I’m so close to the end of pregnancy! And the very sudden transition to parenthood. That’s not terrifying at all.
THIRD TRIMESTER
Third trimester has been all about coping as best as I can and preparing for life ahead. I have continued to have pelvic and back pain what has slowly gotten worse. I have a lot of difficulty rolling over in bed, getting out of bed in the morning, and moving around first thing (including getting to the bathroom). On the plus side, all the stiffness and pain I had in my neck, upper back, and ribs has resolved due to the increase in relaxin. If I wake up with a stiff neck it is gone within a couple hours.
And stiff necks are common since I have to sleep on an incline in order to avoid heartburn. I have to eat smaller meals, drink lots of water, often have something creamy like milk or ice cream after a more acidic meal, and occasionally take tums in order to keep heartburn away. I know lots of people have worse cases of heartburn than this so in this regard I feel pretty lucky.
As it is currently mid August, I do struggle with overheating (which happens to make heartburn worse as well). Pain also increases my body temperature. And when I overheat, I get woozy, dehydrated, nauseous, and very fatigued. So staying cool is important. I have taken to wearing a damp headband hanging around my neck (like having a damp towel on the back of your neck but it doesn’t fall off) and hanging out in the basement or air conditioned spaces as much as I need to on hot days. As the area I was working in had no air conditioning and routinely got up to 26 degrees C, I ended up going off work a couple weeks earlier than planned.
Mostly, my body feels heavy and painful and every movement or activity takes twice as much effort. I’m still trying to enjoy the aspects of pregnancy that I can while I still get to experience them but more and more I am looking forward to the end of this phase (at which point I am able to start taking naproxen again!).
Other than the physical aspects of the third trimester, this part of my pregnancy has been characterized by looking ahead and preparing for what’s to come. This started with learning about labour and birth and moved on to learning about feeding, baby care, and postpartum experiences. I created a birth plan (descriptions of each stage of labour and reminders of what might be helpful to me during each phase) and a to-do list to prepare for labour and postpartum. My husband and I have used our planned time off in advance of baby to get as much of this list done as we can.
People call this ‘nesting’. I think of it more as responsible urgency. You never know when the baby will make their appearance so getting useful preparations done early makes sense. It’s not that I feel the need to clean the whole house and sterilize every surface. In fact, that was nowhere on the list and I likely won’t have time or energy for it. But I do want to have the nursery ready, some frozen meals prepared, and a hospital to-go bag packed in advance.
I will give you an update of how our postpartum experience compared to what I expect and whether these preparations were helpful once life with a little one feels manageable. And of course, whatever gendery things are going on during that phase as well.
WEIRD PREGNANCY SYMPTOMS
Most of these have nothing to do with gender but I wanted to share some of the more strange symptoms I have experienced that I hadn’t heard about until I asked if others had similar experiences.
I have way more freckles, moles, and other little dark spots than I did before. They are mostly on my chest, shoulders, upper back, and arms. I had lots of these before being pregnant but I have way more now. Will they go away afterwards? I guess we’ll find out!
In the last few weeks I have found my skin to be hypersensitive, especially with repeated stimuli like while having a shower. I can tolerate the water hitting me for 5-8 minutes but then it starts to feel like pins and needles. Stiffer clothes or anything with a label in it is extremely irritating. Even the waistband of my underwear can make my skin itch or sting.
The outside surface of my belly feels almost numb. I have lots of stretch marks which might be related but I figure if I started out with a certain number of nerve endings and then my surface area expanded, I likely have fewer nerves per area of skin. My husband can touch me on the belly and if I don’t see it I won’t even know. One of the more common symptoms is an itchy belly (which I also have sometimes). I wonder if this is due to stretching, muscles getting ready for labour, or my brain’s way of filling in the sensation that I’m missing from that area being mostly numb. Either way, it’s definitely weird.
And lastly, I have grown a thin layer of dark hair all over my belly, a little bit on my chest, and I have long thick peach fuzz below my ears and down my neck and jaw a bit. While most people who are pregnant are disappointed, embarrassed, or weirded out by this, I love it. Unless I take testosterone in the future, this is likely the only time I will have belly, chest, and (kind of) facial hair. Unfortunately, people have said it goes away soon after pregnancy is done. This is one pregnancy symptom I wouldn’t mind keeping.
Are there any other weird pregnancy symptoms you’ve heard of or experienced? Did they interact with your gender at all? Leave a comment below and share your experiences!