pregnancy insomnia?
 

Can insomnia be a symptom of pregnancy? I'm well into my second trimester, and I'm up at all hours of the night, several nights a week. Right now it's 3:30 a.m. and I'm wide awake. Most nights that I'm up like this I eat an obscene amount of snacks and play nintendo for hours and hours. Not a very good role model for my 4 and 6 year old lol.

Insomnia is very common with pregnancy. They say 75-80% of women experience it.

In pregnancy expect anything and everything as far as changes in your normal routine, including your normal mood or sleeping habits, go.

After 7 pregnancies, my wife swears each one had it's special "oddities" associated with it.

a suggestion -

if you aren't excercising much you can use this time to help strengthen your body. you need to be careful, obviously, but keeping your back and legs strong is a good thing, not to mention toning your arms, as youll soon be lifting, lifting, lifting a little bundle.

but one thing to keep in mind, deep lunges can help bring on contractions! the body's production of relaxin (that causes your ligaments to loosen) played havoc with my wife's hips toward the end. glad she was in good shape when this took.

Thanks guys, I tried to give both of you comments, but in both cases I was told to spread it around first.

Thanks Rick. I had no idea it was so common. That makes me feel a lot better.

That's really interesting. I do definitely have some weird things that I do now that I never did before I was pregnant. I'll have to wait and see for the second pregnancy about what your wife says.

Thanks kp. I am doing some pilates every day, but have given up on the kickboxing lol. I used to do kickboxing every day too. So far I think I'm in okay shape. I haven't gained much weight at all, other than the baby and the placenta of course. I weigh about 120 right now... my normal weight is 105. I'm a shrimp lol. I do hope though that being so tiny isn't going to effect my ability to give birth. My husband is much taller and broader than me, and if I have a large baby I'm worried I might need a c-section. Anyways thanks for the suggestion. Maybe I will exercise more and play nintendo less! :p

well, as you approach the end and are trying to get things going just keep in mind the "tricks" that can help induce labor and get the kid out before he gets any bigger:

brisk walking

deep lunges

"walking" up stairs like a toddler with your hands on the step in front of you and your rear raised in the air... you're supposed to kinda bounce your bottom up and down and bump the sides of the walls with your hips... our midwife had my wife do this and tho it was the FUNNIEST thing, it did start some mind contractions

breast stimulation and orgasm


sounds like you've got a good exercise program already in place. no kickboxing, eh? yeah, my wife ran until probably mid 2nd trimester. then she focused on her core, like you've done with pilates.

I'm with you orange. I can't sleep most nights and end up falling asleep when I get home from work for a couple of hours. Then i'm right back up again. well I guess it's just prepration for those sleepless nights we're looking forward too...lol

That's a great way of looking at it lol. And yes if this continues I will definitely be prepared for all the sleepless nights. Actually so will my husband haha, because he's a doctor and has had to get up in the middle of the night lots of times when he's on call. So we should sail through this new baby thing!! At least I can hope that, can't I? :rolleyes:

Thanks kp2171. Tried to give you a comment yet again and can't! I must have given you way too many comments already or something. :D But your answers are great and always appreciated. I'm not *quite* ready to go into labour yet lol but when I am I will keep what you've said in mind.

I'm sure that pregnancy can result in insomnia. However, losing sleep while pregnant is not a good thing. If anything you should be sleeping all the more due to the increased demands being made on your body. You should talk to your ob-gyn about this.

I'll mention the insomnia at my next visit, thanks!