Women want to know when they are pregnant as soon as possible and want to know that the pregnancy is healthy.
Unfortunately, a positive pregnancy test doesn’t necessarily prove that a pregnancy is healthy. A woman’s symptoms, especially very early in pregnancy can sometimes give her the reassurance that the pregnancy is progressing normally.
Some of the earliest symptoms of pregnancy feel exactly like you are getting your period. You may feel cramping which is generally milder than when you get a period. You may have a little bit of spotting and will feel bloated, just like when you are getting your period. This is the time of implantation of the embryo into the uterus and the implantation can cause the spotting you notice. A woman can even get a couple of days of bleeding but this is usually much shorter than her regular period, which is suspicious of a pregnancy.
In a healthy pregnancy, the bloating does not go away and the woman’s hormone levels remain high. If you check your basal body temperature, you will notice that the temperature will not go down. Irritability is caused by the elevated hormones and a woman can feel more irritable in the first few days of the pregnancy.
There is also a sensitivity to smells, particularly of the smells of certain foods. You may also feel unable to eat certain foods because of their smell or texture. Nausea of pregnancy tends to begin around week six of the pregnancy but can start earlier and result in nausea and vomiting which can occur any time during the day. People call it “morning sickness” because it tends to be worse when the stomach is empty, although it can occur around certain foods or at other times of the day.
Women can feel more emotional during the early stages of the pregnancy. The hormones are increasing rapidly and can cause mood changes such as sadness, tearfulness, moodiness, irritability and anger. It can feel a lot like having PMS that just doesn’t go away. This can last for several weeks until the woman gets used to the hormonal changes in her body and begins to feel better.
Because the early symptoms of pregnancy are so similar to having premenstrual syndrome or a pre-period state, many women wait expectantly for their late period or believe the spotting they experienced were, in fact, the period, and do not necessarily believe or understand that they are pregnant. It’s not until the missing of the second period or in cases of severe nausea and vomiting that a woman knows she is actually pregnant.
There are things you can do to counteract some of the early symptoms of pregnancy. You can keep your stomach from being empty so as to keep the nausea and vomiting at bay. You can use a hot water bottle on the lower abdomen to alleviate the cramps. Take a pregnancy test to confirm a pregnancy so that you know where some of the irritability comes from and can take it with a grain of salt. Let your partner know why you are so irritable or nauseated so you can manage the symptoms together.
