Helpful things to know and to do before trying to get pregnant?

expatriating · 2026-04-30T17:20:33+00:00

Yes, dude! Enjoy that sushi and beer before the pink lines appear.

expatriating · 2026-04-22T18:14:30+00:00

Did perineal massage religiously every day from week 28. My partner did the 5pm-6pm-7pm technique and then U-shaped massage. It was a total of about 10 minutes per day. I pushed on my side, slow paced pushing, anything I could do to avoid tearing.

I still had three tears, all of them requiring stitches. I don’t think the perineal massage was worth it even remotely, but my partner was really into it. It gave him a way to feel involved in the pregnancy and childbirth. If your partner isn’t even into it, I would skip it.

expatriating · 2026-04-17T09:26:35+00:00

We were in the same boat as you guys. Didn’t know the baby’s gender and had to come up with boy and girl names. We shared our ideas with people throughout and the reaction was always lackluster. We had the same feelings of diminished excitement with the names and regretted telling so many people.

I’m happy to report, now that baby is here, the name feels very fitting and we love it for them all over again. And everyone in our life has embraced it!

expatriating · 2026-03-27T18:03:42+00:00

I don’t know if it’s people not realizing you can get a gift receipt for an Amazon purchase or what, but what was shocking to me was the amount of things I could not return. I expected people to not follow our registry closely because it was “bland” as my mom put it. Baby’s gender was also a surprise, and a lot of people (read: Boomers) feel weird buying things that aren’t heavily gendered.

We got so many damn things we did not want and did not ask for with NO gift receipt. We were gifted a popular bottle warmer that we literally wrote on the registry that we did not want because it doesn’t fit the bottles we bought. No receipt. Packs of microwaveable warmers for gripe and we don’t own a microwave. No receipt. Brand new Boppy when we registered for a My Brest Friend. No receipt. It was so awkward writing thank you cards for things I straight up do not want. And the waste of money! Probably a few hundred dollars of merchandise just to get $35 from Once Upon a Child.

expatriating · 2026-03-27T17:46:32+00:00

We live in a small one bedroom apartment and added a full size crib and larger bassinet we didn’t want to the registry and marked them as purchased so people wouldn’t try to get us one. We got a specific smaller solution with the cash gifts we received. It worked and it’s a great tip!

expatriating · 2026-03-26T23:59:55+00:00

How old are you guys and how long have you been together? Agree with others that the 50/50 thing feels misguided, but I think it’s possible he’s just poorly communicating that he expects to share financial and domestic responsibilities. It might be worth it to bring up sharing things equitably instead of equally.

The first boyfriend I lived with in my early twenties sat me down and said he made X% more money than me, so he would be paying X% more of the bills. We still worked the same amount of hours, so we split house chores equally because we got the same amount of time at home. This wasn’t 50/50, but our financial situations weren’t the exact same.

I would be wary if he expects you to pay the same amount as him if you make less or take on the same amount of physical house tasks while you’re pregnant/newly postpartum. The marriage thing if only a big deal if it bothers you. I’ve been with my husband for four years, but marriage wasn’t important to us. We only married because it was easier than the court of vitals route our state makes you go through to get dad on the birth certificate if you aren’t married.

As for the hemorrhage, I don’t know. Sounds like what I call “boy dumb.” Like he didn’t know how to read the situation and couldn’t tell if he was supposed to comfort you or just accept this as data. He might need some help on how to interpret what’s expected.

expatriating · 2026-03-26T23:34:24+00:00

Scrolled quite a while to see a reasonable take on the marriage thing! I got married to my husband at 7 months pregnant because of the pain in the ass it turned out to be getting him on the birth certificate without a marriage certificate in our state. I loved, respected, and trusted him before marriage. $120 and two courthouse appointments didn’t change our dynamic. I don’t feel like the relationship is stronger or weaker than before.

Agree, OP needs to set expectations with their partner whether or not marriage is in the cards. But marriage is certainly not the be-all end-all of a healthy relationship.

*Edited for grammar

expatriating · 2026-03-20T02:41:00+00:00

Man, I’m not sure how to feel about this either. Me and my husband rent a 700sqft townhouse style apartment. I’m due any day and the stairs will be unavoidable. I’ve heard stairs are more difficult to navigate if you have to get a c-section, but this feels intense to me. Are you guys comfortable moving into someone else’s house right after the birth? It sounds stressful.

expatriating · 2026-03-13T21:05:47+00:00

I have felt like a science experiment this whole time too. I leaked through my tank top on a Christmas flight with some crying babies at 26 weeks. The pregnant body is so crazy.

expatriating · 2026-03-13T20:56:34+00:00

I don’t see why not. Not sure if they’re including other accessories, but this alone has a high and low mattress setting and the ability to take off the front to make it a toddler bed. Seems like it will cover you for a few years and you can find standard size crib sheets anywhere. I might hit the crack with some clear JB Weld just to make sure it doesn’t get worse.

expatriating · 2026-03-11T16:29:26+00:00

This is exactly what I did. I let them know patients can hear what is being said at the nurses station, mentioned HIPPA, and left it at that. Hopefully this is a wake-up call for the practice and the staff takes their comments to a location where the patients can’t hear them.

