The Pee Club

Back when I was trying very hard to get pregnant, I visited my OB/GYN's office regularly so he could monitor my medicated cycles (I was using Clomid). When I was there, many pregnant women were coming in for their appointments and when they arrived they were always told to go ahead and go leave their sample now. Pregnant women pee in a cup with every Dr. visit. During pregnancy they dipstick the urine to check for glucose, protein, and bacteria, as UTI's, gestational diabetes (which causes glucose to spill into urine), and high blood pressure (which can cause protein in the urine) are all common in pregnancy and need to be treated.

Yesterday I joined the "Pee Club." It was a good moment for me, though I'm sure it sounds ridiculous.

So now I'm going to write about the 1st three months of pregnancy. Yep, I'm 12 weeks now (baby is the size of a plum) and I am going to write to you how it went for me. I am not going to sugar coat it. But I want you to know that despite EVERYTHING I'm about to write about here (and it will seem like I'm whining at times I'm sure) I would NOT TRADE THIS FOR ANYTHING. There is a healthy baby growing inside of me right now. If a daily barf session is what gets this kid into my arms then so be it.

First off. Everyone has asked me how I knew I was pregnant. I didn't really "know." I had gone to a pool party on a 113 degree day and when I got home I passed out for two hours, and woke up with what I likely thought was heat stroke. But then, I was due for my period and it hadn't started yet, which was no biggie since I'm kind of an irregular gal. The only weird thing was that my boobs didn't hurt and they always hurt before aunt Flow arrived. Anyway, I decided to take a test. I mean, who knows when I ovulated (nope, I wasn't paying a bit of attention) and...lets be honest....had we even had sex? So, I peed on a stick for a kazillionth time and....there was a faint second line. Now let me tell you that I have torn tests apart to FIND a second line, and taken pictures of tests to play with the saturation and brightness on the computer and see if a second line was hiding but this time, there just was one. It was very faint. But it was there. My husband was down in the garage and every plan or idea that I'd ever had to tell him I was pregnant ran out the window I HAD to know, did he see it too? So I ran downstairs, shoved the pee stick in his face and said, "do you fucking see that?" Classy, I know. He saw it. 48 hours later I tested again, and the line was clearly there. Holy shit we're pregnant. I'm pregnant. I actually got pregnant.

So here they are, the pregnancy symptoms for months 1-3....

1. Huge boobs. Yep, the knockers knock. They knock against each other, they even rest on my starting to pop belly. They got sore for a couple weeks around week 6, but it was nothing to write home about. I'm so used to soreness before my period it didn't seems worse than that, but they are HUGE.

2. I have the worst taste in my mouth. All. The. Time. It's like metal, but sometimes it's like green beans. It's just not good. And it NEVER goes away unless I'm eating something or sucking on something (stop it you sick minded readers). I will discuss this more in the nausea section because I attribute a good portion of the nausea to my bad tasting mouth. You may think....well why don't you just brush your teeth? Great idea, except brushing my teeth makes me dry heave every time. And I mean, every time. And cleaning vomit out of the sink when your nauseous is no bueno.

3. Ok lets go there: nausea. Here is how it went for me: 6 weeks- on and off queasiness. If I didn't wanna eat something I really didn't wanna eat it. I would get flushed, nauseous, and then it would go away. Those were the good ol' days. 8 weeks- nausea. It was there but I could manage it by keeping something in my stomach, munching on crackers, chewing mint gum, and hydrating. 10 weeks- holy effing nausea, and this is when I started throwing up almost every day. By this point I HATED saltines, ginger ale, and preggie pops. These things used to be my BFF's but we broke up at week 10. Now it was graham crackers, gatorade or any type of berry flavored water (plain water was no good), and mint gum. 12 weeks- for the past couple days I have been sicker than EVER. I have gone and thrown up once while writing this. Mint gum is no longer a friend, I've switched to cinnamon. I can do graham crackers but have switched to honey nut cheerios. My saving grace is eating carbs: bagels, waffles with just butter, I keep cereal in my car, in my locker at work, I love cereal. The nausea is the toughest part. I  have missed a few days of work, which I hate both because I don't like to be "that girl that calls in sick" and I want to save my time off for when the baby comes. And, I am the super cool person who got a prescription for Zofran (the save all anti nausea medicine) and it doesn't work, not even a little bit.

3 1/2. But then there is the other side of nausea: hunger. I literally can go from dry heaving to starving in seconds. It's really weird. And if my tummy starts to growl, I need to eat, like 5 minutes ago, or the nausea will set in. I have a love affair with food because when I actually want something, I will do anything I can to get it. Sometimes I get so excited about my morning bagel that I dream about it. Ridiculous I know.

4. I look oddly fat. Like I drink a lot of beer and eat a lot of cheeseburgers. This is thanks to my growing uterus, constipation, and probably because I eat carbs like an addict.

5. Constipation. Holy frick. Jenny McCarthy describes it as "passing stonehenge" and I am going to leave it at that. But if you are pregnant, or plan on being pregnant, I would highly recommend her book "Belly Laughs." It's hilarious and true.

6. The Pee Club. Not just the club at the Dr's office, I pee constantly. I get up at least 3-4 times a night to pee. And I can not really have to go, then change my position and need to go right now. It's great.

7. Psycho emotional chick. Yes, she comes out to play. Let me just give you an example: There was about a 10 day period where I really liked McDonald's hamburger and fries. I ate one every few days, not gonna lie. My husband I had gone out of town for a wedding, and I was reaching a point of hunger that was going to lead to nausea very soon, so I asked him to please find me a McDonalds and get me some food. He decided to order a quarter pounder meal for himself, and a two hamburger meal for me, and he would eat the other hamburger. Well my husband doesn't like onions. So he decides to make it less confusing for the McDonald's people and he orders no onions ON EVERYTHING. Ok, here's the deal. There aren't many things that I really enjoy eating at this point in my pregnancy, so if you change something on my order without clearing it with me, there will be blood. I screamed at him about it IN the drive through, and then when I bit into my onionless hamburger I cried. Yep....I'm not too proud to tell you all the truth. I cried. I wanted my sandwich my way and he messed it up. This is what I am talking about when I say "Psycho emotional chick." My poor husband.

That's pretty much all there is. Oh, I did leave out, I had a lot of cramping and pulling those first few weeks. It was scary. I felt like my period was starting constantly. I would run into the bathroom to check and there'd be nothing. I called my Dr's office twice to ask about it and the reassured me both times but the cramping was really scary for me.

I am almost out of the first trimester. I hope when it leaves the nausea will too. Time will tell, and every day I thank God over and over again for this little one. I am blessed.