7 Weeks

I finally got started taking photos of my pregnant self.  Here I am at 7 weeks pregnant.  (For the uninitiated, being "7 weeks pregnant" means that you conceived 5 weeks ago.  A pregnancy is dated based on the first day of your last period.  Your due date is 40 weeks from that date.)

That belly you see is just my usual fat self, but I have gained 5 pounds and my clothes are too tight.  I'm determined not to buy any maternity clothes until I absolutely have to.  This is not because I don't like maternity clothes.  As a matter of fact, I love maternity clothes!  The only time I get to wear a lot of new things is when I'm pregnant because I'm the kind of person who normally spends about $100 a year on clothes.  Maybe $200 if you include shoes.  $250 if you include jewelry.  Seriously, my budget is $20/month.

So anyway, the reason I don't want to buy anything much in advance is that last time around, I grew out of clothes before I had a chance to wear them.  I was due in September, so in March I went out and bought a lot of summer things.   That year in Michigan the warm weather didn't come until June, and by that time I was too big for some of the stuff I bought.  You're supposed to just buy size "small," "medium," "large," etc. based on your pre-pregnancy size and, just to be safe, I bought a size up from that.  Still, I had to keep buying new things cotinuously.  By August I had grown out of every single thing I owned and had to buy a whole new wardrobe (ok, that just means a few pairs of pants, really) for one month of wear.  I had to shop in the fat womens' maternity section, and I'll tell you, it was really hard to find anything at all that fit me.  I went from an original size of 6 to bigger than 14.  That's not about the belly - that's just the hips and thighs and the rest.

Even with all of that, I really loved the big belly.  I never felt "fat."  Well, there was that one photo that clearly showed all the cellulite on my thighs (shudder).  But really, I loved the whole thing, including the maternity clothes.  Yesterday, I went into my closet and looked at all those jeans that feel so tight, and I thought, "I'm going shopping!"  The thought of buying stretch pants was a thrill.  (I know, I'm sick in the head.)  But I came to my senses.  In the meantime, I'm going to go shopping in those boxes of maternity clothes that have been in storage for 3 years.  Yipee!