20 weeks, 5 days
I used to be a gymrat – my husband and I used to hit the gym at least 5 times a week. We did keep this up throughout the first trimester as best as we could, despite some days being more tedious than others. My first trimester had surprisingly mild morning sickness for me in store, although it came with many food aversions and light, permanent nausea. Since 12 weeks onward however, I’ve felt much much better, and food aversions have disappeared one by one, so the gym was very enjoyable once more from about week 12-16.
At week 16, we went out of country to visit my parents for two weeks, and while we got some decent exercise in form of hikes and various visits, we didn’t really get the same intensity that we’re used to from the gym. Even worse; we fell ill with the flu while we were there, so for about a week we didn’t feel up to much at all. I count my blessings though, I know that flus during pregnancy have the potential to turn into full-blown pneumonia and thankfully I evaded that.
Since our return at week 18, we’ve been carefully making a return to the gym. However, I find that my growing belly – and the ever-growing water bubble within it – make cardio a lot harder than it used to be. I’m a fan of the elliptical, but even though I turned down the elevation to avoid most of the “bouncing”, it still feels like I’m jumping rope with a big water balloon tied to my midsection. It’s uncomfortable! Add to this the fact that everything is starting to take a lot more effort to get done – bending down, going upstairs, sleeping as a few examples – and exercise is no exception. Not only am I lugging a good extra 15 pounds around with me, my blood volume shot up by about 40%, so my heart has to pump extra hard to get its job done and is not a big fan of me putting extra strain on it.
I’m thinking about switching over to the treadmill, although I’m past the stage where running is comfortable, so it’d have to be fast walking… perhaps up an incline to make up for the loss in speed.
Baby seems to be doing fine and goes through various grades of activity. Today he’s been rather quiet; yesterday he’s had a very active day, packing many kicks and rolls and little punches. I do hope he’s growing just fine, since my last appointment had me slightly worried about that. Our next appointment is on June 28th, at which point I’ll be 23 weeks gone. Perhaps they’ll schedule another ultrasound as well! It’d be nice to get another look at the little man and make sure he’s caught up in growth.
In the meantime, I made use of amazon and ordered the following books:
That’s my Son, by Rick Johnson
It’s a Boy!: Your Son’s Development from Birth to Age 18, by Michael Thompson
As mentioned, I have very little knowledge of how to raise a boy and I aim to at least educate myself by the time he gets here! We can learn the rest together, I’m sure.