Morning sickness
From August 2021
Unless you have a child, you’ve probably never knowingly encountered a woman in her first trimester. We carry on as Normal People undercover, because one mustn’t get others excited about a baby until one has greater than 80% certainty the baby is “viable”. This level of certainty, apparently, is allowed after twelve weeks — which is usually seven weeks after you see the pink line on the stick, and five or six weeks after you start experiencing pregnancy symptoms.
A month and a half may not seem like a long time to keep a secret, but it’s not just a month and a half of sitting on some juicy gossip — it’s a month and a half of pretending to be totally fine when you feel like absolute shit. And that is, I believe, one of the most under-appreciated facts about the first trimester: it feels like absolute shit.
No, it’s not just a cheeky puke before breakfast and then going about your normal business. I am fairly certain the term “morning sickness” was coined by the same troll who named Greenland. After he got his jollies watching tourists rock up in sun hats to an iceberg, he decided to bask in the sadistic delight of making pregnant women feel crazy for needing a nap AND a cry AND a vomit-prevention lemon to sniff at 3pm. Bastard.
On good days, it comes in waves throughout the day. On bad days, it’s just there all the time. And “it” includes the trifecta of nausea, fatigue and hormonal fluctuations. Allow me to elaborate on each one for the uninitiated.
The nausea is a sensation occupying the entire space between the throat and the bowel. It sits like a masked bandit with his finger hovering over an ominous red button saying: “Careful now. Any sudden movements, smells or tastes and I’m going to blow.”
The fatigue is an ossification of bones and brain. What do you expect, existing on a diet of plain biscuits and tortillas… while also manufacturing a new organ and a tiny organism? When the stars align, you can muster 30 minutes of half-arsed exercise, but once you sit down on the sofa, getting up for a glass of water feels Herculean. (This baffles your husband who finds it suspicious that you manage reps of squats in the morning, but huff like a geriatric when you take the dog out at night.)
And on top of that, you’re bursting into tears because of the completely unsurprising victory of the Kenyan woman in the Olympic marathon and simultaneously brewing in a murderous rage because someone has the gall to eat LASAGNA within smelling distance of you (i.e. in the same house).
It’s misery. Which, as we all know, doesn’t love loneliness. But who can we commiserate with when we’re bound by the Better Not Risk The Awkward Miscarriage Conversation NDA? In the waddling watermelon-belly stage, we are surrounded by people jumping at the chance to rub our shoulders and give up their seats and furrow sympathetic brows at us. But who can we elicit sympathy from when we look no different than someone who is just off a bad night’s sleep?
Women are, of course, well practiced in the art of grinning and bearing. You can’t casually complain about menstrual cramps at the office like you would about a hangover or a sports injury. So I will grin and bear for three more weeks (except at home of course where I will complain constantly and demand nightly foot massages). And then I will POST THIS TO THE INTERNET FOR ALL THE WORLD TO SEE and be schooled in the badassery of women everywhere!! Call your mother and thank her.
