Pop! Goes the Belly

A couple of weekends ago I received confirmation from three of my mommy friends that what I felt was a bloated tummy is actually a baby belly.

I have always had a belly so I feel like I looked pregnant before I ever was. And I get so bloated when I'm pregnant that it doesn't take much for my mid section to balloon up. I must have skipped over the "baby bump" stage and gone straight to baby belly. I have no idea when this belly showed up, but it is here now.  

It's here and I've come to realize that stomach flab is more forgiving than a growing uterus.

I'm not huge, but somehow the belly is already getting in my way. It's in my way when I put socks on. It's in my way when I tie my shoes. It's in the way when I shave. It's in the way when I try to do lunges in yoga class. It was even in my way when I threw up in the trash can the other morning. It is hard to believe that I'm only going to get bigger and soon I will probably have to revert back to toddler-hood when someone else had to put my shoes and socks on for me (darn being pregnant in the winter!).

And my baby belly is already making me uncomfortable. I don't know when I thought being pregnant would start making me feel uncomfortable. Oh, wait, it's actually day one and I knew that. Let me rephrase -- I don't know when I thought my belly would make things uncomfortable for me. Maybe my last trimester? I feel that pregnant women in their last trimester complain the most about their bellies. I guess, for me and this pregnancy, month four is when the belly starts making things uncomfortable. There are times when my lower belly is hard and others when it feels like my "good ol'" flabby belly. No matter how my belly is feeling, it feels like I'm bending over a railing anytime I need to reach my toes. I have always had a better time sleeping when I lay on my stomach. Now it feels like I'm laying on some kind of hard mass. Finding a position to sleep in makes for a lot of tossing and turning at night now.

Despite it being in the way and making me uncomfortable, I really am loving my little baby belly. I didn't like to wear tight shirts pre-pregnancy after the 15 pound weight gain after my D&C. But now that I have a belly because of a baby and not because I just have too much "fluff", I don't mind showing it off.

And thank goodness for that. It hurt to suck in my stomach all the time!