People Are Sharing Things They Wish They Knew About Pregnancy, And I, For One, Am Stunned

As a woman who’s never been pregnant, there’s nothing more shocking to me than when pregnant people list off the very, very wild things our bodies do when expecting.

A while back, Reddit user tocamix90 asked, “Moms of Reddit: What’s something about pregnancy nobody warned you about?” Here are the most interesting responses:

Some responses are also from this thread because they’re just too good not to share. 

1.“In the first few weeks of lactation, hearing a baby cry would trigger my breasts to leak. Not just my baby, any baby. Made for some really awkward moments in public.”

—CorruptMistress

2.“Sometimes the baby WILL kick your bladder and you WILL piss yourself, no warning at all… Also, in the last trimester, sometimes the baby will seem to flip around and throw you off balance. In my last month, I had zero balance and randomly pissed my pants…awesome.”

—truevwlove

3.“Your body produces a hormone called relaxin that helps loosen your pelvis in preparation for birth. Some women get waayyy too much too soon, and it loosens everything to the point you lose mobility, and every day, all day is painful. Also, your body pushes so hard during birth, you can feel yourself sh*t your own butthole out.”

—Jen_Itals

“Can confirm, week two postpartum, and my butthole looks like a bunch of grapes.”

—caycan

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4.“During labor, the ‘water breaking’ is not one rush of liquid. It’s continuous and can occur for several hours. it’s horrendous and messy and incredibly awful to deal with. it feels like peeing but you have zero control over anything and if you tense up then everything is much more painful and weird feeling. Nobody ever told me that, and I was VERY surprised to find out for myself.”

—[deleted]

5.“The bleeding after having your baby. I had a C-section. The first time I went to pee, the pan looked like a murder had occurred. I pulled the emergency cord, thinking, ‘Oh my god, my insides are falling out.’ The nurse who came to see me gave me the best WTF look ever and just said, ‘You just had a baby, that’s totally normal.'”

—gooberville

6.“I wish I knew that despite all the bran flakes, I’d be severely constipated afterwards, a condition worsened by being torn up down there. The midwife had to administer more gas and air at home three days later, as having a poo was so unbearable. I was tripping so hard sitting on the toilet that I became convinced I was falling off, so I insisted she come in and hold me on the toilet. The whole time I was shouting ‘Splice the mainbrace, I’m all at sea!’ in a Yorkshire accent (I’m not from Yorkshire).”

—[deleted]

7.“33 weeks pregnant here — lotion, lotion, lotion. My boobs and tummy constantly itch, and it’s driving me crazy.”

—airforcewife72

8.“If your baby’s head is too big, or if your baby gets stuck, the OB may have to perform an episiotomy [a surgical cut to the perineum to enlarge the vaginal opening]. I was in the room when they did it, and I will never forget the sound it made as they were cutting. I retch every time I think about it.”

—sanlc504

9.“Hair loss! After I had my kid, I lost a ton of hair. I would pull fistfuls of hair during my showers. I thought there was something wrong with me because no one told me about this. Went to Google, totally normal, and it happens to everyone. It grows back eventually, and you’ll go through an awkward baby hair phase.”

—sm1020

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10.“The stuff that stays with your body afterwards. I developed allergies after I had my second. My feet definitely got bigger. Hormones are no joke.”

—Shakenbake1811

“My feet grew half a size, and my hair got curly. It was wavy before, but now I get ringlets. It also made my fingernails stronger. Also, I developed an aversion to beef that never really went away. I only eat it like once a month to this day, and my youngest is about to turn ten. It’s like a second puberty…what the f*ck is happening to my body???”

—MargotFenring

11.“I wish someone had warned me about muscle cramps. I had to learn a new way to pop my ankles because every night I would pop them and get massive charley horses in my legs that my fiancé had to massage out.”

—BreannaMcAwesome

12.“Those cravings aren’t just food. I craved dirt, particularly beach sand. The smell of the beach was excruciating; I just wanted to shovel handfuls into my mouth. I never ate dirt or sand, and the craving went away when the baby was born. A friend of a friend told me she craved freshly poured asphalt, so in a way I’m glad my craving was just dirt.”

