A Girl...

Every pregnancy is different in how quickly you show and how you carry the thing. I've found my skinnier friends show earlier because they are so freakin' skinny. The heavier ones, a.k.a. moi, take awhile. It's like the baby is settling into the excess fat storages.

That is so nice to hear. Obviously everyone is different, blah blah blah, but it seemed like what I kept reading was that the skinny girls were the ones who stayed skinny and didn't show for like five months. That just didn't make sense to me.

(Be it known that I'm not a size 0 or anything, but I tend to carry my weight in my hips, thighs, and butt, and my waist and abs have always been my pride and joy. It's weird to have that gone--*poof.*)

It was only a brief comment, but it was right on the nose: the problem, at least in my experience, is exactly that non-maternity tops are too short, rather than that they're too small. That's how they get you, damnit!
If it's any consolation, I was totally showing by my fourth week, but my paranoia about miscarrying a third time prevented me from buying any proper attire until after the twelve-week threshold. I got by with a Belly Band, and I'd highly recommend one (or several) to you, too. If you haven't heard of it, it's a thick stretchy band that you wear over unbuttoned pants, meaning you get the comfort of an extra size or two without having to fork out money for interim pants. I got one in plain black, but you can get patterns and colors galore. For those of us who start showing early and don't want to go around flashing our expanding trousers, it's an added bonus that it just looks like the bottom of a layering top peeking out from under your regular shirt.
Finally (god, I write a lot), the demi-panel-style pant strikes me as one that will be comfortable for much longer, especially when your belly starts to itch from the stretching and when your belly button pops out. The last thing you want then is the added discomfort of a proper zip-fly and button.

wait, so the romeo and juliet line actually means "why are you romeo?". . . 'cuz that doesn't seem to make much sense. . . "why are you a montague?" would, but not romeo. . .

regarding the pronunciation thing, i had a friend who did that and it drove me nuts too. . . he kind of toned it down when i told him how to pronounce certain japanese words properly (like "sushi"), only i was messing with him and giving him these weird, but believable, pronunciations. . .

what made it funnier was that soon after i did that we didn't really run into each other for about a year, and when we finally did catch up i'd forgotten i'd done that and asked why he was pronouncing those words all fucked up. . .

I agree with chan, the bella band has saved me so far. It allows you to unbutton/unzip to your hearts content with no one but you ever knowing. The other thing I would reccomend is buying a few pairs of pants one size up, you will wear them post-partum and can wear them with the bella band. You might be suprised how long they will last.

All the preggo bloggers I read got the Bella Band. It turns all your regular pants into Maternity pants. http://www.ingridandisabel.com/

I think you better jump on the "band" wagon...

Gah, typos are the death of me. It's called a Bella Band. Google Belly Band and you something for incontinent canines. :)

"Why are you Romeo", now I'm off on a crazy google search about Shakespeare and Romeo and Juliet. Not that I don't believe you, quite the opposite and now I need to know more!

My sister who is on the thin side had a little belly around 7-10 weeks with both her pregnancies.

i work with the preggy's and they all swear by the bella band-- you can also sort of 'tube top' it when your shirts get a bit clevage-y. woo!

happy expanding! (but for serious. i'm thrilled. grow baby grow!)

The Bella Band was a great addition to my maternity wardrobe last time around. However, this time I am actually starting to pop out much earlier and prefer the ease and comfort of a demi panel maternity pant as I got annoyed trying to pull down the Bella Band every five minutes.

As far as showing goes, it doesn't really make sense, but last time I started as a pretty skinny lady and didn't officially show until I was well past 20 weeks. This time I am starting out heavier and at 11 weeks there is definitely some belly there and it surely isn't all bloat.

well I'm skinny and I still had jeans not closing issues LONG before anyone ELSE could tell i was pregnant. it starts LOW.

My personal experience has been that big women (like me) don't show early, but skinny women do (as already posted above, I'm just confirming it). I say buy what makes you comfortable. Personally, I just bought a size up in regular pants and they lasted well into my last days of pregnancy (they were pretty stretchy). This was mainly because it is incredibly difficult to find materinity clothes for plus sized women and I was teaching at the time so I had to look professional. Maybe you could wear skirts with elastic this summer?

The demi panel jeans from GAP lasted me from about 12 weeks all the way to 42 weeks. I wouldn't recommend the hidden panel. Those aren't very good after you're into the 2nd trimester. Plus, after awhile you have to hitch up the hidden panel ones so far you've got this weird tent-like thing going on around your crotch. It isn't cute.

Go ahead and get the demi panel jeans now! They look like normal jeans on and your belly will feel so much better.

The Gap demi-panel pants always felt uncomfortably tight on/under my belly (even early on), but I loved their roll panels!

