When I found out I was pregnant, in baby-hazed euphoria, my appetite for prenatal information was as large as my real appetite. I gobbled up pregnancy blogs and books like Cookie Monster goes to town on his favorite chocolate chips. I can pretty much quote What to Expect When You’re Expecting from cover to cover.
In all my reading, I kept seeing the same thing. Early pregnancy may be miserable, but the second trimester is a glorious light at the end of the tunnel. Your hair gets shiny and long. Your nails never look more beautiful. You no longer look fat, you actually look pregnant!
But best of all, the second trimester is called the ‘honeymoon trimester.’
Why?
Because apparently your libido surges out of control, and all you want to do is get it on.
As I battled morning sickness, fatigue and feeling like general death during the first trimester, the second trimester became my beacon of hope. This too shall pass! One day I will feel sexy again!
Now that I am about midway through the second trimester, I definitely feel like someone owes me an apology. The second trimester isn’t the total sexfest I thought it was going to be.
In the first trimester, I didn’t want to have sex because I was sick and tired most of the time. Now, I have more energy and feel more like myself, but my libido did not get the memo.
I (and my poor hubs) feel cheated. I thought the second trimester was going to be a golden three months of sexcapades, before we have a tiny screaming milk monster on our hands.
But no.
I tried to get in the mood. I read smutty romance novels. I watched Fifty Shades of Grey. But nada. Not so much as a tingle down there. Drier than the Sahara on a good day.
Despite what the books say, low libido after the first trimester is incredibly common. If you’ve experienced vaginal bleeding in the past, you may be afraid to risk having sex. You may be just too worn out from growing a human to even think about getting it on. Sometimes though, low libido can signal a hormonal imbalance or even low thyroid function, so it is worth mentioning to your doctor. As for me, my doctor says I’m just one of the lucky ones, and that my sex drive will likely return. While I am glad to know this is normal for most women, it doesn’t exactly make me feel better.
You know what would make me feel better? Getting laid.
Many women feel that there’s something wrong with them if they don’t suddenly start acting like hormone-crazed teenagers by the second trimester. All the books tell you one thing is supposed to happen, and you don’t understand why it’s not happening for you.
But it’s ok. I know that some day my sex drive will return. And the following sexfest will be fifty shades of awesome. In the meantime, I remind myself that this little nugget taking over my womb is totally worth the dry spell.
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