Nothing can prepare you for motherhood. Not your mother's advice, reading self help books, watching childrearing videos on YouTube, scanning websites that tell you everything that comes with stepping into the parenthood stage of life...well nothing.
And unless you are one of those eager beavers who count every day to the moment you conceive, even if you have been planning a baby with your spouse, the initial reaction to the news that you are really pregnant can vary from person to person. In my case, I was so taken aback by the revelation that this is it and now there is no turning back, that I initially didn't know how to react. Holding the test that read positive, I realised that I was actually holding the ticket to a new phase of life. One that was going to change my life FOREVER!
I guess my husband went through some of this confused befuddled reaction himself when he came to know it. It takes a gulp and a half to let it sink in that finally your life is taking that twist you were warned, scared and mildly worried about. Papahood beckoned and God knew what lay ahead.
The first thing you want to do when it comes to such big news is let someone more credible confirm it, in most cases the doctor. So when my doctor just took my word for it and started prescribing supplements and calculating a delivery date, I stopped her. But am I really pregnant, I asked. She replied without raising an eyebrow, you said so. But wait, aren't you supposed to confirm it? I asked. Ok. She made me undergo the test again and it confirmed the pregnancy in my face. There was no hiding from it now. So I braced myself for everything that lay ahead, took a deep breath, smiled an encouraging smile at my husband and graciously accepted fate. We had wanted this. How prepared we were for it, time would tell...
The first three months or what is known as the first trimester seemed to pass like a breeze. I travelled to Jaipur with a bunch of friends to attend the Litfest and enjoyed not looking or feeling pregnant but knowing the truth deep inside. Those predictable symptoms of nausea, throwing up, fatigue, exhaustion etc. spared me their torture so that except a couple of occasions, I don't recall being sick or setback by my condition.
When I actually announced the news to the world, apart from happy reactions, little did I realise that I had also opened the flood gate to a host of advice givers. You can get bamboozled into believing that everybody, yeah even people much younger to you would actually know much more about pregnancy than you do. This is a topic that intrigues people and makes whatever they know about it legit. So you will get umpteen lists of dos and don'ts, predictions, reinforcing of myths, superstitions, friendly advice, even warnings and ill fated stories to scare you into believing every word they say for your good. By the end of it, you will want to borrow Harry Potter's invisibility cloak and simply disappear when they start. My advice to you to counter such people is let them sound wise, seem interested, give an impression that you actually are listening and then just use your own head and do what suits you best.
I fell back upon my doctor's advice and my mom and sister who had both undergone this phase with relative ease and shared my practical stance on life. I did everything I was told to do for the baby, sacrificed on everything I was told to abstain from and never forgot to smile, laugh and just be normal. It helped that I had a supportive husband who held my hand every step of the way and actually enjoyed the pregnancy vicariously through me. As my bump started showing, we looked at it together fascinated by the odd changes that my body was bringing about. I was hell bent on not letting life's little pleasures pass me by so hell, I even took a trip to meet my dad all the way in Bhubaneswar!
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