Was Pregnancy What You Expected?

[Polly]

I now how two friends who are expecting, again. Most people seem to be more pragmatic about the second and subsequent pregnancies.

What about pregnacy met your expectations? What didn't?

[Sam]

Well I didn't glow, feel healthy or anything quite so nice.

Apart from the first tri this PG has been ok. I am not a good pregnant person and that surprised me. I expected to love it all.

Get to your 5th and you become VERY pragmatic LOL.

[Kristen]

Nope. I didn't expect to have the terrible difficulties with hyperemesis, that's for sure. The rest of the women in my family are usually just vaguely nauseous.

I didn't expect to adore pregnancy, but I didn't except it to be the horrible experience that it was. I love my kids, and I'm thankful I have them...it's just that the process of getting them here left much to be desired.

[Tobye]

Yeah, I kept waiting for the glow, but it never came. I always thought, hoped, I'd be one of those "cute" pregnant women with just the cute little pregnancy belly, but I wasn't. I seemed to expand everywhere and looked more like a barrel with a large basketball stuck to the side. Plus, with Riley, I had really bad back and chest acne that itched terribly.

[Mary]

The first and second times, yes, it was pretty much what I expected. I didn't expect to have any issues and I didn't. I expected that I wouldn't turn into the stereotypical nutty pregnant woman, and I didn't. I didn't expect to be all enamored with the process (I wasn't) but I also didn't expect I'd hate it (I didn't).

The third time, though, no; it absolutely wasn't what I'd expected. I assumed it would be, not identical, but fairly similar to the first two times. I never expected I'd be sick for 35 weeks or that I'd lose my ever-lovin' mind toward the end. I mean, I know that everyone says all pregnancies are different, blah blah. I got that. I wasn't expecting it to mirror either of the other two exactly. But I just didn't think I had any reason to believe it would be so drastically different. The first time was fairly easy and the second time was even easier, so I just didn't think that I would suddenly have a miserable pregnancy after two pretty painless ones. I guess I figured if my body was going to object to being pregnant it would've done so the first time, not after I'd already done it twice!

[Christine]

No it really wasn't.

I expected pregnancy to basically be a round belly, baby kicks and nesting feelings. I never expected that it would involve my entire body - from my hormones, to my feet. I didn't expect the heavy fatigue at the beginning, the sciatica, the huge hormonal changes. I also didn't expect that my sex drive would run from super high to complete non-existent. And I definitely didn't expect to expand everywhere!

On the flip side, I really didn't expect the overwhelming love I had for the baby before I ever met her (all four times). I didn't expect to get so excited about the kicks and the movement, even when it was uncomfortable. The biggest surprise for me was getting so completely in tune with my body, which increased with each pregnancy.