Well you guys, we’ve made it. The 3rd trimester. The downhill slide. The homestretch. The beginning of the end before the rest of our life. Let me tell you…I feel it.
Everyday there seems to be a new ache or a new pain that my body experiences. Just when you think you can’t possibly feel anything different, you wake up to a new day and a new symptom. Most recently I developed “the waddle”, the “pregnancy face” (as I was so kindly told yesterday by a stranger), lots of hip pains, terrible leg cramps at night, acid reflux at the worst times and something with my pelvic floor is changing. Until a week ago, I had no clue I even had a pelvic floor and now apparently it’s falling or breaking. I really don’t know! It’s a lot, but I guess that it all means things are moving along as they should be!
Then there’s the mental side effects of being in the 3rd trimester that no one can ever prepare you for.
The whole nesting phase is real, ya’ll! It kind of just kicks in one day and suddenly you can’t think of anything else in life other than getting home to clean your ceiling fan because there’s three inches of dust on it and you can’t imagine how you’ve made it through the year with that dust above you. Or, you could be sitting at work, neck deep in your job duties and suddenly you get the urge to bulk order all of the paper products that you’re going to need around the house in 11 weeks. I will admit that I’ve seriously contemplated taking a vacuum to our dogs a couple of times just to help them shed their fur quicker so that it doesn’t fall on the floor that I just cleaned. Or, the black hole of Google searches that are done just trying to find the perfect laundry hamper to fit the nursery theme. Because we all know that infants care so much about what basket their dirty clothes are going to go into. I can’t even count the days and hours that I have spent looking at organization tips for a nursery closet, how many sets of crib sheets I will need, what different deep cleaning ideas I can put to use in my home and what are the best meals that I can make ahead of time to freeze for when baby gets here. Nesting is like the most absurd symptom that I’ve come across with this pregnancy. I’m a clean person, always have been. My house is pretty much always in tip-top shape and it drives people crazy. But this nesting phase has really rocked my mind and made me feel like a total slob-kabob! It’s the ridiculous notion that my home has to be better than perfect, organized more than the Marie Kondo’s house and cleaner than an OR room right before surgery.
Don’t even get me started on the fact that, according to all the blogs out there, I need to have my hospital bag packed in like 2 weeks, plus my husbands AND the diaper bag with clothes for little man. WHAT?! I’m supposed to know what PJ’s I want to wear and what music I’ll want to play during labor and what nursing products I’m going to need in 11 weeks? I am also supposed to know what my husband will need while I’m laboring?! And what I want my son to be dressed in when he leaves the hospital and comes out into the world for the first time?! Yeah, ok. I feel so unprepared.
There’s also this funny switch that flipped in my mind at some point around the 3rd trimester where I stopped focusing so much on MY aches and pains and started realizing that in just 11 weeks, our little man is going to be here. He’ll be out in the scary world of germs and bad breath and people being in his face making weird noises and squishing his cheeks (like I’ve done to MANY children in my lifetime). He’s going to go from a nice climate-controlled environment to the frigid Oklahoma winter weather, being bundled up in blankets or clothes constantly and having to deal with the massive bright ball of light in the sky every day. He’s going to have to sit in his own poop and pee until his dopey parents realize that he’s made a mess. He’s going to have to listen to us freak out over making his bottle at 3 AM while he’s screaming his head off, probably wishing that I’d just put him back inside where this was never a problem. There is just SO much out here waiting for him and the poor kid doesn’t even know what’s coming. But I do, and I’m a nervous wreck about it all!
Honestly up until this point, the thought just hasn’t crossed my mind much about him actually being anywhere except in my womb. Like, I guess I thought I was just going to carry him around in my belly for the rest of time and keep him to myself. Which I am still completely fine with! But…there’s apparently lots of people that would be sad if that happened and would like to meet him for themselves! It’s almost time for me to share him with the world, and I’m just not ready. Don’t get me wrong, I’m SO ready to see his face and smell him and hold him and let him know that I can protect him just as well as I have done for the last 9 months. But thinking about him being out here and being around so many people just gives me straight anxiety.
Just promise me that if you get to meet him, please love him! If he’s crying, please soothe him and wipe his tears away. If he’s sleeping, please check his breathing every now and again. If he scrapes his knee and I’m not there, please clean him up and give him a superhero bandage that makes him feel invincible. If he looks sad, make him laugh. If he’s upset about one of his dogs eating his toys, help him find a new one.
You’ll never love him the way I do, but if you could just give it your best shot, I’d be forever grateful!
P.S. Little man, your mommy and daddy are unbelievably obsessed with you! I hope you’re ready!
Cleansing Confessions 
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