Pregnancy: Week 36

The tiredness of the final few weeks has definitely hit me hard this week. It didn’t help that work was crazy busy! Why is it that no matter how you plan ahead, just when you think it’s time to wind down, something unexpected crops up? So instead of resting up at the weekend, I found myself working late Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday night. Charlie was looking at me like I was nuts, as I pulled out the laptop each evening. But it had to be done. And thankfully, once Tuesday was over, the pressure was off, and I finally got to start winding down.

It wasn’t just work that was tiring me out – but the commute to work. My normal drive to and from work clocks in at just under 100km a day, and takes between 2.5 and 3 hours a day on average. It’s tiring enough on a normal day, but at 36 weeks pregnant, I just started finding it too much. Thankfully I have an alternative route home – but it involves taking two tolls, and given that I have to take those tolls during peak hours, they amount to €11.70 per journey. I reached the point though where that seemed like a small price to pay to knock almost 30 minutes of driving off my journey. I’m afraid to add up the number of journeys to and from work I took through those tolls in the last ten days or so of work. I justified it though by reminding myself that once I start maternity leave, I will be saving a fortune each month on petrol costs!

I’ll definitely be glad to leave the commute behind. I’m not sure if it’s staying in one position for so long, or the combination of a long drive coupled with sitting at a desk all day, but by the evening time each day, my stomach is like a rock. The only way to get it to relax and soften up again is to take a bath or bounce on my birthing ball for an hour or two. Actually, I’d be lost without the birthing ball. I think that using it consistently, together with practising my yoga postures, is what has saved me from back ache this time around.

Find my complete pregnancy journal here.