Pregnancy and Moving to Brisbane

It’s officially been over three months since my last blog and a LOT has happened! Unlike my usual organised self, I have not been recording important events or anything in my diary since getting pregnant so there is a lot that will be missed.

The Pregnancy

As I bet most who know me are most interested in how the pregnancy has been going. If I could describe my pregnancy in two words I would say awful and overwhelming! I believe in being 100% honest and open about my experiences and I can’t say I have liked anything about being pregnant. Literally the day I told my employer I was pregnant (at 6 weeks) I started to have pregnancy symptoms. I absolutely HATE vomiting and at first, I thought I was lucky because I felt nauseous but wasn’t vomiting much. However, my nausea and stomach discomfort was lasting all day long so I started to think maybe I needed to vomit to feel better. I helped coax my body to vomit once and did feel better, but the same attempt didn’t work later so I gave up trying. Add to all this the debilitating tiredness I was miserable at work. My co-workers were great, and my boss let me go lay down if I really needed it so I was really glad I told them right away. It wasn’t hard for anyone to notice I was “off” and not doing well.

Gluten foods like Pasta are so tasty!

After just a couple of weeks I was hating life. It felt like I had the flu or some kind of sickness and didn’t know if it would ever end. Food was a problem as well. You may recall I was doing a gluten free dairy free diet prior to pregnancy and this was likely a major contributor of me even being able to get pregnant. I quickly discovered that not only was I hungry every two hours, but I had to have something heavy and substantial otherwise I still felt sick so I gave up and bought bread and found it was the first time something I ate had settled my stomach. This was stressful though because I was terrified that eating gluten and dairy would actually harm the baby (the MTHFR gene mutation I have is linked to miscarriages and pregnancy problems). Matt gave me a priesthood blessing and stated that “my body would handle the gluten” and that “the Lord does not take bringing a [child] into this world lightly.” After that I learned that I just had to eat what I could eat and that seemed to be mostly unhealthy foods like pizza or something that sounded really tasty. I had all these plans to exercise and eat well throughout, but quickly learned that during pregnancy I couldn’t control what my body wanted. In the end, I could only do whatever helped me get through the day.

Eventually I started to get general anxiety and have various triggers that would make me feel VERY sick and vomit. There was an app that would send me daily e-mails about the baby and pregnancy based on my timeline. Thinking about the “alien” in my body just made me feel sick so I had to start deleting them. One day at work my boss asked me about what size the baby was and after responding I felt so sick I had to run to the toilet to vomit. Discussing other topics like the new computer I was going to get made me nauseous. The idea of eating vegetables sounded disgusting and there was chicken coconut curry Matt and I liked that I had only a little one day and then after that the smell would make me want to vomit. Matt continued to make it often so I had to lock myself in the room till all the smell was gone. Over time I feared going anywhere because I was so sick and tired and I constantly worried I would vomit somewhere public.

I had my first ultrasound around 14 weeks which I was glad I hadn’t seen one earlier because the baby didn’t look like an alien and that might have made me sick. It was the first time where I really accepted I was having a baby. At this stage I had left work and could finally just take a breather and worry about other things such as our move to Brisbane. I was so glad I had quit when I did because I reached the stage of vomiting mid-meal. Luckily, I made it to the toilet every time (mostly) and was surprised that I was hungry again and could finish the rest of my meal without a problem. It was also nice that I could take naps throughout the day if I needed it. Finally, around 16 weeks my all-day sickness had subsided, my energy improved, and I could eat normal size meals.

14 Weeks

Although the sickness is mostly over, I am now still trying to come to terms with the other body changes. As I started to get bigger I made myself some maternity pants that I can continually expand the elastic and maternity maxi skirt so I have some clothing options. Pregnancy hormones have led to me getting acne all over and experiencing heartburn for the first time. To make things more interesting sometimes when I sneeze my bladder releases a little. Too much information? Well it’s the truth and if I have another child someday I want to remember what I went through the first time. I also get sciatica pains at night so I constantly have to switch sides to avoid the pain. So far, I have struggled to comprehend that women can actually hide their first trimester from people, that some women like being pregnant, and that others don’t experience many of these symptoms at all. Matt pointed out that I have never experienced period pains before so I guess my months of pregnancy pains isn’t as bad as the millions of women that experience period pains monthly. 

