As the days of my pregnancy come to an end, I wanted to write what things have helped me through the past 10 months. Hopefully this can be a reference for some of my friends and me for future pregnancies. Also this is a super long post, but I just figured it was better to get it all out in one place other than posting this over a few days.
The most important thing I learned being pregnant was to put myself (which also meant baby) first. It changes everything, and I'm glad I know what life is like when I made myself my #1 priority - which was pretty cool.
Books, Classes & Apps:
I went the fairly traditional route the two books I read throughout my pregnancy were What to Expect When You're Expecting and the Mayo Clinic's Guide to a Healthy Pregnancy.
I also enjoyed weekly emails from my hospital, What to Expect and Baby Center as well as the Baby Center App and What to Expect App. There were other Apps I downloaded, but didn't really enjoy-of course I already deleted them. I also think I would have purchased the Sprout App if I had known about it earlier on, but $5 seemed like a lot for the last month-a-roonie.
We also took a very expensive birthing class offered by our hospital, all the traditional classes were booked through Feb back in October so we took an express class and were defiantly the "overachievers" there four months before we were due. It made me feel a lot more comfortable and confident in what was going to happen and I have referenced the materials multiple times since.
Josh is still angry about the "boob class" I took him to at
The Breastfeeding Center of Greater Washington, it was great for me, but he is still upset by the demonstrations that were made with the fake (as in stuffed animal like) boob.
He did get to change his first diaper (granted it was on a doll) at our baby care basics class with the
Northern Virginia Lactation Consultants. We sprung for a private class after our experience at the The Breastfeeding Center of DC. We really enjoyed our experience here and set everything up to rent our hospital grade pump from them once our little guy gets here. They were a great resources and very friendly, helpful and comforting.
My favorite resource by far is the online class from
Mom's On Call. I feel like I have a plan and lots of ideas of "what to do" when baby arrives because of this great resource. The best part is I can rewatch the clips as needed - because I know I will need some refreshing and reassurance over those first sleepless weeks.
Food & Drinks:
I was sick for just about my entire pregnancy, it was lovely. Perrier with Lime really helped to keep me hydrated and helped tremendously with the nausea.
On that note, anything sour was always in my purse or pocket, including Sour Patch Kids and Preggie Drops (the "pops" without sticks)
I honestly only wanted to eat foods that were favorites before hand. I craved sweets towards the end of my second trimester and all of my third, but the 1st was simple things all the way. Tatertots, cheese pizza and tomato sandwiches have been my mainstay throughout, I can't wait for tomatoes to come back in season!
Clothes:
There is one item I literally wore every day - maternity layering tanks. Sometimes I wore two. They worked well with smoothing everything out, providing a little extra length under my non-maternity tops and were event comfy to sleep in. Plus with the constant flux in body temps it was nice to have the option to take off layers with the tanks.
I have 8 from Old Navy at $10 they can't be beat.
Maternity Jeans- these are a must! I held out for a while before I got my first pair, and now there is no looking back.
My mother in law was kind enough to give me a gift card to Motherhood Maternity, which I used to buy my first pair. On our way home from our babymoon we stopped by the Outlets in North Carolina, where I stocked up on a few more pairs at the Motherhood Maternity Outlet. Granted I was never a jeans (or even pants) kind of girl prior to pregnancy - I am a convert now. Also, I became a "stay at home mom" early on in my pregnancy, so I probably would have been purchasing maternity dress pants vs jeans if I was still going into the office.
Compression Socks - Wow, it's like a massage in a sock. I remember two of my besties who are in the medical field talking about wearing them at their long days at the hospital while pregnant and was super glad I filed that away in my noggin. I wore them early on while I was still working and on my feet a lot, then I guess I forgot about them. In the last few weeks of my pregnancy I found them again and they make a WORLD of difference in keeping swelling and pain to a minimum in my feet and legs.
Maternity Support Belt - This helped tremendoulsy with the pressure the baby puts on internal organs and back pain so glad my husband got this for me, I think he found it in the maternity section at Macy's.
My Bobby Pregnancy Pillow made sleeping comfortably a lot easier.
Josh is ready to see it go so he can have more room in our king size bed-ha!
Activities:
I really enjoyed Water Walking, Water Aerobics and Prenatal Yoga - this DVD from Target was fantastic.
