The 3rd trimester recap…I’m thrilled to say that I can finally write this post! I have completed my 3rd trimester and I’m excited to tell you all about my ups and downs of the final 3 months!
- How I’m feeling
- Mind & Body
- Pregnancy During a Pandemic
- 3rd Trimester Fun
- Weekly Bump Progression
The 3rd trimester started off pretty slow. I was extremely excited that I had finally reached it being that I felt like the 2nd trimester was a full year long. Luckily, it started to speed up due to all the fun activities we started to be able to do! In this post, I’m going to walk you through some exciting adventures and then, of course, some downfalls that took me for a loop.
3rd Trimester Body & Mind
Similar to the 2nd trimester I want to give you an update on how my body and my mind are holding up! The first pregnancy, like for all new mamas, is something that really takes you on a wild ride. It’s like Forest Gump said, ‘Life’s like a box of chocolates, You never know what you’re gunna get’. And let me tell you – I live by this quote.
The thing with pregnancy is that unfortunately each one is different. You can google your symptoms all you want but in the end your situation will always be different than the next mama. It’s too bad that there can’t be straight forward steps to this but perhaps a way to look at it is that it can make life exciting? Let’s just say – I’m working on my positive outlooks!
I want to first start off by saying that I’ve done very well during this pregnancy. I’m writing this at 38 weeks and feeling overjoyed to meet this boy. It’s true what other mamas say, “you love the babe but it’s time to come out!” I do love this little boy and I want to meet him very much so I keep asking him to come on out and meet us. However, I think he wants to hang out safe and sound in my belly for a wee bit longer – I don’t blame him really.
My mind
I’d like to say that overall my mind has been unchanged and that I am the same as I was before pregnancy but I’d be lying. They say once you have a baby your life changes forever and I must say that I feel like my life has already changed dramatically and baby boy hasn’t even popped out yet. All I think about is this little boy and I just imagine our life with him in it so, my selfish mind just wants him to be here already so I can watch him grow.
It’s quite phenomenal how this can change you but I’m not surprised. My husband and I created life and he is almost here to make his debut. I’m still in shock really. I often ask myself, “do we have everything ready and set up for him to come into a safe environment, to a clean space, and to a world where he will be loved for being himself?” I’m so excited to be his mama and I hope he knows how much he is loved already.
So yes, my mind has changed, in my opinion, for the better. Every time I take a step or I go into a baby store or see a family on a show I think about our little boy. When I haven’t felt him move in a little while – I lay down in a position I know he’ll move and when he does it puts a huge smile on my face. When the nurse asks me which side we hear his heartbeat on (the right side of course) – it makes me feel like I know him already.
I used to get extremely annoyed with seeing pregnant women rub their bellies in public – like really what are you doing? Oh – now, I get it; I completely get it. There is this weird nurturing feeling you get that you just want to rub your belly because thats the only way to feel your baby. There are several things that put a smile on my face during pregnancy but my favorite one is seeing my husband read to my belly hoping baby boy is listening; he is. I’ve not seen him kick so much until daddy comes over and reads a silly zebra book to him – boom boom kick baby kick! <3 it truly is the sweetest and most memorable.
Things like this are hard to explain to others but it really eases my mind that the two of us are going to be there for this boy and no one is going to stop us. We are going to raise him how we see fit and we are going to love him with all of our hearts no matter how silly we are. We are a family. So – my mind… is happy; my mind is… serene.
My Body
Your mind is such a complex engine but honestly, so is your body. A scientist will tell you that everything with your body can be explained. A yoga teacher will tell you that your body is your temple so what you do with it changes the outcome. And google will tell you that you’re most likely dying.
Before I even started this pregnancy I told myself and my husband that all I’m going to eat are veggies and healthy food. Why do I come up with these crazy things? I couldn’t tell you because I must have been out of my mind. These days, I tell myself, “hey – don’t starve yourself, if you want the pasta – eat the pasta.” I also tell myself that I hope baby comes out hating pasta and fries and craves veggies because he didn’t get that in the womb. Anyone want to take bets on what will come of that? Yeah – me neither.
