The Waiting Game: Surviving the Last Week of Pregnancy

It’s a terrible thing when you have two weeks till Christmas day and you’re five years old. It’s even worse when you’re seven and three quarters, and in one sleeps time you know your parents are going to whisk you off to Disneyland. You know in eight long, long hours you will wake up and begin a journey to walk amongst the heroes and heroines of all those bed-time stories and all your dreams. But that’s still not the worst. Oh no, the worst, as I have recently discovered is being a pregnant woman two weeks from her due date, when pregnancy is not all glowing skin and tiny kicks but, full blown World War Three (with all the modern world’s advances in technological weaponry) in your tummy; that and spending the majority of your time on the toilet or on the search for the next one. Handy tip: if going on a countryside walk just stuff multiple tissues up a sleeve and carry some antibac gel and be utterly prepared to lose all dignity and squat behind a tiny twig of a bush, easy prey for the overexcited puppy dog on the hunt. Or, if slightly luckier (and blessed for me on this one occasion) find a dilapidated riding centre, perfect an exaggerated pregnancy waddle, look distressed, and anxiously cradle bump and plead to use the facilities. Those suckers fell for it a treat and, my bladder was satisfyingly emptied before I skipped out and up the hill to continue my country frolic.
The thing is, it’s been 38 weeks of growing my bundle of joy and with her ever increasing weight load things are no longer so pretty. All I want to do is hold this yummy scrum in my arms and make the wait and the weight on my poor bones stop; be gone sleepless tossing and turning, bring on the ability to just lie on my tummy! It would have been slightly easier had I not had a scare, with moderate contractions throughout the night and thus hubby and I drove to hospital expecting to leave with babe in arms. Instead, after anxious monitoring the contractions all stopped and the only things I had achieved were an utterly exhausting night and a taste of the pain to come. I know these ‘practices’ can be common but they can also be downright mindboggling confusing and leave you feeling like a Topsy Turvy, Humpty Dumpty, with no concept of her rights and lefts. That coupled with the fact my midwife had told me I was one centimetre dilated, she could feel baby’s head and that should we even bother to book another appointment, well as you can imagine I felt like the Easter Chick told to deliver every Childs’ Christmas present, total state of bobbing flux.
So here are my survival tips to get through the last slog and to remain a coherent, semi-functioning member of society...

1. Meet up with fellow preggos and have a moan, surround yourself with a support network of like minded women who not only understand but are right there in it with you, feeling it and fighting it too.
2. Treat yourself like the Queen that you are... book a blowdry, put your face on, wear what makes you feel fabulous and walk that catwalk of life like you don’t even know you’re pregnant. “Me, preggo? Pah, darling I’m a supermodel and I’m going to fake it until I make it”.
3. Look to the future and indulge in some retail therapy... check out Baby Luno’s gorgeous collection of baby clothing and play dress up in your mind with your newborn.
4. Buy a decent nursing bra from Baby Luno and give those boobs the respect and scaffolding they deserve, literally give yourself some support.
5. Go for a walk, dance, do something that makes YOU feel alive and sod the neighbours and your volume control... you’re pregnant, you’re a warrior and no man tells you to ‘turn that music down’.
6. Swim, take the weight off your aching muscles and float in a suspended limbo of lushness- ignore lane control, you’re not an Olympian length swimmer you’re a floating island of bliss.
7. Do a date night for yourself... run a warm bath, soak in Epsom salts, surround yourself in candles, grab a book, listen to some music and feel that Zen.
8. Go on an internet pregnancy forum and read about other women’s experience... I can guarantee there is someone worse off than you and then you can feel ‘not so bad, and totally nailing this losing your shizzle business’.
9. Glare at anyone who dares ask you if they can touch your bump, stares at your bump, overcrowds your bump or generally gets right up your nose like Hay Fever in the height of summer. You’re pregnant; you are not a Public Art Gallery.
10. Talk to your mother, she’s been there and if anyone’s got your back it’s that fierce Mumma wolf. Her cub might have grown up, but she will always have her best interests at heart. This leads me nicely to my favourite poem of the moment by the incredibly talented Nikita Gill, applying both to a current mother and an extremely cranky mother to be, oh and the end of this rather aggressive blog!

Lottie xx

Lottie Keble-Wyatt is Baby Luno's blogger. Lottie is a pilates instructor and blogger, currently in her 39th week of pregnancy. We can't wait to follow her journey as she takes on motherhood!