August 27, 2007

My sleeping position of choice is flat on my stomach with my arms tucked underneath me, but lately I’ve started feeling more uncomfortable when I try to do so. Like I’m lying on something, or more specifically, someone.

The pregnancy books tell you to sleep on your side to make things easier on your heart, which has to pump massively increased blood flow into parts of your body that have enlarged during pregnancy, such as your ass. I start out nearly every night perched on one side or another, but lately I’ve been waking up on my back—which is weird, because I don’t even like sleeping on my back. I have this suspicion that I’m doing something weird with my arms, too, while I’m lying there snoring like an elephant seal, because sometimes they’re all half-dead-feeling at first, like the blood has been drained from them. Am I holding them up in my sleep like a zombie prairie dog? MAYBE.

Not that I’m sleeping in any one position for any great length of time, mind you. Oh no, my bladder has things to do, places to go! Like the bathroom, for the eight millionth time. I get up to pee so many times at night you’d think I spend each evening preparing for bedtime by power-glugging a few kegs of Gatorade. It is only slightly more ridiculous than the fact that my face seems to suddenly have received the memo that holy shit, we’re pregnant up in here, and now I’m breaking out like a crackle-voiced teenager.

Also, every single pregnancy newsletter I get from BabyCenter compares the fetus’s size to some type of food, leading me to some inescapable and disturbing eating-related associations. Apparently this week Smalltopus is the size of an avocado. Mmmm, guacamole.

:::

Random: I saw a couple of you comment on having noticed my rainbow-hued bookshelf; the scintillating story behind that organizational theme is here. Also, if you’d like to see a big ole fancy sticker I slapped on my wall yesterday (it’s cooler than it sounds), you can do so here.

:::

I think I’ve publicly mocked him for this before, but just in case I haven’t: JB refuses to buy cucumbers at the store because they are “embarrassing”.

He will, however, buy zucchini. I can’t figure this one out.

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Robyn
16 years ago

I can relate to the sleeping issue….I’m only 10 weeks and I already can’t sleep on my stomach…a friend of mine just recommended something called a snoogle – said she can’t sleep without it, despite the fact that she gets up to pee all the time.

Robin
Robin
16 years ago

Oh yeah, the weird dead arm thing! I had that when I was pregnant, never figured out why. We’re about to try for #2, and between your blog and my newly pregnant friend, I’m remembering all kinds of bad pregnancy crap that I’d forced out from my brain. Maybe I’ll get on the pill for a while…

Aunt Linda
16 years ago

You make it more and more difficult to visit with you and JB without braying in laughter at him. Keep it up.

Teralyne
16 years ago

My husband said one day in the produce Isle (very loudly) that ever woman over the age 25 needs to have a cucumber in the house. The 60ish year old lady standing near the cucumbers turned the brightest red color you can image. So I believe my husband (and lady shopper) don’t think like JB..lol.

hello insomnia
16 years ago

Oh that pregnancy sleep is such a challenge. My hip started hurting until I slept with a pillow between my legs. I tried out one of those full-body maternity pillows and was that ever a waste of money.

And that wall sticker is too modern for my house. My husband would prefer something more hideous with a Carter-administration flair.

warcrygirl
16 years ago

Hubby just came home with a bag of cucumbers, he prefers them sliced up and dipped in vinegar rather than shoved up his nether regions. He did, however, “offer” me one. I politely declined. Also: I’m normally a side sleeper but we desperately need a new mattress. For some weird reason I keep ending up on my back, which makes me have the most bizarre dreams and I’m not even preggo.

Pete
Pete
16 years ago

What exactly does he do with the cucumbers?

Gillian
16 years ago

My favorite was the week when he was the the size of a kumquat. I don’t even know what a kumquat is!

And only now, at 37.5 weeks, do I notice any difference in how hard my heart has to work when I lay on my back. It really does hurt now, but it took a long time to reach this point. I can’t wait to sleep on my belly again!!!

Kathy
16 years ago

Is that because cucumbers are like…. sturdier?

Sarah
16 years ago

I SO feel you on the fetus=food issue! Every week, my husband and I would receive our own, separate newsletters, saying perhaps that our darling child was the size of a shrimp. It was inevitable that we would visit Red Lobster that night.

Scott
16 years ago

We got the same BabyCenter produce newsletter, which is why we referred to our child as “The Lime” before she was even born. We call her that less and less now, possibly because it’s hard to imagine a lime screaming its head off about putting on its socks.

Michelle
Michelle
16 years ago

We are a week apart it seems. We’ve moved up to a “large onion”. With my first pregnancy, I made fun of the produce references until they stopped giving them to me. Then I got very nervous that I had outgrown even “a gianorous melon”!

brid
brid
16 years ago

For my bad back, i find a blanket (a handmade knit smaller than twin bed size blanket) to work better than any pillow for the whole side sleeping arrangement. That way you can customize the amount of smooshiness exactly where you need it and it stands a good change of staying there. I could never get a pillow to stay where i put it, even if i managed to get it into a comfortable position in the first place. Now i just sort of snuggle up to a blanket.

