All About Baby: First Trimester

We just got back from our annual family beach trip! These pictures are from my birthday, which was the sweetest day on the beach. I laid out and read and talked with family all day. While I was laying out the baby started moving and I had a bikini on and looked down, and I could SEE him moving around. That was the first time that has happened and it was such a sweet surprise on my birthday! I also already learned in the past two weeks of having a bump that its really difficult to take a picture without putting your hand on it…but its also difficult figuring out how to place your hands haha.

It’s been so much fun for us announcing our baby and you guys have been so sweet with congratulating us! I’ve been documenting our life on this blog for the past 4 years now and I’m excited to finally get to write about expecting our first baby. I put up one of the stickers in my story for y’all to ask questions, so I’m going to try and answer some of those within this post! I could literally talk about this baby all the time haha, so its fun for me to get to tell you about him. Gosh, we’re just so stinking excited!

“How far along are you?  How did you know it was the right time for a baby?”

I am 17 weeks along now and he is due at the end of October. We’ve known now for almost 4 months which is crazy to me. Finding out was extra sweet because we found out in February while we were in Lynchburg packing up our house, which was our first home and where we’ve lived for 3 years. We got to tell my sister and a few of our closest friends while we there because it’d be months before we saw any of them again.

By the time our baby gets here we will have been married for 4 years. We’ve really enjoyed the time of just the two us and feel like it’s been the perfect amount of time for us personally to have together just the two of us. We’re still young- we’ll be 23 and 24 when he gets here, but we just both were wanting a baby and didn’t have any reason to put it off! We actually thought I was pregnant last year, unintentionally, and I was panicked at first but after that experience, each month that passed by and I wasn’t pregnant I was wishing I was! That made me realize, “oh wait, my fears of having a baby are totally being outweighed by my desire for one!”  So I was finishing school and we were moving back home and it felt like such a good time. A lot of people have had babies young on John Luke’s side of the family and he loves that he’s gotten to know and grow up with his grandparents and great grandparents. Of course, I don’t know if you’re ever “ready” to have a baby. Its totally easy to think “Oh I wish we had this, this, and this before a baby,” or “Oh I wish I was like this, this, and this before.” It reminds me of getting married! You’re entering a season  you’ve never been in before and there is so much unknown. Its easy for there to be fear in the unknown. But I think you just get to a point where you’re like, “We want a baby and if God wants to give us a baby He will and if He does He’ll give us the grace to do it and we’ll make it work!” It was good timing with how our life is and we’re so happy about it.

How did you find out?

I knew I was pregnant sooooo early. My sister is in nursing school right now and totally doesn’t believe me when I say it but I totally knew it! My body is just super sensitive. I’ve always been easily thrown by a change in my hormones. From super early on I just felt like something was off. I was nauseous to the point I couldn’t eat and that is not common for me. I also started falling asleep around 7 or 8 each night. I kept telling John Luke, “John Luke, I have GOT to be pregnant. Something is different.” I took a test one morning super early and sure enough it came back positive. I walked back into our bedroom to get my phone to video telling John Luke but it was the one morning out of the year he decided to go ahead and wake up early so he was just sitting up in bed. I had the test behind my back so I just held it out and was like, “I’m pregnant.” It was the funniest moment because we both were so excited yet  super calm haha. We had just both been feeling so sure of it! Of course there was just the shock of “Oh my gosh I’m pregnant. Oh my gosh we’re having a baby this year!”

It was so hard waiting to tell our parents! I just avoided calling my mom at all because it was hard to have a normal conversation without telling her. We told John Luke’s mom in a hotel room in San Diego haha and then my parents when we got to Louisiana! So we told our family pretty early, and planned on waiting till later to tell anyone outside of our family, but both being from small towns, news travels fast. We did wait to put it online just to be safe and so we could tell friends face-to-face.

How are you feeling?

