Week 34: Pregnant AF

Holy crap! I was so not prepared for how hard the last trimester would be. It’s not that I didn’t read about the details in the pregnancy books or listen to third trimester warnings of the pregnant women who have come before me. No, I was well informed on what to expect in the last leg of pregnancy; I just didn’t heed those warnings. Instead, I let the blissfulness of an easy second trimester carry me along until this pregnancy finally caught up with me.
I’ve heard a million times over that the last two months of pregnancy can be pretty miserable, and each time I heard that familiar phrase I nodded along and smiled politely, all the while not taking such threats seriously. Well, it’s safe to say that those third trimester symptoms everyone warns you about have hit me like a ton of bricks. All of the sudden, back pain and achy feet are unwelcome constants. I have to pee all the time. Even when I don’t really have to pee, it feels like this baby is giving my bladder a big old hug. To be fair, these were all to be expected, but what about this other weird crap that’s happening to my body?
No one ever warned me about the possibility of one of my legs going numb! The first time it happened I woke up in the middle of the night needing to pee. My husband’s giant leg was draped over mine and I had that tingly numbing sensation in my left thigh. Naturally, I chalked it up to a temporary loss in blood flow to that leg. But then it happened again the next day while I was sitting on the couch, and again two days after that. For the past two weeks, my left thigh has gone numb a handful of times. After realizing a somewhat alarming pattern, I turned to several pregnancy forums where I discovered that this numbing (and sometimes burning) sensation is actually very common. I will of course be discussing this with my OB/GYN at my appointment tomorrow, but it appears the cause has something to do with the uterus putting pressure on certain nerves in the sciatic area. Interestingly enough, the left side of my belly is my daughter’s favorite spot on the couch, as my doctor likes to call it, and it’s only ever my left thigh that goes numb.
And what about the shortness of breath?! I’ve never felt so out of shape in my life! Even my normal routine to get ready in the morning will often leave me out of breath, and going up and down the stairs almost always arouses some sort of huffing and puffing. Cleaning the house or taking the dogs for a short walk is enough to tire me out for hours. Unloading the groceries or doing the laundry usually results in hot flashes and deep breaths. Kudos to those mamas who stay fitness strong until the very end of their pregnancy, but my body isn’t having any of it.
With just six weeks to go, I’m pregnant as heck, and my body won’t let me forget it. The other day I had my first struggle with equilibrium after simply turning around. If I drop something on the floor, a heated debate ensues in my head on whether or not the item is worth the struggle of bending over to pick it up. It takes about an hour or so to get comfortable in bed at night, just long enough before I have to get up to pee and then start the whole process all over again. This happens about four or five times a night. But there’s something so sweet about the unpleasantness and discomfort that is the third trimester because at the end of it all, just around the corner, I get to meet my beautiful baby girl.