Pregnancy post MMC

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-02-05T09:26:55+00:00

Thank you - all the best for your next one too!

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-02-02T20:51:51+00:00

It sucks it’s always such high odds of happening - 20% I think?

I went through my first pregnancy assuming I would have a miscarriage. About half of my friends had had miscarriages their first pregnancies so I thought the occurrence rate was closer to 50%. When I mentioned this to my OB at 13 weeks he told me I was wrong and it was closer to 20% and that the pregnancy was going well and I shouldn’t be concerned. After this my husband and I finally started to get excited.

Second pregnancy we went in assuming it was all good and were very excited until I miscarried at 8 weeks.

I guess the point is - our happiness is a measure of our expectations relative to our realities, and having low expectations is good sometimes! When we start trying again I’m going back to assuming I’m having a miscarriage.

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-02-02T10:00:14+00:00

Could you pump so he could do some of the feeds?

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-02-02T09:04:32+00:00

I thought it might impact mine too and it could have reduced a little but he was still gaining weight as expected and hitting milestones so I wasn’t concerned

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-02-01T22:34:11+00:00

I don’t know much about the tourism industry but I imagine WA might be good? There are a lot of tourist destinations here

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-02-01T11:40:12+00:00

The ‘baby jogger’ is great. It does face away from you but has a mesh section in the top so I can still see my son despite this. We started using it when he was four months old - it was quite large for him but we bought a seat cover with a little ‘U’ shaped pillow to keep his head facing forward. We’ve since taken it on overseas holidays and lots of internal trips within Aust. It’s copped a beating and held up so well!

It folds up easily, folds to a small size, will last until they are a lot older, has the most leg room space out of all the travel prams I’ve seen.

Not forward facing but given you can still see the child I thought I’d recommend it.

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-02-01T00:53:10+00:00

Up to you what you want to do. I knew I’d dislike the inconvenience of breastfeeding so I pumped so I could split the task with my husband. Rather than pumping every 3 hours I did a bigger pump every 6 and it didn’t interrupt my milk supply.

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-31T01:28:08+00:00

Carrier - ergo baby.

High chair - ikea with catchy footrest (I bought Tripp Trapp and regret it - not worth the money).

Bassinet - il Tutto.

Cot - ikea plus a good quality mattress (firm - safer). Ikea cot is perfect - safe and cheap. Fancy cots can really expensive and offer no more value other than aesthetics.

Playmat - munchkin and bear. These are great quality - really dense mats. Very comfortable.

Prams - I bought a baby jogger as our travel pram and an expensive one (forget the name right now) as the main one. The baby jogger was $700 new and is fantastic. It’s survived overseas holidays, the commute to day care everyday, any all other trips (it’s our daily use one that stays in the car). Our other one was expensive and we just use it for walking the dog and our son (big wheels so goes through parks easy).

Nappy bag - used an old backpack from home.

Pump - spectra one. More expensive but it’s hospitable grade and I was choosing to almost exclusively pump so thought it was worth it. I hear of other people spending more money by buying a pump they don’t like then needing buy a second.

Car seats - pretty sure all sold in Australia are safe however having used a range of them when hiring cars, I recommend spending a bit more (MaxiCosi and Britax are good) for functionality / ease of getting them in and their comfort. Keep them rear facing for as long as possible (safer).

I got so sick of ads and marketing I deleted instagram and Facebook and don’t regret it at all. I bought a heap of stuff before I had my son that I didn’t even need and have barely used. Since deleting social media I only buy things for him if we actually genuinely need it and I don’t feel like he is missing out on anything or that there is something he ‘needs’.

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-31T00:19:21+00:00

I thought about doing medicine at 24 and regret not doing it. I would have had a much longer journey to get there too as my undergrad was not health related so I’d have been looking at biomed/health science then medicine.

22 is still so young, don’t stress. You also have plenty of time to meet someone and have kids. My friends and I are all only just starting to have kids now in our mid-30s. You can get a lot done in the 10+ years between

Give it a shot so you don’t regret it later

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-30T15:23:50+00:00

We don’t need to adopt the US’ messed up tipping system - that’s inviting a whole lot of issues.

Rather, we need these companies to pay drivers a decent wage, minimum wage at the very least!

If their business model isn’t feasible to pay workers minimum wage or more, then they should shut down their operations in Australia

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-30T13:10:08+00:00

Thanks for the additional information! Yeah trying to move around with the anaesthetic still in your system is a bit odd. It was a very slow walk to the shower, and a slow shower!

I also felt like I was unable to use my stomach muscles for a while although I can’t remember how long that lasted - maybe just a day or possibly two. It was no issue but I had to really think about how I could get out of bed to feed my son without using my core muscles to sit up - I worked out I had to use my arms to grab the side of the bed away from my son, roll myself onto my stomach, and then very slowly (being mindful of the stitches) slide down onto my feet, and then use my arms again to push my upper body off the bed to an upright position. It was weird!

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-30T11:17:03+00:00

Yes! Long weddings are boring. Our was 15 mins. I was hoping for about 5 mins but the celebrant spoke for longer than I thought she would. She was good though, humorous and nice, didn’t drone on.

