Pregnancy, life’s greatest miracle. How insane is it that a woman can single-handedly (okay, with some sperm) grow a baby in less than a year? That’s less time than it takes me to recover from a minor running injury. But with great miracles also come some very strange side effects. How is it possible to grow a human in nine months? By experiencing things like nausea, mood swings, lightning crotch (definitely the funniest term for a pregnancy symptom), and loads of heartburn.
We’ve rounded up some of the weirdest symptoms that you may be lucky enough to experience should you decide to take a go at life’s greatest miracle:
Crazy Dreams
Think you’ve experienced crazy, vivid dreams before? Wait until you’re pregnant. Don’t be surprised if they are riddled with underlying themes of anxiety—I think it’s the baby’s way of preparing you for not being anxious ever again. You may also encounter some incredibly detailed sex dreams, because the increased hormones can surprisingly ramp up that sex drive.
Discharge
Discharge can also change quite drastically throughout your pregnancy, and you may become obsessed with it as you approach your due date. There’s something called your mucus plug (did we expect to find a phrase more gross than moist?) that starts becoming, well, unplugged as you get closer to delivering. With a bowling ball-sized child crushing your insides throughout the third trimester, you will probably consult Dr. Google daily in hopes that some discharge you noticed may be your body’s way of getting ready for birth.
Skin Changes
Of all the things that I expected during pregnancy, one thing I definitely didn’t expect was all the random skin changes. At ten months postpartum, I still have linea nigra (a dark line down your stomach), which is apparently caused by hormones. Varicose veins may also show up, which resemble the veins on that bodybuilding bro you dated in college. And you may go through stages of the worst acne of your life, followed by the freshest, clearest skin you haven’t experienced since you were eight.
Gas
We all know hormones cause pregnant women to cry, but what we don’t talk about enough is that it also often causes them to fart uncontrollably. The hormone is called progesterone, and it slows digestion so that your baby can steal all your nutrients like the little vampire they are. Other GI issues, like diarrhea and constipation, are common as well, in case there wasn’t enough for you to look forward to.
Sex Drive
Ah, there’s nothing like feeling like you’re the size of a house to get you in the mood. But really, pregnancy hormones do some weird sh*t to your libido. One day you may want nothing to do with your partner, and the next you may quite literally dream of the next sesh. I think most guys agree this is the best symptom out there when it swings in their favor.
Lightning Crotch
A pain that is commonly referred to as lightning crotch deserves the top spot on weird sh*t that happens to pregnant women. Unfortunately, the name is also a fairly accurate description of how it feels. Most people describe it as sharp, shooting pain in their vagina that appears suddenly, and usually is felt in the third trimester as the baby is putting greater pressure on muscles and nerves. You may experience round ligament pain anywhere in your pelvic region because your muscles really don’t understand how the hell they’re supposed to deal with all that pressure.
The most twisted part of all this sh*t pregnant women deal with is that each pregnancy is different. You may have no clue what lightning crotch is, but definitely puked for nine months straight, or vice versa. Or maybe you were one of the lucky ones with minimal symptoms and took spin classes until birth (no one wants to hear it if so). If you are crazy enough to get pregnant again, you may have a whole host of symptoms you didn’t experience before, because with each new life comes new hazing techniques.
The only thing you are guaranteed not to be is rational, because again, hormones. Whatever symptoms you get #blessed with, remember you have a nine-month pass to make other people do sh*t for you, so take advantage.
Images: Ömürden Cengiz / Unsplash
The last few weeks have been a big time for celebrity baby news, and given that all the other news is about coronavirus or murder hornets, I’ll take it. We’ve had pregnancy announcements from Gigi Hadid, Lea Michele, Aaron Carter, Chris Pratt, and Ashlee Simpson, just to name a few, and I’m sure there will be more quarantine babies on the way. But who isn’t pregnant in quarantine? Amanda Bynes!
Back in March (yes, this was less than two months ago), Amanda shocked us all when she and her (ex?) fiancé Paul both posted a sonogram picture on Instagram. Amanda captioned her photo “Baby on board!”, so it was pretty clear that it was meant to be a pregnancy announcement. Or was it? Amanda quickly deleted the photo, so we were all left to wonder WTF was going on here. Was there, in fact, a baby on board?? That is, until this week, when Amanda’s attorney finally decided to clear things up.
In a statement given to Fox News (ew), her attorney David Esquibias said “Amanda is not pregnant and she is not residing in a sober living facility.” So uhh, no baby on board, and I guess that’s that on that. He didn’t offer any further explanation about the whole pregnancy thing, so I guess we may never really know what happened there. Esquibias also spoke to Entertainment Tonight, saying that Amanda “is sheltering in a safe location and is doing very well.” That’s good to hear, but I want to know why her attorney is suddenly going on a press tour. These past two months have been a whirlwind, and I feel like we had all basically forgotten about Amanda’s sonogram post, so why bring it up now? Also, is she still with her drop dead gorgeous fiancé Paul? Or is he completely out of the picture? Why can’t her attorney make statements about the things we actually care about?
The last time we heard from Amanda’s attorney was back in March, just a day after the alleged pregnancy announcement. At that time, he told Fox News that Amanda was “seeking treatment for ongoing mental health issues,” and that “Any reports that Amanda is suffering from drug or alcohol addiction issues are completely false.” While, at the time, he didn’t directly reference the pregnancy thing, he did ask for privacy for Amanda, and for “any speculation about her personal life from the public and the media to cease so Amanda can focus on getting better.”
The thing is, I feel like speculation about Amanda did kind of cease after this? Like, we talked about the weird, maybe fake pregnancy announcement for a few days, and then we all moved on? Maybe David Esquibias hasn’t noticed, but there’s been a loth happening in the world since mid-March, so Amanda Bynes’ non-pregnancy wasn’t the kind of story that hung around for weeks. I mean, the government literally confirmed the existence of UFOs last week, and none of us even cared! To be honest, I care more about Amanda Bynes than UFOs, but still, we’re living in a 10-minute news cycle.
Sadly, Amanda has been radio silent on Instagram since the sonogram picture, so her attorney’s statements are the only info we have on her current situation. I wish she would bless us with some quarantine content, but maybe she just needs a break from social media for a while. Either way, I would really like an update on her relationship with Paul, so if her attorney could address that in his next Fox News statement, I’d appreciate it.
Images: s_bukley / Shutterstock.com; amandabynesreal / Instagram