Hi Leah,
I found out almost the same day that you did that I'm also pregnant with our 1st. I love reading your updates...it makes me think I'm not the only one stressing about all these things baby-related! Go December Babies!

Well, um, I have nothing about pants. (Although my myriad (three, literally) of currently pregnant friends insist that the way to go is the low cut jeans that don't have a panel and instead go under the (growing) belly.) (Also, liberal use of quotation marks is cool! Tell the kids!)

But, I am very talented at the giving of the CONGRATULATIONS! One more time!

My best friend wore her normal pants (open) with a cute sort of "Units" belt over the top to cover the open fly. She did this most of her pregnancy, and had them in really lightweight browns and blacks and they were really cute. The are actually made for just that - perhaps look into those? Then you don't get stuck with panel pants post baby, but Thanksgiving belts...

If you're interested I can find out where to buy.

Can't help you on the maternity wear issue, but I am with you 100% about Dress Barn. Occasionally I'll walk by one and see something that's actually not hideous in the window, but I could never bring myself to go in, because the name of the place is so off-putting. I don't buy clothes in places that insinuate I resemble a farm animal.

Has no one showed you the rubber band trick for your pants?

You know what you need? Fried pickles. Yep, there's a bbq joint near here that sells great fried pickles.
When she was preggers, the wife wanted fried pickles. Ok, she didn't really want fried pickles, she wanted something wierd to want so she could send me out to get it and see if I would. Of course, I did go get them, because I really loved fried pickles...and I really loved her...and my son growing in her.
I hope you guys get a chance to enjoy some fried pickles. I miss them.

Hey, congrats on your pregnancy! I have never been, so have no insights to share on the pants situation...my sister just had a baby and her MO was "dresses."

My preference was the ones with the short elastic all around. I wish you well with the bloat. It's annoying but welcome so it's a funny feeling isn't it?

Another plug for the Bella Band, but I also recommend some longer, roomier shirts. They will last you quite a while, I would guess, while you make the most of various pants-trickery efforts. Such as (I'm sure you know this one) looping one end of an elastic band through the buttonhole of your pants once you hit the midday Expando Craziness and looping the other around the button. I usually did this after lunch because yes, you start out nearly normal in the morning and as the hours go on MOOOOOOOO.

Juliet is despairing of the fact that Romeo is who he is- ie, a Montague, someone she is not supposed to love. The whole monologue is a really interesting meditation on the significance of names which are, in essence, simply words, but in this context, spell doom for R&J. Shakespeare says it much better than I do:
'This but thy name that is my enemy;

Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.

What's a Montague? It is nor hand nor foot,

Nor arm nor face, (nor any other part)

Belonging to a man. O be some other name!

What's in a name? That which we call a rose

By any other would smell as sweet;

So Romeo would be not Romeo call'd,

Retain that dear perfection which he owes

Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name,

And for thy name, which is no part of thee,

Take all myself.

ps Don't know a thing about maternity wear.

Sorry I have no sage advice to offer about pants & panels, but I just have to thank you for bringing up Dress Barn...every time my husband & I see one, we have to say (with an exaggerated Boston accent) "DRESS BAAHHHHN!" in honor of that one SNL skit with Jimmy Fallon & Rachel Dratch playing the Boston teenagers ("You're retaahded." "YOU AH!"). That's where Rachel Dratch's character bought her prom dress. Hee!

Demi all the way. Stay away from the scary big panel, the larger you get a funky line across your belly will show through your tops and has been previously stated you'll want to scratch the bejezus out of your stomach. Also, don't bother with maternity underwear, bikinis worked for me all the way through and I'm not a wee lass like you.

I'd not even commented with a congratulations yet, damn me! but CONGRATULATIONS!

I don't know anything about pants that fit, my own pants don't fit and I'm not even pregnant.

hiya
am new here and found you as a googled about whether I could find out if I was having a boy or a girl, but found you instead!

I am having the same problem with the size. It's not my second pregnancy it's my first but I am already looking like I'm 3 months pregnant or more and i'm only 8.5 weeks!

I also haven't and am not intending to tell extended family and friends til the 12 weeks thing but SURELY they are going to guess at work sooner or later because I used to weigh 8 stone and at 9 stone I am huge and I am only 5'4 so it really really shows!

The only words of comfort I can offer is that so far no-one has even joked with me about looking pregnant, either those that know or those that don't, so perhaps I'm not looking anything but not skinny....

Would love to compare pregnancy diaries with you although mine's a little bitter at the moment as my boyfriend ran off when we found out we were expecting, but regarding weight and sickness and all that stuff, we could stay in touch!?

