So far, besides a very slight amount of morning sickness that was mostly just me trying to play up the severity of my symptoms for my own peace of mind, I’ve gotten through this pregnancy with very few negative side effects. The worst of these has been excessive weight gain (and in conjunction, the alarming appearance of stretch marks), which I’m kind of just filing away “to deal with later when I can diet and exercise and ingest nothing but ice cube smoothies for a few weeks.” That is, until the third trimester reared her ugly head. Now I’m suffering the torment of…INDIGESTION (dun dun dun!).
It’s kind of funny, and reminds me of the one and only time I suffered seasonal allergies. That probably lasted about a week. I remember calling my mom and saying, “I wake up with a stuffy nose and all this congestion, then it gradually fades throughout the day, then it comes back in the morning! What is wrong with me? Do I have a cold or not?” She laughed at me, and explained that yes, I was experiencing allergy symptoms, and how could I be so dense as to not recognize that when such a large part of the population suffers the same, especially in our pollen-laden geographical location. That’s sort of how I feel about indigestion. Like oh, I’ve seen 9 billion commercials for antacids and my husband laments his acid reflux after basically every meal, but still it took me a few days to comprehend what was happening. And now, oh, the torment!
It keeps me awake and plagues my entire day. It’s so uncomfortable! At first I sat there just kind of accepting the pain until one recent day when I discovered the magic of Tums. Now I pop those suckers like candy. No, they’re not just cleverly disguised Necco wafers – Tums are the antidote to all that ails! I had no idea. Magical, chalky little magicians, they are.
I suppose as symptoms go, this one isn’t so bad. I would definitely take this over morning sickness.
Also! Now that I’ve officially been off gluten for more than 7 months, I’ve been wondering what my reaction will be once I eat it again (I think maybe I’ve mentioned this before?). Since I’m not entirely convinced I even have a gluten intolerance, it should be interesting to see if anything happens. Well, yesterday, seeing as I was on a healthful eating kick AS USUAL, I went to Wendys for lunch and got an order of chili cheese fries. I did check ahead of time – their chili is gluten free, their cheese is gluten free, and their fries I have had before, even though they’re fried in the same oil as some breaded items, so they’re technically not GF. I’ve never been very stringent with things like cross-contamination, and I order French fries everywhere I go and never have reacitons. BUT, I will mention that yesterday was my first time specifically getting the chili cheese fries from Wendys (how I missed this on the menu prior to then is beyond me). Within 10 minutes of eating my glorious meal, I was struck down with the most intense headache of my life. Like, I wanted to bury my head in the sand ostrich-style, and possibly even die. It was definitely a food reaction headache, but why? I have no idea. My guess is that the fryer oil did have breading in it this time, and it touched my fries. When I told Eric about the whole event, his first question was, “How’s the baby?” which I found adorable. At this point I think she’s past the point of being affected by a tiny smidgen of gluten, though it was scary for a minute when I realized what I had done. Luckily she’s still kicking away in there (and during my indegestion episode last night at 1 am, incessantly hiccupping. Which is not conducive to sleep at all. But at least I had 2048 on my phone to keep me well occupied).
Can we please take note of how I am literally telling indigestion and food allergy stories on my blog right now? Is this seriously what my life has become? I’m sorry. If you’re still reading this and haven’t keeled over from boredom, I am eternally grateful. Any day now we’ll turn a corner and I’ll have more intriguing things to say.
Just one more (hopefully slightly more interesting) thing – today is my little sister Alessandra’s 9th birthday, which is pretty insane to think about. I am so proud of the young lady she has become. I thought I was pretty clever stealing a photo of her from a recent Easter photo shoot to post on my Facebook, and then as per usual, my other sister one-upped me with an adorable photo collage. I seriously can’t win with her; she always finds cuter pics to post. Oh well… I’ll just shamelessly repost what she made and admit my defeat to her superior photo finding skills. Here it is:
