Sneezing While Pregnant

29 Weeks, 4 Days

Now that I'm comfortably (or should I say uncomfortably?) into my third trimester, the pregnancy symptoms I had hoped were a thing of the past are coming back to haunt me with a vengeance. Case in point: extreme fatigue. During my first trimester, Vicente teased me about my chronic fatigue, saying that I must have contracted the African Sleeping Sickness (a parasitic disease endemic to Subsaharan Africa that is transmitted via the lovable tse-tse fly.) All I wanted to do in those first 12 weeks of pregnancy was sleep.  Luckily, I regained my energy in the second trimester, only to lose it again the moment I hit 28 weeks. Oh joy.

Another symptom? Breast growth! As a woman who was already enjoying a healthy C-cup prior to pregnancy, I wasn't really begging for a more bountiful bosom as some of my smaller chested counterparts do. Frankly, I was shocked and even a bit awed to find myself jumping up THREE cup sizes in the first trimester. I was praying to God Almighty that the growth would slow down after the first trimester, and it did....but only for a few weeks. Now the boobs are starting to take over my body. I think they're jealous that my belly has surpassed them and they're now playing catch up. I assume the growth is due to the fact that I'll soon be a milk factory, but let me just say I'm not a fan. There's got to be a flip side to these Dolly Parton-esque breasts. Because let me tell ya, being ogled at by every man walking the street isn't one of the perks (no pun intended). I better have one healthy, chubby little baby who never cries because he's hungry at the end of all this. I'm certainly not going to trade in my career in PR for a career in porno.

I've also been suffering from a whole new pregnancy symptom since I hit the third trimester: RAGING heartburn. Unfortunately, I've always suffered from heartburn as an adult, but with some minor modifications to my diet (bye-bye cranberry vodkas) and a regular dose of Zantac prior to red wine binges and steak dinners, I could deal with it. Pregnancy heartburn, however, is a whole new beast. Obviously I'm not drinking wine or cranberry vodkas these days, but I still get the raging heartburn every day around 4 pm like clockwork. I keep a giant tub of Tums on my desk at work to help me deal. I expected to get heartburn, but I never imagined it could be this bad. It feels like battery acid is splashing into my throat. The burning is so intense it brings tears to my eyes. I can totally sympathize with fire-breathing dragons these days.

But enough complaining. Some of the joys so far from my third trimester? I can tell which end is what now that baby V is approximately three pounds (the size of a butternut squash). His little round head prefers the left side of my body, and his feet are usually firmly planted into the right side of my abdomen. He also gets the hiccups at least three times a day, which I utterly adore.

29 Weeks, 3 Days

PS: Sneezing while pregnant sucks. It's painful and I feel like I'm going to pop a hernia or pee on myself every time I do it.

PPS: I have a friend who grew up in Denmark who told me this weekend that Danish people call pregnant women whales...and it's not deemed an insult. I'm so glad he didn't ask Vicente how the old whale was doing. I might have punched him in the face.