This week I got to find out the gender of the baby and for the first time I’m happy about something related to pregnancy. We are having a girl! Both Matt and I were hoping for a girl first. This may seem silly, but neither of us are baby people and have struggled to be excited about a baby on the way. We both felt we would bond easier with a girl at first. People told me once you had the baby it wouldn’t matter, but I wasn’t so sure and so it was a relief to find out we are having a girl. Additionally, this is the first time where I have started looking forward to having a child since getting pregnant. Things will get better and at least now I can say I am half way!  I now feel the baby on a daily basis and I described the feeling to Matt as if I have a bubble move in my lower abdomen. Sometimes it makes me jump because it’s unexpectedly strong. Pregnancy has not been fun, but at least now I am accepting what is happening to me.

21 Weeks

The Move

We planned on moving to Brisbane by the end of May before we knew about the pregnancy. At first it seemed like good timing because I would be near the end of my first trimester when I would be leaving work to get things ready for the move. Unfortunately, as I left work I was still sick and didn’t get near as much done as needed. I started to have anxiety about all that I needed to get done and it just got worse each day. Finding a place was proving difficult as I couldn’t just fly to be at the open house whenever I wanted. My friend Cate could go to a couple houses for me, but my applications didn’t go through. I was really trying to find a house that would have lots of extra space for Matt’s painting gear, our food storage, and hopefully room for all my sewing stuff. In the end, I found a complex of townhouses called Vidorra that would let me apply for an available townhouse that fit the floorplan we wanted. I felt good about the location and confident that it fit our needs at least so although I hadn’t physically seen the place, we organised a 12-month lease for a unit and could finally move on to the other steps of moving.

Before I had a place set up I was able to get a cheap flight to Brisbane. I figured if I hadn’t found a place by that time it would give me about four days to finalise things. By the time the day came I had already gotten the place so it became more of a holiday in a way. I stayed with my friend Cate who had her baby that week and was dismissed from the hospital the same day I arrived! It worked out perfectly because her mother couldn’t be there until next week and at first, she really needed a lot of help. I was so glad to be able to be there and help at such a crucial time. It was also beneficial for me to learn from her experience and watch what needs to be done when taking the baby home for the first time.

I did spend one day while in Brisbane to travel out to our new place and get the keys. It took about 1.5 hours on public transport so it wasn’t a short trip. For the most part I was pleased with our new home, but quickly discovered a couple of real issues – no space for Matt’s painting stuff (without sacrificing the garage), and the phone reception was basically non-existent. Other than that, I felt like most things would work out, but I wasn’t sure how everything would fit until our stuff arrived. The property is brand new so we get to be the first ones to give it some wear and tear. After reviewing everything and taking pictures, I had to eat before heading back. Unfortunately, while walking I quickly discovered there were no food places anywhere within walking distance. I had to use Uber to get to the nearby NorthLakes shopping centre. To my surprise it took even longer to get back to Cate’s place from there so I was gone nearly all day!

Before I left for Brisbane I had organised how to get all our stuff to Brisbane, which proved to be quite difficult. The largest truck we could hire and drive wouldn’t fit our stuff so the next cheapest option was to get it all taken on a backloaded truck. This also posed a problem because the small driveway we lived on won’t accommodate such a large truck so I had to talk to many companies to determine the best solution. We ended up having them send a loading truck to be put on the backloaded truck later. I was never entirely certain how much space we needed because we hadn’t boxed everything yet. We had 44 boxes in total at the end! We had 12 boxes that we had brought from the states, 20 or so that had been dumped and were basically new, and the rest we bought at the hardware store. The free ones were not double walled so weren’t sure how well they would hold up, but the day the truck arrived they seemed to be not be collapsing. Luckily our ward had four new elders that could come help load the truck and we got everything out quickly and it all fit! The truck with our items was going to arrive at our new place before us so I had met with the bishop of our new ward in North Brisbane and had given him a set of keys so he could let the drivers in to unload. Luckily it all went well!

