First off, if you are pregnant for the third or more time, may I suggest not subscribing to those weekly updates that are emailed to you. You will find them increasingly inaccurate and depressing. Oh, they will tell you what week you are in and how your little one is developing well enough, but it's the finer details that will somehow slip away. For example, a couple of weeks ago I got an email congratulating me on reaching my 7th week. The email nicely assured me that everything was progressing well and informed me that I am not yet showing. Hmmmmm. Not. Yet. Showing. Well, that's not right. Since my third pregnancy, my body has what I like to call 'pregnancy memory.' From the moment the sperm hits the egg, my body kicks in and says, "Oh yeah, I remember this." Then I wake up having grown what looks to be a 4 month belly overnight. Laugh if you will, but it is true. I think about those people that choose to not tell others they are pregnant until they are in their second trimester. This is laughable to me. I wouldn't be able to hide it.
Another example of how these notices have become irksome is my feeling like the writers of these bulletins really don't relate to me at all. Have they ever actually gone through a pregnancy? Do they really know what they are talking about? Last week I read about how I might be experiencing some morning sickness. They talked about possible symptoms, encouraged me to talk to my doctor, and reminded me that it will be short-lived. Ten years ago I might have been encouraged by such news. As it is, I've been nauseous almost nonstop from morning until night and all the time in-between. Nothing my doctor suggested seems to help (or anything anyone else suggested either for that matter). So you'll forgive me if I don't feel encouraged. I'm going to go about my days, marveling about how awful it must be to have a chronic illness, and hope that in three more weeks the nausea will go away, as it did with my first four pregnancies.
Experiences like these lead me to believe that pregnancy updates, while fun and useful for the first couple of pregnancies, can actually be disheartening when we get a bit on the older side or have more than two children. Because of these types of situations, I've decided to leave the pregnancy updates behind-or at least roll my eyes at them. I can use my own prowess to figure out how far along I am, or where my baby stands in development, and I can turn away from silly updates that lead me to feel like they really have nothing to do with me.