I was telling my husband yesterday about how difficult it is to be present when you are queasy, nauseous, all day, every day. The last thing you want to do is be present to everything that is making you feel bad, and for me these days, it’s the unrelenting queasiness that I feel upon waking to the moment I go to bed. I just want to check out and avoid it. I want to sleep it off. Either this constant nauseous feeling is making me fatigued all day long, or it’s the fatigue itself I’m trying to work with in addition to the unsettled stomach. There is a bit of heartburn too.
I’m 6 weeks and 2 days along and in three days, I’m heading back in for our second ultrasound, hoping to see a heartbeat and get the confirmation that all is good in the hood, errr, I mean, all is good in the womb. My diet has changed drastically. The nausea makes me not want to eat which obviously isn’t an option…I’m struggling to find foods that entice me and my taste buds and all the usuals don’t seem to cut it. In fact, most of the foods repulse me. Yesterday I settled on frozen mango chunks and buckwheat crackers for dinner. To force down the calories, I slathered on raw, organic almond butter and honey, topped off with a fresh blackberry. I managed that okay. This morning, as I’m typing this, I’m cooking boiled rice. Wait, or boiling rice is what I meant to type. I woke up starving this morning…but wait, starving doesn’t mean I want to eat. Starving just means I have the sharp shooting pains telling my brain that I want to eat, but my taste buds have their own agenda. I thought, hell, why not boil some rice like we did in childhood days, the traditional Chinese bland porridge that seems to be the end all cure all for everything. You’re sick? Oh, eat some porridge. You have a headache? Oh, here, eat some porridge. Upset stomach? Eat some porridge. Heart burn? Eat some porridge. Constipation? Fever? Flu? Eat some porridge. Everything can be cured with bland, over cooked white rice, you see. It’s kind of like the mom’s chicken soup equivalent of the West.
So I’m hoping this bland, overcooked white rice will cure my nausea. Maybe I’ll have some pickled cucumber with it.
I’m still on chinese herbs and probably will continue until the end of the first trimester. My acupuncturist added another herbie thing into it to help my nausea. I’m hoping it actually works. My herbs are cooked the traditional way, in a clay herb pot. Every pouch of herbs are soaked and cooked for an hour and 10 minutes. To be honest, I love it. I love the aroma it gives us (which repels most people who aren’t used to it)…it reminds me of childhood days. I grew up with Chinese herbalists and acupuncture and all that jazz and it’s in my nature to turn towards eastern remedies vs western. My amazing husband tends to veer towards the opposite, so I’m even more grateful when he tolerates and never says a word about the strong pungent herb smells wafting through the house.
Yesterday I had some thoughts. I had a moment of anxiety when I thought about not being able to be present for this part of the pregnancy…the early part of the pregnancy because I feel so yuckie. I don’t want to miss any part of it and I fear that I am. I feel that I’m half awake to these days that are quickly passing by. Three weeks has since passed since our transfer. All has been a blur. I want to take pictures of my body before it changes…and there are some mixed emotions about that too. I’ll never see this body the same way again. This body that has been with me for 36 years of my life…will my new body be one that I love? I found myself wanting to hold on to, not wanting things to change, not wanting my body to change, and then remembering that pregnancy has been something both my husband and I have been working towards for some time now. And then I remember the wise practice of releasing, letting go of the need to control…
This body that houses me, is not me. Over identifying with it will cause me suffering.
Growth inevitably causes some discomfort.
Moving towards a healthy pregnancy is my ultimate practice at the moment. Surrendering to a higher intelligence that is creating life inside of me. Surrendering to what I don’t know…and this whole process is one that I can’t quite control or attempt to know until each day arrives. I can only work on being fluid, unattached to the changes happening inside, outside, all around…and on the day of delivery? I can plan for the type of delivery I want, the type of experience I want to have, but who the hell knows? It will be the way it will be…and so it is. Nothing can prepare you for pregnancy, and delivery…and nothing can prepare you for true parenthood. You’re really just along for the ride…the ultimate journey of your life. All we can do is stay present to it all.
Pineapples and Avocados 