Swistle
16 years ago

How weird: that same thing happens to me in pregnancy. I don’t normally EVER sleep on my back, but when I’m pregnant I’ll wake up on my back often. My theory: during the course of normal sleep, maybe I DO sleep on my back, but I turn over before I wake up so I don’t know it–but during pregnancy, it’s uncomfortable to sleep on my back so it wakes me up like that.

Brooke
16 years ago

I’m 8 weeks and can still sleep on my tummy, but those days are fading fast. I was so blissed out when I came home from delivering my daughter and slept on my belly!

Angella
16 years ago

I, too, am a tummy sleeper. My three pregnancies made for poor sleeping. Then came the nose stuffiness, and I would prop myself up on many pillows. I felt like the Queen of Sheba sleeping upright like that.

Also? My Honey will buy the cucumber, but then come home and (without fail) say, “Honey! Look at this!” while holding it in position.

Boys.

Kathryn
Kathryn
16 years ago

Hmm…what’s wrong with me that when I bring home cucumbers or zucchinis, I inevitably put them “in position” and proceed to hump my husband from behind? What can I say–payback’s a bitch, especially with these late-summer zucchinis. ;)

Samantha jo campen
16 years ago

I’m at the stage that when they compare the baby to a food, I gag.

Now I’m worried that, like Pavlov’s dog, I’ll gag whenever I see our kid. And I’m pretty sure that won’t get me Mother Of The Year.

Jennifer
Jennifer
16 years ago

Hmm, cucumbers eh… will he buy a salami? a banana? a daikon radish? a Japanese eggplant? an Anaheim pepper? A bottle of shampoo?

JaB
JaB
16 years ago

My wife loved her full body pillow when she was preggers with the twins. It was the wrap around kind, sort of shaped like a horseshoe. I think we got it on amazon, and it wasn’t that expensive.

The only problem was that I got a little jealous. There were times she appeared to like that pillow just a little too much.

Kristi
Kristi
16 years ago

I had the dead-arm thing through both pregnancies and it royally sucked (!!!) because I really used to love sleeping on my back – sigh. My youngest is almost 3 now and I still can’t sleep on my back w/out zombie arms – must have damaged some kind of “direct to the arms” blood vessle. Kids … sheesh! They really do suck the blood right outta ya! :)

Lisa
Lisa
16 years ago

I’m JaB’s wife, and yes I did LOVE that pillow (though not in the way he was suggesting). I too had trouble with sleeping on my back especially mid-pregnancy. I really tried to sleep on my side, but to no avail. I just gave in and waited until the 3rd trimester to naturally break that habit. For me, the arms falling asleep thing had to do with sleeping with them above my head. I must say it was mighty difficult to make all those bathroom trips while trying to rid my arms of the insane pins-and-needles sensation. Crumpled or folded doesn’t matter if you don’t have working hands.

Lesley
Lesley
16 years ago

I love the sticker! I’m usually terrified of wallpapery things, but the sticker looks doable even for a clutz like me.

I also feel embarrassed about cucumbers…I always have to feel them for firmness and wonder if people think I’m buying them for a purpose other than salad. (I’m not!)

Jennifer
Jennifer
16 years ago

I’m a stomach-sleeper/tucker of arms underneath me as well – I can’t imagine sleeping any other way. I also sleep with the covers over my head because I am scared of vampires. SHUT UP.

Sometimes I feel dirty buying cucumbers at the store because I am always looking for the LARGEST, THICKEST ones. Since they are sold individually and not by the pound I like to get my money’s worth, OKAY?

Emily
16 years ago

You know how you cure him of that fear? Send him to the store to buy you a vibrator. He will WELCOME cucumbers after that.

Also, for facial catastrophe — which I have also been experiencing of late, although for entirely different reasons — try Clinique Acne Solutions Spot Healing Gel. It dries those bitches up within hours.

Eric's Mommy
Eric's Mommy
16 years ago

I can’t believe that JB won’t buy cucumbers! That is so funny!

I remember when I had high blood pressure and was on bedrest I was told to lay on my left side which was awful because I sleep on my stomach with my head to the left (which I found out is really bad for your back) or I sleep on my right side never my left. I also had one of those big body pillows, it was comfortable but my husband hated it because he couldn’t get anywhere near me.

Even after I had Eric it was awful because I still couldn’t sleep on my stomach because of my c-section “area” I can actually remember clearly when I could finally lay on my stomach without severe pain I was so happy.

Kelsey
16 years ago

Mmmmmm. . . zucchini bread. I recently learned to make that in desperate hopes of getting my two-year-old to ingest something resembling a vegetable and she loves it. She calls it keeni bread, which for some reason always sounds a little dirty to me. The only cucumber issue we have in our house is that no one likes them!

Amy M.
Amy M.
16 years ago

Hmmm . . . maybe because cucumbers are bumpy?

