) is that according to the ancient scales in my mother's bedroom, I have lost three pounds. Either that is an error on the part of the scales or I have stopped expanding and this must mean that the baby is ready to be born, right?
Watch this space.
That pretty much says it all. Thirty-four just has such a great ring to it.
Just exactly what last night's mushroom omelette and chips were still doing in my system ten hours after they were eaten is anyone's guess. Does food just never get digested anymore? Does being pregnant mean that one no longer has intestines and food just sits there in the stomach, gradually congealing forever? The levels of acid reflux I am experiencing would suggest that it is so.
See, I told you this blog would be a veritable goldmine of Too Much Information.
In other news, the baby shows precisely no signs of wanting to come out yet, but then this is probably a good thing, since one would hardly want the prediction of one of my Year 11s "but miss, what if the baby comes on your birthday?" to come true, since that would mean never having a birthday ever again, but being condemned to spend own birthday in perpetuity stone-cold sober, trying to direct children's birthday party complete with overpriced party bags and screaming hordes of other people's children baying for cake. Even at 34, I'm not sure I'm ready for that kind of self-sacrifice.
Also, mercifully the fact that the baby has not come yet has allowed me some time to prepare. Preparing in this case means trekking to London and picking up piles of baby clothes, along with the few remaining threads that I can fit into, and organising an appointment with the midwife here in order to change hospitals, which I am feeling much better about now, as nobody within the NHS has sent out a lynch mob just yet. My brother has amusingly referred to the whole process as me being like a salmon, returning to the land of its birth in order to breed. Hopefully this doesn't mean I will not at some point in the future get away again, rather than be trapped forever as a house guest in single bed in my teenage bedroom which still has pink shelves on the wall which I adorned with glitter, and a door which, in a moment of arbitrary teenage madness and overexcitement at opening of local Ikea store, I painted purple, and which most tellingly of all still bears the blu-tac scars from the eighty-three pictures of Alessandro Del Piero I once festooned upon it. At least the pictures themselves-lovingly cut out of the pages of the Gazetta Dello Sport no less-are not still there.
Where exactly the baby is going to sleep at this point remains something of a mystery. My mother has kindly purchased a Moses basket, so he may well have to sit in it in the middle of the room like a bit of furniture or a suitcase no one quite knows where to put. Alternatively there's his car seat, which I have to admit looks very comfortable from where I'm sitting. Many's the time I've been tempted to park my expanding posterior in there, but I doubt I'd ever get out again and I'm not sure the safety tests are quite rigorous enough to see if the contraption will withstand overexcited parents trying to climb in with the-probably erroneous-belief that it might be more comfortable than a trip in the front seat with a neck pillow. Come to think of it, babies do have pretty nice lives. My brother has even expressed an interest in borrowing some of the Little One's clothes, although quite how he will look in a woollen sailor onesie from Le Petit Bateau is a matter of some debate.
Lastly, the only other noteworthy thing that has happened (it's been a slow day) is that according to the ancient scales in my mother's bedroom, I have lost three pounds. Either that is an error on the part of the scales or I have stopped expanding and this must mean that the baby is ready to be born, right?
Watch this space.
Thursday, 3 July 2014
Not a very yummy mummy....
Well I don't mean to sound ungrateful but I have to admit I am feeling less than enamoured with my physical appearance at the moment.
Today I actually discovered that I have fat feet.
Fat feet! Perish the thought! Cue visions of obese people squeezing their bloated plates of meat into too-tight ballet pumps, flesh spilling out over the top, ankles obliterated.
This is now me.
Anyway, at least my maternity leave is almost nigh. Tomorrow is a training day, so today was basically my last day at work. As much as it surprises me to say it, I actually felt quite sad. To be honest this had more to do with the fact that I felt I was being usurped by younger, keener models and would return washed up, knowing no one and more bitter than ever, repeating endless soliloquies about how it all used to be better in my day, rather than emotional desolation at the thought of leaving the place. Apparently I am already so old that I have actually taught one of the new teachers. It's just as well I'm in the process of creating a new generation as clearly my own time on Planet Earth is now obsolete.
Fat, bloated and past it. That's pretty much the shape of things to come. YAY.
