Every woman’s pregnancy journey is a little different. For some, it’s a wonderful, exciting journey that they breeze through with very minimal side effects. For others, it’s hard just getting out of bed every morning due to unbearable morning sickness.
While you come to expect a lot of potentially nasty side effects and discomfort, there’s a surprising number of ailments and experiences you can go through in pregnancy which you may not be aware of. So, here, we’ll look at 10 things nobody tells you about pregnancy to ensure you’re well-prepared.
Table of Contents
1. Morning Sickness Isn’t Restricted To Just Mornings!
With morning sickness, it’s logical to assume you’re going to feel sick in the mornings throughout the first trimester. However, for many pregnant women the term “morning sickness” couldn’t be less accurate. You may very well feel sick in the mornings, but there’s a chance you’ll also feel sick in the afternoons and even the evenings too! So, it would be much better suited to the term “all-day sickness”.
It’s one of the main symptoms many women are totally unprepared for. The all-day sickness can range from feeling a little queasy, to what feels like you’re vomiting non-stop. If you do experience severe sickness, it’s worth visiting the doctor as you could be suffering from a condition known as Hyperemesis Gravidarum. This is an extreme form of morning sickness which can result in hospitalization.
2. Eating Healthy Becomes Extremely Difficult
When you first find out you’re pregnant, you may have the very best intentions to eat healthily. Under no circumstances will you fall into the “eating for two” excuse to be greedy. However, the cravings developed throughout the pregnancy can be really difficult to ignore.
Many women find themselves suddenly craving junk food. Anything carb-related will become a must-eat food. So, expect to start indulging in doughnuts, cakes, bread and cookies. Eating healthy can be extremely difficult during pregnancy so this is definitely something to be aware of!
3. You’ll Get Some Seriously Weird Cravings
Speaking of diet, you’ll also develop some pretty weird cravings. Now, cravings are a well-known part of pregnancy and you expect them to be weird to some degree. However, while you may be expecting to start indulging in strange food combinations such as ice cream and pickles, what you may not be expecting is a craving for sponges!
It’s actually pretty common for women to crave seriously weird non-food items when they’re pregnant. As well as chewing on new sponges, some women find they’re attracted to the smell of dust, others even crave charcoal. If you do experience these types of cravings, it’s best to visit a doctor as chewing on sponges and charcoal may have nasty side effects.
4. You May Experience Pelvic Pain
Pregnancy, especially the later stages, is packed full of aches and pains. However, pelvis pain isn’t something you’re typically prepared for. As your body gets ready to give birth, it starts to go through quite a lot of changes. A hormone known as “Relaxin”, is released to soften up the tendons, muscles and ligaments. This allows much more flexibility, but it can also cause problems for some women later in pregnancy.
The pelvis is made up of two halves and they’re held together by a joint. In later pregnancy, this joint can separate completely, triggering Symphysis Pubis Dysfunction. This in turn can cause a lot of backache and pain when standing, sitting and walking.
5. You May Develop Hemorrhoids
Another medical condition you likely aren’t prepared for is hemorrhoids. It’s estimated around 50% of pregnant women develop hemorrhoids throughout their pregnancy. They do usually disappear after the birth, but in the meantime, they can be extremely uncomfortable to live with.
Another thing which doesn’t help, is that your expanding uterus places a lot more pressure onto the veins within the rectum. This can cause the hemorrhoids to become worse. You’ll especially find it painful or uncomfortable to sit for long periods of time – something you’ll definitely want to do during the later stages of pregnancy!
6. Leaking Issues
At some point, your breasts are going to start to leak. However, it’s the leakage which comes from other parts of the body which can come as a surprise. Vaginal discharge is extremely common in the later stages. You’ll start to feel like you’re leaking from practically every orifice.
7. You May Start To Have Pretty Weird Dreams
A lot of pregnant women experience very vivid dreams. It’s all down to the changing hormone levels and the types of dreams you have will depend upon which stage of pregnancy you’re at.
Pregnant women are also more likely to remember their dreams. This is because you typically spend more time sleeping and waking up more throughout the night. Whether it’s because baby is moving around, you develop heartburn or you need to get up more frequently to urinate – the waking stage is when you typically remember the dreams you were having.
8. People May Start To Drive You Crazy
At first, seeing the joy on everyone’s faces when you reveal your pregnancy and your bump starts to show, can be amazing. You love the attention and the excitement over your little miracle. However, it can soon start to go from awesome to annoying!
You’ll find complete strangers start coming up to you, automatically placing their hand on your bump. You’ll start to receive all kinds of unsolicited advice and opinions, not just on pregnancy, but the birth and how you should handle baby’s first year. You’ll even start to hear some pretty horrendous birth stories which, let’s face it, you could really do without!
It will drive you crazy and no doubt increase your anxiety levels! However, it’s best to smile politely, nod, and remember this is your journey and although annoying, other people do mean well.
9. The First Sonogram Is Nothing Like You Expect
The most common image of a sonogram you tend to have, is where you’re lying on a bed with a doctor rubbing cold gel and a little device over your stomach. It’s what you’ve seen on TV many times before. However, this isn’t how the very first sonogram may go.
If you have a sonogram during the first trimester, it isn’t possible for the doctor to see baby through your stomach. Instead, they have to look from the same angle as how your baby actually got there! So, it can come as a bit of a shock if you’re not expecting it.
10. You’re Likely To Feel Exhausted Throughout Your First Trimester
As well as morning sickness, the first trimester of pregnancy can also cause exhaustion. Now, you may have heard that you’ll feel tired during the first trimester, but until you’ve actually experienced it, you truly have no idea just how tired you’re going to be.