That last week was hard because most everything that needed to be done Matt had to do because I wasn’t supposed to use any chemical cleaners, lift heavy items, overwork myself, etc. We just did as much as we could and relaxed at the end of the day. In retrospect, we decided we should have kept some chairs to sit on at home because sitting on the floor was uncomfortable. At least we were getting a good night sleep on our air mattress. The youth from church came to help clean, but in the end, they only had 20 minutes so the most I could have them do was wipe down the cupboards. At that point, I knew we needed help to get the place cleaned so we decided to hire a cleaner and I had a guy come look at the place to give me a quote. I told him the main needs were the windows, the kitchen including the oven, and the bathroom. From our chat, it seemed like he was going to do that and more so I felt pretty good about it. The catch was that we had to have the whole place gutted for them to clean. The day of the cleaning we literally were rushing to put everything in the garage.

Shade didn't want to leave the bed, even as I deflated it.

It became quite clear we had A LOT of things to pack in the cars! I was really overwhelmed and had to take the cat and fridge stuff to some friends until the cleaners were done. Matt was going to put some of his painting stuff to a storage garage he rented so he could still work in Sydney for the time being. This became an issue because he wasn’t back for the guy to pick up the dishwasher so I had to leave my friend’s place to take care of the dishwasher guy. To my surprise the cleaners finished at the same time which was a good 2 hours earlier than I had expected. I walked through the home quickly and noticed the shower still had soap scum and the screens didn’t look clean. When I asked the cleaner, he said that the screens were old and they can’t scrub them without potentially breaking the glass. I didn’t really like his answer, but he was in a rush to get to another job and I didn’t want to argue so I paid them and headed back to get my cat. It was a VERY long day, but we were able to sell the fridge and dishwasher (way cheaper than we wanted though), the place had been cleaned, and all our leftover items were in the garage and ready to be put in storage or the cars.

The following day was moving day! I had booked a pet friendly place in Coffs Harbour for that night so we really needed to leave by about 1 or 2pm. We had a pest treatment guy coming at 11am so that morning we had to finish anything not cleaned and Matt had loads of painting touch-ups throughout the place. When cleaning the shower, I felt that the cleaners hadn’t even touched it because they could have easily gotten the soap scum off. With a bit of Windex, I was able to get the screens cleaned and felt the cleaner was just making excuses. I decided to take a picture to show how much of a difference it was.

Can you tell which I cleaned? 

They also clearly hadn’t done the windows as we had hoped so I rushed to do interior and exterior windows. By that time the pest guy had arrived so we had no time to really double check anything, just vacuum and get out! I was exhausted and stressed and felt there was a lot of things that needed to be checked and wiped down, but because of the chemicals I couldn’t go back into the house. Matt went to drop stuff off to storage again while Shade and I sat in the garage with our stuff.

I gave Shade a sedative to prepare him for the long road trip and let him explore a bit while I waited for Matt. It was easy to see it was working as he started to walk funny and just plop over. We packed up the cars and could just barely fit it all in. I had my giant Panda bear in the front seat and Shade in the back in his carrier. I tried to organise everything so he would have decent space to move around. We finally dropped off the keys around 3pm and headed out. Luckily when I called the hotel about our very late check in they just told me the room number and said it would be open when we arrived. I was worried I would be tired and desperately needing a nap, but Shade solved that problem. He meowed constantly! At this stage, the sedatives made his eyes all weird and he seemed really unhappy. He was trying to claw and bite his way out of the cage so I opened the cage thinking maybe he would settle if he could roam around. He didn’t. The sedatives made him not very coordinated so he would lose his balance and fall at times and I was worrying he would hurt himself. He sat on me and meowed in my face then tried to claw his way down to my feet. I got him to go back in the carrier, but then he started passing out in odd positions as if he was dead then wake up and whine even more. I decided he was more aggressive, unhappy, and confused with what was happening to him because of the medicine. Not much I could do about it other than bear with it for the 6-hour drive. Luckily the medicine was starting to wear off when we arrived at the hotel and he instantly adjusted to the room without a problem. Thank goodness!

