In mid-October I found out—to great excitement—that I was pregnant; a test taken on a hunch, a beautiful fall day. Stuart came home at lunch with me, eager to see the results, his suspicions already raised by an insatiable burger craving several days prior. I was due to visit Charleston that same week for a conference and embarked feeling eerily…the same, still processing the enormity of what was happening, searching for any sign in my body for something novel as I enjoyed seafood po’ boys and other low country delights.
Two weeks later I texted a group of girlfriends, also pregnant or recently so, “I think the morning sickness has found me.” A few days later, I was off to another pre-planned trip, to meet a childhood friend in Atlanta, where I promptly told her about the pregnancy, unable to keep up with anything we had schemed out for the trip, only able to nibble saltines (and white rice at one attempted Thai dinner). I returned home and proceeded to lie on the couch through the end of the year. Haruki was the biggest fan of this arrangement!
By the end of November, at doctor’s advice, I’d started taking anti-nausea medication so that I could at least stomach buttered bread and plain crackers, trying to get anything down. I lost weight, slogged through each work day, struggled past the holidays, eagerly awaiting for the supposedly magical 12-week mark. It brought no relief. Eventually, somewhere between 18 and 20 weeks that relief did start to come, slowly but surely, allowing me to (as I am now) finish out my pregnancy eating more or less normally with the occasional off day.
Those months gave me a lot of time to strategize, and to think, about the very weirdness of eating while pregnant. Of course, there’s much attention given to the pressures of eating while pregnant, and rightly so. Hence, Emily Oster’s rise in popularity for dispelling the multitude of fears that come with eating while pregnant. While I personally struggled less with the risk management of eating (since I wasn’t eating anything remotely un-benign anyway), I definitely felt the flipside of it; the guilt (first Mom guilt?) of not eating a well-balanced diet from day one, of not being able to stomach a rainbow of foods, of the rare craving (or at least non-aversion) being mostly to something junky (see: Dairy Queen emergency). I’m at 33 weeks and JUST transitioning back to the semblance of the relatively healthy diet I had before.
Beyond the weirdness of eating while pregnant in relation to the baby, there’s also the weirdness of eating while pregnant in relation to you. Being an adventurous eater has always been an inherent part of my identity. I was a kid who loved smoked oysters (seriously, one of my favorite childhood snacks). As an adult, I take pleasure in spice and garlic (both currently off the table), in trying new foods. My husband and I love going out to eat and cooking together, and for the entirety of our relationship have made a point of a weekly date night that utilizes one of those options, both off the table. For the last seven months that part of me has been simply gone. I’ve been eating to live, instead of a usual vice versa.
Eating while pregnant has provided lessons that have proved useful to the rest of pregnancy, and I imagine will translate well to parenthood too. There’s been the lesson of relinquishing control, and a process of learning to not be quite so hard on myself. There’s also the reminder that underneath it all, even with all of these massive changes, I’m still me. With the arrival of spring I’ve begun (mostly) eating with relish again; even enjoying it as my appetite often feels insatiable (finally). After so long feeling not quite myself, it’s a good reminder that this piece of my identity is still there, even if it has had its ebbs and flows.
I’m going to share today the “recipe” that absolutely, 100% got me through the worst of it. My cousin, who in a fun twist also was pregnant at the same time, gave me the advice early on to start every day with protein (even if you’re not hungry, even if you don’t think you need it). With a little trial and error I learned that the combination of an English muffin with scrambled eggs and American cheese (in a perfect 1:1:1 ratio) did the trick, even on days where I could barely keep down saltines. Stuart made one of these for me probably for about one hundred straight mornings and nicknamed it “The Midge.” I can probably never eat one in its pure form again (hence why it's depicted slightly differently below; with feta and a harder scramble), but I’ll always feel gratitude to this little sandwich for keeping me going in my darkest of eating days.
"The Midge" Egg Sandwich
Serves 1
Ingredients
One English muffin
One egg
One slice of American cheese
Butter, salt and pepper
Toast your English muffin and gather the rest of your ingredients; scramble your one egg in a bowl (don't pre-salt!). Pre-unwrap your American cheese for ease.
Heat a generous glob of butter, preferably salted, in a small frying pan over low heat. Add your scrambled egg before it gets too hot.
Stir your eggs, low and slow, to let them develop a creamy, soft texture. Add the American cheese early in this process (you can tear it until little chunks or just throw it on whole and mix it in), for prime gooey-ness. Of course, if you're pregnant, make sure to not undercook your eggs!
Remove the pan from heat and butter each side of your toasted English muffin. Add egg/cheese mixture and top with a tiny grind of black pepper (if well tolerated) and a generous pinch of Maldon salt (hey, salt helps the nausea!).
Enjoy your sandwich... and remember, this too shall pass.
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