No matter where you are, you’ll often find yourself wanting to sleep. It’s exhausting growing a little person inside of you, so you will need to rest a lot more during the initial first stages. It will usually fade after the first trimester and you’ll start to feel a lot more energized. So, until it passes, enjoy getting some extra sleep while you can!
Conclusion
The above are just 10 of the things nobody tells you about pregnancy. Some can come as a real shock to the system and can be pretty rough to deal with. However, now you’re aware of them, you can go into your pregnancy much more prepared. There’s always going to be side effects which you aren’t prepared for. Just remember, it’s all part of the journey and in nine months, it will all be worth it.
I’ve heard other women complain before about strangers trying to touch their baby bump. It’s so rude! I can’t believe that anyone would feel they have the right to touch another person like that without asking!
That is so rude indeed. A bump is a part of a woman’s body and nobody can just touch it! I don’t know why other people do such a thing. It’s a violation of one’s body.
Over here in my country pregnant woman don’t take it very lightly with anyone probably unknown strangers touching their belly. This is actually because some wicked one use that means in form of witchcraft to cause miscarriage for pregnant women. There has been some unexplained cases so far about this but the fact is that women don’t fancy it at all and I personally believe it’s crossing over boundaries to do such to one you aren’t familiar and intimate with.
Oh, my! That is scary.
It’s really difficult to understand the mindset of people who make it their business to cause harm to other people. So sad about this lack of respect for others.
You can still gorge on healthy food, just like junk food. I don’t think that’s a problem. In fact, a typical Chinese buffet might be loaded with all sorts calorie adding choices which also are healthy. Also, the same idea is true for grocery choices. I mean, fish is typically good for you when baked, but you could still eat 20 pieces if you want.
That’s true. As long as a pregnant woman eats healthy food, she can eat all she wants. Although during the last trimester, OB’s would usually advice against eating too much because the baby could gain a lot of weight and delivery would be quite difficult.
Some of the pregnant women that I’ve seen around always have preferences for food that they want to take during this period and this post has made me understand more about the reason they do such. My mom is such a different woman that when she was carrying my kid sister, she ate everything and never had some issues. However, it’s nice to learn these revelations about pregnant women.
Wow! You’re mom is one of the lucky few who never had issues with food. Good for her! Unfortunately, many are not as lucky, with some suffering from “morning sickness” until their last trimester. I can’t imagine having an upset stomach for nine months.
Honestly, I felt dad is one of the lucky men on earth to have married mom. Mom is the type of woman that never allowed her pregnancy periods to hinder from doing anything at home and I loved her for that.
Hemorrhoids and leaking issues is the scary part but I am glad I have known about this sooner. Thank you for sharing this post since I will now know what to expect when carrying my first child. 😀
I also think expectant mothers can experience difficulties when they want to bent. I mean touching the feet or picking something on the floor can be difficult. I would like to read about how a woman can overcome this especially when the belly grows bigger than expected. 🙂
Hi! jessym. A pregnant woman needs to squat (bend her knees) when she needs to pick up something from the floor or low place. She should never bend her back to pick an item.
When my wife was pregnant, I was always with her. I witnessed her stomach grumps, her morning sickness which also appeared at different times, her desire to eat unusual and not desire to eat healthy foo and all that. Pregnancy is really a different experience for a woman. However, it is also an amazing experience for husbands and expectant fathers.
So true, vinaya. Pregnancy is a different experience altogether. It’s a different ‘high’ for new parents. And when you see your little you, you feel a lot of wonderful emotions all at the same time 🙂
We all know that pregnancy is a very serious thing. I am still not yet married but I have a girlfriend, there comes a time that we plan about our future and one of the thing that we talk about is that ‘what if she get pregnant’ I told her that I would do everything to give the best for her and for our baby. And when she ask me that what would I like, A girl or a boy? I told her anything and all I want is for them to grow healthy.
It’s wonderful to hear future parents plan about how they will care for each other and of their future babies. This is a good way to start because couples should really be prepared to become parents. It’s a very big responsibility and not always fun, haha. It would take a lot of patience and understanding, as well as multi-tasking so you should be ready for it.
As for a boy or a girl, yes, it doesn’t really matter. As long as they’re strong and healthy, that is what matters most.
I guess when they say we forget the pain of childbirth, they forgot a few things that WE forget as well (wow lots of forgetful people! 😉 )
We tend to remember what we LOVED during pregnancy. I think that has a lot to do with the all around overwhelming feeling of LOVE that we feel for our newborn. After childbirth a lot of new mothers are just overcome with so much joy, happiness, gratefulness, adoration and all of those mushy, gushy feelings, that we sort of, well, forget all of the unpleasant and gross parts of pregnancy.
I guess the good just outweighs the bad for most of us and that’s what we want new mothers to know when we’re explaining pregnancy to them.
Overall the experience was wonderful with all of my pregnancies, even though I did experience quite a few bad things. The good parts just outweigh the bad!
I totally agree with you. The best things far outweigh the not-so-good ones so we tend to forget them along the way.
I do remember more happy and wacky moments of my kids’ growing up years than the awful ones 🙂
If anyone tell you that pregnancy is an easy task or that being a woman is that simple, please never take such person’s words serious in anything because to be a woman is never easy no matter how you look at it, and certainly pregnancy is not a child’s dance.
It’s the stressful thing and 9 months period a woman pass through just to ensure she successfully brings in a new individual into this world and the unfortunate ones will still suffer the pains of cesarean in order to give birth to their baby.
When I was pregnant, I didn’t hear anyone say pregnancy is easy. Most of the time, they told me about how difficult things would be, haha. No future moms should think it would be easy because as you said, it’s “never easy”. It’s something a woman should be prepared for emotionally, physically, psychologically and financially.
But as DawnsDivination said, all the difficulties are worth it once we see our little bundle of joy and watch him/her grow up.