This is without a doubt a strange time for all of us. There is uncertainty swirling everywhere, and this is an incredibly bizarre time to be carrying and birthing a baby.
Baby showers cancelled, maternity photos put to the side, birth photos stopped, birth classes, pregnancy yoga and more. Pregnancy can be a high stress time and these are the things that we reach for to add into our life, either to ease our minds or complete the perfect picture of what pregnancy looks like to us.
Coronavirus has taken so much from us. So much of our freedom, BUT it absolutely will not steal our pregnancy joy.
Here are some ways you can still implement all of the ‘pregnancy things’ into your life that you’ve been dreaming of, despite the restrictions in place right now.
1. You can still have a ‘Baby Shower,’ just ask your partner or children to create one for you at home. After all what more do you need right now then your greatest loves. Get then to make you a lovely lunch, decorate with flowers from the garden and maybe even buy you a surprise for the baby.
2. Delay your big baby shower and enjoy the celebration once your little love is here and the world is back to ‘normal.’ The silver lining being you’ll get to responsibly enjoy some bubbles too!
3. Don’t panic you can still buy everything you need for babies arrival right down to car seats and nappies. You can even do it from the comfort of your bed and have items delivered to your front door. This ticks all of the social distancing boxes. Don’t forget to check out small businesses, they need your support too. Bonus is there are lots of sales around right now.
4. You can still do your pregnancy yoga by joining in with an online class or searching you tube for the perfect session for you.
5. Create ‘me time,’ even if you have children, by asking your partner to put them to bed and enjoying a bath with some salts and a candle.
6. Try out a pregnancy meditation class through an app. Some great ones are Head Space, Expectful and Mind the Bump.
7. Create your own maternity shoot at home. DYI floral baths are surprisingly simple to pull off, all you need is a a few litres of fresh milk and some pretty blooms from the supermarket or garden.
8. You might not be able to have birth photos, so think about training up your partner to take a few snaps, or setting up a camera (go pro would be great) in the corner of your birth suite to video the big moment.
9. You can still attend so many birth classes like Calmbirth which are being conducted with your Calmbirth instructor via zoom. I can recommend some amazing instructors just send me a DM on Instagram for recommendations.
10. Your pregnancy massages may have stopped but that’s no excuse to not indulge in them. It’s time for your partner to step up and start working on those sore spots.
11. Hold your pregnancy mother’s group via Facebook. You can still catch up with your favourite expectant Mamas over a coffee or tea.
12. Enjoy a Mummy focused podcast. I love The Mummy Republic and Australian Birth Stories.
So don’t let this mixed up time stop you from enjoying every moment of your journey. Be flexible, make adjustment and enjoy the ride. There is so much beauty to be found isn’t he world right now, enjoy the peace and still that has been created.
Most importantly stay safe and stay home.
Love of love from a fellow corona mama (because apparently that’s what we are calling ourselves.)
