20 Week Pregnancy Update

Non-Maternity Dress | Letter Board | Wallpaper 

Can ya’ll believe I’m 20 (well now 21 almost 22) weeks along?! That’s HALF WAY! It’s crazy because in the moment I feel like I’ve been and will be pregnant forever – but then when I think about how I just have to do the time I’ve already done once more until I get to meet our BABY, I feel like it’s flying.

Being in my second trimester has been a completely different ballgame and I’m diggin’ it!! Incase you missed my ‘first trimester‘ blog post, I linked it there so you can go back and read more about my early experience, trying to get pregnant, and some of the more juicy details. Some things have been similar the past weeks but a lot of differences too! If you are new around here…I share a lot of TMI I guess you can call it haha. No filter for this girl I just like to kinda tell it how it is so beware! And if you are a regular here – you already know that’s my personality lol.

Symptoms: I can happily say that a lot of my ‘negative’ symptoms have decreased finally, yay! Some say the day you hit the second trimester everything changes and you instantly feel energized and refreshed but that took me a few more weeks. We went to Arizona for a family trip when I was 14-15 weeks and in the second trimester and I felt awful almost the entire time. I had to walk away one night at dinner to go hover over the toilet, I was having the most insane breakout, and I even had an emotional breakdown which was the first time I had cried during pregnancy other than over something sentimental. So the second trimester ‘honeymoon phase’ definitely did not hit me instantly. I can say that my nausea has gone down, I don’t get too many headaches anymore,  and I’m not tired 24/7 like I was! The only symptoms that tend to occasionally weigh me down now are back pain and an increased heart rate or blood flow or something that I tend to feel at night that makes me feel like I’m having anxiety or something. It’s uncomfortable and my doctor says it’s due to the increases in those things that happens when you are pregnant. 

Weight Gain: I asked about this on my Instagram story recently to see what other mamas said and the truth is – it’s all over the place. Every pregnancy really is SO different!! Some said they lost weight at 20 weeks due to being sick first trimester and others had gained 15-20lbs already. I personally have gained 11 pounds! My doctor says that’s good so I’m happy! It’s definitely weird to watch your body change for the first time haha. As much as I LOVE my growing bump and actually look forward to the big belly…I have some days where I take photos and feel like I look ‘different’ or I get discouraged thinking of having to lose the weight in a few months. I also officially not fitting into lots of my clothing which has been a little bit of a hard adjustment when it comes to getting ready to go out or trying to dress cute. I have used this to my advantage lately and ordered some new looser fitted items that are cute and comfy 🙂 Just being honest here I have had moments of being down on myself in this department. I know it’s all worth this little miracle inside me but again, just being honest! 

Eating, Working Out, & Cravings: This is an almost embarrassing one to address LOL. My first trimester nothing sounded good to me for food so I ate a lot of really simple comfort foods. The second trimester I have been trying to watch what I eat a little more and don’t really have many ‘cravings’. I still go for treats and make dinners that have carbs and that kind of stuff but I am trying to make healthy decisions for breakfasts and lunches. One thing that I’ll mention that has totally saved us is our Home Chef meals! Lots of the time I will make something super easy – like Trader Joe’s orange chicken, broccoli, and brown rice or a Trader Joe’s lasagna. So these meals have got me cooking again and typically only take me 30 minutes. It’s also so nice to get new recipes instead of the same things we do each week! This isn’t sponsored it’s just helped me so much! And I did get a discount code from them back in November that still works – KARLIERAE for $30 off your first order! As far as working out, I haven’t gotten into a workout routine but I’m hoping to keep my walking up and do little things at home! I’ll of course update you guys with that too! 

Nursery + Baby Buys: We are slacking here! I am actually more focused currently on getting other areas of my house finished and organized before I get into full baby mode and only focus on things for her! So once I get a little deeper down my to-do list of things I want done before she gets here, then I will probably start focusing a lot more on our nursery! I also haven’t bought a ton of things because I will have my shower and will wait to see what I still need to buy after that. I have been starting to research car seats, strollers, and those bigger items and think I know the direction for some of them so I am making progress as far as decisions go! I think March – May will be go time for all this kind of stuff. 

Name: As most of you know, we are having a little girl! This has now been confirmed once via blood test and four times via ultrasound so if a boy pops out I’ll have lots of returns to make since the girl stuff is flying in from family and friends 😂 A lot of you are asking about names and we aren’t going to probably decide and definitely won’t announce until she is born! We are way too indecisive so I can just see us completely changing our minds in the hospital last second so we just want to wait until she’s here to finalize that decision. We aren’t set on anything so I LOVE to get suggestions from you! Send them my way! 

That’s all for today’s update! I am finally showing and it’s so fun to have people that know me personally see me and go ‘WOAH where did that come from!” haha I’m sure this is going to happen more in the upcoming weeks and months but I just love it. It’s fun to look pregnant when you’ve just been feeling it for so long! I’ll be doing more ‘pregnancy topic’ posts in between these updates so be on the lookout for those! A few things I’ll be sharing in the upcoming weeks / months are my skincare routine + how I’m dealing with all the pregnant breakouts, stretch mark prevention,  what I’m registering for, etc! If you don’t wanna miss them you can also always sign up for my newsletter here! It’ll send you my blog posts when they go live so you don’t have to worry about missing me share it over on Instagram or Facebook. I hope you are all having a wonderful New Year so far! As always, if you have any questions just comment below or on the Instagram picture that matches the one above 🙂 Talk soon! 

Xx, Karlie Rae