In Like Twin

All of the not-so-fun symptoms of being pregnant had finally hit me at six weeks. Waking up everyday I felt extremely tired. Even if Oakley and I went to bed early, it never seemed to be quite early enough. My body was changing and aching and more importantly, rearranging to where it needed to be to hold my two growing babies. Out of all of the early struggles, the thought of how much my body was about to change bothered me. Growing up, I knew having a baby would change my body, but having twins was going to completely reshape my body.

I remember occasionally catching myself looking in the mirror and pushing my stomach out as much as I could to envision how much my belly was going to stretch. I was feeling a bit insecure, and at times, overwhelmingly insecure. Carrying one baby is a lot, but I was carrying two. My body was in for a huge change. Will my body bounce back from this? Will I have stretch marks? How much weight will I gain? Those questions circled my mind all the time. Yet, looking at myself in the mirror, I couldn’t help but smile. There were TWO beautiful lives forming inside of my own belly! Little did I know, what I was in for, I could’ve never imagined.

Along with trying to get used to the fact that my body will never be the same, I was starting to feel really sick. ALL DAY, EVERYDAY. I had heard of morning sickness, but this wasn’t just the morning, this was all day. I remember feeling so nauseous, all I wanted to do was lay on the couch. Have you ever had a horrible hangover? Well, it’s similar, but doesn’t get better all day and a big greasy breakfast definitely doesn’t cure it. The smell of certain foods were enough to make me gag. Oakley and I had dinner with my brother one night, a delicious pasta and salad, absolutely nothing to complain about. Yet, on the way home we had to stop so I could throw up. It seemed as if I couldn’t predict what was going to make me sick. Let me tell you, it was awful. The nauseousness would hit me at out of nowhere and I felt as if it were never going to end. Looking back at the first trimester, if I had to pick a one word definition, it would be NAUSEA. I was one big nauseaous, bloated and emotional mess.

The biggest struggle in the first trimester other than how I felt, was keeping a secret. We knew that there was a risk for great loss, especially with twins. I remember the doctor telling me not to push my body too hard. I had to refrain from running and working out, which were huge parts of my life. It was so hard not to have those to release all of my pent up emotions. I was willing to do whatever it took to keep those little nuggets safe and sound though. We had a mark set at 13 weeks. That is when we felt comfortable sharing our awesome little secrets with the world. We knew we couldn’t keep it a secret for long as my little frame couldn’t hide twins much more than the end of the 1st trimester. It was such a relief telling all of our friends and announcing on social media that we were going to be parents to two!

As the first trimester came to an end, the morning sickness, or all-day sickness in my case, tapered off. I began to feel pretty darn normal. I was able to go about my normal life other than my clothes started to fit more and more snug as the days went by. We had to take our first trip to buy some maternity clothes, which was interesting. Most maternity clothes aren’t built around twin-mommy bodies, so I rocked my fair share of XL shirts and leggings as time went on. I was officially becoming the pregnant lady, at the salon, at home, and around family. I was happy being pregnant and I couldn’t wait for that second trimester ultrasound, which happened to be right around the corner! Were we having two boys, two girls, one of each? The second trimester was awaiting and was full of awesome surprises.

-Annalissa ❤