2nd Pregnancy | My Mills Baby

I think it’s fair to say that pregnancy doesn’t agree with me. Every weekly update so far has been full of doom & gloom and this one will be no exception. So as I’m giving away a BabyWatch doppler on the blog at the moment, I sneakily asked for the entrants to leave me their number one pregnancy tip by way of a comment. The general consensus seems to be that I should rest as much as possible and try to enjoy it. Unfortunately I seem capable of neither.

The biggest problem this week has been sleeping. I’m not uncomfortable, I just struggle to relax and let my mind shut down. I’m only averaging 2-3 hours per night, and the little sleep I do manage is plagued by nightmares about people breaking into the house, Dexter being abducted, or Craig dying. These nightmares sometimes spill into the day resulting in mini day terrors. This means I can be sat on the bus and panicking that someone is wearing a IED, or something equally ridiculous. Clearly my inability to switch off is causing my mind to race. Couple this with my anxiety about completely mundane things and it seems all this is manifesting itself in my dreams - whether I’m awake or not.

Think I’m overreacting? Well if you weren’t before, you will do now.

On Saturday, Craig went to a 50th birthday party and I stayed home. At some ungodly hour in the morning, as I lay tossing and turning in bed in a state of exhaustion, Alistair McGowan entered my house. He crept up the stairs and I saw him plain-as-day stood on the top step decked in a white turtleneck. He didn’t do anything. He just stood there staring at me and Dexter before running back down the stairs, and out the front door. I was utterly terrified and had to call Craig and beg him to leave the party early. This is how ridiculous my life has become.

None of this is aided by my thankfully soon-to-be ex neighbour indulging in a bit of over-dramatics in the bedroom with her new boyfriend. I can’t work out if she’s blissfully ignorant that our terraced house means her bed is actually less than 3 foot away from ours, or she likes the thought of being heard. I’ve never met her other half but I already know so much about him thanks to their x-rated bedside ‘chats’. I’ve never been brave enough to mention this before but it seems insomnia breeds recklessness. I do hope by some freak coincidence she stumbles across this blog and saves me the embarrassment of having to confront her myself, if not for our sake, for the sake of whomever next moves in.

All of this has left me feeling decidedly flat (which is laughable really as you couldn’t get anymore convex than me right now). I barely have the energy to parent Dexter, and I’m very jittery. Tiredness sees me doing very strange things like crying when I have a cuddle with Dexter, or heading for my bed mid conversation with Craig. I actually burst into tears when watching Joey Essex on I’m a Celebrity last night as I felt sorry for his parents! Nothing I do seems to make any sense.

The only person who can give me the reassurance I need right now is my Craig, but for him it’s like living with someone who should be committed to an asylum. I’m not depressed as such, just constantly alternating between pawing over him, or throwing my toys out of the pram.

This pregnancy just doesn’t seem to have registered with him as much as the last one. I had to practically drag him into the bedroom to listen to the baby’s heartbeat on our new doppler, and we won’t spontaneously talk about him / her like we did when I was this far gone with Dexter. The only time he’ll ask me about the baby is when he catches sight of me grimacing when I sit up awkwardly and accidentally treat baby to an abdominal crunch.

It’s not his fault - I think I’m just feeling very guilty about this pregnancy and projecting this onto him. I feel like I’m just getting on with daily life and parenting Dexter rather than talking about / making plan for this baby. With Dexter, at 19 weeks pregnant, I had the nursery set-up and was simply waiting on the gender scan before adding all the finishing touches. With this pregnancy I’ve spent all day being sick, crying and having the occasional bout of IBS - it only serves to increase my anxiety that the gender won’t be the only thing I discover at next week’s anomaly scan.

So that’s it. I’m off to Google some relaxation tips. I clearly need to!

I’m pretty sure that Dex has sussed out that he has a new brother or sister coming. Strangely, I think he’s also worked out he or she is in my tummy. And here was me thinking that under 5′s are usually told that their mums and dads bought a new baby from a hospital shop, or had a secret meeting with the baby-fairy!

All the signs are pointing to the fact he knows. He’s recently become obsessed with flicking through mother & baby magazines and pointing to pictures of babies. He’ll kiss the pages, rip them out and bring them to us with the proudest look on his face.

Over the last few months, our living room has also become a student obstetrician’s paradise with tons of pregnancy books scattered around. I’m pretty obsessed with learning about the new baby and like to follow my pregnancy week by week. One of these books is heavily pictorial and has become a firm favourite with my little man. He’ll stare for hours at pictures of pregnant women (…obviously we’ve got our fingers crossed this isn’t the start of a lifelong fetish!).

Although he can’t talk yet, Dexter is able to understand basic commands. “Where’s Daddy?” will see him searching out Craig, and “Up the wooden hill for Bedfordshire” (a.k.a up the stairs to bed) will result in him hiding behind the sofa. Now, when we say “Where’s the baby?” he’ll lift up his shirt and rub his belly! Whenever my own belly is out he’ll bend over and kiss it too. The only explanation I can think of is that his choice of reading matter has prompted the connection between my bump and a baby. At just 18 months, I’m now thinking I have an utter genius on my hands.

Finally, he’s become very loving over the past few months. Previously you’d have to pin him down for a cuddle and he’d wriggle free in minutes. He’d kiss you occasionally but he wouldn’t seek it out - it would always be as a result of us bending down at an opportune moment. Now he’ll run into our arms, climb onto our laps and bat books and mobile phones out of our hands to plant a kiss on our lips. It’s an amazing and very welcome transition but I can’t help but link it to the new baby. It’s as though he knows his days as an only child (with exclusive access to us) are numbered.

Has anyone else had two babies in short amount of time, and experienced anything similar with their eldest? I’d love to hear your stories.

Linking up this week to Wot So Funnee? from the lovely Actually Mummy. If you fancy a giggle, discover more toddler antics and click the badge below to be transported straight to all this weeks posts!