Being pregnant is one of the weirdest experiences your body can go through. All of a sudden you become an incubator for a new life: your hormones fluctuate, your appetite goes up and down, and your mood can change in an instant. Add to that the actual physical strain of supporting a growing baby for a whole nine stressful months. You might develop back or knee pain as a result of the extra weight you're carrying around. Not only that, but actually having a baby inside of you can take some getting used to, especially when it decides to start kicking you from the inside. That's not even getting to the subject of the labour and birth itself.
Yes, there are lots of things that people don't tell you about the experience. But if you've got a little one on the way, then fear not; we have some of the answers to all of those questions you've always been too afraid to ask. Recently, a Reddit thread asked moms online to open up about all the little things they experienced while pregnant that they were unprepared for, and the answers were pretty enlightening.
1. Losing control of your bladder"Sometimes the baby WILL kick your bladder and you WILL piss yourself, no warning at all... Also in the last trimester sometimes the baby will seem to flip around and throw you off balance. My last month I had zero balance and randomly pissed my pants...awesome."
2. Leaking nips"In the first few weeks of lactation, hearing a baby cry would trigger my breasts to leak. Not just my baby, any baby. Made for some really awkward moments in public."
3. Itching"33 weeks pregnant here... My boobs and tummy constantly itch and its driving me crazy. Also when you get to 30+ weeks, sit on the edge of the couch if you want to be able to get off of it by yourself."
4. Constipation"Despite all the bran flakes, I'd be severely constipated afterwards, a condition worsened by being torn up down there. The midwife had to administer more gas and air at home 3 days later as having a poo was so unbearable."
5. An improved sex life"It wasn't all bad. Orgasms were way better while pregnant. Around the second semester, after the morning sickness fades, sex just gets more intense, and I was horny ALL the time."
6. Baby hiccups"Completely infuriating but utterly funny. Like someone tickling from the inside."
7. The amount of bleeding"The bleeding after having your baby. I had a c-section, the first time I went to pee the pan looked like a murder had occurred. I pulled the emergency cord, thinking oh my god my insides are falling out. The nurse who came to see me gave me the best WTF look ever and just said 'you just had a baby, that's totally normal'."
8. Morning sickness is a misnomer"Nobody ever warned me that 'morning sickness' is a total misnomer. I worked up until the later stages of pregnancy and had to take lengthy afternoon breaks, because that's when my 'morning sickness' would strike. A friend of mine had it in the evening through late night, but never thought to warn me until I brought it up with her after baby was born."
If you've found these confessions interesting, then you might be curious about what it's like to be pregnant with multiple children at once. Well, here's the personal accounts of 15 mothers who went through that very experience.