Guac? Now I want nachos. . . thanks a lot. And it’s 8:30 in the morning! Yum!

Felicia
Felicia
16 years ago

The whole “numb arm” (heh, narm!) thing is because laying on your back makes smalltopus/your growing uterus compress your anterior vena cava which drastically reduces blood flow to your extremities.

In case you wanted to know… :)

bad penguin
16 years ago

I do always feel ever so slightly furtive when evaluating cucumbers at the store. Not because I’m going to do anything naughty with them, but I don’t know, something about the squeezing and sizing up of the cucumber feels wrong. But I still buy them.

Jen
Jen
16 years ago

JB and his cucumber issues….dude that’s funny!

Leslie
Leslie
16 years ago

So cukes are off limits? Bet he doesn’t have a problem buying two healthy melons though, right? Men are weird.

Alyson
16 years ago

If JB won’t buy cucumbers, then he shouldn’t buy zucchini, bananas or japanese eggplant either! What about parsnips, daikon radish or large carrots. Heck! forget the produce department all together!

Men can be so silly, can’t they?

Maureen
Maureen
16 years ago

OK-the phrase “zombie prairie dog” just made me christen my monitor with my skinny latte….you are hilarious!

Josh
16 years ago

I sleep weird too. I always start out flat on my back, and then periodically through the night shift clockwise into the next position. That would be back, right side, belly, and last but not least left side. It doesn’t make sense because every other aspect of my mind is disorganized, but it works for me. And the plus, seldom do I have blood flow problems. Occasionally a stray arm will wander under my torso or get wedged crooked under my giant cranium, thus leaving me with that freaky half awake impression that I am paralyzed. But usually it is smooth, can’t possibly be over yet, sailing.

On the cucumbers, um, JB is right on this one. The problem with cucumbers is that they are both phalic and girly. Men don’t eat them. Zuchini’s are ok to eat. They go with chicken and pork chops. But cukes are impossible to turn into a manly dish. (as far as I know, I’ve been wrong before) Cucumbers are for salad, which guys don’t eat, and beauty products, which guys don’t use. Unless they are pickles, which you can put on burgers, or solid meat cucumbers, which don’t exist. It’s one thing to have to buy tampons or something, cause the casual observer will immediately assume that you are shopping for said item in the hopes of getting laid at a later date. But if some guy spots me buying cucumbers in the produce section, he’s gonna think I’m gay. I know I would.

bonkrood
16 years ago

If your hands are going numb but not your pinky fingers, you could have carpal tunnel onset by pregnancy… I have carpal tunnel but it hasn’t flared up in a really long time. But really you just wake up with numb hands.

breckgirl
breckgirl
16 years ago

Like other readers, I always feel kind of dirty when I am examining cucumbers at the store, assessing their girth and heft. I mean, who wants to buy a skinny little cucumber? Of course I want the one that most closely resembles a large penis – how else would I be fully satisfied? And of course, whenever we buy cucumbers (or zuchini, for that matter), my husband has to wriggle his eyebrows at me and dangle the veg between his legs, thrusting his pelvis at me. Men. Oh, even better – once a woman at work brought in a basket of giant, I mean HUGE, zuchinis and my husband sent me a filthy pix message just showing his hand gripping the giant zuk against his crotch, under his desk. If I could figure out a way to produce that picture here, I would, it was so gross and funny. He would be mortified. Boys are so dirty in private, aren’t they?

ali
ali
16 years ago

Isabella has a mute button…it’s called a pacifier :) he

Jenny H.
16 years ago

The numb arms were the worst!

I bought a ginormous body pillow from Target, maybe? That sucker worked like a charm. Four years, and two babies later, I can’t sleep without it!

We don’t have any produce issues in my house! My hubby loves fresh veggies and fruit. And not in a dirty way, either!

Kaire
16 years ago

Perhaps if JB not hold them up to the light, scrutenize their size, and look back at his bootie it would not be such an issue ;)

Niki P.
Niki P.
16 years ago

Just shorten it to DB and you will feel much better- even if he does hear you!!

Audrey
Audrey
16 years ago

I know I’m a day late, but I’ll post this anyways… One night, right before Winter Break during college, a friend and I went to the grocery store. Picture this: two college freshman buying (1) cucumber and (2) chocolate. The clerk, not much older than us, looked us up and down and said “Looks like you’re going to have a good night!” Um, actually we did: facial masks with cucumbers over our eyes and chocolate while watching chick flicks — doesn’t get much better than that!!

And, I’m totally going to try the cucumber “sneak attack” game the next time we get a cucumber! :)

Bill
Bill
15 years ago

JaB’s comment about his wife liking her body pillow maybe a little too much makes me think about my wife and her body pillow. Her baby doctor had suggested we buy a body pillow when she was pregnant, and she still “uses” it…in a very intimate manner (yes, I mean she does with it just what you’re thinking I’m impying here). Saves us money on cucumbers.