The joy of puking for 9 months

I was recently pondering the possibility that I could be pregnant with baby #4. Me feelings could be summed up as follows: AAAAARGHHHHHHHHH!!!!! Fortunately for myself (and everyone who has to live with me) that was not the case.

I do hope to have another baby one day, but not for a couple of years when I don't already have three pre-school age children, and hopefully when we are rich enough to experiment with possible cures for morning sickness, e.g. acupuncture, expensive anti-nausea medication, or a nanny....a surrogate...at the very least, sufficient funds to cover my daily requirements of hot chips.
(This was our plan for the last two- to have a little more money, and that didn't happen, so, fingers crossed for next time!!)

I am waffling. My point is, as I contemplated the world crashing down around me, having three kids destroying the house for the next nine months while I lie on the couch in the foetal position, or with my head over the toilet, crying about how miserable pregnancy is and how incredibly annoyed I am that I have to pay for food I will no doubt vomit up anyway, I remembered last time I was faced this this situation.

I lived in Perth and had literally just finished becoming a qualified personal trainer, maybe a week or two before. I was pretty sure almost immediately that I was pregnant and was merely waiting it out until I could actually check. I was doing a bunch of errands at Joondalup shopping centre and I was pushing around a trolley with Jack and Isabel playing and screaming and crying and jumping in and out, all frazzled and dishevelled, and we entered the pharmacy where I found a pregnancy test. I remember the overwhelming embarrassment I felt walking to the front counter as people turned to look at all the racket coming from my kids while I attempted to threaten or distract them, and then placing the box on the counter while I deliberately avoided the saleslady's gaze. Ohhhhh the humiliation. Young out of control mum with psycho kids buying a pregnancy test, don't you just feel sympathy hearing about it? It's like, Oh, the crazy cat lady is getting another cat, cool.

At some point I took the test, it was positive, and i don't even remember any of this or telling my husband or anything, you see this is how frequently I get knocked up, I can't even separate different pregnancies any more! We also moved two hours away to a smaller town (city? It feels like a small town) halfway through the pregnancy so that wasn't all that much fun. I got huge, like with the other pregnancies, so I was very used to questions about if I had my dates right, and was I sure it wasn't twins. My favourite was at the gym, this guy said to me,"Not long to go now, huh?" I was three and a half months pregnant. SIX months left. At the end of my pregnancy, I recall someone walking past me saying WOW.

Now I have my baby, Sophia Adele. She is almost one now, standing up by herself and trying to walk. Eep! I am absolutely in love with her. I love all my children, of course, but Sophia is still little enough that I am her favourite person, and that feels very, very nice. She smiles and laughs and buries her face in my chest and puts her arms around my neck tightly. Plus she is very cute (says her Mum). But it does make it worth it to go through all the ickiness of pregnancy and then have a beautiful child. LUCKILY.

"I just want to aim for health...once I lose 12 kg."

Yes, I said that. And I said it in all seriousness. Once I have lost enough weight and look perfect, then I'll stop obsessing about my body and my looks and appearance, because then I will such a healthy body image.

Ha!

I remember thinking I was fat in Year 7. I don't know what that was about, but I weighed at most 35 kg, and as a child I was actually this odd looking skinny kid.

Around the time I started high school, there was a whole lot of fuss in the media about "shrinking celebrities". Think Lara Flynn Boyle, Helen Hunt, Jennifer Aniston, Calista Flockhart etc slimming down quite noticeably. The idea was that their bodies were so petite that their figure was like that of a pre-pubescent boy, with their head like a lollipop at the top of a stick. While all this was going on, I was beginning puberty and my body was changing. So it was then that I started to notice different shapes, and decide what was fat, and what was skinny. I am not saying that all the celebrities shown in the media are completely responsible for my unhealthy attitudes towards my body, but I do think it was relevant considering the timing for me.

Since then, I have grown up and taken more control over my body- my eating habits, my exercise regime. I completed a course in personal training that was more for my own interest than a desire to work as a personal trainer. I have had three children in three and a half years, so think...gain lots of weight, slowly lose it, get pregnant again, gain lots of weight, slowly lose it, get pregnant again...you get the idea. Pregnancy, breast feeding and spending my time caring for my children has resulted in a lot of frustration and stress and time spent thinking about my body and what exactly is wrong with it. I would feel so guilty if I missed a work out or ate junk food, and I would let these things weigh me down and ruin my day. I have put so much energy into thinking that my life would be perfect, and I would be perfect, if I could just be skinny. Being skinny= happiness.

Right?

I have nothing to wear....

It has been 5 months since I gave birth to my third child Sophia. I put on the most weight with her and am losing it very slowly...so slow in fact the numbers on the scale are currently staying the same... So this creates a dilemma. On the one hand, I was fully prepared to be patient and wait it out, and then get back into my pre-pregnancy clothes, some of which I bought just before getting pregnant and have never even worn (including a trenchcoat)! It seemed pointless to buy new clothes that I would hopefully only be wearing for a few months, until I was back to my regular size.

However, here I am, 5 months later, with 12 kg still to go. I think by the time I lose the weight it will be the wrong season to wear all those new clothes I never got to wear! And the clothes I am wearing now look really hideous. My jeans are all wrinkly and kind of baggy, most of my shirts don't comfortably fit over my bust, and my maternity clothes are too big. Plus, all of the shirts that I squeezed into while pregnant are now very stretched- so most of the time I look like a hobo. This bothers me.

Trying to get dressed up for church or to go out somewhere nice is the WORST. I can't just wear jeans and a top, I have to actually reach into my wardrobe and pull out a top and a bottom that vaguely match, or in which the styles work together. And chances are, my maternity bra made out of the most beautiful grandma-style lace you have ever been forced to wear, will be sticking out the top by about 3 cm. And shoes! Why buy shoes to go with certain styles of clothing when you have basically been pregnant for the last 5 years and stopped noticing clothes that aren't sack shaped?

Did I mention I am also poor. As if I'm going to spend money on clothes when I keep planning on losing weight, like any day now.

Please feel free to share your hints and secrets of dressing after pregnancy, because after three times I still haven't figured it out!!