Pregnant for Lent

[Miserissima]

Well, I spoke with my priest and confirmed that there’s no reason to change my diet, especially since my OB/Gyn and perinatologist are strongly against it.

However, I have found that most of my Lenten resolutions are already shot. I fall asleep during Lectio or other meditative prayer. I swear that it’s not a lack of discipline but my body refuses to get used to the hormones coursing through my blood.

This is my first pregnancy and I’m just miserable. Although in the second trimester, I am still going through morning sickness all day every day. My knees feel ready to dislocate (I’ve already dislocated the right one 3x and the left one 2x because of the hormone fluctuactions with PCOS) and my diaphragm is being pushed up so I am short of breath. My hips hurt from the spreading and I can’t lie on my back without the round ligament pain becoming very sharp. My bbs are incredibly sore and sensitive.

My medical team says it’s natural for some women’s bodies not to adjust to these changes, especially in the first pregnancy.

I hate to sound so ungrateful as we’ve been TTC for @ 5yrs now, and this is a gen-yoo-wine miracle baby. I am not posting just to rant, but did you have a miserable pregnancy? What gave you spiritual comfort? All I can do at this point is “offer it up,” making this my new Lenten sacrifice.

 

[Arlene]

Not to go into the gory details, lets just say I am NOT a woman who glows when she is pregnant.
All you can do is offer it up. Just remember that you have been given an awesome gift. We just have to work harder for it and suffer through it more than other women.
This is just another case where God’s plan is different from ours…you thought you knew what you were doing for Lent. Now you are nurturing the child within you, and trying to do it with a thankful and grateful attitude. Trust me, I know how much of a sacrifice that can be, dying to how you really want to act: kicking and screaming and ranting about how unfun pregnancy can be.

Ask Mary to help you through this pregnancy with grace, and trust in God. Draw on her strength and gentleness. Once you hold your baby in your arms it will ALL be worth it. Just trust me on that.

And congratulations, by the way.

 

[Muzhik]

Congratulations! And it looks like while you may not be able to follow your original Lenten sacrifices, G_D has given you a whole new set; ones that will provide you with grace and stamina for the next 18 years, and beyond. “Oh, yeah, I thought about giving up chocolate, but I decided to give up a good night’s sleep instead.”

Look at it this way: we named our third baby “Rosemary”, because the scent of the rosemary we had planted under the kitchen window suddenly made my wife’s stomach roil. With what you’re experiencing, you can name this baby “Jabez”!

 

[NPalmby]

Miserissima, the same thing is happening to me (I’m pregnant with our first). I’ve been extremely tired, so the extra time I’ve wanted to spend in prayer and study hasn’t been happening.

I agree with Arlene and Muzhik. We’ve been given a wonderful gift, and the Lord knows our hearts!

 

[monicatholic]

Miserissima,

congratulations on your miracle baby!

as Muzhik has suggested, your Lent was a packaged deal, sent from God to you.

unlike your contentions with PCOS, i’ve been like scary fertile! I’ve had 12 pregnancies, 10 babies born. none of those pregnancies have been lovely. several of them have been positively miserable, one bordered on vile.

sick till half way and beyond. morning lasts all day and into the next. twisty knees, spreading hips that feel like a burning hammock attached to my pelvic bones. headaches. exhaustion fluctuating with sleeplessness. ribs that burn with every breath. lower back that feels like i ran with the bulls and fell in the street.

the vile pregnancy i was nauseated and vomiting right up to the 7th month. dry heaves with burning ribs makes for a bad day. i swear it. and it was the pregnancy in which i had a profound conversion experience. suffering brings us closer to Jesus if we let it.

and then after nine months that seem like 2 years, it’s over.

it’s ok to want, pray, try, hope for a baby Mis and still hate being pregnant. simply my advice: don’t sabotage yourself by complaining to people who will remind you that you wanted this. talk to compassionate gal pals. gals with whom you can put your head down on the kitchen table and cry. those are the best pregnancy friends.

 

[Miserissima]

Arlene, Muzhik, NPalmby, and monicatholic…I never thought that I could find real people on Internet forums…just personas. But here, especially in the parenting forum, there are wonderful women (and men) who are warm and loving.

I. Love. You. Sincerely. Some angel on your shouulder encouraged you to post and I thank God with every beat of my heart for your support.

:grouphug:

I feel less alone. I moved here a few years ago and the best advice I can get from my friends is “all pregnancies are different as women are different.” I just never imagined it would be so physically daunting. Where’s the glow, hmm??? Haha.

I had my first real good cry about an hour ago. I’m so scared – no family other than my husband – and no book in the world is going to tell you for certain that x per cent of women may experience y symptoms for z period of time. There’s the “average” and then you learn that that the “average” is more of a minority! Hee!