I’m in my second trimester and am finally getting some energy back and experiencing less nausea…all the praise hands. I already have chronic fatigue syndrome so being pregnant on top of that has left me pretty exhausted all the time. I got a virus early on and had a hard time fighting that off, so I was just stuck on the couch for several weeks. The constant fatigue and changes in my hormones did leave me really emotional and I think I did experience some depression for a while. That was the strangest thing- I felt so happy and grateful about expecting our baby but at the same time felt so sad and apathetic everything. I didn’t know why I was having those negative feelings. To help that I made sure I was taking plenty of Vitamin D and B, and tried to get outside as much as I could, but also just tried to give myself grace in that. I was nauseous nearly everyday but only got sick once. Warning to anyone traveling to a high altitude while pregnant- be ware. I really was not super nauseous that much at home, but when we traveled to Colorado and Utah felt awful! It was worse in Colorado when I was still in my first trimester. One thing thats helped me with the nausea was having orange juice. Since I’ve been pregnant water often makes me gag which is the weirdest thing! I ordered these little silicone push-pop molds and froze orange juice and would eat those when I didn’t feel like I could eat anything else. So between the excitement, the fatigue, the emotional troubles, and nausea, that’s why you have not seen me posting a ton on Instagram or on here. I’m doing a lot better now and am really grateful for that.

Any cravings?

Everyone keeps asking me if I’ve ben having any cravings but I really haven’t! There’s some food that I want to eat everyday, but that’s nothing new for me haha. I’m very routine with eating and when I find something I like I’ll eat it till I’m sick of it then move on to something else. Being so nauseous I guess it was more os food aversions. I haven’t really wanted anything sweet the whole time. Every now and then I’ll eat some dark chocolate but that’s about it! I mostly just wanted things that were super plain- like French fries or rice or noodles….just whatever was the most flavorless. That was not good for me because my lyme doctor has me supposed to be eating low carb. These noodles were a good find for me.

Did you think it was a boy? Did you have a gender reveal party?

We did the blood test so we found out the gender at 11 weeks! We were actually completely shocked to find out we were having a boy because we both totally felt like the baby was a girl. It was a surprise but we are sooooo excited for a little boy! John Luke’s sister had a baby 4 months ago so its really sweet we’ll have little boys the same year and they’ll get to grow up with each other. Also one of my best friends is having a boy this year too! Because we were so surprised at finding out about a boy we told our families immediately! We were wanting to have a gender reveal party, but we just couldn’t hold in the news from them haha. That’s why last weekend we had a “baby party” as I was calling it. John Luke’s mom threw it for us and we just had family over to celebrate having a boy! The night ended and we realized we’d barely taken any pictures haha.

Bump? Are you buying maternity clothes- if so from where?

Some of you asked if I’d show my bump and I will but it”s barely here right now haha. It is definitely here though now and I feel like it just popped out overnight. I literally just woke up one morning and went to make coffee and bumped into the counter with my stomach and was like “what the heck.” Ever since then its been around, but its still really small, it kind of depends on the time of day and what I’ve eaten. I tried to show you guys as best I could in those announcement pictures though! Its already a little bigger now so I’m sure you’ll see it in some beach pictures! Some of you asked about maternity clothes. I am at the point where I’m outgrowing some clothes, but honestly I already wore comfy clothes and oversized things, so most of  my wardrobe is still working ok haha. I decided early on I didn’t want to buy a lot of clothes I’d only wear when I was pregnant. I’ve only bought 3 actual maternity pieces. Some maternity clothes are really expensive! One super cute brand is Hatch, so I scored a couple cute pieces from them on Poshmark! I’ll do a whole post on this later!

I really have enjoyed being pregnant. Now is the most fun it’s been because I am feeling him move more and more each day! I felt him for the first time about 3 weeks ago and John Luke actually felt him move for the first time yesterday. Feeling him is SO sweet and the best feeling!

Do you have a name picked out?

And we DO have a name. We’re going to wait and announce it when he’s born though! I never thought I’d be the person to be bold enough to claim to have a name down for sure till his birth, but we just know that’s him. Its been on a running list of baby names I’ve had in my phone since high school, but when we found out we were having a baby it was the only boy name we ever mentioned. We both liked it so much that we never tried to come up with any other boy ones, and then when we found out we were having a boy, we just knew that name was for him! I love it.

So thanks again for all the congratulations, prayers, and well wishes. I’m grateful to be carrying this boy and already ready to meet him. I’ll keep you guys updated in the months to come 🙂

*I had been looking for a shirt like this for months especially to get me through a hot Louisiana pregnant, and I finally found exactly what I was wanting! Its so soft and comfy and breezy but not too sheer. Will be in my closet for a longggg time. Top linked below and hat is from here, though I can’t tell if this is exact.