Gametes In Love

In pregnancy there comes a stage where sleeping on your back (or lying on your back) is strongly discouraged. As the baby grows, it’s weight begins to apply pressure on a large vein (called the ‘vena cava’ if you want to be technical) running on the side of the spinal cord, which carries blood from the heart to the lower portions of the body. It’s kind of like a garden hose: you step on it and water coming out of the end reduces to a trickle, or stops altogether. Lack of blood-flow, while entertaining to watch as your limbs go purple, isn’t particularly good either for me… or the baby.

The solution? Sleeping on your side. Obviously stomach sleeping is out, unless you enjoy a nice teeter-totter, which then leaves sleeping on one side or another.

However, this is easier said than done: I can’t naturally force myself to assume a side position and not move overnight. For this people recommend that you sleep with a bunch of pillows around you and in between your legs. So the fortress of pillows begins.

I went out and acquired myself a Snoogle: it’s a pregnancy pillow that looks like a snake.

You wrap it around you and rely on the back snuggle bit to prevent you from rolling around. But it’s BIG! Good thing we have a king sized bed. Now between S, myself, Neko (our Maine Coon who takes up just as much space as his parents) and pregnancy pillows a king sized bed feels mighty small.

I have now had two nights sleeping with this thing. Apparently I can wrap it anyway I want, but I still wake up in the middle of the night flat on my back. The pillow, instead of preventing me from rolling over, is just cradling me in between. Clearly, I am smarter than said pillow!

The end result?
Me: 1; Pillow: 0