I didn’t mean to sound like “poor me” above. And i really am trying to offer it up. But, this isn’t normal according to the average reports of symptoms. Docs say that it’s normal for me. ::sigh::

 

[Trishie]

I just found your thread!

This is my first pregnancy and I’m just miserable. Although in the second trimester, I am still going through morning sickness all day every day. My knees feel ready to dislocate (I’ve already dislocated the right one 3x and the left one 2x because of the hormone fluctuactions with PCOS) and my diaphragm is being pushed up so I am short of breath. My hips hurt from the spreading and I can’t lie on my back without the round ligament pain becoming very sharp. My bbs are incredibly sore and sensitive.

You poor darling! I’m so sorry to hear you’re having such a bad time.

Dear God, please help her body to adjust, please help all to go well. What can be done to help her? Please ensure that she receives all help that she can for all of these pains and discomforts.

I was so sick until into the fourth month with my first baby!
I couldn’t get out of bed without nibbling a couple of plain dry crackers…unless I wanted to be sick when I got up. It should get better! In time!

And my darling husband announced one day when I was eight months pregnant, “Guess what. I’ve got a job in Mount Isa and we have a week to get there”. We were as poor as church mice, so had to travel with any possessions we had in our small second hand car. It broke down several times on the thousand mile journey. It was summer, and we didn’t have enough water, so a passing road train driver gave us some yellowish creek water when he stopped to give us one of the tow starts we had on that journey The car finally died outside a little outback town called McKinlay. We sat under a tree in the shade, but sometimes I returned throughout the day to the car to rest my legs in the air on my seat-back, because by that time, my ankles and knees were so swollen they were no more. It was so hot.

The regional policeman drove past during the day and offered to tow us back to McKinlay if we were still stuck there by nightfall. He did so, and his wife made us roast beef sandwiches…may God bless them…and travellers took news of our predicament to my husband’s parents in Mount Isa, so they journeyed to us through the night and towed us the rest of the way to Mount Isa…whic is an outback mining town.
I spent a week in hospital, after that.

And the day my son was born, after a long labour, my husband mentioned the ‘ext time’ whic was not easily forgiveable! But my other two pregnancies were good.

I hope and pray that things improve for you.:hug3:

 

[Trishie]

I just found your thread!

This is my first pregnancy and I’m just miserable. Although in the second trimester, I am still going through morning sickness all day every day. My knees feel ready to dislocate (I’ve already dislocated the right one 3x and the left one 2x because of the hormone fluctuactions with PCOS) and my diaphragm is being pushed up so I am short of breath. My hips hurt from the spreading and I can’t lie on my back without the round ligament pain becoming very sharp. My bbs are incredibly sore and sensitive.

You poor darling! I’m so sorry to hear you’re having such a bad time.

Dear God, please help her body to adjust, please help all to go well. What can be done to help her? Please ensure that she receives all help that she can for all of these pains and discomforts.

I was so sick until into the fourth month with my first baby!
I couldn’t get out of bed without nibbling a couple of plain dry crackers…unless I wanted to be sick when I got up. It should get better! In time!

And my darling husband announced one day when I was eight months pregnant, “Guess what. I’ve got a job in Mount Isa and we have a week to get there”. We were as poor as church mice, so had to travel with any possessions we had in our small second hand car. It broke down several times on the thousand mile journey. It was summer, and we didn’t have enough water, so a passing road train driver gave us some yellowish creek water when he stopped to give us one of the tow starts we had on that journey The car finally died outside a little outback town called McKinlay. We sat under a tree in the shade, but sometimes I returned throughout the day to the car to rest my legs in the air on my seat-back, because by that time, my ankles and knees were so swollen they were no more. It was so hot.

The regional policeman drove past during the day and offered to tow us back to McKinlay if we were still stuck there by nightfall. He did so, and his wife made us roast beef sandwiches…may God bless them…and travellers took news of our predicament to my husband’s parents in Mount Isa, so they journeyed to us through the night and towed us the rest of the way to Mount Isa…whic is an outback mining town.
I spent a week in hospital, after that.

And the day my son was born, after a long labour, my husband mentioned the ‘ext time’ whic was not easily forgiveable! But my other two pregnancies were good.

I hope and pray that things improve for you.:hug3:

 

[Miserissima]

Trishie, I can’t imagine moving while pregnant…I read that moving is the 2nd most stressful event next to the death of a loved one.

This thread is the kind of encouragement I was looking for…I didn’t mean to ask for horror stories and haven’t heard any yet…but I need to know that “tough” pregnancies are normal in some way, even if the symptoms are judged on a curve.