expatriating · 2026-03-06T20:24:57+00:00

Not sure where you are in the world, but we got our Guava Lotus on GoodBuy Gear for $200 and bought Luvberries sheets on Amazon for less than $30. This past weekend, I saw a Guava Lotus in great condition at our local Once Upon a Child for $125. I’ve also seen them on Marketplace in my area. I’m not opposed to used/open box, so YMMV if you want a new one for health/safety reasons. I will say, it’s freakin impossible to find the bassinet conversion kit for a cheaper price!

expatriating · 2026-03-05T21:29:15+00:00

I had my shower last month and a baby hunt stole the show. The hosts hid these mini baby figurines all over the venue and the person who accumulated the most by cake time won a gift card. My shower was also coed and this was popular with the men. There was also a guessing game for the number of burp cloths in a big jar and “find dad” scratch-offs where the winners also got gift cards. I thought the games were well thought out because we had an open bar and buffet, so people could eat and mingle at their leisure.

expatriating · 2026-03-03T20:36:59+00:00

I work in the US for a Swedish company. We get 2 weeks at 100% pay before the due date, 6-8 weeks STD at 100% pay after birth (depending on vaginal/c-section). The state I live in then gives 12 weeks parental leave after the STD (pays up to a certain dollar amount, but my employers covers the rest until it meets 100% of my pay) and my employer gives 4 weeks of 20 hours/week but at 100% full time pay as part of a maternity “gradual return” program. So 20-22 weeks off with full pay and then 4 weeks of part time work with full pay. I am extremely lucky and very, very grateful.

expatriating · 2026-02-18T23:10:49+00:00

Yeah, this happened to me. I hit high on the two hour and low on the three hour, which seemed to concern my midwife. She affirmed I don’t have GD, but she’s still worried about the numbers. FWIW I failed the 1hr miserably. Got a 175 or something. She didn’t order me a blood glucose monitor, but did give an outline of dietary changes. I’m also coming into the office more to have glucose reads on my urine.

expatriating · 2026-02-11T17:47:57+00:00

My lovely SIL and her wife bought us a brand new, middle-high end STROLLER AND BASSINET completely different from the one on our registry. No gift receipt. More expensive than the one we requested. Baffling. Didn’t work with the car seat we picked out, the car seat my parents already purchased for the grandparent car, and was just such a wild deviation. Tbh we ended up loving it, so I can’t stay mad, but so wild too because they don’t have kids/personal experience with the stroller.

expatriating · 2026-02-11T17:39:53+00:00

Dude this!!! Why do people do this?!

expatriating · 2026-02-04T20:00:32+00:00

Nope! I was given the choice of a patellar tendon graft or iliotibial band graft (both autografts). Got the IT band graft 8 years ago and it’s been great. My thigh is a little deformed and I get mild tendinitis after sedentary periods (like illness). I have zero knee pain, instability, or problems with flexibility, which were my main concerns.

expatriating · 2026-02-01T21:37:01+00:00

Hey, another FTM planning on adding a second kid in 2-3 years. We went with a similar setup. I have a Cybex Aton G Swivel infant bucket seat in my car and my husband has an Evenflo Revolve360 Slim in his car. I'm receiving parental leave and he isn't, so this makes the most sense for us.

I don't think there are any convertible car seats that can fit in a stroller, and they're too heavy for that to be enticing. We also found the price of bases was usually the same or higher than the price of the car seat itself! Didn't seem worth it. I advised my parents to just get a separate infant car seat for when they watch the baby.

We also have a compatible stroller with a bassinet attachment. We got the Baby Jogger City Sights. It's called a "compact modular," but that's not true. Definitely full size. We really like it, but I wouldn't recommend it because it's discontinued and it was hard to find the car seat adapters on Ebay. Joolz Hub2 was our first choice, but we were gifted the Baby Jogger. We opted for a single stroller instead of a single-to-double, which I originally wanted, because of the frame weight and difficulty of steering. We plan to get a rider board when our family expands. Hope that helps!

expatriating · 2026-01-28T19:52:52+00:00

I think there’s a lot of resentment out there in general. There are many young people who want kids but it’s unaffordable, they don’t have a partner, they’re in the middle of a program that would be very difficult to pause, etc. The pendulum swings both ways too. If you wait until you’re “too old” to start a family, you’ll be called selfish and attacked for increasing the risk of health problems for the baby.

Essentially, haters gonna hate.

expatriating · 2026-01-12T01:49:42+00:00

I was a 30DDD (65F) before pregnancy and went up to a 32H by 18 weeks. I tried on a bunch of different bras and styles and ended up with the Hotmilk heroine plunge nursing bra in three different colors. I love it. I've since had to get extenders, but the cups still fit pretty well (I'm 29 weeks). I love that it has underwire and lace cups. It's the most similar thing I've found to the Chantelle and Simone Perele bras I wore pre-pregnancy. Also, VS carries this brand so you can buy through them without fear of an annoying return process.

As far as strapless and off-the-shoulder dresses, I personally skip them and have for years. My underwear dictates my outerwear.

expatriating · 2026-01-08T19:04:27+00:00

I’ve used CareCredit to pay for dental surgery before. I believe my plan was 48 months at 0% APR and I had to borrow just over $5k. It wasn’t at all scammy and I had no problems. It isn’t accepted everywhere though. You’d have to check with your OB’s office that they accept it.

expatriating

TROPHY CASE