Sarah X

I didn't "show" to anyone else until I was like 20- 25 weeks- and I was a skinny skinny girl. I could tell the difference, and see the wee baby bump, and could so tell that my clothes weren't fitting right, but nobody else could- until I "popped" overnight and had people asking me if I was having twins. I wasn't. I almost cried. ANYWAY- I have no opinions on maternity clothes- I just went for cheap because I couldn't see myself spending a ton of money for something that I wouldn't wear but for 9 months or so- I did LOVE maternity dresses though, out of jersey knit- and generally in black because I am apparently goth like that.

Also, rubber band trick= loop the hairband or rubber band through the buttonhole of your pants and itself so it stays on, then over the button on the other side. Pull shirt (or undershirt) down to cover it. Pants stay up, no buying other stuff yet, yay. Works until you start gaining in the butt and thighs, then you have to go a size up in pants and/or buy maternity stuff.

Am long winded. Sorry.

1. I think you should wear whatever is most comfortable, and not worry too much about growing out of it. I was in a maternity shop not long ago with one of my pregnant friends, and I tried on a pair of maternity khaki capris, and holy hell were they comfortable. And I am most definitively NOT pregnant.

2. Longer shirts hide a multitude of sins, embrace them now and forevermore.

Get a bella band! My sister has worn bella bands throughout her entire pregnancy (she's at about 28 weeks now), and hasn't had to buy one pair of maternity pants. She loves it :)

http://www.ingridandisabel.com/bellaband.html

We have the saaaaame belly there, with the bloating. So, so bad. This time it was easier to deal with because I already OWNED maternity pants and didn't have to go through the jinxing agony of BUYING maternity pants in the first trimester, but still. Waking up normal and going to bed six months pregnant gets old.

I see everybody has already told you about the Bella Band, which is a huuuuuge lifesaver -- I used to wear it to work with my pants properly buttoned underneath, and then mid-day I could unbutton and halfway unzip and ahhhh, relief.

I did by some no-panel maternity pants last time, and they are pretty useless pretty quickly, even the ones with the adjustable waists. They weren't ultra-comfortable and I had the worst time finding shirts long enough to cover that last little inch-and-a-half of skin above the waistband. Go with the real panel and fold it halfway down for a couple months if that works.

(This time I've had to go straight to the full panel, not because I'm THAT much bigger but because I'm...squishier, and the half-panel pants give me this weird maternity muffin-top that is NOT CUTE.)

(On that note...what size are you, pre-pregnancy? I have a BUNCH of stuff that is just not going to work for me this time [work clothes, wrong size, wrong season, etc.] and would love to find a new home for it. Email me!)

Shit, I've fallen in love with the ONE person I'm not supposed to have fallen in love with.

Why do you have to be who you are? Your name determines what family you are from, but it doesn't determine WHO you are. I mean JEEZ, it's not like a name is an actual PART of you, it's just a label.

It's just your name that is my enemy. If you were named Joe Green, or Hank Blofeld, then you'd still be the super guy that you are, but i wouldn't be forced to consider you an enemy.

So gee, if you could just not be a Montague, then we'd be smokin'.

Shit, I've fallen in love with the ONE person I'm not supposed to have fallen in love with.

Why do you have to be who you are? Your name determines what family you are from, but it doesn't determine WHO you are. I mean JEEZ, it's not like a name is an actual PART of you, it's just a label.

It's just your name that is my enemy. If you were named Joe Green, or Hank Blofeld, then you'd still be the super guy that you are, but i wouldn't be forced to consider you an enemy.

So gee, if you could just not be a Montague, then we'd be smokin'.

BELLA BAND. I really should read all your comments before I call the Bella Band a "units belt" heh.

But yes - that's it! :)

the belly bands are great for the early stages. I didn't wear mat clothes until I'd told people at work around 14 weeks - and man it was hard to fit into my clothes until then! But I second the recommendation to buy a pair of trousers in a larger size - you'll wear them post-partumn and then I also invested in a couple of maternity t-shirts that didn't look to maternity-ish. Also, don't assume that maternity clothes will last you the whole pregnancy - I've found that I need two sets - one in my size for the second trimester and one set in a larger size for the third. It depends how much weight you gain and how you carry and it's impossible to predict...

Oy, the comment spammers have come for a visit. I'm not one of them, I promise. I have two words for you:

YOGA PANTS

Two more words:

GAP BODY

And one more that sounds like two:

lululemon

I wore my Gap Body yoga pants up until (through? they're visible in the 24-week photo here: http://www.avocado8.com/belly.html) the second trimester, and I still wear them to work out in, on morning walks, and whenever I'm feeling too bloated for jeans. They're awesome. I now own two pairs of lululemon athletica yoga pants, too, and they're fabu. The "Still" pant has a big fat waistband with a tie for adjustment purposes, and it can be worn up (the way I like it) or rolled down (to accommodate a belly).