Sometimes I think that these specialists know that there are too may variables that may affect any part of the pregnancy, delivery, and child development that it’s like trying to predict the weather…no matter how many averages and modern technology, there’s alway the chance of a rough patch!

I was starting to fret that there may be something wrong with just me…but I’m reassured by the medical community that it’s not just me. I am NOT soliciting medical advice here, but I want to connect with other women to know that I am not alone in this scary, new adventure of motherhood.

I live on ginger lately…a great carminative…ginger tea, candied ginger, powdered ginger tea, boiled ginger root, etc. Ginger snaps, unfortunately, don’t count!

 

[monicatholic]

isn’t trishie the best prayer warrior?

every time i’ve ever posted to prayer intentions, she responds with an entreaty to God that read my heart just the way i felt it.

she’s wonderful.

Mis, you just keep writing and asking for love and support and you’ll keep getting it. your gratitude post reminds me, though, that there was a gal who emailed me regularly during one of my pregnancies. her emails were a visit of love every time. and then i’d respond and just cry through the whole thing.

she and i have gone separate ways, though only because of logistics. your gratitude post reminds me i should email her and tell her, “hey remember that pregnancy when you gave me a place to cry every day…? … well, thanks.”

so, another day is just about done for you. another day of feeling cruddy that you never have to do again. another day of real Lenten pennance. another day closer to meeting your little one face to face. ok, a bad day, but not a useless day.

 

[Miserissima]

isn’t trishie the best prayer warrior?

every time i’ve ever posted to prayer intentions, she responds with an entreaty to God that read my heart just the way i felt it.

she’s wonderful.

Thoroughly and unequivocally agreed. Trishie has a gift for reading hearts, but don’t let anyone who has posted here sell themselves short, either!

I have to laugh because I know I wouldn’t have been ready for this five years ago. I guess that’s why it’s all in God’s good time and not ours, huh?

I did reach out to a friend here, but she admits that her pregnancy was a breeze…

I"m not worried about the parenting part, as my spouse and I seem to be on the same page regarding both care and discipline. (We’ve seen so many parents contradict and undermine each other in front of their children that we vowed not to ever intentionally do that, as it’s incredibly unfair to the child.)

But, I am terrified of childbirth. I didn’t realize how much until the past couple of weeks. If it hurts this much now, what about in the delivery room? Yikes! Nothing I have read can prepare me for that…even women who have had more than one child say each time is different. I will leave the decision regarding drugs and/or an epidural to the doctor, deferring to his expereience. I am comforted knowing that we have the option of modern medical technology, though that will make money even tighter if we need to go that route. Again, I guess that’s where I have to leave it in G-d’s hands. And ain’t that the most difficult thing to do?

Sorry, to ramble; I’m just “talking this out” in my mind because I’m finally letting myself believe that this preganancy is going to stick and my mind is playing the “what if” scenarios. But with the help of my parish, my parish priest, and the women I have met here, I know that G-d is looking out for me!

On Monday I have my AFP test and hopefully, an ultrasound to learn the baby’s gender. I’ll definately post the pics here. I want to share it with you.

 

[monicatholic]

Mis,
here’s something that heppened to me. after several very hard labors, i was worried aBOUT another one when i was pregnant again.

i prayed because i was very scared. i asked God to help me with labor, help me to be OK in labor, many many prayers about that day in the future. finally i said to the Lord, “I don’t feel any better about this. I’m still very scared.”

I felt a certain response in my heart that went like this: you’re scared because you’re asking for graces for the future. ask for graces now.

so i started to leave future events in God’s hands and started praying for Him to help me with this fear right now. He never aleviated those fears by showing me the future. He just helped me continue to give him my now fears now. it helped so much.

now i’m reminded of our three things: the Lord’s prayer asks the Father for THIS day our daily bread.

the Hail Mary asks the Blessed Mother for prayers at the hour of our death (which only God knows) and for NOW.

when the isrealites were in the desert, they were only allowed to gather enough mana for one day-- if they tried to hoarde for future days, everything would rot.

Mis, God’s loving tender graces are here for you now. Rest in Him now. Cry to Him about all you experience in the now. Praise Him now. let Him love you here and now.

 

[NPalmby]

Arlene, Muzhik, NPalmby, and monicatholic…I never thought that I could find real people on Internet forums…just personas. But here, especially in the parenting forum, there are wonderful women (and men) who are warm and loving.

I. Love. You. Sincerely. Some angel on your shouulder encouraged you to post and I thank God with every beat of my heart for your support.

