My dear friends and readers,
I have the most wonderful news to share with you. We are having a baby!
2 glorious lines
The first two hours after finding out was a blur. The ground was pulled from beneath us.
I could barely form a single thought. I could not process a single thing. Inside of me, I was bursting with intensity and emotion. My husband was asking me questions that I could not answer. All I could do was laugh and weep.
One moment, the life-altering reality of what this means dawns on me. The realities and practicalities of what it takes to raise a little human, to help them blossom and become so magnificently who they were born to be. The immense responsibility of being a parent, of embodying everything your new baby knows about what it is to be alive (and yet I feel that babies know more about being so incredibly present than I do). I can’t comprehend that.
The next moment I feel surreally detached from everything and I feel like I am floating through a dream, watching life wind and twist it’s way around me. Just watching.
I kept cycling between the two, unable to settle in either sentiment.
And then….morning sickness.
….I wrote the above in the week following finding out that we were expecting a baby. I was feeling wonderful and full of life.
And then…morning sickness kicked in, and if I could write during those times (I could not) it would have taken on a much less “everything is rainbows and butterflies” tone. I had to include it here because it has been such a true and real part of my experience.
Morning sickness honestly consumed my life. It lasted from the moment I woke up to the moment I slept, and then I would wake up in the middle of the night feeling awful too. I had almost no relief – except for maybe around an hour in the evening when I wasn’t actively throwing up, just nauseous.
I didn’t know what to do with myself. I stayed in bed all day, trying to sleep through the nausea. I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t read, I couldn’t write, I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t drink. It stripped away all my joy and honestly, after 2 weeks of it, I felt quite low, and the thought of this continuing for another 8 weeks (Morning sickness usually settles down around 12-14 weeks for most women) made me cry.
The real face of the first trimester.
Suddenly, my pregnancy didn’t even feel like a baby anymore, and every thought I had was consumed by overwhelming nausea.
I couldn’t smell food, or even think about food. It’s funny to me now, but even the word “food” made me feel so unsettled. One evening my sweet husband came into my room, I was wrapped up in darkness, and he innocently reminded me “there’s a whole bunch of food out in the kitchen if you are hungry.”
Just hearing the word food…oh my goodness. It triggered me and I rushed to the washroom. Actually, even writing about “that incident” makes me feel queasy.
It also really impacted the quality of my daily practice of kriya. I found that the breathing practices of Kriya really intensified my nausea, and I was often running to the bathroom afterwards.
Oh. but medication is glorious. And Diclectin has made such a difference. I can eat small amounts again. I can move around the room. I don’t feel quite as nauseous, and I don’t throw up nearly half as much as I did. Honestly, it felt like it gave me my life back!
And this is how I am even able to write to you today.
Becoming a mother
11 weeks
12 weeks
13 weeks
12 weeks
13 weeks. The beginnings of a bump, though for now, it just feels like bloat rather than baby.It is remarkable to me, the difference just a week makes.
First portrait at 8 weeks, a little grain of rice.
I think about the weight and responsibility of growing and nurturing a life made from our love. It is the sweetest responsibility that makes me want to weep.
December has marked the beginning of my second trimester, an adventure that I am looking forward to documenting and sharing with you.
Love,
Malavika xo
