Tiny Human Announcement

This is the first non related food entry, welcome to it. It is delayed in timing, but I honestly don’t think people care that much. I currently am 5 months pregnant, and I never thought I’d be in this state. I had a lot of ideas and thoughts on finding out I was pregnant, but lately I can not relate any concept to where in life I am. I’m not in doubt any more that I am pregnant; there’s no doubting when he twirls all throughout the day. It’s no longer mistaken feels of what could potentially be my organs digesting. I haven’t really felt awful, which I know is not the case for everyone, but I believe this has led me to not fully processing a growing human. I’m very much of an action taker who is more on the practical side when it comes to life situations. While I may not emotionally take action, if something needs to get done, I don’t want to dream of how to do it; I want to impatiently get it done. It has its positives and negatives.

When it came to becoming pregnant, I had been putting off even trying because I was horrified (still am) of broken bones, screams of high strung emotions, blood, putting someone new into society, or accidentally killing said human. I was scared to grow up because all moms are grown ups right? (totally no, now I have met so many parents that I wide eyed do not blink at with some of their responses and actions)

I had a few serious inner talks with myself and with my gentleband for about a year trying to soften my heart to the idea of becoming a mother and him becoming someones father. Once I started to think more in that direction, my action step personality stepped in and I started to research products, buying expensive products I thought I’d want, and I even set up a tour of a birthing facility. I thought there would be more people like me out there, but after our tour of the birthing center, I quickly felt embarrassed and a little judged when we had to explain we weren’t pregnant yet. I didn’t really want people to know how I felt, and I honestly didn’t want everyone giving me advice. People are already opinionated, but I’ve also found when it comes to parenthood, people are especially vocal and forceful. I didn’t even know if we could get pregnant and I honestly had (still have) so many thoughts that he’ll die. I know this is morbid and hopefully it’s not too alarming, but we’ve had a lot of friends who have had miscarriages. In 2000 my sister gave birth to a full term baby she knew wasn’t alive. It has kind of stuck with me and I also didn’t want to get my hopes up because such news would be such an obvious disappointment. I have since talked to myself about my unhealthy thoughts; I don’t want to be a mom with a four year old beautiful little boy wondering if tomorrow he’ll still be real. I want to be a mother who lives each day full, maybe not always happy full days but full days.

Sorry, didn’t think this first non food entry would turn so dark when all I was really going to do was share some stories based on some photos, geesh. Maybe I will stick with food, ha.

I found out I was pregnant at 5 weeks which I think is pretty early on. I had a hunch since we uh had taken actions to have a baby and also my boobs did feel a little sore. My gentleband works from home and I knew I wanted to be alone if any tests said yes. I drove out of my way to go to a Target just so I could go through a self check out line. I left, went to a grocery store bathroom on the way back, and took one of the tests. Surprised that it said yes, I just sat pants down sitting on a grocery store toilet trying to make grown up decisions. I didn’t believe it; I went to Panera next door to eat and drink a ton of water so I could take another test. It also said yes so I went home and wrote in a journal I had started writing to a future being that didn’t exist. I wrote a third entry and signed it, “maybe your mom.” I waited until I had time to just sit with my new knowledge before I told my gentleband. A year before, I had bought a blanket a girl I kind of knew had in her Etsy shop. She had partnered with another girl to sell these swaddles with morse code on them. Each swaddle has a unique saying. I fell in love with this one that reads, “Such Strange Joy.” I just felt like if I was ever going to get pregnant or become someones mother, it’d be weird and joyful, so it seemed fitting to describe a feeling I thought I might have one day. I asked my gentleband if he could get the package down from the top shelf we had put it on in our bedroom closet and asked if he thought it’d be a good idea to maybe one day announce we were pregnant with the blanket. I feel weird sharing some of these feelings with you since they were such a personal moment spent alone in our bedroom, so I’m going to leave the story there.

I went to the other side of the country a few days later at 6 weeks pregnant and avoided the fact that I was. I ended up telling one my friends at the very end of the trip only because I barfed twice on the plane back. Now that I think back on it, I don’t think I threw up because of pregnancy because I never puked at any other time, but I have always had severe motion sickness. I honestly think it was just that.

I share some personal thoughts on Instagram sometimes, but for the most part I don’t share unless I have mulled thoughts over. I have not been very thoughtful lately as I am action step oriented. So if you care, here’s some images from announcing publicly we were growing a human together. All photos were taken by my insanely talented friend Amanda Lenhardt!