I didn’t mean to sound like “poor me” above. And i really am trying to offer it up. But, this isn’t normal according to the average reports of symptoms. Docs say that it’s normal for me. ::sigh::

I’m so glad you’re finding love and support here, and I feel so blessed to be a part of it! God bless you! I love you, too!

Remember: it may feel awful now, but when you have your little blessing, none of that will matter. Really. My mom had some miserable experiences during her pregnancies, but once she had each baby, she was ready to do it all over again!

I’ll be praying for you. God bless you!

 

[Liberanosamalo]

Monicatholic, those are wonderful thoughts about praying for TODAY!

Where’s the glow, hmm???

That’s not a glow. It’s sweat. Because you’re carrying around an oven inside you and it makes you hot hot hot!

I also was one of those who had horrible morning sickness with two of my three. To the point I needed medication to function. It dissipated after the 13th week, though.

I hated the people who barely had it who would cheerfully chirp how it was mind over matter and if I just ate a saltine before I got up. I wanted to throw crackers at them. When I ate a cracker that was the first thing to go in the morning. Mind over matter. Hmmpph.
Then how come I barely had any problems with the middle kid. That wasn’t mind over matter.

Agreed about our wonderful Trishie the Prayer Warrior.

Hang in there and come here and complain, Miserrissima. We know. They call it “delivery” for a reason. By the time you are 9 months pregnant and the ninth month lasts 6 weeks, you don’t care how much it hurts to get the baby out, you just want it OUT NOW.

God uses all these discomforts to turn us into mothers. It’s like boot camp for women. By the end of the pregnancy we’re very different and ready to kill to protect that little baby. We didn’t go through all this for anyone to hurt them. And also it makes us ready to kill husbands who cheerfully chirp “This pregnancy is going so fast.” Or “I can’t believe we’re going to have a baby.” Just a warning. It’s not as real to your husband as it is to you. But if you throw up on his shoes, he might be able to participate vicariously.

 

[Sailor_Kenshin]

Well, I spoke with my priest and confirmed that there’s no reason to change my diet, especially since my OB/Gyn and perinatologist are strongly against it.

However, I have found that most of my Lenten resolutions are already shot. I fall asleep during Lectio or other meditative prayer. I swear that it’s not a lack of discipline but my body refuses to get used to the hormones coursing through my blood.

This is my first pregnancy and I’m just miserable. Although in the second trimester, I am still going through morning sickness all day every day. My knees feel ready to dislocate (I’ve already dislocated the right one 3x and the left one 2x because of the hormone fluctuactions with PCOS) and my diaphragm is being pushed up so I am short of breath. My hips hurt from the spreading and I can’t lie on my back without the round ligament pain becoming very sharp. My bbs are incredibly sore and sensitive.

My medical team says it’s natural for some women’s bodies not to adjust to these changes, especially in the first pregnancy.

I hate to sound so ungrateful as we’ve been TTC for @ 5yrs now, and this is a gen-yoo-wine miracle baby. I am not posting just to rant, but did you have a miserable pregnancy? What gave you spiritual comfort? All I can do at this point is “offer it up,” making this my new Lenten sacrifice.

Never had a pregnancy but PLEASE! Don’t be too hard on yourself. You do have a miracle on your hands and the best thing is probably to take good care of your little one and offer up your discomforts.

If complaining helps, by all means do so!

 

[Miserissima]

Thank you, Sailor Kenshin and Liberanosamalo!

I hated the people who barely had it who would cheerfully chirp how it was mind over matter and if I just ate a saltine before I got up. I wanted to throw crackers at them. When I ate a cracker that was the first thing to go in the morning. Mind over matter. Hmmpph.
…
Just a warning. It’s not as real to your husband as it is to you. But if you throw up on his shoes, he might be able to participate vicariously.

Oh, THIS is the kind of complaining I love – with humor – I haven’t had a belly laugh like that in weeks!!!

XOXOXOXOXOX

 

[lifeisbeautiful]

I hated the people who barely had it who would cheerfully chirp how it was mind over matter and if I just ate a saltine before I got up. I wanted to throw crackers at them. When I ate a cracker that was the first thing to go in the morning. Mind over matter. Hmmpph.

