I had to describe what the first trimester feels like to a man the other day. Not just any man, my husband. I wasn’t sure where to start with this description. How do you define these three months of life that begin another? I think you have to take it in phases.

Phase 1: Ignorance and Wonder: In this phase you don’t even know you’re knocked up. Nope. You are in the dark as much as that zygote in your uterus. During this time you may be blissfully unaware of your delicate condition and decide to party hard at your friend’s wedding, eat sushi appetizers and go on roller coasters because you have to get all that in before you get pregnant, right? So, you feel oblivious.

You may be more cautious because you are in your “two week wait.” If you don’t know what that means, you must not hang out on fertility and pregnancy message boards. For shame! The 2WW or TWW is the time between ovulation and your expected period. A gal desperately seeking conception may not dare let champagne nor raw fish touch her lips. This means she is probably counting the days until she can pee on a plastic stick. Chances are, you are overly assessing every stomach rumble to figure out if it’s morning sickness. So, you feel anxious.

Phase 2: Queasy: Morning sickness is a woefully misnamed affliction. Pick a time of day. Each girl feels sick at a different time. For me, it was in the evening. Most are hanging over the toilet when they wake up. The unlucky ones are so sick all the time they actually lose weight in the first trimester because they can’t keep anything down. The doctor may give them Zofran. Then they feel like they’ll never poop again. So, you feel nausous and constipated.

Phase 3: Drugged: Surely someone has poisoned you. They must have slipped something in your drink. I personally had flashbacks to my 8th grade mono days. That’s how tired you feel.

Imagine you are on a long car or boat trip and you feel seasick. Okay, then what do you do? You take a Dramamine, right? Let’s be honest, Dramamine only touches nausea a little. It really just knocks you out. Combine the feelings of phases 2 and 3. So, it feels like you’re a seasick person on Dramamine.

Phase 4: Generally Emotional: If you really want to be pregnant, you could be crazy elated. Regardless of whether this is a surprise baby or not, you’re pretty much terrified because once you see that plus sign, the uncertainty sets in. You are worried about the baby and hoping the pregnancy goes well. You are unsure you will be a good mother, or unsure you can handle another child. So, you feel overwhelmed.

Phase 5: Bloated: That’s self-explanatory.

I guess if you have to describe it to someone you can say the first trimester feels oblivious-anxious-nauseous-constipated-drugged-exhausted-elated-worried-usure-overwhelmed and puffy.

Thank God it’s over. Hello second trimester. I’ve been waiting for you. You’re much easier to describe.

I didn’t know that I needed today.

I didn’t know that I needed to see my daughter’s excitement when she woke up in the bed next to me, surprised that I was there. We are spending the night with my sister and brother-in-law. When I put her down, she thought that was just her bed for the night, not knowing we were sharing. I didn’t know that when I woke up I needed her wide eyes smiling at me and I needed to hear her whisper, “Mama!”

I didn’t know that I needed to catch my husband on the phone for a last goodbye early in the morning before he flew to the other side of the world. I needed to miss him and needed to tell him I loved him.

I needed the last minute rush of printing blog business cards at the FedEx Kinkos at 8:00am this morning because I can’t for the life of me find all the damn cards I had printed for BlogHer ’12 and I had to have new ones for SITS Bloggy Boot Camp today. I needed the fast work and kindness of Chris at FedEx Kinkos. Hey, FedEx execs! Give that guy a raise!

I needed the bustling room of other bloggers and chats about SEO and utilizing Pinterest. I needed to hear the ideas of speakers and reminders of new Facebook rules for fan pages.

I needed to come home to my happy child who is finally feeling better after almost a full week of nasty funk. I needed to see that she had been spoiled rotten that day as only aunts and uncles can spoil a child.

I needed to eat greasy pizza and lick the parmesan off my fingers while listening to my sister’s infectious laugh. I needed to sniffle through the final episode of “The Office” and recall our favorite of Steve Carrell’s “That’s what she said” lines.

Mostly I needed this break.

I needed to restore myself a little and today did it. I’ve been a little worried about me lately. I wasn’t really myself through the first trimester and then the move. I’ve been more stressed than necessary at work. Frankly, I need to relax about it all. The pregnancy, work, the move, all of it. I need to give myself a break.

So I did, because I needed it.

Greyson let me sleep in while he got up to make me a spectacular breakfast.  Before that, he had to deal with a massive out-of-Pull-Up explosion Charlotte had overnight.  (Remind me of this before Father’s Day.)  We watched Kristen Wiig on Saturday Night Live on the DVR.  We took some time to blow some bubbles in the yard before I took off to get a much needed pedicure and made a Target run.  

