Two years ago, when I was pregnant with my son, people used to tell me that pregnancy was the most wonderful time of their lives. I would literally balk. Pregnancy–anything but miserable? Perhaps. But the greatest experience of their lives? Yeah, there was no way. Perhaps some people had okay experiences, but there was no way that pregnancy was the best time of their lives.
Now we’re coming up on my sweet boy’s second birthday which has left me reflecting on bringing him into this world. Joyful? Absolutely–that boy is one the greatest gifts God has ever given me, right after my salvation and my husband. But was being pregnant with him the best time of my life?
Hah! That’s hilarious.
Let me tell you a story. I found out I was pregnant while visiting family in Florida, and I thought I was five weeks along at that point but when I went in for my first ultrasound I found out I was actually due two weeks later, meaning my pregnancy felt like it lasted forever. Six weeks came and went and I thought I was one of the lucky few who avoided morning sickness–until one day it hit me out of nowhere and continued to hit me daily, hourly, for the next twenty seven weeks. TWENTY SEVEN.
Most of that time is a blur, to be honest. There were many visits to the hospital on days I couldn’t drink even a sip of water without it coming up again. I called my husband at work on more than one occasion in tears because I had spent all morning bent over the toilet and I was scared to eat because I was so tired of throwing up. That was my life from week 7 until well into my third trimester of pregnancy.
There was more. Exhaustion hit early on and I slept 15 hour a night most days and yet still felt wiped out after an hour of being awake. Then I tried being active and sleeping less but that didn’t work either. I couldn’t shower alone because I would black out from the steam, and I had such bad heartburn that I thought perhaps my gallbladder had ceased to function properly and I looked into having it removed.
The pain in my back and pelvis was so frequent I literally forgot it wasn’t normal. One day, about eight months into my pregnancy, I was on a walk with a friend and it occurred to me that she didn’t look uncomfortable. Cassey, I asked, you don’t feel shooting pain up your back and pelvis when you walk, do you?
She looked at me like I was crazy and shook her head. I was so used to the pain at that point it blew my mind.
Two things helped: 1) Candy canes and 2) bread and cheese. I discovered I could suck on candy canes to help with nausea due to motion sickness in the car and bread and cheese was easy enough on my stomach that I could eat it and, for lack of a pleasant way to say it, not taste it a second time. I tried everything else too, including Ginger Ale and crackers in the morning and those pregnancy lollipops and bland food and ginger everything and none of it worked. During that time I was just starting to use essential oils and while I’ve had many people swear by them to instantly quell morning sickness, none of them ever worked for me either. We all have different body compositions so different oils work differently for different people.
Miraculously, at 34 weeks my morning sickness all but went away and my energy came back, meaning I could start going to the gym with my husband in the mornings and I could finally be out and about comfortably. My husband and I enjoyed three weeks of relative normality before he left for five months of unaccompanied training when I was 37 weeks along. At 38 weeks pregnant, I moved out of our tiny California apartment by myself and moved in with a sweet military family from church (they had four boys, plus mine made it five!) and finally, at 39 weeks my son was born. The way God worked out the timing there was perfect–so perfect, in fact, that it deserves it’s own post. Check back here in a few days for that!
It wasn’t all bad! The feeling of my son rolling around in my belly was amazing until I hit the third trimester and then I swear he took up Muay Thai and starting practicing his left hooks and low kicks on my uterus, but still, I loved the feeling of life inside me.
Mostly, knowing the havoc pregnancy was wreaking inside my body would lead to a precious child is what got me through those long nine months. When I lived in California, I volunteered at a crisis pregnancy center where broken women regularly walked through the doors and learned about the miracle growing inside them. Some were on drugs, some in abusive relationships, some in high school, some homeless, and some completely stable married women. They were from all different walks of life and many came in just for support or counseling but many more came in because they were terrified and hopeless, some considering abortion. The crisis pregnancy center provided free ultrasounds and wise counsel for many of these women, and it changed their outlook on the life growing inside them.
Perhaps my time there was what affected me most of all through my pregnancy.
I learned that all babies are a gift, regardless of the circumstances. All babies are a gift, even when growing them leaves you in bed or in front of a toilet for nine months straight.
As I type this, my husband is home from work early and my son is standing on his lap with my husband’s face in his tiny hands, covering him in kisses and laughing hysterically because whatever they’re doing on the sofa is apparently hilarious.
When I reflect on the pregnancy that made me want to die, even while remembering exactly how terrible I felt, I have no doubt I would go through it again without a second thought because my son is worth every moment of the misery that was my pregnancy. That boy lights up my life in a way that only high pitched giggles and tiny, chubby hands can, and I could not be more thankful God gave me that kid.
Now I look back and laugh about those nine months of baby-growing, but only because it’s over.
And hey, once my son was born, the postpartum stage couldn’t be any worse, right? It wasn’t–I felt great, and more on that coming in the next post.
I love you, baby boy! I would do it all over again for you any day.
Check out all three parts of the series on my son’s birth here!
Part one, the pregnancy: Almost two years since the pregnancy that made me want to die
Part two, the delivery: “Is he supposed to look like that?!”
Part three, postpartum: Ten airplanes by five weeks old: postpartum and alone with my son