—DoxieBalls

13.“The skin tags! Never had a single one in 30 years. And then I got pregnant, and they were everywhere. I had never heard any mention of them in any of the many books I read… I was not prepared at all!”

—kmf1022

14.“When people spoke to me about morning sickness, they all said it would end after the first trimester. Like the day you hit your second trimester, it all magically disappears and you can eat again. No one told me that if you’re ‘lucky,’ you can have it throughout your entire pregnancy. They do have medication to help ease the nausea. Advice: If you need to pee and puke, go pee first. Or hold a bucket and pee.”

—[deleted]

15.“Each pregnancy is different, even with the same person. I have three kids. The first pregnancy was very typical and followed the normal timeline. The second pregnancy was awful. I was miserable and sick the entire time. My third pregnancy was easy peasy, and I finally understood why some women liked being pregnant.”

—Tallerc

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16.“I wish I’d heard the term ‘mother’s apron’ before I had one. Like, there are warnings all over, ‘Your body’s going to change!’ and some specifics on how, but everything I read and heard was reassuring me about how it would all mostly go back eventually. I’m still pretty bitter.”

—metonymimic

“Yup! No one told me! My skin isn’t very elastic, and I lost the weight extremely fast after both babies, resulting in a lot of sag. My tummy is foreign to me. Makes me sad whenever I look in the mirror. The only way to treat it is surgery or accepting and changing the way I look at myself.”

—Hanaboloza

17.“Nosebleeds. I’m not currently pregnant, but when I was, I got nosebleeds every few days during the first and second trimesters.”

—creativeandwonderful

18.“Lochia. It’s basically the biggest ‘period’ ever as your body expels the leftovers from carrying a baby, and it can go on for weeks. I will never forget being told that I might pass clots as big as a tennis ball and that was normal. So gross.”

19.“That you can get a horrible full-body rash. It’s a rare condition called PUPPP. PUPPP occurs in about 1 in every 200 pregnancies, and 70% of sufferers give birth to boys. I gave birth to a girl. So, I was in the 0.15% of women who get this horrible, itchy, mind-numbing rash that I suffered with for over two months. I couldn’t sleep, I sat half of my day in oatmeal baths. I cried A LOT. The only thing that stopped the itching for a few hours was Grandpa’s Tar Soap because it left a coating on my skin that soothed or protected it somehow. I NEVER want to go through that again.”

—QuidditchSnitchBitch

20.“How hungry you can be. All. The. Time. Especially with twins. Then, how hungry you still are after the baby comes. Then how hungry you are while breast feeding.”

—kleigh1313

21.“HEMORRHOIDS. My butthole still has a pucker to it.”

—Daneelbel_Lee

22.“My boobs, especially the nipples, got so sensitive that having anything touch them was agony. So, I would strap them to my body really tight with strips of cloth. Really hard to do, when my boobs swelled to a 36G and stayed that way.”

—Daneelbel_Lee

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23.“No one warned me about the horrible, horrible headaches. Every damn day. And the only pain medication you can take is Tylenol, which is pretty much just like not taking anything at all.”

—iamkristen15

24.“Pimples. I had a major breakout almost monthly during my first and second trimesters.”

—Trishlovesdolphins

25.“The smell. I can shower twice a day, and I can still look and smell like I haven’t showered in days by the end of the night. I’ve been showering in the morning and when my 3-year-old takes his nap. By 8 or 9 at night, my feet are rank.”

—Trishlovesdolphins

26.“The heartburn…Dear god, the heartburn! I had my kids in the ’90s before I ever heard of Prilosec (I don’t even know if you can take these when you’re pregnant anyway, so I don’t know if they would help). The months of trying to sleep sitting up with rolls of Tums clutched in my hand. No matter how I tried to change my diet or the times I ate, nothing helped much. It was awful.”

—headfullofnickles

27.And finally, “Pregnancy mask (also known as melasma). Some of the skin on your face gets darker. Mine kind of looked like an emo raccoon. I’m told it gets darker and lasts longer for each child. Not everyone gets it, but I wish I had known it was a possibility.”

Responses have been edited for length/clarity. 

So, to all the parents and soon-to-be parents out there, what were the most shocking things about pregnancy that you wished you’d learned sooner? Let us know in the comments. Or, if you prefer to remain anonymous, leave your submission in the form here.

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