Week 25: The dropsies (plus a healthy dose of emotion)

By Published On: January 1st, 2016

Pregnancy comes with a variety of blessings and a decent […]

-5Pregnancy comes with a variety of blessings and a decent amount of curses. There are the beautiful ones: seeing your baby for the first time on an ultrasound, hearing baby’s heartbeat, feeling baby’s kicks that start as slight fluttering and grow to healthy thumps. There are the less pleasant ones: having to pee all the time, feeling hungrier than normal and then not hungry at all, nausea. And then there are the ones you sometimes don’t find out about until you’re in the thick of it. Case in point: the dropsies.
When I first got pregnant with our daughter Olivia, I thought I knew exactly what to expect—including the fact that you can never know exactly what to expect until you are, ahem, expecting. I was ready to buy a pair of glamorous support stockings to combat varicose veins (worked like a charm!). I had decided which stretch mark cream to try (Honest Company—I swear by it). And I knew I may be in for an upset stomach (or worse) during my first trimester. One thing I was not expecting was having a major case of the dropsies.
Now, in the grand scheme, not being able to hold onto anything is a very minor inconvenience during pregnancy. However, the fact that it’s a minor side effect does not make it any less frustrating. During my first pregnancy, I had exactly that: a minor case of it. But during this pregnancy? Major dropsies.
I was unloading the dishwasher one night and could not hold onto one of our plastic cups. Luckily, it was a plastic one. I dropped it on the counter. I dropped it on the floor. When my husband said, “Geeze!” I informed him (because, as a teacher, I like to provide an education whenever I can) that dropping things was a side effect of pregnancy. He chuckled and said I blame everything on being pregnant.
Since then, I think I may have convinced him that the dropsies is a real thing. I drop at least two things every day. At least. Silverware, dry erase markers, erasers, Olivia’s toys, you name it. Today, I was at a coffee shop, and within a five-minute period, I dropped my four cents in change, my loyalty card, and spilled some of my decaf on the table. Luckily, I have not dropped our daughter. I always make sure I have a firm, two-handed grasp on Olivia, especially when we’re going upstairs. She usually tries to push one of my hands off her—little Miss Independent that she is—but I don’t trust myself enough to do a one-handed carry with that precious cargo, especially considering my phone and water bottle have both met the floor almost daily!
Another one of the lovely side effects of pregnancy that I’ve mentioned before is the overload of emotions. Over the weekend, ABC Family was showing the entire Harry Potter movie series in succession. Sunday night, my husband and I happened upon the last hour of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2. During that last hour, (bear with me, non-Harry Potter fans—and shame on you) as the students, faculty, and friends of Hogwarts tend to their wounded and dead, Harry goes to Dumbledore’s office to use the pensieve. He puts Snape’s tears inside and is transported to events in his life, including the night Harry’s parents were killed by Voldemort. As many times as I’ve seen that movie, that particular scene never affected me the way it did Sunday night. I watched as a fictional baby Harry Potter cried in his crib as his fictional mother was killed. I saw the tears streaming down little Harry’s face and thought, oh crap. When my husband turned to me during the commercial break and saw the weird look on my face, he asked what was wrong. And I couldn’t hold them in anymore. Tears started running down my face, and I said, “That scene is so sad…” and he started laughing. Laughing! He told me it was affecting me because we are parents now and I’m pregnant.
And then he assured me that an evil wizard wouldn’t kill us and leave Olivia an orphan.
And for that, I am grateful.