There really isn't anything that can adequately prepare a person for being a parent.
All the advice and childcare books in the world seem inadequate in the face of caring for a tiny human, on-call, 24/7.
An r/AskReddit thread asked, "Pregnant women, what is something you wish you knew BEFORE you got pregnant?"
The responses were downright fascinating — and helpful, too!
"Each pregnancy is different, even with the same person. I have three kids —the first pregnancy was very typical and followed the normal timeline. Second pregnancy was awful. I was miserable and sick the entire time. Third pregnancy was easy peasy and I finally understood why some women liked being pregnant."
"That cravings aren't just food. I craved dirt, particularly beach sand. The smell of the beach was excruciating, I just wanted to shovel handfuls into my mouth. I never ate dirt or sand and the craving went away when baby was born."
"Not currently pregnant, but I wish someone had warned me about muscle cramps. I had to learn a new way to pop my ankles because every night I would pop them and get massive charlie horses in my legs that my fiance had to massage out."
"How hard it can be to get, and stay, pregnant. Everyone imagines it will happen easily and quickly and, unfortunately, it's not the case for so many women. And for women who've dealt with infertility or loss, how much anxiety you'll have throughout the pregnancy."
"Everyone has an opinion on what you do whilst pregnant and how you want to raise your child."
"Your body produces a hormone called relaxin that helps loosen your pelvis in preparation for birth. Some women get waayyy too much too soon and it loosens everything to the point you lose mobility and every day all day is painful."
"Being pregnant seems to make other people think they can make incredibly rude observations about your body that they’d never make otherwise!"
"Hair loss! After I had my kid I lost a ton of hair. I would pull fists full of hair during my showers. I thought there was something wrong with me because no one told me about this. Went to Google, totally normal and it happens to everyone. It grows back eventually and you’ll go through an awkward baby hair phase."
"During labor the “water breaking” is not one rush of liquid. it’s continuous and can occur for several hours. it’s horrendous and messy and incredibly awful to deal with. it feels like peeing but you have zero control over anything and if you tense up then everything is much more painful and weird feeling."
"I wish I'd heard the term 'mother's apron' before I had one. Like, there's warnings all over, 'Your body's going to change!' and some specifics on how, but everything I read and heard was reassuring me about how it would all mostly go back eventually. I'm still pretty bitter."
"My [expletive] boobs hurt so bad. I hit one in my sleep and woke up in excruciating pain. Like...wtf. I knew they got bigger, but the pain was a surprise."
"The sickest joke of all: you stop being able to sleep way before the baby gets here. Everyone loves to tell me to 'sleep now while I can' but pregnancy leads to unexplained insomnia and I’m a total wreck already."
"Morning sickness isn't in the morning. And that I would be puking the whole time not just in the beginning"
"You will not sleep like you used to. I’m a belly sleeper and have had the worst time sleeping since like 15 weeks. Pregnancy pillow doesn’t help!"
"How comfortable maternity pants are. I was stubborn the first time around and didn't want to switch over from my regular clothes. Once I had to I regretted those extra weeks of discomfort all because of vanity."
"You can 'do everything right' and have an 'easy' pregnancy but baby is born prematurely. The kicker is you may never get a reason as to why."
"Not everyone falls in love instantly . I like mine but didn’t fall in love till after a year."
"Speaking as the husband, my wife was very annoyed when she learned later in her pregnancy the borderline miracle properties of ginger as regards morning sickness. Wished she'd known it from the git-go."
"Not all gynecologists are competent. And if you have a feeling yours isn't, find a new one."
"From my mom: I paralyzed her from the waist down for a few hours because I decided to take a nap on her spinal cord in the third trimester."
"Baby kicks don’t feel like butterflies. They feel like something crawled across your skin quickly; but from the inside"
"I wish someone would have warned me about the constipation. Corollary: I wish someone would have warned me that 'fiber supplement' does not equal 'stool softener.'"
"Things can go wrong in any situation. My first child was stillborn at 41 weeks after a healthy and normal pregnancy from a umbilical cord accident."
"Skin tags, so many skin tags!
Moles growing into skin tags then dropping off, like WTF body
Sandpaper dry skin, which I still get from time to time, just this one patch on the back of my right hand"
"Pregnancy brain is REAL.
It's not a joke. It's not exaggerated.
When you start forgetting, misplacing, and outright losing things, you can start feeling like you're also losing your mind."
