Whilst pregnancy is supposed to be about bringing great joy to our lives there are definitely a number of downsides. Here we share our top twenty problems that we think only a pregnant woman could relate to.
1) The Tiredness
You’re in the first trimester. You’ve given up caffeine. You’re extremely tired from brewing the new human and yawning constantly. Your colleagues think you’re spending every night in the pub because it’s too early to explain the real reason for your fatigue.
2) The Over-Sharing Relatives
You’ve just had the first scan. Your immediate family already know the good news and you go on Facebook to make a public announcement, only to see that Mother / Mother-In-Law has already announced her status as “Proud Nana-To-Be,” stealing all your thunder.
3) The Bump Feelers
You have to fend off multiple strangers attempting to feel your stomach, as if that is somehow now magically acceptable behaviour thanks to the presence of a growing foetus.
4) The Gender Guessers
Your crazy aunt waves a crystal over your stomach and declares to the world that you are definitely having a girl. You already know and are keeping it secret that you are, in fact, having a boy.
5) The Unhelpful Advisers
People give you bizarre, unwanted advice that sounds like something out of the middle ages, such as “Don’t lift your arms over your head” and other equally useful tips.
6) The Unreachable Toes
In the third trimester, you need someone else to cut your toenails for you.
7) The Labour Horror Stories
Other mothers keep telling you awful stories about their labour in order to “prepare” you for the ordeal.
8) The Indigestion
The heartburn. It burns.
9) The Blockages
You need to eat a tin of prunes a day just to keep regular thanks to the iron that’s included in the pregnancy supplements. You hate prunes.
10) The No List
You can’t eat blue cheese, cured meats, too much tuna, anything with undercooked eggs, including raw cake mixture, and these are all your favourite things.
11) The Heat
It’s the middle of winter and you are sweating.
12) The Uncomfortable Sleep
You can only sleep on your left side at night. Sleep on your back and you feel dizzy. Stomach sleeping is impossible. Sleep on your right side and the baby kicks your ribs constantly.
13) The Inconvenient Acrobats
You’re sat in an important meeting where you have to act professionally and suddenly the baby attempts a move that would impress an Olympic gymnast and manages to simultaneously kick your rib and head-butt your bladder, making you squeal and have a desperate urge to go to the toilet.
14) The Emotional Roller-coaster
You burst into tears because your take away order was wrong / you dropped and broke a mug / your Internet connection went down.
15) The Unwanted Help
Well-meaning friends and relatives try and stop you from doing anything that might harm your baby, including carrying your own handbag, putting your own food on a plate, and reaching to get your coat off a hook.
16) The Not So Pregnancy Glow
You keep waiting for that “Pregnancy Glow” that everyone hears about, but instead your skin is covered in spots.
17) The Maternity Clothes
You have to spend around nine months wearing what feels like someone else’s clothes, as maternity clothes are generally awful, consisting of plain colours, stripes, or stupid slogans such as “hands off the bump.” The nicer maternity clothes are too expensive and you can’t justify buying them when you’ve got so many baby things to buy.
18) The Earth Mother
There’s always that one woman in the antenatal classes who makes you feel inadequate for wanting all of the possible pain medication on the planet during labour because she’s going to do it “naturally at home with no pain relief.”
19) The Unwanted Displays
So many medical professionals now have access to your intimate parts; you feel like an exhibitionist.
20) The Fear
Everyone keeps asking you how excited you are about the arrival of your baby and you can’t admit to him or her that whilst you are excited, you are also very, very, terrified.
