First of all, the entire section IN THE BEGINNING about birth defects and all these tests you can have done to check for this and that... all the stuff about Downs Syndrome... I didn't need to read that in early pregnancy. I know these tests are supposed to be done early on if you're going to have them, but no thanks. This section of the book caused my heart to race, my blood pressure to rise, and that anxious feeling in my stomach. Number One, even if there was something wrong with my poppy seed, I most certainly would NEVER terminate the pregnancy. Number Two, why is this in the beginning of the book? All it did was remind me of the many things that can go wrong and that isn't what I needed this early in the game.
Second of all, the section about food & nutrition caused me to break down and cry not once, but twice. Yes, that's right. Twice. At this point, right now, I understand that the food & nutrition notes are supposed to be a guide... but when I first started to read about it, in my mind I was thinking, "How in the world am I supposed to remember all this stuff?" There are so many things I can't have... and then so many things I'm supposed to have. Do I really have to obsess over every meal when it comes to how much calcium I'm getting? Or how much mercury is in that tuna fish I want so bad? Or if my favorite green tea is going to deplete my folate, thus resulting in Spina Bifida?! Do you see where I am going with this? In my mind, the question is constantly there... Will this be a successful pregnancy? When I'm faced with all of these rules I had no idea about, it overwhelmes me to tears.
Once I got past the horrible beginning of the book, I started to enjoy it. I enjoy that there is a monthly & weekly breakdown of baby development, symptoms, and what my body is going through in general. Lots of questions are answered and that is a wonderful thing. But I have to recommend to all my fellow mothers-to-be, and all my cysters who are trying oh so hard to get pregnant... DO NOT READ THE FIRST FEW CHAPTERS OF THIS BOOK. Just don't. Save yourself the tears and just skip to the fun part. Just wait until you meet with your doctor and then ask their recommendations on food & medicines.
My first prenatal appointment is on September 15 when I will be 8 weeks along. My doctor's office went ahead and scheduled my appointments for the rest of the year, actually. :) Now that I have gotten past the fear of whether or not my beta hCG levels are rising in a healthy way (thank God they are) I have to wait for the dreaded first ultrasound to make sure there is a healthy little bun in my oven. This is the part that scares me. I guess because I see so many of my fellow cysters post on SoulCysters that everything was fine until they had that first ultrasound and then found that there was no yolk sac... this scares the daylights out of me. All I can do is hope and pray... pray that God protects my little poppy seed for a long 40-week pregnancy.
