Top Ten: Crappy Pregnancy Symptoms I Never Got (Yet)

Before you get pregnant, everyone is quick to tell you how wonderful having a baby is, and how it will complete your life, and what a magical experience pregnancy is.

Then, once you are pregnant, everything changes. You no longer hear about the pregnancy glow or being cute with your belly sticking out, but instead listen to tales of pregnancy constipation and super-hairiness. And the greatest part is: no one tells you about the crappy stuff until you're already pregnant! Beautiful miracle, my ass.

I figure since I just passed the 30-week mark, most of the wonderful symptoms of pregnancy should have happened to me already. And some of them have. However, it seems like I dodged several hormonal bullets. This blog's purpose is to help me remember what did or didn't happen during my pregnancy so I can tell the Beast and any future girl/boyfriends all about it; therefore, I feel that including a post like this is essential.

So here we go: the Top Ten Crappy Pregnancy Symptoms I Never Got

1. Sasquatch-esque Hair Growth

One of the good side-effects of pregnancy is that your hair (on your head) will stop shedding. It will get super thick and shiny and luxurious, and you'll be all fabulous. Sometimes, the opposite occurs and you look like a chemotherapy patient. With me, however, my hair didn't change. It was partly disappointing, because I really wanted to enjoy thick, supermodel hair for a while. I'm kind of glad I didn't have any changes with my hair, though, because the same mechanism in your body that keeps you from shedding on your head also keeps you from shedding everywhere else. Thus, Wolf-Lady hairiness. Hairy legs, pits, No-No Zone, mustache, etc. I like that I didn't have to pluck a mustache.

2. Pregnancy Mask

Pregnancy mask occurs when the skin on a pregnant woman's face reacts unfavorably to sunlight. It will make the skin mottled, usually around the eyes, nose, and mouth (thus looking like a mask). I haven't changed my sun-soaking habits (or lack thereof) since I got pregnant, and I always wear SPF 15 on my face every day anyway. I've experienced no pregnancy mask, and no major skin problems at all, period. I wouldn't say I'm glowing; I'd say, I'm normal.

3. Poop Problems

Constipation and diarrhea are both fairly common during pregnancy, and I've not experienced any of that. Well, any more than usual. I've been craving dairy products more than usual, and being lactose intolerant, the ingestion of dairy always makes my GI tract unhappy. It's not pregnancy's fault, though, it's my addiction to moomoo milk.

4. Edema

The swelling of the extremities. Edema can indicate heart problems, but during pregnancy, it just indicates that pregnancy sucks more than your mom ever told you it did. I can still wear my wedding band all day, every day, no problem.

5. Incontinence

The increased stresses placed on a woman's pelvic area during pregnancy sometimes results in the inability to hold her pee (and less often, her doody). Sometimes, the position of the baby in later weeks puts a whole lot of pressure on the pregnant lady's bladder, and sometimes (like in my case with the Beast), the baby will use the bladder as a soccer ball and practice kicking, punching, and headbutting it. Any of these factors can contribute to incontinence. I am happy to report that I haven't peed my pants yet.

6. Foot Size Increase

During pregnancy, your body will loosen up the ligaments in your hips, so that they will come apart easier during labor, which will allow for the baby's head to fit through the birth canal. Hooray Nature! However, your body isn't shooting a ligament-loosening sniper rifle; it's blasting a ligament-loosening shotgun. By that, I mean not only do the ligaments in your hips loosen; the ligaments in your entire body do. Your feet have a lot of ligaments in them, and when they loosen, your foot size increases. Permanently. I like my small feet, and I'm glad I get to keep them.

7. Crazy Food Cravings

One of the first questions everyone asks me is, "So, what weird food cravings have you had?" And I always have to (get to?) disappoint by responding, "Nothing." It's true. I haven't even really had any huge food aversions (black olives, for the most part), and I guess Jake's lucky that I haven't forced him to go out to the store at 11pm for raisins, Jell-O, and chicken patties.

8. Sticky-Outy Belly Button

It's still amazingly concave, even this late. I thought it would have popped by now, but it hasn't. I guess there's still time, but I think it's going to stay mostly the way it was.

9. Varicose Veins (to Include Hemorrhoids)

Now, here is one of those pregnancy symptoms that no one will talk about with you until you're pregnant. Varicose veins suck enough as it is, but when they're located in your pooper (or even in your bajingo), it ups the suckfactor. Imagine hearing as a little girl: "When a mommy is pregnant with a baby, sometimes her butt will bleed when she poops!" Just FYI, when I was Googling for pics for this part, I came across some truly heinous pictures of hemorrhoids. I have decided to be merciful and not post any of them here.

10. Drooling

I forget why drooling is common during pregnancy, but it is. And I haven't drooled more than normal. It seems like a mild sucky symptom next to incontinence and hemorrhoids, but I think that drooling all over yourself while standing in line at the bank would be pretty embarrassing.

I also haven't gotten stretch marks yet, nor did I ever fly into completely insane fits of hormone-induced pregnancy rage. The stretch marks can still happen, though, and are really more likely to happen later since that's when all the stretching occurs. I don't think my mom got stretch marks, and heredity plays a significant part in the acquisition of the dreaded stretch mark. As for pregnancy uber-bitchiness, it just never showed up. There was pregnancy-related crying and sadness (some of you may recall my tale of the Energizer Bunny commercial from a previous blog posting), but those lasted about 15 minutes each and have only occurred a total of probably 6-ish times. I consider hormonal emotion swings to be a dodged bullet, as well.

I think going into painstaking detail about the really awful parts of pregnancy would deter a lot of girls from getting knocked up.