As we all know, my body has changed dramatically; weird – there is a human growing in my belly!! There are a few things I’d like to point out that are a bit unique to my situation regarding the changing of my body. My 3rd trimester body strugglers were as follows:
- Aching Back (no surprise)
- Limited Mobility (also, no surprise)
- Increased Sensitive Skin
- Stretch Marks
- 3rd Trimester Braxton Hicks & Lightning
- Headaches
- Loss of Voice
The first one is 100% obvious – there is no doubt about that. My low back hurts so much that I truly feel like it’s going to break when I stand up or walk around for too long. Just when I think standing is hard – okay sitting hurts so you try to get up… let’s not get crazy girl you are going to need help there too. This aspect of the whole process is most likely my most hated part. Don’t get me wrong – I am all for sitting and doing nothing but I want to do that on my own terms – not being forced. I hate the fact that my husband has to do everything around the house – he is truly a god send. I’m so blessed for such an amazing partner to be going through this with me. I feel like I’ve done nothing to deserve such grace and patience but I’m unbelievably happy to have it.
Sensitive Skin
As far as sensitive skin – this one is really interesting to me. Over the years I have noticed that my skin is easily irritated. I’m not overly thrilled about this either. I knew I had a sensitive face when my mom’s fancy facial mask made my face look like a tomato but other than that – I didn’t think anything of it. Recently, my skin and muscles get irritated easily. Previously, I mentioned that I was using multiple creams and lotions to prevent stretch marks – but I still got them (now not surprised). I wish that stretch marks didn’t get a bad rep but it is what it is. Fortunately (unfortunately), I have stretch marks from childhood so I know how they are and that they don’t easily go away.
One of the things I do with my skin is I itch like crazy (even before pregnancy). It wasn’t a surprise that when my legs and belly started to itch that this was going to be a struggle for me. I used lots of lotion, creams and body wash but unfortunately – it still itched. One day, there was a sore on my leg that I don’t remember bumping into anything but there showed up a bruise! My skin was so sensitive that my minimal itch turned into a bruise; I found that to be the weirdest thing! It went away pretty quickly though.
3rd Trimester Braxton Hicks, Lightning & Headaches
When it comes to Braxton Hicks contractions and Lightning, it took me a while to recognize them. They didn’t show up until about 34 weeks or so which I was told was ‘normal’ for first time moms. Now, I feel them quite often but not for very long and generally at night. The lightning is, in my opinion, worse than Braxton Hicks right now. It is such a weird feeling and I think that if I could go without anything I would choose that.
For Christmas, yes… unfortunately during Christmas, I managed to snag a headache that lasted from the day before Christmas Eve through Christmas. This was highly unpleasant because we already were bummed that Christmas was a little lack luster this year that fate had to give me a headache. I suppose I should be grateful that I haven’t had one in months but, I was confused because well, I hadn’t had one in months. I reached out to my doctor and they told me as long as Tylenol was working and that I didn’t have any other symptoms that I should just ride it out (essentially). Then for my 38 week appointment my blood pressure rose. Thinking that the two could be connected, I was required to take a bunch of tests to see if I had signs of late preeclampsia. Luckily – all tests and the additional blood pressure test the next day came back negative. Nothing like the fear of getting preeclampsia to get your heart rate going…
Loss of Voice
Lastly, I wanted to bring up a very strange thing I came across recently. My husband and I sat down in our nursery to begin discussing what we were going to pack for baby’s hospital bag. Then, out of nowhere I wasn’t able to speak. To back up a tiny bit…We had recently done a video chat with family the night prior for our Christmas gift opening call that was 5 hours long. I had a random bloody nose in the middle of the call (no one knows if this was relevant). When we went to bed and I woke up in the middle of the night – I realized I had a sore throat so I took some Tylenol. Boom woke up and it was gone! woo hoo!
Not woo hoo… in the evening when we went to pack baby’s bag and I tried to speak I would get this shooting pain in the left side of my throat. I eventually started to get very emotional and went into a break down because I didn’t understand why this was happening to me. It hurt so bad. We ended up trying an online call with a doctor to see if it was worth going into the clinic – it was. We went to urgent care and unfortunately no one could explain what was happening to me. In the end – they gave me more Tylenol and told me to rest with no talking and to see if that would help – it did. Luckily the next day it was gone. However, a week later when I spoke with my boss for an hour online it had come back. My husband and I started to believe that pregnancy could affect your vocal cords. Remember when I said that every pregnancy is different and no one can really tell you whats going to happen? Apparently, mine comes with faulty vocal cords. However, I asked my doctor about this and she didn’t understand nor did she think that pregnancy would affect your vocals. Alas. The mystery is yet unsolved.
