The Secret Club - Blogher Post

There is this secret club that no one ever talks about and you would never know that it even exists, that is until you get pregnant.

Before you ever get pregnant you think you have an idea about how it is going to go; morning sickness, the urge to pee all the time, cravings, and that it is going to hurt like hell. Well there is a lot that isn't taught in school or talked about, it isn't until your pregnant everyone who has gone through it decides that's when to share what really happens, when there is no turning back!

Once I became pregnant, I heard a lot of "has [this] happened yet?" I usually looked at them in question and either said "um, no" or "um, yeah. It happened to you too?"

I was lucky, I had a really easy pregnancy. No morning sickness (at any part of the day), no cravings that I just had to have at that very minute, I felt great! Well all for one little thing...hemorrhoids and I had them bad. I don't remember anyone ever telling me that I was going to have to take a stool softener everyday for the last two months. But once I mentioned constipation, my mom and sister both told me it could be bad. Why didn't anyone tell me before?

My favorite question, "have you had the bloody show yet?" WHAT?? Nothing about that sounds good! Well if I actually did research I would have known what that was but really they need to call it something else.
I also had it in my head that both my mom and sister had easy deliveries and that will deliver like my mother, well almost. Everything was going smoothly, I went from not being dilated to fully dilated in thirty minutes, he crowned in the next five, then nothing he wouldn't move. After three hours of pushing I was taken to surgery for an emergency c-section. I wasn't expecting it and neither was my husband or mother (who was in the waiting room and I found out later was crying to her best friend because she knew something was wrong.) Well after sharing my story, I couldn't believe how many people said "yeah, that happened to me too." Once again, why do I find out after the fact?

I also never realized what came along with the c-section. It is a serious surgery, why anyone would choose to have one is beyond me! I was in the hospital for four full days, the let me go a day early. I was hooked to a catheter till the third night because I couldn't pee on my own. I couldn't walk. The worst...I wasn't able to hold or focus on my new son right after he was born because of the drugs. My mom feed him with a bottle because my boobs were numb and my arms were so shaky. Once we got home, I could barely bend and walk. I am lucky that my husband was able to take off as long as he did. No one tells you these things!

But now, when I know someone is pregnant (and not before) I share some of the joys of being pregnant. When I am asked a question I answer it honestly with out making it seem better than it really is. Because I am now apart of this club, I am a mom and have been through something that I now know you can't really explain to someone who isn't. Being pregnant is just the initiation. There is no turning back...and you won't ever want too (well you might, but it will pass.)

http://www.blogher.com/secret-club