The First Trimester: Bliss & Blues

As I sit here and write this, my day is mostly behind me. It is dark in my house, lit only by the glow of our Christmas tree and a few of our LED holiday decorations. My day looked incredibly different than a Sunday normally would. I woke up later than normal, despite going to bed shockingly early for a Saturday night. I went from my bed, to the couch, where I stayed until around lunch time. It’s hard to do much outside of laying horizontally when you are bogged down with queasiness worse than any hangover you’ve ever had. Add in some intense fatigue and it’s a whole recipe for dubbing yourself queen of the chaise lounge.

The symptoms can be debilitating in a way that is hard to describe. I’ve sat many of days from my home office wondering how in the world people work traditional 9-5 jobs in an office setting with these kind of symptoms overtaking their bodies. And although these side effects can be incredibly hard to persevere through, there is a certain amount of comfort in them. With symptoms, you are reassured about the viability of your pregnancy. I cannot tell you the number of times I’ve heard, “Nausea? Great sign!”. Comments like that velcro to your subconscious. So although you are suffering through the majority of your day, you can’t help but be grateful for what you are feeling.

Now imagine those symptoms fluctuate. One day you feel like you are knocking on death’s door (but remember, somewhat thankful for it) and the next, you feel like your old self. Your pre-pregnancy self. No queasiness, not much fatigue. And that breast tenderness sure did just disappear.

Insert panic.

All of those symptoms that you cursed but brought you a sense of reassurance are now gone. Poof. Vanished. Which must of course mean that the little jelly bean that you are working hard to grow has also vanished. Poof. Just like that.

Talk about a rollercoaster of emotions.

This is just one example of what I did not expect in the first trimester. The worry. The constant anxiety of whether or not everything is okay. Never your mind that you are already exhausted from growing a human; let’s add in mind numbing stress about how the baby is doing! This is especially hard as a couple that underwent IVF because you find out you are pregnant so early. Since you are very deliberately trying to get pregnant and know exactly the date that an embryo was placed in your uterus, you normally take a pregnancy test when you are not even to the 5 week mark. When Laine and I found out we were expecting, I was just 4 weeks pregnant on the dot. A large majority of straight couples do not find out they are pregnant until around 6 weeks, sometimes well past that if not actively trying to get pregnant. All of that to say, knowing you are pregnant for that long in the first trimester when your pregnancy is most vulnerable is incredibly trying on your mental health. I don’t think this is spoken about enough and I am sure that not all women experience the fear and anxiety. But for those that do or that have, GIRL I see you.

Quite honestly, I am not sure anyone can prepare you for the way in which pregnancy will rock your world in those first 13 weeks. You hear women talk about it and you halfway listen. But it’s hard to fully understand until you have gone through it. I will be the first to admit, I imagined SO much more glow. By that I do not mean an actual glow – but a life glow.

Let me explain. Once I found out we were pregnant, I started planning all of the things that I wanted to consume. I envisioned a plethora of green juices and smoothies, fresh salads packed with nutrients, and a whole lot of plant based protein. I am normally a pretty healthy eater; I like to eat my fruits and veggies and never started a morning without a protein packed egg scramble. However, I had big plans of stepping up my healthy eating lifestyle even more. Along with all of this incredibly nutritious food, I also envisioned a ton of body movement. Barre class, cycle, weight training, and long walks and yoga for recovery. I am a very active person. It brings me so much joy to start my day with movement. So I couldn’t wait to continue this trend with some modifications where necessary.

Well. WELL WELL WELL. If I can give my first bit of unsolicited advice to any newly pregnant mamas: do not have first trimester expectations! The joke was completely on me.

Once I started to feel those classic first trimester symptoms, I couldn’t even look at a vegetable much less consume one. I actually had multiple occasions where I tried to force myself to eat just a few bites of a veggie, and had to spit out what I had tried to eat into the trashcan. Cute, I know. This completely shattered all of my dreams of green drinks and freshly made salads. I physically could not stomach them if I tried. In regards to what I COULD consume, it consisted of this: bread, pasta, crackers, bread, potatoes, and more bread. My body refused just about anything that was not a carb. This was incredibly hard for me as I am used to eating a well balanced diet and I constantly felt guilt about not giving my baby any necessary nutrients. Every pregnancy pamphlet or blog post will advice you to eat “a healthy, balanced diet with plenty of fruits and vegetables”. None of that advice ever had a caveat that stated “but if you are only able to eat carbs, that’s okay too!” I had to give myself an incredible amount of grace throughout these food aversions. I knew in my heart that the most important thing was that I was fed, even if that meant with a PB&J for lunch and mac-n-cheese for dinner. But it was hard to shake the guilt of not eating quite as nutritious as I was used to for both myself and our growing babe.