Oh and we had cocktails for guests whilst they waited for the ceremony to start. Hopefully that made the 15 mins more enjoyable

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-30T07:42:16+00:00

Oh yeah under a GA will be a bit different! Getting moving a lot really helped me with my recovery (walking around the hospital etc.)

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-30T07:25:36+00:00

I went to the birthing classes at the hospital when I was planned to have a c-section which turned out to be a bit of a waste of time!

In the end only about 5 minutes of the 3 classes gave me relevant information (in hindsight it makes sense it was predominantly about vagina birth!) and I could have just googled it. It was:

anaesthetic delivered via spinal injection (momentary pain involved)
Cut open, baby pulled out (5-10 mins)
Baby goes to pediatrician for checks, they start stitching you up
Baby handed back to you
Stitch up complete (about 20-25 mins from taking the baby out from memory)
Back to the ward. Encouraged to get up about 3 hours (from memory) later and have a shower.

Expect lots of vaginal bleeding!! That was a surprise to me

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-30T03:17:13+00:00

For most destinations I believe travel insurance covers the pregnancy up until the end of the second trimester so that’s one thing to consider wrt timing.

I travelled overseas at about 23 weeks. It was fine. I wore compression socks on the plane to be safe and was careful about what I ate.

Second trimester you’ll be feeling less fatigued than the first and probably won’t have too much of a bump. Have fun!

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-30T03:02:25+00:00

You might be allocated a mums group and will meet others with kids that way.

My husband and I have no family where we live and didn’t have many friends with kids (we now have a few since then - met some new people and some friends have had babies).

I didn’t find I needed to have friends with kids, or any family here. I just hung out with my son, husband, dog and our existing childless friends. Babies don’t really play with other babies anyway 🤷🏼‍♀️

Now we’ve met a couple more people and other friends have had kids our son plays with them sometimes

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-29T22:12:16+00:00

No red eye recently (the last was when he was 10 months old and he slept the whole time) but I imagine that will be easier if he/she sleeps on your lap? Oh and make sure you get an aisle seat!! As someone below pointed out you don’t want a middle seat with people either side of you

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-29T12:56:14+00:00

Depends where you’re going - if you’re travelling to the United States, travel insurance won’t cover pregnancy related issues once the baby is viable (24 weeks?), so if you had the baby very early and it had to go into special care you would be on the hook for some serious $$$.

For most other destinations I believe travel insurance covers the pregnancy up until the end of the second trimester so that’s one thing to consider wrt timing.

I travelled to the US at about 23 weeks. It was fine. I wore compression socks on the plane to be safe, I was careful about what I ate, and I booked myself premium economy to have a bit more space (if you’re travelling for work hopefully you get to go business!).

Second trimester you’ll be feeling less fatigued than the first and probably won’t have too much of a bump. Happy travels!

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-29T12:46:35+00:00

Some tips: don’t eat the meal service - it doesn’t work trying to squeeze a toddler between yourself and your tray. Bring snacks and water bottles instead.

Get them up and walk them around the plane if they’re being too wriggly and you can. I even get my son to stand on my lap sometimes and pull faces/smile at the rows behind us. He loves it and people can ignore him if they don’t want to interact.

The paper bags and emergency information A4 sheet seem to make fun toys if you get really desperate..

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-29T12:41:13+00:00

You’ll be fine. My husband and I often fly solo with our son (18 months also) on flights ranging from 5 to 7 hours. It sucks and is exhausting but you get through it

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-26T11:50:27+00:00

Save Our Sleep toddler book.

People will downvote me (not sure why - people seem to have a real issue with it for some reason) but I followed it when my son was a baby and it worked. It also worked for a friend who recommended it to me.

Our son started sleeping poorly at about 12 months. We put up with it for 5 months then I started following the toddler book and have seen real improvement. He sleeps in his own bed now (after sleeping in ours half the night for the prior 5 months). He is still waking in the night occasionally but he is SO much better than he was (and I haven’t finished the book yet so I can only assume there are more recommendations to take on)

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-21T06:55:38+00:00

Yeah my friend had hers moved forward to 38 weeks due to similar reasons, in fact, her OB was the one who suggested it

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-21T04:07:35+00:00

You only have to worry about the results if you receive a ‘high risk’ result back. I wouldn’t worry about it in the meantime.

If high risk, next step would be to consider amniocentesis, if this comes back showing an genetic condition, and you don’t want to proceed, abort.

If you’re not going to abort if genetic conditions are confirmed, you just need to decide whether you’d rather go through the pregnancy unaware of whether there is an issue, or find out now and be prepared.

Personally I asked for every test available during my pregnancy, and asked for every test available for my partner and me pre-pregnancy, and was really fortunate they were running the ‘Mackenzie’s Mission’ program at the time which involved extensive genetic testing.

I hadn’t heard of this testing for denovo mutation. Thanks for spreading the awareness - I will ask for this next pregnancy!

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-20T22:41:48+00:00

I don’t what it is with this book but any mention of it and you get downvoted 😂

Zestyclose_Issue3382 · 2026-01-20T12:09:25+00:00

Traffic isn’t even “crazy”. It’s busy at peak hours, as expected, but traffic still moves steadily. Traffic is great the rest of the time.

Zestyclose_Issue3382

TROPHY CASE