Becoming a doctor and mother at the same time

1st Trimester

Not knowing yet that I was pregnant, I walked the W tour in Torres del Paine, ate an underdone steak from a Patagonian cow and drank a few (deep) glasses of pisco sour. Those were such happy moments. Then I went back to Edinburgh and I was overwhelmed with incredible fatigue and emotion. On the first morning after the evening, when the two lines caused tears of joy, I got up at five o'clock and did one more test. Two lines, strong and positive. Not leaving any doubts. I didn't believe it was true.

I remember writing on my phone, where I note my daily thoughts, that my tear ducts have shortened. Coffee lost its taste. Hormones flooded my synapses, this time with nothing but kindness, and from week to week I became a little bit different, a more sensitive, milder version of myself. I will remember those first three months of pregnancy as if through a fog: full of peace, afternoon naps and smiling at myself in the mirror because I had my secret and only a few people in the world knew who I was carrying under my intestines.

Another feeling was the repressed fear and conscious prohibition of joy that was a result of my medical education and pragmatism. I knew the risk of miscarriage in percentage for each week of pregnancy. I didn't allow myself to feel the joy, and I didn't share it with others, but I still had hope. 

Is this why a pregnant woman is said to be hopeful? Was this the first lesson in the uncertainty that accompanies every human being who decides to bring new life into this world? That's how I explained it to myself. Still, those first few weeks were special. I was lucky and the second trimester came faster than I expected.

2nd trimester - building a new identity

When I first saw her, she had one leg balanced on top of the other, hands folded comfortably behind the head and she was 8 cm long.

"Arms behind the head, very comfy, just like mummy,' commented the sonographer who did my ultrasound at 13 weeks of pregnancy, comparing my position on the couch and the baby on the screen.

Who did she call mother? I guess not me. Despite the clear evidence in the black and white photo, I did not feel that it was time to think about myself in this way.

After graduation, and even before starting work, I had time for myself. I will remember these weeks as the taste of bitter tea with pieces of fresh ginger at the bottom of the cup. Slices of bread and butter for breakfast, long spring walks around the Meadows in Edinburgh. I wondered whether when I swam in the pool she was swimming with me in the same direction.

At 18 weeks I started working as a foundation doctor and time began to flow differently. I was determined that the pregnancy would not affect my work, and to a large extent, it didn't. 

In the beginning, it was not visible that I was expecting a child, at work very few people knew. Once again this year, I added a new element to my adult identity. I became a doctor and a woman expecting a child. I forgot about this second element when I ran through the corridor to a sick patient, when I did another ECG, talked to the families of the patients, took bloods, pressed buttons on the defibrillator during resuscitation during night shifts or watched abscesses on the forearms of patients with substance abuse problems. 

Sometimes the child reminded me of their presence. Around 20 weeks, they started to get more active when I was stressed. I wondered if she would remember the sound of my pager. I was scared for her only once when a patient threw a heavy object at me and hit my swollen stomach.

The second trimester covered the months in which I devoted myself to medicine, and at the same time, I felt that what I needed to do was to change the world into which I was bringing this child. Talk about idealistic aspirations.

Those were also the months when my body was changing at such a pace that I couldn't keep up with it. I felt that it was happening not because of me, but despite me, beyond my power or will. My whole physiology was undergoing a process that was not up to me, over which I had no influence. Sometimes I felt powerless and thought about those women for whom pregnancy was not a planned or happy event. I thought and couldn't imagine how they must feel since I had feelings of powerlessness, doubt and lack of control over what was happening to my body. At the time, I was sensitive to comments about happiness and pregnancy.I was feeling weary listening to comments assuming that pregnancy for me must be associated with joyful anticipation and radiating optimism.

My take on the subject more often stayed on the level of: I'm just another woman who will contribute to the continuation of the human race - what's so amazing about that? Can we talk about something else?

Trimester 3 - oops, I'm going to be a mother

I was in the bathtub at the time. After a long bath, the only remedy for my aching back and pelvis, the water had already started to cool, so I unscrewed the stopper at the bottom. My whole belly jumped, startled by the sound of escaping water. That was the first moment I felt that this was my baby. That my job is to protect this little creature from fear, from the evil of this world.

I expected all the ailments of the third trimester, so I approached them with calmness and acceptance. Painful back, penguin waddle, planning a walk on my days off around the availability of toilets on the route, breathlessness and raising my arms to make more space for feet stubbornly pushing under the ribs.

Now every day I'm waiting, daydreaming about what will be, and marvelling at how my body can do things like keeping a baby alive until it's time for our double debut: hers as a human, mine as a mother.

It's been a good 9 months. It's time for the finale. I can't wait.