ferrousland.com - diary archives
Thursday, May 15, 2003
not a useless lump - 09:24 PM
i always assumed that pregnant women had trouble getting up from a reclining position because of the extra weight they were carrying. this may be partly true, but now that i'm having the same trouble, i think i know the truth.
even from early on in the pregnancy my stomach muscles went kind of weird. not weak, exactly, but they just didn't seem to want to work the way they used to. i'd lie down in bed, then lift my head up to move my hair out from under my neck & back. even before i started to show, i began to have trouble doing this. i'd have to do it one side at a time, kind of leaning forward at an angle on one side, then moving the other direction.
it must have something to do with the hormones that cause the ligments & bones to soften up in preparation for carrying & delivering the baby.
it's really hard to describe. it's like they're weak, but i can't imagine they suddenly lose their strength. perhaps because the ligaments are all looser, when you tell the muscle to do something, it can't react quite the same way it used to. if my basic knowledge of human physiology is correct, then the ligaments are attached to the ends of the muscles. if they're looser & stretchier than they used to be, then of course they won't work the same.
so if i'm sitting back in a chair & i want to get out of it, or lean forward, i can't simply move forward. i have to brace myself & use my arms to help me up, while shuffling my bum into position. even if you've never been in close contact with a pregnant woman, you must have seen this manoeuvre once or twice, maybe even just on tv.
it's not just the stomach muscles either, although they seem to affect most of what we usually do in a day. it's amazing how much we depend on them & don't realise it until they suddenly work differently, or not as well. even the mildest exercise, like a ten minute walk down to the shops, i can feel the next day. previously, a short walk like that wouldn't have made a dent. now though, the next day i can feel my calves as though i'd gone mountain climbing. that was actually one of the few energetic things i used to enjoy every now & then. if i did it now i think i'd be unable to move the next day because of stiff & sore muscles!
today & last night, after my one session of aqua aerobics yesterday, i've been able to feel discomfort in one of my calf muscles. if i pointed my toe really hard, then the calf muscle would cramp, i can feel it. i've always thought of aqua aerobics as being for sixty year olds (which proved itself to be true when i got there .. 
) but i guess now my body is acting as though it's sixty.
with everything i do, i feel as though i've aged thirty years. i don't seem to have the strength that i used to & when i do exert myself even the tiniest bit, my muscles tell me about it loudly & clearly the next day.
maybe it's a natural way of making sure that we don't do things that will endanger the baby. if a woman is quite fit beforehand, then she may take certain risks, knowing her limit. when pregnant, that limit is lowered substantially, making sure those risks aren't taken. just as well it happens relatively slowly.
as slow as it is though, it's still a shock to the system. not just physically, but mentally. these days i feel like an invalid. when i got out of the pool the other day, rather than line up behind all the older women to wait for the ladder, i climbed up on the step under the water then got out onto the side of the pool. i couldn't simply hoist myself up on my arms & lift a leg up to the edge of the pool though, i couldn't manage it. instead, i oh-so-very-elegantly had to climb up on the edge on all fours, then get one leg up at a time. i must have looked a sight .. next time i think i'll just wait for the ladder. *rolls eyes at self*
that's what i'm talking about, see? i can't do the simplest things which i could do before. i guess that's why so many people tell you to take the time to pamper yourself while you're pregnant. if i didn't buy a nice little thing for myself here or there, or make myself feel good with a bit of skin care or hairdressing which i wouldn't usually bother with, then i'd feel useless & big & ugly.
perhaps it's a woman thing. if we don't feel good about ourselves, then it affects us in a bigger way than we might think. feeling good on the inside makes us feel good on the outside & vice versa. here's a good example. i'm not sure if other women are the same, but if i have a cold or a flu, then i know that i'm almost over it when i take a shower & wash my hair, shave my legs & underarms, brush my teeth & maybe even get dressed in something a bit nicer than what i might usually laze around the house in. that's a case of feeling good on the outside making me feel a bit better on the inside.
i suppose it's why women like to be told that they look nice, or told by their partner that they love them, even if they already know deep down. the physical affects the mental & the other way around.
so making sure that i look nice (by ensuring i have clothes that fit me well during my pregnancy, for instance) means that i feel less like a big lump of uslessness & more like a beautiful woman doing something amazing by growing a new baby human inside me. 
trying to get out of the bath is the worst one!
i think something most people don't expect is that the changes in your body aren't necessarily temporary. some things gradually go back to normal after the baby is born, but in other ways your body is different forever. that is what is hard to get used to. it's not exactly bad or not as good as it used to be, it's just different.
What is remarkable is that every first prenancey is great. Yoy read all the books, consider water births, don't eat this, try breathing exercises etc etc. But at the end of the day it all goes out the window on the day and its "on your back and nature dictates"... All will be fine, trust me I'm a man and I know about these things
Father & Grandfather
Don't trust Terry! Don't get on your back! Gravity cannot possibly assist you unless you're vertical!
And Jade is right.. your body will be changed forever. Make sure you do your pelvic floor exersizes, or you'll never be able to sneeze again!
I second you Melanie on the pelvic floor exercises! I was pretty slack at doing them and after a few sneezing attacks had a little accident! Oops
Also agree on the being vertical thing during labour, pushing a baby up hill is only convenient for the specialist sitting between your legs, not for anyone else!
gmail
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Wait tillyour hips roll out of joint when you are lying in bed doing nothing, and you have to put them back in (this also includes knees, sigh)
I think you should be reading as much as possible on your pregnacy!!