New Mama

So much has happened in my life, and to the world, since my last post. During these hard times with the world facing a pandemic, I have been able to experience the most beautiful blessing in the form of my new baby daughter. 

As life in the UK began to change back in March with the nation getting used to a national lockdown, I found out I was pregnant with my first child. Such amazing news that came at such a strange time in the world. 

My pregnancy was mostly smooth and without complications, apart from severe morning sickness for the first 17 weeks. This is something that nobody can prepare you for and once I passed this stage I loved every minute of being pregnant and my bump. We found out I was pregnant very early on and in the first trimester I tried to prepare myself by buying all the food and drinks that help with sickness. My twin sister had suffered badly so I wanted to prepare for the inevitable. All I can say for me is that nothing worked and no amount of ginger biscuits were going to help with my gag reflux. I was prescribed cyclizine by my GP and things started to look up and I felt I could finally feel like myself again. 

I loved the second and third trimesters and was grateful to be able to work from home for the whole period of my pregnancy. Being tall at 5"10, I carried my bump well and therefore seemed quite small to my midwife and she referred me to have a few extra growth scans at the end of my third trimester. Baby was always fine and it just was down to the size of my bump. We decided to keep the gender a surprise and wanted to wait until delivery to find out what we were having. There is so much gender neutral clothing available but it definitely got harder nearer to our due date as we were so desperate to know after guessing for so long. I was pretty sure it was a boy up until the moment she was on my chest. 

Being pregnant during lockdown was an experience and unfortunately my partner could not attend the scans and we had no antenatal classes. Finally our due date came at 40 weeks + 5 and we were so fortunate that he was allowed into the hospital and was able to stay with me for all stages of labour once we were tested negative for Covid. I had a very quick labour and after 5 hours and 23 minutes our baby girl was welcomed into the world. A feeling that everybody says cannot be explained but all I can say is my life now feels complete. I had wanted a family for so long and now my dreams have come true.