Sunday 30 March 2014

Fear

With my first pregnancy I was a bit anxious because it was all a new experience but innocent enough to believe things would probably be fine until it all went downhill at ten weeks.

With my second pregnancy I was hyper-vigilant.  I worried and over-analysed every symptom until we passed 14 weeks gestation.  Now that we were out of the first trimester surely it was safe to hope everything would be okay.  I had three whole days of relative peace-of-mind before things went downhill again.

This time I have every reason to believe the pregnancy will go to term - we're now more than 75% of the way there.  I'm healthy and growing and gaining weight as expected.

But that is just in my head.  In my heart is fear.

I know that babies can still die in utero in the third trimester.  Some babies are stillborn.  And some babies die due to birth complications.

Upon waking every morning the first thing I do is check for movement.  Most often there is none and the cold fingers of fear start to crawl up my spine.  Pickle seems not to be a morning person, preferring to save the major acrobatics for when I'm trying to fall asleep at night.  I know this in my head, but still the nightmare scenarios play through my mind until I first feel movement later in the day.

All I can do is treat myself well and hope for the best.  It is much more difficult than I would have believed.

There are no guarantees.

4 comments:

  1. I get this. I was the same way, all the way up until my son was born. I actually feel relived that he is outside now, where I can check his breathing whenever I need to. It's a funny universe where you feel like your body can betray you at any time.

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    1. "your body can betray you at any time" - thats exactly how I feel! Good to know it will decrease after the birth. I don't want to be one of those paranoid, overprotective parents.

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  2. Oh Lisa, fear is not fun at all. Sending you peace and hope. You are 75% of the way and will have a baby in your arms soon.

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    1. Thanks Marcy. I'm trying to meditate and do relaxation exercises to manage it, as the last thing I want is to be full of fear when it is time to give birth.

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