Pregnancy Reads

MCPD: 19 weeks 1 day

I need pregnancy books to get myself informed. Since my body changes dramatically and never had I experienced this, definitely I need something to read during these magical nine months. During lunch hour I usually check my email and read my online daily digest. Some colleagues who notice it and who happen to have dealt with pregnancy said I should get rid of those readings. They said once in a while is okay but not all the time. Maybe they think I should have got enough of it and try to be relaxed and see what will happen instead of knowing it from theories. Well I thank them for the advise but I just don't get what they think. Pregnancy comes in stages. Each stage is not the same. Getting knowledge was never a crime, aight? As a first-timer I want to know how my body is developing, and I'm certain even if they have given birth for 10 times I suppose they don't know how and why things are progressing. Doesn't anyone curious to know the miraculous things happen inside them? It's not just the belly which is progressing but everywhere, from hair to toes and there's always why each and every bit happens. To me reading pregnancy-related stuffs are ultimate guide to keep track of all the memorable pregnancy milestones and to cope with several pregnancy-related aches or problems that might happen.

So these are what I read to feed my hunger in knowing about what's happening behind this changing body.

This is a small booklet. Makcik Lynn gave me a few days before I got married. It has all from self-care, antenatal visits, how baby grows, the changing body, labour and birth, hospital stay. Everything is explained briefly.

I got this one also from Makcik Lynn. The book contains prayers and things a woman and her husband suppose to do when expecting a child. It explains what aqiqah is, why circumcision is needed and how to name a child. At the end

of the book, there's a list of Muslim names as reference to choose baby names.

This is the translated version of The Complete Book of Mother & Baby Care. I got this one from DH's aunt, Mak Usu. It's an interesting book with coloured prints. This book shows the developing body of a pregnant woman by showing pictures of a naked pregnant lady for the whole of her pregnancy at every 4 weeks. So we can see the changes of the body as her body developing. Interesting right? As for now I only read a quarter of the book as the rest is about baby care.

From DH. It's is a slim book which explains pregnancy week by week. It explains stages throughout pregnancy, from conception to delivery and birth. The text is broken down into clearly-labelled information boxes and illustrated with lots of big pictures, the detail never seems too dense, perfect if I prefer to dip in and out to find out about the subject I require without reading an entire book from cover to cover.

These two here are the best. The left one I got from Mak Yah which she couriered from KL. I got the same copy from Makcik Lynn but the pages were not in order and there's no page number. So I couldn't figure exactly which page should come first. But I did learn about ovulate and conceiving from the loose pages. :) It's common to learn from books since we aren't taught by our parents how to get pregnant, are we? So I received another new copy from Mak Yah which she got from Mama Siti. Once received I quickly bound it, afraid the same thing would happen to this one. This booklet's contents are heavier than the other books above. It explains conception, antenatal visits, how baby develops, the changing body, labour and birth, problems, hospital stay, early weeks of the baby, etc in more detail. The texts are more, with less illustrations. The last one which is on the right, is the heaviest I got so far. It's What to Expect When You're Expecting. I bought this one myself. So far, I can tell that whatever issues I may be wondering about pregnancy I can find in this book, be it about dental, nose, hiccups, dreams, constipation, foot growth, sleeping position, skin breakouts, fast growing nails and hair, eczema, you name it, they actually have something to do with pregnancy and this book has the answers.

I'd like to give credits to my aunties who delightfully gave the books as gifts. They are useful and somehow I know pregnancy more than just nausea and big belly.