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PREGNANCY IS NOT ALL FUN 2

During the first trimester you will need to do a serie of blood tests and urine tests in order to establish whether you and your baby are going to have any problems or if everything is fine (ah needles!!).

• Among them it is important to determine your blood type or group, unless you already know it, as a woman with a RH- combined with a male partner's RH+ can be very dangerous for the first or next child and a blood test that in italy we call COOMBS' TEST must be repeated each month if this is the case, in order to exclude problems for the first or next baby. The danger consists in having a baby with "Hemolytic disease of the newborn" or "HDN" (click on the link to find out more about this subject).

Other common tests are checking for Toxoplasmosis antibodies, glucose levels, a check for liver and heart important proteins, a complete blood count, Rubella antibodies, HIV test, Syphilis test and the Complement fixation test.

• A common problem during pregnancy is a possible iron deficiency that will need to be treated appropriately with integrators and daily iron-rich food intakes, most commonly meat (veal, beef, turkey, horse) but also eggs, spinach, artichokes, egg-based pasta, legumes, green radish and walnuts.

• A daily intake of FOLIC ACID is very important from the beginning of the pregnancy on all the way till you are breastfeeding or wanting to conceive another child. Folic acid is normally sold as an integrator but can also be found in foods such as: spinach, broccoli, asparagus, lettuce, oranges, concentrated orange juice, cereals, lemons, kiwis, strawberries and legumes.

To be continued...

PREGNANCY IS NOT ALL FUN...

What people don't tell you before you get pregnant is that there is about a billion things going on during pregnancy that are not fun... some of them are, in fact, quite annoying.

But it's all worth the baby you will see at the end of this amazing adventure.

1. First of all there is the well-known sickness, that, thank Gods, i never experienced, but i did have nausea and it could lead to sickness if you don't manage to get out of the range of the hideous smell in time so that you don't get overwhelmed by it;
2. Then something you don't expect: you smell everything different, taste everything different, everything is amplified, smell, taste, sounds; hunger makes you feel like starving in a few minutes (a minute before you were feeling ok, then suddenly you could kill for a piece of bread);
3. Hormones can cause a serie of problems, obviously it's different from person to person... for me they had a devastating effect...if i got irritated i was often mutating into a red version of Hulk, if i wasn't getting out of anger rapidly enough;
   
4. Then your nipples get so sore you think they are cutting them out and sometimes the only way to calm the pain is massaging the whole breasts which can be annoying too. Or you keep the pain and suffer in silence (or cursing...);
5. There are also back aches (had and keep having), sciatica aches (had and have sometimes still), pelvic aches due to the expansion of your uterus (had), gums and teeth aches (had), gums bleeding (have occasionally), headaches (not had much), dizziness (had very little), problems with excessive secretions (not had), nose bleeding (almost had)...
   
   

The first trimester is usually the most difficult part. And with the second trimester some of the stuff that has been bothering you leaves you in peace...

During the second trimester is when you:

1. Start feeling the baby's movements;
2. Get to know the sex of your baby
3. and more

In my case since it's a boy i had, and keep having, a clear amount of strong kicks, punches and pokings here and there, some were so strong they made me jump back in my seat when i was at the chinese restaurant, LOL

An amazing phenomenon may take place already: the production of the first milk, also called Colostrum. This may happen not only at the end of the pregnancy and/or after you gave birth but also during pregnancy in a period that changes from woman to woman. Sometimes some women never even manage to get milk unfortunately. So far i got it already and feel very happy about it altough i have to wear protective cotton disks to avoid wetting and/or staining my clothes (it's a yellow colour because of tehe betacarotene it contains).


To be continued...

20th week!!!

20 Weeks Pregnant