What has helped me throughout healthy eating aversions? Find a somewhat healthy alternative to the comfort food you are craving! My best example to this has been mac-n-cheese. Y’all. I haven’t had a box of mac-n-cheese in my house since I was in college. That is not to say I do not eat mac-n-cheese, I am not a monster. It’s one of my favorite side dishes at restaurants and I will absolutely order it if on a menu. However, I have not kept the stuff in my house for YEARS. Until pregnancy. A bowl of good old fashioned Kraft mac-n-cheese just sounded simple and good. However, I instead discovered that Banza – a company that makes pasta out of chickpeas – makes boxed mac-n-cheese. Its packed with protein, which is a nutrient that really helped me to feel less queasy. Although still much different than anything I would normally consume for dinner, this made me feel more at ease and helped me to still eat what sounded good while feeling like I was still putting some good nutrients in my body. Some other examples: chocolate protein shakes that I would pack with spinach before blending (can’t taste the veggie but it’s there!), protein waffles and protein oatmeal for the mornings (I was loving Kodiak Cake Protein Packed Waffles and RX Oats Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal), cauliflower pizza (this one was a stretch but I made myself feel like I was at least getting a trace of veggies with that cauliflower crust), and veggie chicken nuggets (my favorite brand is MorningStar Farms).

I also had to give myself plenty of grace when it came to my desires to keep exercising. While I have tried to stay somewhat consistently active throughout the pregnancy so far, it looks nothing like I imagined. All of my workouts are 30 minutes or less, unless I am on a long steady walk. Some weeks I am able to make five workout days happen, others its just two to three. Week six to seven of pregnancy, it was none. As someone who, prior to conceiving, woke up almost every day and completed a workout and even taught cycle classes once a week, this was very challenging for me. This one has much more to do with my mental health than my physical health. I am much less concerned with how my workouts change my body than I am with how they aid in my daily joy. When I do not move, I feel less energetic and more anxious. So although it has not been up to the intensity or frequency that I expected, I am very grateful that I have had the ability to continue being active in one way or another so far.

What has helped me stay active? First and foremost, being kind to myself. Instead of forcing myself to do anything, I wake up every morning and access how I feel. Sometimes that has led me to being able to do a more cardio focused workout, while other mornings that assessment has told me that a slow and steady stretch class will be all that I can muster. And of course on plenty of days, my body told me no movement at all would be best. Now, this has kept me active because instead of just getting in the habit of not working out at all, I took the time every morning to make it a priority to make that decision on whether or not I could work in some movement. I was holding myself accountable by asking myself: do you just not WANT to workout, or do you truly feel like you can’t? So often this helped me to identify how I was actually feeling and many of mornings led me to getting in some form of exercise. Secondly, I opened my mind to ANY kind of movement. Prior to pregnancy, I was all about Cycle classes, HIIT formats, heavy weight lifting, and boot camp style work outs. During pregnancy so far, I have considered any type of movement a win. A walk, slow and mindful yoga, cleaning the house or re-organizing a closet. I have been able to work in some of those old styles of workouts when I have felt exceptionally great, but lots of days a brisk walk was the ticket! Anything outside of laying on the couch turned into a chance to check off the movement box.

I recently saw a blog post that talked all about how experienced moms need to stop scaring new moms. As I read it, I could not agree with it more. However, as I write this, I can’t help but feel like I may be doing the same thing to newly pregnant women. I want to make it clear – I do not say any of this to promote fear! I write this because I searched and searched for blogs, forums, or instagram posts discussing how the first trimester can be challenging mentally (not just physically), and couldn’t find much at all. The first trimester has been HARD for me. That feels scary to admit considering how badly we wanted to get pregnant. But between the constant worry, the complete change in diet, the drastic modification in my work out routine, and simply not feeling well day in and day out, it has been hard for me to find the joy. PHEW, that felt good to say.

I am ecstatic about our pregnancy and the chance that we have been given to be parents to our sweet, growing babe. But I think it is important to note that it is okay to feel both bliss and blues, no matter what stage of pregnancy we are in. And I think it is even more important to make it known that I can say this while still being deeply empathetic to those that struggle with fertility. I know that many of yearning mamas would give anything to be sick all day if it meant they were growing a baby. Which is why through the valleys, I’ve consistently found my way back to gratitude.

Being just a day away from the the second trimester, I am starting to really allow myself to feel excitement about how our world is going to change (which is easier to do when you are not queasy every second of the day). I cannot wait to be a mama to this little one and there’s zero doubt in my mind that the lack of vegetables or missed workouts in these last 13 weeks will be the farthest thing from my mind once he or she is here. Just like every single doctors appointment and progesterone injection were worth it, I know that all of these nausea ridden days will feel like a distant memory when we finally get to hold our baby. Counting down the seconds!