Most people are completely fascinated by pregnant women and their bellies.
After all, growing new life IS the greatest human superpower of all.
You’ve most likely endured flurries of attention from family, friends and even strangers, all wanting to get a piece of the action and excitement.
Some want to impart their advice or ask personal questions, and many will want to cop a feel of your baby bump.
Your phone is also constantly hot from everyone wanting updates direct from your womb.
There are certain pregnancy moments that everybody fixates on. These are the gold-star pregnancy moments that you’re allowed to share on Facebook without people rolling their eyes at your pregnancy-related status.
They are the very moment you peed on the stick, the ultrasound scans, the first movements and hearing baby’s heartbeat for the first time. These are the Very Important Pregnancy Moments (VIPM), and everyone will want to hear all about them.
These moments will make your heart skip a beat, your stomach do a flip and your eyes fill up with tears because they are just so overwhelming. But, they’re not the only pregnancy moments worth writing home about.
Here are 10 underrated pregnancy moments that may not be quite as emotional, but they’re still pretty damn special:
#1: The First Time You Get Offered A Seat
After weeks of worrying that the entire world just thinks you’re putting on weight, finally you have the confirmation you need that your bump looks more pregnant than pigged out. You can’t help but breathe a massive sigh of relief.
Finally, you can stop trying to breathe in all the time, and can now relish the belly rubbing stage.
#2: The First Time You Enjoy Your Food
After years as a self-confessed foodie, it can be tough when the first trimester nausea hits. All of a sudden, there isn’t a food type in existence you can keep down. Even the beloved ginger biscuits everyone raves about leave you hurling into a bush on the way to work. You know you have to eat, and so mealtimes become a battleground as you desperately experiment to find something nutritious that won’t come straight back up.
It feels like it will never end, but then one day, without warning, it’s over. Now you can eat as much as you like without fear of regurgitation.
#3: Successfully Providing A Urine Sample
There are a lot of urine samples involved in pregnancy. If you’re not peeing all over sticks in the comfort of your own bathroom, you’re handing a small container of your pee over to your healthcare provider so they can check for proteins.
It might not be something you’ve thought about much before, but controlling the direction of your pee is actually really hard. The very first time you took a pregnancy test, you probably just held it under yourself as you sat on the toilet, only to discover that not a drop had landed on it!
Once you’ve mastered the whole peeing on a stick thing, it’s time to take it to the next level. Now you’ll be given a very small plastic cup to pee in. The first time you manage to fill the pot without peeing all over your hands, tights, knickers and toilet seat is definitely a cause for celebration.
#4: Waking From A Pleasant Dream
Pregnancy is filled with all kinds of creepy and terrifying pregnancy dreams. Whether you’re dreaming about not being able to feed your baby, losing your baby, or your baby being born as a full grown man (yep, that dream happened), you probably wake up dripping in sweat.
Dreams during pregnancy seem so much more realistic than usual too, so don’t expect to forget them easily. While your hormones are all over the place, so will your dreams be. The few nights you wake up from a pleasant and totally not at all scary dream will be worth celebration.
Oh, and the best kind of dreams you’ll have will be the sexy ones. About Channing Tatum. Those will be good dreams to wake up from.
#5: Finding The Right Support
Your poor breasts started growing quite early in the pregnancy, and they haven’t stopped since. For the first trimester, you may find that the word painful is simply not powerful enough to capture the burning hot and excruciatingly tender action going on in your bra. Each time the soft cotton of your night shirt brushes against your nipple, you howl in pain.
Your old bras are now too tight, too uncomfortable and simply not supportive enough. The first time you try on a maternity bra that fits, your breasts will think they are in boob heaven.
All of a sudden, your poor breasts are being hugged better by the softest and most loving bra they have ever known. A bra who not only understands how tender they are, but also has the enormous support straps you really need. Crack open the alcohol-free champagne, this moment is worth celebrating!
#6: The First Time You Cut In Line For The Bathroom
Public bathrooms are the worst. This statement is true throughout life, but it takes on new meaning when you are with child. All of a sudden, there is a very real risk that you might pee yourself as you wait in line for a free cubicle.
Luckily, as your bump grows, so does the guilt of the women waiting in line ahead of you. Now they can’t live with themselves for making you wait, and so you get to waddle to the front of the line.
Don’t be afraid to do some exaggerated belly rubbing as you wait in line, this will increase the chances of you being moved to prime position of next in line.
#7: Every Time You Get Away With Something
This is one of those amazing things that doesn’t lose excitement on the tenth go, and it’s something you will miss a lot when it’s gone. So much so that you will consider carrying a fake baby bump around with you for emergencies. Basically, as long as you have a visible baby bump, you can get away with anything.
Did you accidentally just drive into another car in the car park? No problem, just step out of the car so the other drive can see your bump. Did you accidentally almost shoplift a packet of strawberries?
No problem, just rub that bump.
Obviously it won’t do much to fight the offensive stereotype that once women are pregnant they are essentially idiots, but, ahem, it will get you out of a tight fix so is probably worth it on this occasion.
#8: Finding Your Bump Shelf
It takes quite a while for that tiny collection of cells to become big enough to rest your cup of tea on, but it will happen. And when it does, you should celebrate. Now you don’t need to drag yourself up off the sofa to reach your belongings, you can just lie back and use your bump as a makeshift table.
#9: Agreeing On A Name
If there’s any moment of pregnancy that deserves to be celebrated, it is the moment where you actually manage to find a name you both like. And yet this moment goes unmentioned, with people casually saying things like, “ah, what a cute name.” As if you haven’t spent HOURS of your life hunched over a baby name book, passive aggressively marking angry little crosses next to your partner’s name choices. When you finally find one that you are both happy with, it’s a freaking big deal. And you both deserve medals.
#10: Getting To Work On Time
This is a tough one, because if you celebrate it to publicly then your boss is probably going to get annoyed. That said, it is definitely worthy of a little high five action, because getting to work on time is pretty damn hard when you’re pregnant.
First of all you have to wake up, which isn’t easy when you’ve had about two hours of filthy-dream-filled broken sleep thanks to your stupid bladder. Then you have to physically get up, which isn’t easy unless you have a small crane by your bed.
Then it’s time to get dressed, which is mostly fine until it’s time to put your socks on. You can easily lose the best part of an hour trying to put your shoes and socks on. Then it’s time to waddle for the bus, which you’ll definitely miss because waddling is very slow. To be honest, it’s a wonder you make it in at all these days, and yet still nobody claps when you walk through the door.