Today I actually discovered that I have fat feet.
Fat feet! Perish the thought! Cue visions of obese people squeezing their bloated plates of meat into too-tight ballet pumps, flesh spilling out over the top, ankles obliterated.
This is now me.
Anyway, at least my maternity leave is almost nigh. Tomorrow is a training day, so today was basically my last day at work. As much as it surprises me to say it, I actually felt quite sad. To be honest this had more to do with the fact that I felt I was being usurped by younger, keener models and would return washed up, knowing no one and more bitter than ever, repeating endless soliloquies about how it all used to be better in my day, rather than emotional desolation at the thought of leaving the place. Apparently I am already so old that I have actually taught one of the new teachers. It's just as well I'm in the process of creating a new generation as clearly my own time on Planet Earth is now obsolete.
Fat, bloated and past it. That's pretty much the shape of things to come. YAY.
Saturday, 21 June 2014
Bloated Whale
Urgh. Lounging on the sofa like a bloated whale. And every now and again my belly goes all hard and pointy, and I am told that this may be a Braxton Hicks contraction. I had thought it was just the baby moving around. Still, hopefully this means that by the time I finally go into labour my body will know what it's doing.
Anyway, just because I am a glutton for punishment, today I went to Topshop (my haul: a pair of leggings and a T-shirt) and American Apparel, where I almost wept as I yet again realised I will probably never again be slim enough to wear a crop top, and had to settle for something called a "tent dress."
And on top of all this, I feel sick. In fact, last night I woke up at 3am and actually was sick. I have become disgusting. This better be worth it.
Anyway, just because I am a glutton for punishment, today I went to Topshop (my haul: a pair of leggings and a T-shirt) and American Apparel, where I almost wept as I yet again realised I will probably never again be slim enough to wear a crop top, and had to settle for something called a "tent dress."
And on top of all this, I feel sick. In fact, last night I woke up at 3am and actually was sick. I have become disgusting. This better be worth it.
Tuesday, 21 January 2014
It's official, there are EVEN MORE things to worry about after birth.
Had an appointment with the obstetrician today.
This was, of course, brilliant, as I got to leave work early to go to the hospital and then got home early enough to watch Escape to the Country.
However, despite the fact that my actual appointment with the obstetrician lasted, as I had predicted, five minutes, and was basically just a chat where he signed my maternity notes and said I was unlikely to have any problems, I was at the hospital for HOURS. Literally hours.
And this time it was not because I got lost.
First of all I had to queue for ages with loads of other pregnant women while the women on reception faffed about with huge piles of people's maternity notes. Then I had to go and get a urine sample, and then wait for ages and ages (clutching said sample of my own urine. I mean, what is the etiquette here? Does one wrap it in tissue to disguise the offending urine-as I noticed everyone else had done-or does one spend 45 minutes trying to stuff the unwrapped sample up a sleeve to disguise the fact that it's unwrapped, as I did? And what happens if you get it wrong? Does a burly midwife escort you from the premises yelling "ALL URINE SAMPLES NEED TO BE WRAPPED IN TISSUE. THINK OF YOUR MODESTY!") with nothing but a screen showing a rolling film of adverts for overpriced baby products, such as the £19.99 "aid to natural labour" that appeared to be nothing more than a piece of foam to put between your teeth when gritting them during contractions, and a series of public information films on the theme "How to avoid accidentally killing your baby."
Yes, apparently birth is just the start of a lifelong series of hazards that are poised to attack and kill your baby when you least expect it. First of all, the hospital will not let you leave until you can produce some sort of approved baby car seat, which leaves me more than a little flummoxed as I was planning on taking the baby home on the tube. Will I have to prove I can hold the baby effectively so that it doesn't slip onto the electrified tracks? Or demonstrate perfect pram-pushing skills to show that I can "mind the gap?" Then, as if this were not alarming enough, babies can drown in an inch of water in less than a minute (beautifully illustrated by a distressed mother interrupting her child's bath to answer the phone and then having to run back to dramatically rescue the child), they can be scalded by any water hotter than about 2 degrees celsius and if you accidentally breathe in some cigarette smoke in the street (which I do a lot, by the way, and end up walking around with my scarf covering my mouth as though I was battling my way through a desert sandstorm) then the baby is destined to expire from cot death, as warned by a stern-looking Anne Diamond. Good god it's a miracle anyone ever survives to adulthood.
