TOP FIVE PREGNANCY 'SURPRISES'

No matter how prepared you think you are, you’ll undoubtedly still run into so many things that will make you go “Wait, what? No one told me that!”. It’s no surprise that society does a shit job preparing women for… anything really… but it becomes evidently clear when you go through the process of having a baby. I grew up around children, my family members had babies, I even grew up in a house of primarily women, and still I’ve run into endless amounts of new information. Things I couldn’t believe I’d never heard of! So without further ado, here are my Top 5 Pregnancy ‘surprises’ that noooobody told me about!

the foley bulb

I know a lot of women who’ve been induced, it’s incredibly common and people are pretty open when it comes to talking about it. What you don’t often hear about, is that there is a bit of a process to being induced and that likely all starts with a foley bulb. A foley is a not-so-fun balloon that gets inserted into your cervix via a catheter and then… inflated. Spoiler alert: It does not feel good. It’s like a really intense vaginal exam that gives you instant, excruciating cramps. The catheter is left hanging out of you and taped to your leg (tip: wear loose pants to this appointment) and you’re sent home to sleep (as if). You’re also informed that once your cervix reaches the 3cm mark it will likely fall out, and if it doesn’t after about 8 hours you can give it a little tug and pull it out. This is usually done a day or so before a scheduled induction, and the whole goal of the foley bulb is to get you dilated to around 3cm so that the actual process of inducing labour will be much smoother for you. Also, sometimes the pressure put on the cervix can spur natural labour. When you get called in for your actual induction, nurses will break you water and likely ask you to walk around the hospital a bit in another effort to naturally start the labour process. If there’s still no imminent sign of baby, then you’ll be given oxytocin and the ball will really get rolling.

melasma

Okay, the first one was intense so let’s slow things down a bit. Melasma in pregnancy is when your hormones (for whatever reason) tell the colour-producing cells in your skin to produce more pigment. It can result in dark patches on your skin, often effecting the face (which is why this condition has been given the nickname the mask of pregnancy). I had a birthmark-like splotch appear next to my belly button, but nothing too extreme. The same process can be responsible for making already darker areas of the skin, appear even darker (i.e. an old scar on my knee made a comeback). This ties in with the darkening and enlarging appearance of your nipples (bonus surprise!) which is actually our bodies natural preparation for breastfeeding. Babies vision hasn’t quite developed at birth but they can see contrast… hence the big dark nipples. Kind of fascinating, no?

epidural = catheter

I’m not going to lie, I heard this one and panicked. When you’re given an epidural, you’re also given a catheter because you’re (hopefully) completely frozen from the waist down and don’t really have a lot of control over your bladder. The initial reality can be intimidating but I’m going to keep this one short and sweet because I can honestly say, as long as the epidural is doing what it’s intended to do, you will have no idea it’s even happening. You won’t feel a thing, it won’t effect you at all, and it will likely be removed before your lower half ‘thaws’. A small price to pay for painless labour.

group B strep

This is a test given to women near the end of their pregnancy (around week 37) to see if the mother has the particular bacteria. It’s fairly common, with about 1 in 5 women testing positive. It has absolutely no effect on your health, but the concern is that it could lead to complications for baby when they pass through the birth canal and are exposed to it. What is a little off-putting, is the way your OBGYN will just casually slip into the appointment conversation that she’s going to swab your vagina… and your rectum… to test you for it. If you’re negative nothing changes and if you’re positive they set you up with an antibiotic, so either way it’s no risk to you or baby. But at some point on this journey, you will get a medical q-tip up your ass.

episiotomy

Let’s finish with a bang, shall we? An episiotomy is a procedure where your delivery doctor cuts your perineum (the area between your vagina and your anus) to make your vaginal opening larger for childbirth. It’s often done as a preventative measure, to protect the mother against any unnatural tearing. I was lucky enough to not have to have one with Lou, and I’m really hoping lightening will strike twice. But… from what I’ve heard from other mothers who have had it done, it’s just one more of those things you go through in the heat of the labour moment to safely deliver your baby. If you opted for an epidural, you’re frozen down there anyways! The doctor will stitch you up and you’ll reallllly appreciate your Frida Mom peri bottle and padsicles during your postpartum journey.

Even though some of those may have been eye opening (and slightly terrifying) I want to echo the sentiment of the newest mom in my circle of friends, when I asked her how she was feeling after giving birth she replied with “I have stitches, but I know it’s all temporary” and I think that sums it up perfectly. All those moments are fleeting in the big picture; you’ll heal, you’ll forget, and you’ll maybe even do it all over again. The only constant in this experience really is the best part… that beautiful new baby!