I am tired and I am hungry. It feels like there’s no limit to how much I could sleep. There are, of course, clear limits to how much I can actually sleep, since I do need to work and take care of the household. Interestingly the tiredness really only hits me when I slow down. As long as I am moving, kept busy, I don’t feel it too much. Then I finish eating dinner and just sit for 5 minutes, and I can barely keep awake.

The pregnancy is clearly messing with my blood sugar and digestion. I have to eat every three hours or so, but often when I feel that I absolutely must eat something RIGHT NOW, when I go to the kitchen to actually get food, the only thing I want is a yoghurt or perhaps an apple. The thought of actually eating real food is almost revolting. So the signal of hunger arises from low blood sugar, not from lack of energy.

My blood pressure also seems to be swinging wildly, and standing still for long stretches of time is not good. Several mornings now, while standing on the train – only 11 minutes – I’ve been close to fainting due to low blood pressure. It’s the worst combination: standing still, and being slightly too hot because we’re effectively indoors but with outdoor clothes.

My least favourite pregnancy complaint thus far: gassy stomach. Very uncomfortable, sometimes really painfully so. I fart like a champion. Because of this I find it hard to fit into my clothes at times, even though I haven’t gained much weight yet, so I feel a lot more pregnant than I really am.

Speaking of which… Whenever I think of the English word (farting) I cannot help but remember a business trip, back in 2004 or so. This was while I was living and working in London. There were four of us, visiting a few companies in Stockholm over two days: myself, a colleague, my boss, and my boss’s boss. As our taxi left the airport, one of the others spotted a sign for “Utfart”, meaning Exit in Swedish. And they found it hilarious. So hilarious that for the next two, they would shout “utfart!” to each other about once every half hour. It got old after about 3 repetitions, but not for them. Educated intelligent adults, with jobs entailing significant responsibility over much money – and with a sense of humour at the level of an 8-year-old. And they’ve forever ruined the word utfart for me.

Another positive pregnancy test 10 days ago – looks like we’re back in business. Another autumn baby, if this works out; s/he should arrive about 2 weeks before Ingrid’s birthday.

And now I’m entering the tired phase. All afternoon and evening all I can think of is just lying down and closing my eyes. I’m already noticing increasing hunger, too, but I’m clearly not yet in that extreme phase of constant eating.

Well, looks like this is it for this pregnancy. Cramps and bleeding today. Good thing I resisted the temptation to tell everyone.

I’m still keeping quiet about my pregnancy. From what I understand, the whole thing isn’t really “solid” until after the first trimester. And I wouldn’t like to spread the good news, only to have to tell everyone a few weeks later that, oops, we’re not having a baby after all. So I’m going to wait another month.

But of course I myself think about it all the time. When I was trying to conceive, my thoughts kept coming back to the topic of babies all the time. Daily, several times over. I was counting days, and thinking about my pills, and sex, and so on. I have to say, it’s nicer to ruminate about a baby than about wanting a baby. Now I think about the time of year when Blump the Second will be born, and how big I will be in February when we’ll be attending a wedding, and what will Ingrid think, and will I need to buy new clothes again because last time I mostly needed summer clothes, and who will take care of Ingrid while I’m giving birth, and how long will I stay home with the baby, and so on.

Lies beget lies, and hiding one thing leads to having to hide other things, too. Since I haven’t told people I’m pregnant, I can’t explain at work why I need to take a morning off (to have that first meeting with the pre-natal care clinic). I can’t mention my flu shot (which I got yesterday, together with Ingrid) because they’re only available for risk groups and children at this point, and I got mine only because I was pregnant. Gah, I wish this month could pass faster.

I found out this Friday that I’m pregnant again. Since I’d undergone all sorts of examinations last time around, I knew what parts of the system were not working properly, so the process went a lot more quickly this time. Instead of years of waiting and investigations, it took less than half a year (and some pills).

I’m already thinking of how I will manage two children, where they will sleep, the clothes I will have to buy for myself, what it will feel like to breast-feed again, etc. I wish it didn’t have to take so long!

I can…

• … stand on one leg long enough to pull off a sock, or put a leg through a trouser leg opening.
• … reach my toes for cutting toenails.
• … cycle in 3rd gear, and run up the stairs.
• … sleep in other positions than on my left side.
• … feel like I’m sharing a bed with Eric again, without a Chinese wall of a pillow between us.
• … button my jacket all the way.
• … sit right up to the table when eating.

For those of you interested in knowing more about my labour and birth (and I imagine only other mothers would be!), you can find the full story here.

There are some gory details here and there; don’t read it unless you really want to know what labour and childbirth can be like. It’s also quite a long story, but as with my blog posts, I’ve written it more for myself than for anyone else.

Our daughter Ingrid Johanna Toomik Bergheden was born Sunday morning at 3.17, weighing a healthy 3.9 kg.

Everything went well. The worst of the exhaustion has now passed, but we’re all still quite tired and haven’t quite found our footing yet, so further details will have to wait a while.

Ingrid Johanna, age 90 minutes

Another way to experience your pregnancy.

Walking has become hard work, and now has to be limited to short distances and a very slow pace. I’m not at all used to walking slowly, so the latter actually takes some effort and attention. And when I say slow, I mean really really slow: imagine the pace you would keep if you were very reluctant to arrive wherever you’re going, just moving your feet enough to keep up the appearance of walking forward.

This afternoon I walked to the post box to mail a letter, and then to the local clinic to get a repeat prescription renewed. This should normally have taken about 20 minutes, but took me an hour. I think I walked at half my normal pace, on average, but on my way there I forgot myself and sped up for a moment – and paid for it by getting a stitch in the side (at least that’s what I think it was – with a pregnant belly it felt more like a an agonising cramp in the stomach muscles) and having my blood pressure drop through the floor, so I had to sit and wait 20 minutes at the clinic for it to recover.

Then I got home and slept 2 hours out of exhaustion, waking only once to turn to the other side.

No, walking doesn’t work well now. Cycling, however, still works perfectly well for short distances (did yesterday, at least). With hindsight it’s clear that I should have cycled to the clinic instead of walking.

I’ve been cycling throughout the whole pregnancy, both because I always cycled everywhere before I was pregnant, and because I’ve found it more comfortable and/or convenient than any of the alternatives. It’s definitely less tiring than walking and puts less strain on the back. It’s also more comfortable than sitting on a bus – bus seats give me a backache. Above all, it is far more comfortable than taking a taxi, which is what everyone has been suggesting to me (if it costs more, it must be better?). London streets are so uneven and taxis have such strong suspension that a taxi ride here feels like being on a fairground ride or a large trampoline. At the top of each bounce Blump pushes my stomach up to my throat, and at the end of the bounce s/he lands painfully on some internal organs. Not comfy at all. On the bike I can at least see each bump coming and avoid it or compensate for it, but there’s no way to do that in a taxi.

The bike is not really an option for longer distances any more (too tired afterwards) so I’ve been taking the tube for my daytime bookshopping trips etc. The tube has turned out to be a reasonably good alternative, as long as I’m not in a hurry (which I’m not) and can avoid the rush hour (which I can) – a positive surprise, on the whole.