1st Trimester: Is Anyone Really in There?

It took me a while to come up and write this post. But here it goes.

I found out I was pregnant in September 2019 while I was back in Montreal for about a month. It came to me as quite the surprise actually. Although we were not really being careful, it was always in my mind that I would not be able to get pregnant “just like that”. I have polycystic ovaries, which means I do not regularly ovulate (or necessarily know when I will), and my periods come and go as they wish. I always thought we would need some sort of medical assistance to get pregnant.

Honestly, having a baby was the last thing on my mind. Although my husband has been wanting/asking for us to have one for over 2-3 years now, I just didn’t feel ready (is anyone ever ready?). Moving to Peru was a really big step and it challenged me in many ways as well as my lifestyle; some things for the better but others for the worst. I feel like it took me a good 3 years (maybe even more) to really get “accustomed” to the country and its people. And even still today, 5 years later, I still don’t feel quite “at home”. I wanted to continue the nomad lifestyle we had, continue growing my business, and honestly, I sometimes even had doubts whether I wanted kids or not.

Finding Out
And then, just like that, boom! The way I found out was interesting. At the end of August, when I went to my hair appointment, my hairdresser tells me: I am sorry for asking, but, are you pregnant? I looked at him and laughed and said no I am not, why? He answered that he felt ‘gestational vibes’ and that he had predicted pregnancies twice before. I left it at that and thought nothing of it. I continued enjoying the summer, my friends, the parties, travels, running, yoga, and life. Then, maybe a week and a half later, I started noticing that I was not really hungry in the morning. Normally, I eat breakfast about 30-40mins after waking up, brushing my teeth, and meditating. I was going sometimes 3-4h after waking up before hunger would creep up. I thought: well, maybe it’s the food we ate last night, we ate too late, or too much, etc. Again, did not think much of it. When my period “should have come around” according to the app I use to track it, again, it was so normal for me to not get my period on the predicted date, I was not worried. However, since my hairdresser’s comment, not being hungry, and waiting for my period to appear, I started to wonder: Could it be?
My brother was trying to plan his trip to Peru to come and document my big project: organizing the first yoga session over 6,000m altitude. He wanted us to sit down and buy his team’s flights before I left Canada. As I sat for breakfast with a friend and started chatting about all that I am writing now, she told me to just take a test before buying the flights. Oh boy I got so nervous, I couldn’t finish my breakfast.
Next thing I know I am at the pharmacy buying a test and bringing it home. Luckily, no one was at the apartment, so I decided to do it right away. As I am in the bathroom, peeing on the stick, my husband and a bunch of friends arrive. When I look down, I see the positive sign turn on instantly and the typical movie scene starts where I sit on the bathroom floor crying and text my friend to come and join me.
Then I had to lie to everyone and told them I was vomiting breakfast because it had mango in it and I am allergic. When everyone finally left (which seemed like an eternity) I told my husband.

I took my doctor’s appointment for the day I got back to Lima and according to the calculations, I assumed I was about 7-8 weeks. When we met the doctor and checked if I was really pregnant, we could not see anything but the sac: there was no embryo. So the wait continued: was something actually going to grow in there? Or was my body going to flush it all out? Well, it stuck. Now that I think about it, I do not know if I would have ever given the green light and actually tried to have a baby, so maybe this is how it was supposed to happen.

My First Trimester: Is There Really Something in There?
Yup, that was the big question for me during the following weeks. It was a little hard to believe because I felt like nothing was really different: no nausea, no vomiting, no cravings. The only symptoms I had were that my breasts were very sensitive and I wanted to sleep longer at night. That. Was. It. Life continued: I traveled (SO MUCH) in October, I continued all my activities like going to the gym, practicing yoga, trail running, and most importantly, my altitude yoga project continued once I got into the second trimester.

Even when I heard the heartbeat around week 8, it was shocking and I could see the tiny peanut on the screen, but… it still seemed so surreal. In between appointments and among all the things happening around me, I would even forget I was pregnant. This made it easier to simply put it aside to deal with later.