Is she Gibbs? 
Do you have to pee/poop more often?
Yes to both.
Is a 56 lb weight gain normal during a pregnancy? Baby plus placenta and I hear pregnant ladies get fluid retention so I guess its possible. Am asking this as a dude who has never followed a female’s pregnancy closely but it does seem a lot. Does it all come off after the birth?
Congratulations by the way my birthday is March too so am all in favour of spring births!! She’ll be in her stroller with proud mom and dad in the summer!
Do you notice the weather more? Does the winter cold (I’ll go ahead and assume it’s winter where you are) feel more cold than it did last winter?
56 pounds is definitely too much, but everybody’s weight gain is different.
Some women who start out very overweight, then are careful about what they eat, can maintain the same weight or actually lose a little during pregnancy.
The doctor’s recommendation for a “normal” pregnancy is to gain 25-35 pounds. Women who are vigilant about diet and exercise often stay in this range.
A lot of women go severely over, though. Many women gain 50, 60, 70, or even 100 pounds. Some women who are very thin in normal life tend to really balloon up, then lose it all. Many women having their first pregnancy (like me) don’t realize how much the effects of eating a little more/moving a little less will be magnified and compounded by pregnancy. I gained so much weight because I’ve been lazy and greedy; I accept that. I’ll know better with the next kid. (I’m also retaining a LOT of water since the baby dropped and the circulation to everything below my hips was compromised… I “gained” five pounds from 36-37 weeks, but I bet you dollars to doughnuts that four of those are just water).
One of the baby books I have tallies up the weight of the baby, amniotic fluid, placenta, uterus, retained fluid, and increased blood volume in pregnancy, and estimated that on average, 25 pounds should come off within a week or two after giving birth. If you breastfeed, that takes an extra 300-500 calories a day, which makes weight loss somewhat easier than it is under normal conditions.
Weather systems seem to affect my sleep much more than they used to. Every time one of these springtime fronts has come through, in the last month, I barely sleep at all.
The winter feels much less cold than it has been. You get warm when you’re pregnant. I honestly haven’t been bothered by feeling cold at all this winter, while my husband (usually the warm one) has shivered and huddled under blankets and put on extra sweaters. I’m happy wearing short sleeves around the house with the temperature set at 65F, and am too hot to sleep at night with the thermostat set over 60F.
Am sure your soon to be delightful but hectic lifestyle with your new born will get you back slim and trim.
Am sorry I wanted to edit my post as after I google searched average weight gain during pregnancy as my post sounded condescending! ( missed the edit window)
I really didn’t mean it to be, Am sorry if it came across that way.
I know nuttin about pregnancies as am a dude and even now at age 52 never been involved with pregnant ladies too much.
But I can guess how much you want your new addition to come out and say hello to you and the world.
best wishes!!
That’s fine manila, no offense taken. I’ve been spending a lot of time feeling sorry that my poor husband has to put up with my weight gain (though bless his heart, he says he doesn’t see it), and now that I’m at the end and walking is getting hard, I’m sorry that I have to put up with the weight gain. It’s my own damn fault though.
How often are you peeing now? Do you sleep on your back and how easy is it to turn over? I ask because it was difficult for me.
Left to my own devices, I drink enough to pee about once an hour. To minimize the swelling I’m experiencing, though, I’m supposed to drink a tall glass of water every hour that I’m awake… which leads to peeing 2-3 times an hour. I usually get up to go 4 times in the course of the night.
No, I haven’t been able to sleep on my back since the first half of the pregnancy. All that weight pushing on my guts makes me feel sick. Turning over is getting really hard, as the pain and pressure move out of my pelvis and into my upper legs… it hurts a lot to use them to turn myself over, and even more to get myself into a sitting position.
Congratulations MandaJO! Thinking sticky healthy happy thoughts for you!
Philosphr, have you guys bought a copy of The Birth Partner yet? I know from your other thread that you have a natural birth focus, which my husband and I share as well. It has a ton of information on pain relief and positions, natural and medicated, and how to be a good, informed support person and making up a birth plan. Penny Simkin (et al)'s Pregnancy, Childbirth & the Newborn is another thorough resource of the type. It seems the key is to keep moving, if you can. Here are the books we found most useful:
The Mayo Clinic Guide to Healthy Pregnancy Well organized, not dumbed down for “entertainment” purposes, thorough and well balanced. There’s a page at the end of each section for the “when to call the doctor” type questions that constantly pop up. Dr. Google is never helpful in pregnancy.
Exercising Through Your Pregnancy Even if your wife isn’t interested in exercising during pregnancy, this is a really amazingly informative book on the adaptations of the body to pregnancy. I found its reassurance and information invaluable. There is no better source of information on continuing or beginning exercise during pregnancy that I’ve found, and it’s backed up by studies, not superstitions. I love this book. Continued exercise has been great for keeping myself feeling healthy and happy this pregnancy I think. I’ve gained 30 lbs by this almost 37th week and feel fantastic. For a while I used a calorie tracking app to make sure I accounted for the extra calories you need to support a pregnancy plus those you need to replace from exercising, but after a while you just get a good sense of where you’re at–plus, we’ve been doing the Bradley birth classes and you track your diet for those, so it was redundant. I drink about 2 gallons of milk a week.
Sorry! Didn’t mean to threadjack, but I had meant to chime in on Philosphr’s other thread and kept forgetting. Feel free to PM me, or, I guess, ask Qs here if it’s okay with Sattua. I’m not hugely pregnant, just pregnant at only 36+5, so maybe I’ll feel differently in a week and a couple days. 
For Sattua though, what’s been your favorite thing about pregnancy?
Ruffle-butt baby leggings. I can’t get enough. I’m so glad we’re having a girl.
how does your husband feel about your changing figure?
Has your libido changed through the course of your pregnancy?
I’m jealous. I have two boys. No ruffles and no pink.
My husband is a very sweet guy who hasn’t let on that he feels any disappointment in the loss of my pre-pregnancy body. He’s not one of those guys who finds pregnancy erotic, but he has continued to be affectionate and interested throughout the pregnancy. I still weigh less than his ex-wife, which gets me points I’m sure.
My libido plummeted during the exhaustion of the first few weeks, made perhaps a 50% recovery in the second trimester (pregnancy orgasms are pretty spectacular, but harder to achieve), and at this point is completely gone. I still think my husband’s a smoking a hottie, and I enjoy making love for the closeness and affection, but orgasm? No freaking way. My hips hurt, my legs hurt, my belly hurts, my cervix hurts, and everything else down there is numb from the pressure.
About exercise and feeling great during pregnancy–I have felt like crap from six weeks onward, personally. From about 18-28 weeks I was almost on the low side of feeling “okay”, otherwise I’ve been tired and uncomfortable. I took daily walks until the first snow fell in December, when I was around 25-26 weeks pregnant, then I gave it up. Starting at about six weeks, just walking felt more like walking through water, it was so hard. I strongly suggest that Phlosphr let his wife find her own level of exercise throughout the pregnancy.
Have you heard the advice that sex will get labor started? When you get really desperate to get that baby out you’ll try almost anything
Good luck to you!
Yyyyyyep, I’ve heard it and I believe it, and give my husband 100% of the credit for what little bit of progress I’ve made, effacement-wise.
Have you started getting a million & 1 flyers in the mail with discounts in baby clothes, baby furniture, formula, toys, and diapers yet?