Still, if I had got bored of the public information films, I could have spent some time wandering around the hospital pointing out cracks in the walls and unsightly paint jobs, as there was a useful sign in the toilet reminding one that "it's YOUR hospital" and encouraging the likes of me to point out where parts of the building could be in need of improvements; "a light not working, a patch of peeling paintwork." For Christ's sake have you been to Northwick Park Hospital? The entire building is an eyesore! They should just bulldoze the entire place and start again! It's hardly the place you go to if you want to marvel at one of the wonders of modern architecture, and have a discussion with Kevin McCloud about how well it fits in with the surrounding natural landscape, and you would barely even notice it's there.
Still, I got to come home from work early and watch Escape to the Country, so all was worthwhile. Even if I do think I may have haemorrhoids. Pregnancy is lovely.
This was, of course, brilliant, as I got to leave work early to go to the hospital and then got home early enough to watch Escape to the Country.
However, despite the fact that my actual appointment with the obstetrician lasted, as I had predicted, five minutes, and was basically just a chat where he signed my maternity notes and said I was unlikely to have any problems, I was at the hospital for HOURS. Literally hours.
And this time it was not because I got lost.
First of all I had to queue for ages with loads of other pregnant women while the women on reception faffed about with huge piles of people's maternity notes. Then I had to go and get a urine sample, and then wait for ages and ages (clutching said sample of my own urine. I mean, what is the etiquette here? Does one wrap it in tissue to disguise the offending urine-as I noticed everyone else had done-or does one spend 45 minutes trying to stuff the unwrapped sample up a sleeve to disguise the fact that it's unwrapped, as I did? And what happens if you get it wrong? Does a burly midwife escort you from the premises yelling "ALL URINE SAMPLES NEED TO BE WRAPPED IN TISSUE. THINK OF YOUR MODESTY!") with nothing but a screen showing a rolling film of adverts for overpriced baby products, such as the £19.99 "aid to natural labour" that appeared to be nothing more than a piece of foam to put between your teeth when gritting them during contractions, and a series of public information films on the theme "How to avoid accidentally killing your baby."
Yes, apparently birth is just the start of a lifelong series of hazards that are poised to attack and kill your baby when you least expect it. First of all, the hospital will not let you leave until you can produce some sort of approved baby car seat, which leaves me more than a little flummoxed as I was planning on taking the baby home on the tube. Will I have to prove I can hold the baby effectively so that it doesn't slip onto the electrified tracks? Or demonstrate perfect pram-pushing skills to show that I can "mind the gap?" Then, as if this were not alarming enough, babies can drown in an inch of water in less than a minute (beautifully illustrated by a distressed mother interrupting her child's bath to answer the phone and then having to run back to dramatically rescue the child), they can be scalded by any water hotter than about 2 degrees celsius and if you accidentally breathe in some cigarette smoke in the street (which I do a lot, by the way, and end up walking around with my scarf covering my mouth as though I was battling my way through a desert sandstorm) then the baby is destined to expire from cot death, as warned by a stern-looking Anne Diamond. Good god it's a miracle anyone ever survives to adulthood.
Still, if I had got bored of the public information films, I could have spent some time wandering around the hospital pointing out cracks in the walls and unsightly paint jobs, as there was a useful sign in the toilet reminding one that "it's YOUR hospital" and encouraging the likes of me to point out where parts of the building could be in need of improvements; "a light not working, a patch of peeling paintwork." For Christ's sake have you been to Northwick Park Hospital? The entire building is an eyesore! They should just bulldoze the entire place and start again! It's hardly the place you go to if you want to marvel at one of the wonders of modern architecture, and have a discussion with Kevin McCloud about how well it fits in with the surrounding natural landscape, and you would barely even notice it's there.
Still, I got to come home from work early and watch Escape to the Country, so all was worthwhile. Even if I do think I may have haemorrhoids. Pregnancy is lovely.