After a family nap my mom came over to play with Charlotte and we ate dinner.  Mom and I left to see Carol Burnett perform at a theater.  My mom was always a fan of the Carol Burnett Show and we knew her being in town on Mother’s Day night would be the perfect gift.  The loud cackling across the theater?  That was us.

I figured this would be a good day to debut the bump at 15.5 weeks.  I hope your Mother’s Day was this awesome!

The second pregnancy has been different.  I feel physically the same most of the time, but the major thing that has made this pregnancy different is our approach to it.  The best example of this is a decision we made preconception.

We’re not finding out the sex of the baby until it’s born.  

Reaction to this is has been twofold.  Some people are like, “What?!  What do you mean you’re not going to find out?!  How will you know how to decorate, shop, plan and generally gestate if you don’t know if it’s a girl or a boy!?”  Others are like, “That is so awesome! It’s such a shame how people find out ahead of time.  The surprise is the best part! It’s the way God intended it to be.”

There was no real reason behind it.  We just wanted to be different this time around.  Why not?  We don’t need to buy anything.  We have everything.  Seriously.  Our infant car seat, bouncy seat, swing, Pack ‘N Play, high chair etc. are all in gender neutral colors.  My husband said it best when he said, “Even if the chair was pink, my son would be man enough to sit in that pink chair because I remember how much it cost and we’re not buying another one.”  We have plenty of yellow and green newborn clothes our son could wear as hand-me-downs from his sister.  I’m sure the news that it is a boy would inspire someone to buy a blue little something to bring him home in, knowing we have quite a few pink onesies around here.  I’m not too worried about that.

If it’s another girl I want to bring her home from the hospital in the same outfit I brought Charlotte home in and then frame it.  It will be the treasured outfit I brought my girls home wearing.

Will it be hard not to ask when that black and white image comes up on the screen?  Yes.  It will be tempting to find out, but we won’t.  We’re excited either way.  This new little person will round out our family no matter what.

Sometimes I’m really proud to say this, and sometimes I feel super guilty saying this after hearing the horror stories of my friends with Princess-Kate-Like-Morning-Sickness. You ready for this?

I went my entire first pregnancy without puking.

It’s true. It was crazy. Conception through delivery, no barfing. I was queasy and uncomfortable in the first trimester, but it never resulted in toilet hugging sessions. I felt like Jerry Seinfeld in that episode of Seinfeld where he explained he hadn’t thrown-up since 1980. It was 1993 by that time. That’s a huge vomitless accomplishment if you ask me.

When I made it through the first trimester this time I thought I was in the clear. No such luck. Here’s what went down, well, came back up…

Monday I had an event for a client at work where I was filming a presentation. A large part of my job is video work, stemming from my news shooting and editing days. We were at a very nice local hotel for the event. I got there early and had everything set up and ready to go. The woman I was working with was very kind and we chatted about families and I mentioned that I was expecting my second baby. As it often happens, when you tell someone you’re pregnant, they offer you food. She walked me over to the snack table of charming carnival food the hotel had on display for the event. They had soft pretzels ya’ll. Soft freakin’ pretzels. I suddenly needed something salty and was excited to indulge. I tweeted out this pic on Instagram…

That’ll teach me to brag. That’ll also teach me to dip anything in mustard, a condiment I’ve long had an aversion to. The 90 minute presentation got underway and I happily panned and zoomed across the room. The speaker’s remarks were interesting and I learned a lot. I only ate about half of the pretzel. Suddenly I wasn’t hungry. About halfway in I felt some rumbles. I got really hot and then really cold. I started feeling dizzy. I looked at the mirror over the snack table. Ooph! Pale. I looked down at what was left of the pretzel next to me. Ugh! I looked around to see if anyone was looking at me. I wiped sweat off my head. Oh God! No! Not here.

I quickly zoomed out, left the camera rolling and tried not to run, but just walk out of the room with any dignity I had left under the sweat. When I hit the hallway I sprinted to the restroom. I got to the first stall in the ladies room of this four-star hotel and made like a drunk in a first-star hotel. I cursed the pretzel the whole time.

Just the smell of mustard could do me in until this baby is born. I’m thinking this may have been just something disagreeing with me, not morning sickness. So maybe I can just say I made it through two pregnancies with no morning sickness? Is that too braggy? Yeah, maybe I’ll just shut up.