the best laid pregnancy plans never work out

When my cousin's wife gave birth to their second child she had pictures posted to one of the social networking sites. She looked gorgeous for having gone through what I now know is like several hours of torture. I took my cues from her to have my hair cut so that I could quickly run a comb through it and hopefully look half as good as she did.

And I wanted to get a pedicure too. As a matter of fact, I had my husband remove the old nail polish from my toes just days before my water broke.  I never made it to the salon to have them redone.

This is how it went down:  Thursday I went to the OB/GYN for the first exam of my last 6 weeks of pregnancy, my water broke three days later, then I gave birth two days after that. Not only was my hair a wreck I had unpolished ugly summertime feet! Calluses and all, hanging out there for everyone to see. I felt terrible for my doctor who had to stare at them for however many hours it was I was pushing. Fortunately she wasn't my real doctor, who by the way was on vacation.

So I'm telling all the women I know (and men because they will inevitably have a woman to go through this at some point) to keep their toes looking cute because no one knows what is going to happen next.

pregnancy doesn't follow a script

Once I found out I was pregnant, I quit drinking caffeine, alcohol and started taking a prenatal vitamin. Sounds familiar. Most conscientious women do this. I thought I would go to prenatal yoga classes and had the best of intentions to be a green mom.

Boy was I wrong.

There are tons of books out there to guide you step by step through your pregnancy and into motherhood but nothing prepares you like the real thing. The old stand-by What to Expect When You are Expecting walks you through each week of development which can have you worried right off the bat if you're not careful. For example, I thought I was getting away without morning sickness until bam! it hit me exactly at 1:47am the first day back to work after the Christmas holidays. Fortunately I was clocked out and almost in my car on the way home. I managed not to puke until I got home (we live 3 miles from work thank goodness). When they say "morning" they mean it! Anyhow, What to Expect... is a must read for any preggo.

Another of my favorite books was The Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy. With it's wit it explains in a matter of fact way some of the nuances of pregnancy, such as how you might feel about some of the body changes you are going through. It is supposed to tell you what your girlfriends would but the doctors don't. To some extent the book does just that. But no book can tell you what your own reaction to pregnancy will be. I work in a male dominate environment. I can hold my own there. Being pregnant certainly did not get in my way, or so I thought. Once I got so big that I couldn't physically do the things I normally had to do during the course of the day, there was no getting around it. I just couldn't do the things I used to. Sure all the books tell you this will happen but hardheads like me fight it to the bitter end.