Wednesday, 1 January 2014
Cruel and Unusual Symptoms of Pregnancy
I'm back! Already! After just one day!
Obviously this means that one of my hundreds of New Year's Resolutions is to write more often.
The other main one is to clean the flat but I still haven't done that. I'm using morning sickness as an excuse, especially since I threw up three times this morning and was feeling too ropey even to go to Topshop, so ended staying in all day, apart from one ill-fated trip to Asda, which turned out to be closed.
Along with the sickness, this morning I noticed a new and alarming Disgusting Pregnancy Symptom.
I have developed weird brown spots on my nipples.
AAAAAARRRRGHHHH!!!!!
Obviously this required instant googling to check that it wasn't breast cancer. Kylie wasn't much older than me when she had breast cancer was she? How old was she? God I should know this, as a proud owner of the Kylie Annual 1988.
Also, whatever happened to annuals? Do the youngsters still get them for Christmas every year? Is there, in fact, such a thing as the One Direction Annual 2014, for example? I'm going back on the Google to check.
There is, look!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/One-Direction-Official-Annual-Annuals/dp/0007521006
My faith in humanity is restored.
Oh God now I have "One Direction Annual 2014" stored in the saved searches on my computer. Does this make me a suspected peodophile? The spelling of that last word there might be wrong, but I am not checking that on the Google. Definitely not.
Anyway, it's 7.30pm now so I might go to bed soon. There's nothing on TV to keep me awake, as with it being New Year's Day and all, all the TV presenters and other people involved in putting programmes on the television have got the day off, so all they are showing is films. Old films I've seen a million times, like the Karate Kid and Big, but not, it would seem, Brilliant Old Films that one would welcome watching again for the millionth time, like Grease 2 or Dirty Dancing. The other day I thought I had stumbed across Short Circuit but it turned out to be a disappointing modern lookalike called Wall E. When the baby is born, I will make sure it watches all the old classics. Especially Grease 2. Everyone needs a good strong feminist message like "I ain't nobody's trophy."
Anyway, now I am totally off the point. I was supposed to be talking about the brown patches on my areolas.
What, nobody wants to hear about that? Well, I'll be off then.
Obviously this means that one of my hundreds of New Year's Resolutions is to write more often.
The other main one is to clean the flat but I still haven't done that. I'm using morning sickness as an excuse, especially since I threw up three times this morning and was feeling too ropey even to go to Topshop, so ended staying in all day, apart from one ill-fated trip to Asda, which turned out to be closed.
Along with the sickness, this morning I noticed a new and alarming Disgusting Pregnancy Symptom.
I have developed weird brown spots on my nipples.
AAAAAARRRRGHHHH!!!!!
Obviously this required instant googling to check that it wasn't breast cancer. Kylie wasn't much older than me when she had breast cancer was she? How old was she? God I should know this, as a proud owner of the Kylie Annual 1988.
Also, whatever happened to annuals? Do the youngsters still get them for Christmas every year? Is there, in fact, such a thing as the One Direction Annual 2014, for example? I'm going back on the Google to check.
There is, look!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/One-Direction-Official-Annual-Annuals/dp/0007521006
My faith in humanity is restored.
Oh God now I have "One Direction Annual 2014" stored in the saved searches on my computer. Does this make me a suspected peodophile? The spelling of that last word there might be wrong, but I am not checking that on the Google. Definitely not.
Anyway, it's 7.30pm now so I might go to bed soon. There's nothing on TV to keep me awake, as with it being New Year's Day and all, all the TV presenters and other people involved in putting programmes on the television have got the day off, so all they are showing is films. Old films I've seen a million times, like the Karate Kid and Big, but not, it would seem, Brilliant Old Films that one would welcome watching again for the millionth time, like Grease 2 or Dirty Dancing. The other day I thought I had stumbed across Short Circuit but it turned out to be a disappointing modern lookalike called Wall E. When the baby is born, I will make sure it watches all the old classics. Especially Grease 2. Everyone needs a good strong feminist message like "I ain't nobody's trophy."
Anyway, now I am totally off the point. I was supposed to be talking about the brown patches on my areolas.
What, nobody wants to hear about that? Well, I'll be off then.
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