After a gorgeous luncheon last week with Lisa Tant, Editor-in-Chief of Flare Magazine, it was time to transfer inspiration into a revamp of the closet. Hosted at Vancouver’s Wear Else, I was in a mecca of fashion, and all I wanted to do was hit the changing rooms. The first fall season while I haven’t been pregnant or attempting to drop baby weight, and, as luck would have it, it’s a particularly stellar year for pregnancy and postpartum dressing. Gone are the gladiator sandals, the cut-off tights and the butt/thigh-hugging shirts (thank you very much).
Sexy and pregnant — once seemingly an oxymoron — are smouldering together, with the backlash against the uninviting muumuu (a.k.a. the baby bivouac or tent shirt) at full speed.
Sex and the City may be gone, but you have only to recall how Patricia Field dressed Sarah Jessica Parker when she was pregnant…
Pregnancy is all about timing and it can get complicated. When will you ovulate? When will you conceive? At what rate does the fetus grow? When is your due date? There’s a lot going on and it can be overwhelming keeping track of all the dates. Fortunately there is a “Pregnancy Wheel” available to help you keep track of all the important dates and stages of your pregnancy. The wheels are interactive tools that you turn to match the dates of your menstrual cycle and more. Once the wheel is lined up to your specific dates, they provide valuable information predicting the dates of pregnancy milestones.
During pregnancy, increased pressure on the abdominal wall can cause a condition called diastasis recti. I wish it had a less scary name. Diastasis recti looks like a gorge running vertically down the middle of the belly area. It stretches from the bottom of the breastbone to the belly button, and increases with muscle straining. The middle muscle, the ‘linea alba’, is where our 6-pack usually lies. Chuckle. When the muscles on either side of this line pull apart, women may develop 2 finger’s width of separation (2.7cm or greater) of the abdominus recti muscle (down the centre line of the belly). The area between these two muscles may stick out like a vertical pouch. It’s important to realize that this area is not torn – just temporarily separated.
A birth or labour doula is a woman who attends the birthing family before, during, and just after the birth of a baby. She is also called a “birth assistant” or “labour support specialist”. A birth doula will draw on her experience and training to provide physical and emotional support during your labour.
Remember when maternity fashion was an oxymoron? When insipid little rosebuds on a mu-mu were au courant? Canadian designers are among the top in the world, and as our reputation grows as a world-class travel destination, our shopping options do as well – even for maternity clothes. I remember when I was trying to conceive and kept going to the States to buy out of season Pea in the Pod items on sale in hopes that they’d fit if I conceived right away!! NO MORE. Shop local. Shop Canadian. We are featuring stores that carry maternity clothes in Canada and the ones below are Canadian-based stores dedicated to the belly. We’ve also got a section on nursing bras and nursing wear. Let us know if you have any additions!
Morning sickness is a bit of a misnomer; while morning is the most common time to experience feelings of nausea, morning sickness can be experienced at any point in the day – especially if you are carrying twins. Researchers aren’t entirely sure what causes morning sickness, but there is a general consensus that morning sickness is at least partially related to hCG, (human chorionic gonadotropin), a hormone produced during pregnancy. During a multiple pregnancy, hCG levels are higher than in a singleton pregnancy which explains why episodes of morning sickness tend to be elevated in twin pregnancies. This leaves many moms asking how to cope with morning sickness.
Q: I am a part time esthetician, and go to client’s homes to give manicures and pedicures. No artificials are used, so the fumes are straight from the regular nail polish bottles. Now that. I am trying to get pregnant, I am wondering if I should stop doing my house calls till all is said and done, or is it ok that I continue doing mani’s and pedi’s throughout my pregnancy?
When I was about 10 weeks pregnant I was very excited to see my doctor, because the pregnancy was advanced enough to be able to hear my baby’s heartbeat on the Doppler. We heard it, and it was unbelievable. It made everything seem real – there was, in fact, a baby on the way. I joked to my practitioner at the time, ‘there’s only one in there, right?’ She laughed and said no way was I having twins, I had barely gained any weight and besides, we could only hear one heartbeat.
