Pregnancy is weird. I’m sure this isn’t the first time someone has said this, but it really is. I don’t know what I really expected growing a human, excuse me, two humans, would be like; but to sum it up, it’s weird. I’ve been extremely lucky, I guess I should start by saying that. TV and movies portray pregnancy as this horrifying experience, and I guess for some women it is. I was, still am, very tired. That’s been my main pregnancy symptom. Just pure exhaustion. I had bouts of nausea, but I only actually puked a couple of times. I was expecting to spend every morning over the toilet, to smell weird things, to not be able to eat things I normally love. Nope. Not me. I was all prepared to have sudden, weird, gotta-have-it-now food cravings; but again, nope. I did/do want ice cream more than I normally do…but that’s about it. First and second trimester were a breeze for me; I had very few complaints.
I felt the first flutters and kicks around 15-16 weeks. That is such a great/weird feeling. At first it felt like twitches, and like something rolling around. Then the movements got more deliberate, stronger, more like being poked. Now I have seen my stomach actually move quite a few times, and C has felt little kicks from the outside. Baby girls are in a weird position. Baby A is the baby that is closest to your cervix, and Baby B is the baby that is higher up. For awhile there they were both sideways, facing opposite directions. I felt lots of movement on both sides of my tummy. Then Baby A shifted, and I started feeling kicks in my lower abdomen. For the last month baby girls have been comfortably snug in the same positions; Baby A is feet down, kicking away at my cervix, and Baby B is still sideways, making my upper tummy jump when she decides to roll around.
Third trimester has been a whole other story for me. I guess I’m grouping the the last couple weeks of second trimester in with third trimester. The only word for it is uncomfortable. All the time. My back hurts, I can’t get comfortable in bed, I don’t sleep much. But hey, I’m growing people, so that’s to be expected.
I’m also getting a lovely little preview into twin motherhood. I have a friend who has twins, and she did warn me a bit about what would come our way. When you’re having twins/have twins, you automatically become a sideshow. People are excited for people who are having one baby; people are horrified for people who are having two babies. The wide eyed looks are usually followed by comments like, “oh you’ll have your hands full” “you’ll never sleep again!” “Oh wow, so glad that didn’t happen to me!”. As if the thought of having twins isn’t terrifying enough, you have complete strangers tell you just how awful it will be. Thanks for the support. Then there’s the “how did you get twins?” questions. What people are really asking is “did you have trouble getting pregnant? Did you use fertility drugs? Or IVF?”, or the more innocent inquirers simply ask if twins run in your family.
We “got” twins by sheer spontaneous luck. Fraternal twins, which is what our girls *likely* are, aren’t something that “runs in families”. I say *likely* because there is a 30% chance that our girls could be identical. If an egg splits in the first 72 hours, each baby would have their own sacs and placentas. So there’s still that random chance out there that our girls will come out identical. My doctor tells us that twins have nothing to do with the dad, despite my husband having a set of twin cousins, and mostly have to do with the mother (I have twin cousins too) and her genes. There are some women who are genetically inclined to drop multiple eggs, but mostly, it’s just something that randomly happens. There are studies that suggest that other things, like being overweight, being over 30, or getting pregnant immediately after stopping birth control, will cause a woman to drop multiple eggs. We’re just lucky I guess, which by the way, is really what people should say to parents expecting twins; “Congratulations! You’re so lucky!” Why yes, yes we are.
This Oregonian Girl 