MAY 2021 - we welcome you. An exciting month for our Missta fam as we are due to welcome our newest and littlest member, MELINDA'S 3rd BABY!!
In light of Mel being due this month, we thought we would share her thoughts and experience with her 3rd pregnancy while looking after her almost 4 year old, Leo (4 in August) and her 20 month old daughter, Penelope (2 in September).
Written by Melinda Baxter.
Well, firstly, I should be honest and let you know that as I write this, I am 33 weeks pregnant and eating a block of chocolate. What can I say about pregnancy with two toddlers? All that comes to mind is “LOL”.
If I had a dollar for every time someone tells me “You are going to have your hands full”…. I already have my hands bloody full Susan, but thanks for the hot tip!! My usual answer back is “Oh I lost the plot a long time ago, what’s one more kid thrown in the mix?” 🙄 Okay that was a bit of a rant but I’ll explain in more detail now, how pregnancy has been going!
I have to say, I have had a great pregnancy compared to A LOT of women, so for that I am thankful but at the exact same time it defiantly hasn’t been “easy”!
First trimester was vomiting and constant nausea from week 6-11 weeks. It did feel like it was never going to end and some mornings I would sit and watch the kids rip my house to shreds while wearing a dirty nappy, but I just didn’t have the physical ability to do anything about it, I describe first trimester as going into survival mode! I did the absolute bare minimum that was required of me to run a household; the worst part about it however was that I had a damn coffee aversion... Thankfully that stopped in trimester two 🙌🏼
Extreme tiredness with nausea mixed with two energetic toddlers was not ideal. The foods I could stomach were dry crackers, Maccas and bakers delight bread with butter. One morning by 10am I had called Demi explaining I was eating a McChicken meal.. and then 5 minutes later I called her to tell her I vomited it up 😳
Cooking made me feel sick but I somehow still had a meal on the table every night for the kids and my husband, to this day, I’m not quite sure how I managed that 🤷🏼♀️ Along with all of that, I still had Missta work that needed to be done, somehow, keeping busy with that is what saved me I think... I didn’t have time to think about how sick I was when I did Missta work!
Anyway, as quickly as the nausea started, I woke up one day and it had ended, so I could begin to enjoy the blissfulness that is trimester 2. Energy came back, my clean house returned and life was more manageable again. I returned to running and could do 4km runs until about 25 weeks!! I don’t have much to say about trimester two, mostly because I don’t remember it... It few by! With your first pregnancy you think about being pregnant every single day, second pregnancy, you think about it a bit less and by the third pregnancy, its so far at the back of your mind you generally have no idea how far along you are or any form of countdown happening.
Third trimester rolled around and my iron deficiency and pelvic pressure kicked into full swing. I had been iron deficient my last two pregnancy's so I expected it but I was back to daily naps and lots of screen time for the kids for me to survive... also, my son constantly said to my husband “mummy is grumpy” 😬. I also set up camp at McDonalds yet again as well as spending most of my time in the chocolate isle at the supermarket.
As mentioned, pelvic pressure also made a special guest appearance this pregnancy. Basically, the best way to describe it, is that it feels like the baby is trying to exit your body with every step you take. You don’t really realise how many toys you have to pick up off the floor from two toddlers until you have a giant belly in your way and its basically your only form of exercise. During my last two pregnancies, I never felt like I wanted it to hurry up but this pregnancy I am defiantly excited to be back to my normal self with normal energy levels again.
We always planned on having three kids, I am so excited to see if it’s a little boy or girl in there kick boxing my bladder... we haven’t found the gender with any of our baby's, it was tempting this time but we didn’t cave 🙈
I had an incredibly fast labour with Penelope where I made it to hospital JUST in time to push her out but I hear the third labour throws you a curve ball... so we'll just have to wait and see 🤪
All in all, I am having a good, stock standard pregnancy!! Yes, it’s my hardest pregnancy by far, having two other toddlers but at the same time, they keep you occupied enough to make the pregnancy seemingly go faster AND slower all at the same time somehow… I will report back after I give birth!
WISH ME LUCK 💫
Love Melinda xx