Pregnancy During A Pandemic
It sounds like the year of 2020 was the year that America had a miniature baby boom and yes we were apart of that even though baby’s due date is January 2021. I mean, let’s be real – if you’re stuck inside with your significant other for months on end… there’s only so much you can do ;).
The nice thing about pregnancy during a pandemic is that working from home makes it easy to deal with things like morning sickness and prenatal appointments. Gratefully, my company and boss were extremely flexible when it came to those appointments and when I didn’t feel good.
Though there are a lot of benefits when it came to being pregnant during a pandemic; there were also some downfalls. The biggest being that my husband (baby daddy) could not attend any of the appointments except for Week 12 and Week 19. We all know that there are ways to be involved via phone/internet but there’s obviously something about being there in person that makes a difference. It got a little lonely going to each appointment alone for such an important time in both my husband and I’s life.
Another downfall with pregnancy during a pandemic was that the gatherings/parties that one has were tremendously different. We had to change the way we thought when it came to hosting a gender reveal party or a baby shower. When planning these events you had to think about how many people we could invite and the safety of the guests due to Covid. That’s not to say that we didn’t learn something from this because we definitely did!
Lastly, due to the pandemic we also had to limit our in-person time with our immediate family. We found out that our hospital wouldn’t allow Zach in for the birth if he had Covid so – we had to make sure that we saw the least amount of people as possible. Thus, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years were spent alone. I know that this was the direction of the CDC but – it was very difficult for me to not get to see my parents and Zach’s parents at ALL in-person. It definitely made the holiday season not as special.
The Fun 3rd Trimester Activities
- Finished The Nursery –> August’s Modern Woodland Nursery
- Building all the furniture
- Baby Shower –> The Best Chic Woodland Baby Shower
- Maternity Photos –> Studio Maternity Photos
- Started packing the hospital bags –> What You Should Actually Pack in Your Hospital Bag
- Prenatal Classes
- Prepping Bottles and doing laundry
- Weekly Bump Progression
Zach was such a gem when it came to helping prep for the nursery. We have a post about it that I listen above but during the 3rd Trimester Zach graciously built all the new furniture that is going in baby’s room! It was a lot of hard work and Zach did it all with a huge smile on his face!
I’m going to be putting together a post about the before and after use of our hospital bags. I think you will find that post very interesting!
I spoke above about pregnancy during a pandemic and one other thing regarding that is the prenatal classes. One of the things I was looking forward to was going to in-person prenatal classes but unfortunately, all of these were switched to online only. I’m grateful that they were still able to host them but I do wish they could have been in-person and more hands on.
It’s amazing how long cleaning bottles and doing laundry it takes when you are prepping for the arrival of a newborn. There are so many rules when it comes to cleaning bottles so we had to do our research and just make sure that they are properly cleaned in time for baby. I spoke about detergent in my registry items post so we used Seventh Heaven detergent to clean all of his clothes we received from our friends and family. Let me tell you – it took forever but it will be nice to not have to worry about it when he is actually here!
Each week starting Tuesday, June 9th (9 weeks) I had my husband take my photo so that I could see how my bump and body would grow throughout pregnancy! We took a more ‘fashion’ shot that you can see all over my site and instagram. Then, we took photos of me in the same dress and the same location in our apartment to see how my bump would grow! Lastly, we took a photo with a polaroid to save the moment in a fun way; I also recorded my weight each week.
In Conclusion
The 3rd Trimester was long, tiring, and made me very impatient but ended in happy news. I can’t say that I loved every moment of pregnancy because who really does? There are always ups and downs with anything in our lives but I try to cherish the ups and learn from the downs.
I loved the baby kicks and dreaming of who our baby will be when he grows up. I didn’t love not being able to walk without running out of breath or not helping around the house. But luckily, I had my perfect husband there the entire way through. If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t have been able to get through it.
As always, I appreciate you reading my journey and my thoughts about pregnancy. I’m no expert in the matter but I do like to record my thoughts on life changing events and maybe someday some of my words will help someone.
Until Next Time,
Looking for some other great material? Check out my 2nd Trimeter Recap & maybe my husband post on his view of fatherhood –> An Art Gallery in the Dark – New Fatherhood
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