Lol, saltines felt like a bag of flour in my mouth (I tried them again with this pregnancy just in case, a no go). Even after pregnancy I have a hard time eating saltines for a while (and I used to love them). I also remember with my first reading how by the end of first trimester, on average at a certain week (can’t remember which) morning sickness ended. Well that week came and went, and then the next week, and the next, and I was still sick. Dh would tell me to stop reading all this info on what the “average” is because I was getting frustrated that I was not fitting into the average. I used to have fainting spells, cold sweats and stuff, but I know my pregnancies haven’t been as tough as they are for other women. I am sorry for all you are going through. We have a friend of the family that had 9 kids and was always sick for all 9 months. She is an inspiration for me. There are several mamas on here that are also an inspiration for me, with the right outlook on the difficulties that pregnancy can present. Monica has already written such beautiful things. A few things that help me is to offer everything up for the baby, for his/her purity, for their sainthood, etc, (kind of like trying to get a head start on parenting ). I also offer certain difficulties up for certain intentions that may need prayer at the moment. These things help my “miserable” moments be better.

 

[Sailor_Kenshin]

Depends on whether you can stomach ginger, but I hear it helps quell nausea. I don’t know if you’re supposed to gnaw on a hunk of it or if you can go the ginger ale route, though.

 

[NPalmby]

Depends on whether you can stomach ginger, but I hear it helps quell nausea. I don’t know if you’re supposed to gnaw on a hunk of it or if you can go the ginger ale route, though.

Ginger lemon tea worked for me for a while. Just make sure it’s herbal (not green), and decaf!

 

[Muzhik]

I"m not worried about the parenting part, as my spouse and I seem to be on the same page regarding both care and discipline. (We’ve seen so many parents contradict and undermine each other in front of their children that we vowed not to ever intentionally do that, as it’s incredibly unfair to the child.)

But, I am terrified of childbirth. I didn’t realize how much until the past couple of weeks. If it hurts this much now, what about in the delivery room? Yikes! Nothing I have read can prepare me for that…even women who have had more than one child say each time is different. I will leave the decision regarding drugs and/or an epidural to the doctor, deferring to his expereience. I am comforted knowing that we have the option of modern medical technology, though that will make money even tighter if we need to go that route. Again, I guess that’s where I have to leave it in G-d’s hands. And ain’t that the most difficult thing to do?

This thread is the kind of encouragement I was looking for…I didn’t mean to ask for horror stories and haven’t heard any yet…but I need to know that “tough” pregnancies are normal in some way, even if the symptoms are judged on a curve.

Just wait. You didn’t say how far along you are (I suspect beginning of second trimester), but sooner that you expect you’re going to have complete strangers approach you in the line at the grocery store, touch your stomach as if they’re rubbing the Buddha’s belly for luck, then tell you all about their 49 hours of back labor before the baby came out sideways. At some point, another couple of women (including the lady running the cash register, so you know you’re trapped) will start chiming in, and your husband will hear you and the other women exchange details that he didn’t think would ever be heard outside the gynecologist’s office.

Just understand that this is both their way of bragging, and also their way to encourage you – they lived through it, you will too.

My advice as a 3-time daddy is to take the Zen approach to the childbirth pain. There’s a story I told to the group at church when we were doing a 30-hour fast. So many people talked about how they never ate breakfast, but now that they were fasting that was all they could think about, or about how now they just wanted to eat everything in sight; I thought this story was appropriate:

One day, the student asked the Master, “What is the way to enlightenment?” The Master replied, “You must not think of the White Elephant.” The student went away to work in the fields. One day, the student came running back saying, “Master! I stopped thinking about the White Elephant!” Then the Master beat him, and after that the student understood.

At the risk of denying you enlightenment, here is one meaning to the story. If I asked you how your left hand was, you would say, “Okay,” then look at the hand and repeat, “Okay.” The question is, why did you look at your hand? You didn’t notice anything about your hand before the question was asked; you could have simply answered the question without looking at it. But once we drew your attention to your hand, you had to examine it, to make sure your experience with your hand up to that point was accurate. Your hand was not important to your well being until we brought up the possibility that it might be “okay.” You have not accepted that your hand simply “is.”

Likewise, we might not be thinking about what we eat – the food is just there. We don’t even have to experience the loss of food, though, just the possibility that the food won’t be there, and suddenly we are consumed not with hunger but with a desire to possess, to consume. In this way we show our lack of faith in G_D. Jesus told us not to worry about what we will wear or what we will eat – G_D will provide. We need to recognize that the hunger simply is, and it will pass when G_D wills it. This is what we mean in Christianity when we talk about “offering it up to G_D” or “turning things over to G_D.”

In your case, you are experiencing pain now, but the pain of childbirth is your White Elephant: once in your mind, you can’t **not **think about it. The key is NOT to *ignore *what your body is feeling but to accept it, and know that it will not last. The pain of childbirth may be more than the pain you are experiencing now; but it may not. Worse or not, it is part of the future. What you are experiencing now is preparing you for that, but it is not that pain. That pain will come, but it is not here now, so focus on and accept what is happening now.

To help you do this, try praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet.