Pregnancy Fears

I don’t plan on becoming pregnant for at least another 2 years, but like most women in their late 20s I’m thinking about what it will be like. I’ve never feared pregnancy until this year when I realized that my pain will not be going away. What I didn’t talk about in my post explaining my broken ribs and damaged nerves was that it has resulted in my inability to lift or carry heavy things. While I can work around this on a day to day basis – my fiancée can carry grocery bags, I can use a cart, or have someone help me – the fear I have is what will happen when we do decide to get pregnant.

The medication I take for the pain cannot be used during a pregnancy. At all. I have to go off of it once we decide it is time to become parents. If I’m in pain under maximum dosages of 2 medications what will happen once I have to go off of it for what I imagine will be a year or more (I don’t know if I would have to be off it during breast feeding). There is hope of course. Sometimes the hormones that are produced during pregnancy can help alleviate pain (or so Dr. Miles/Pain tells me).

Sometimes I joke about it and having a surrogate. But that isn’t what I want. I want to carry my own baby and I want to do it without any pain that isn’t directly related to the pregnancy itself. I guess you could say I am disappointed in myself, in my body.

Then, of course, will be the issue of carrying my baby once she or he is born. Even on the medication if I carry something heavy I am left in more pain the next days (depending on how heavy it is and for how long I carried it). Lifting my nephew sometimes triggers it (although he is 5 years old). To that end, though, I’d rather be in pain and be able to hold my child and pick them up when a cuddle is needed than to forgo it all.

Only time will tell.

/end sad post