The second 6-hour drive to our new home was a lot more relaxed. I decided no sedatives for Shade this time and although he whined the whole time and was panting, he wasn’t trying to escape the car and hurting himself. We stopped for lunch at Macadamia Castle for pancakes and let Shade have a break walking around. The drive was absolutely beautiful! Matt and I would often call each other and chat throughout or we would try calling family, but the reception wasn’t very consistent. We eventually made it to our new home! There wasn’t much time to absorb things though because we had prearranged to get a fridge at Costco and hired a guy with a trailer to meet us there. When we returned and installed the fridge Shade was happily curled up in his cat tree in the garage so I was happy he seemed to have adjusted quickly to the new space. The worst was now over!

Our Resident Peacocks

The area is pretty nice. The few neighbours we’ve met in the complex were friendly, the ward was nice, and we absolutely love the nearby North Lakes shopping centre. Matt was going to head back to Sydney, but I convinced him to wait and help move boxes since I couldn’t lift most of them. This proved to be a blessing because a member of our church contacted us and had work for Matt! We had only been in the area for two days so this was a big surprise. Within a week I had unpacked the majority of the kitchen and a few other essentials, most of the furniture was in place, and the place was liveable. I had to go to the shopping centre to use the internet for a few days in order to get our internet and some other things set up. We had to buy a fancy router that would work with the NBN, but it was well worth it. Once I got it all set up we now have over double the speeds we had before! Since we have poor mobile reception we also really need good Wi-Fi for making calls as well.

Matt had to go back to Sydney for some work there and unfortunately, I got a bad cold just before he left. Instead of unpacking I spent all my time resting, watching TV, and trying to get better. At least at this stage I had internet at home and could get our addresses changed and do other computer tasks. Matt flew back this weekend for a job here in Brisbane and will go back again on Sunday.  I don’t mind Matt being gone and in some ways, it makes me feel less stressed about what I didn’t complete as he’s not at home to see. I’ve been motivated to cook more and even made dulce de leche and gluten free tortas fritas! Matt calls them fried turtles because “torta” sounds like “tortuga” the Spanish word for turtle.

I’ve been feeling rather anxious about all that still needs to be done, but mostly I am worried about finding work. In Australia, you can get up to 16 weeks of paid maternity leave from the government. There are a lot of conditions to this, and one is that you can’t have more than 8 weeks of a gap between working. My eight weeks from when I left my job is up on June 16^th and I haven’t felt well enough to even consider looking for work. I really want to work from home and considered doing self-employment for renovating, but it seems to get myself set up that way will require me to spend more money to set it up without any money coming in for some time. Other jobs such as tutoring have the same kind of problem. The other option is employment that is casual or part-time, but I’m not sure what I could handle or if they would want to hire a pregnant woman. Another option is for me to be employed by Matt as I already do a lot of his tax work and administrative work. I’m just not sure that will give me the required hours either. I have six days to figure this out. I’m meeting with my GP on Tuesday to discuss my mental health and to start seeing a psychologist again. Maybe this will make me qualify under the “unable to work” category and I can still qualify? Too many questions. At this stage I need to confirm with the government authority Centrelink exactly what they need for me to be able to meet the requirements for this and what option will work best for me. The truth of the matter is I am not mentally well and I don’t really feel fit to work anywhere at the moment.

Despite all the negatives, we are doing well and I am hopeful for the future. I know that we have been very blessed throughout the pregnancy and move so I know that the Lord is watching over us. The weather has been beautiful here in the Brisbane area and I look forward to making new friends and having everything finalised at home. I better get back to unpacking now because my best friend Laura from Oregon is coming to visit in 9 days! Currently our spare room is more of our junk room so there’s definitely a bit to do!