I first suspected pregnancy while I was on the cruise back in December because I had never been so bloated in my life.  I mean, PMS makes me bloat, but this was just unreal. (Of course looking back at the pictures I don't know how I was so self-conscious in my bikini, because compared to my third trimester bump that little 3-week baby belly bloat looked so flat). The symptom I didn't recognize: EXHAUSTION. I missed family game night almost every single night because I literally couldn't keep my eyes open. We were on the world's most relaxing vacation, but I was CRASHING. One night Dallin wanted to go to the comedy show, so I made a compromise that I would go only if I could sleep after dinner and then have him wake me up at 10 for the show.  

Because I'd been trying to get pregnant since August, I was wary of what I consumed and had, following Dallin's mom's advice, started putting on progesterone cream just a week or two before. As I mentioned in a previous post, I took a false negative test on Christmas Eve, threw up on the 26th, and then took a positive test on the 28th.  I felt pretty good during weeks 4 and 5, but then week 6 came and I was so sick. I started throwing up a couple times a day and ate a lot of bread and Gatorade since those were some of the few things I could keep down.  At one point I nearly fainted at work and, unable to be productive when I was so woozy from lack of nutrition, finally called my doctor for nausea meds. I don't know why I was under the impression that I had to be deathly ill before they prescribed anything--if I had realized how sympathetic they would be, I would have gotten nausea meds sooner!  We tried a few, but Promethazine was the pill for me. I've tried to wean off it a couple times but I just feel so much better when I'm on it. My mom was so astounded that I got morning sickness because she and her sisters never did, and neither did my paternal grandma... but I guess the gene pool didn't work in my favor with that regard. Otherwise, I was SUPER tired and on weekends would sleep half the day away.   

Honestly, I was just trying to get through the first trimester because I was so nervous about miscarriage. I told family and close friends in the early weeks of pregnancy with the awareness that I would have to tell them all if I miscarried. People started finding out at work before that 12-week mark, partially because I was getting too excited to wait and partially because I was starting to show. But hitting the 12-week mark was such a tremendous relief, and though I knew it didn't "guarantee" a healthy pregnancy, at least the statistics were in my favor now. I felt like I could finally bond more with my baby and start thinking about the future more.  

 

10 weeks pregnant and unsure what to wear -- I bought these pants, which only lasted a few weeks before my belly was too big.