• Tip 5: YOU ARE POSSESSED...just accept it

I would not say that I am average girl, so this might not apply to most of the women out there that are pregnant, BUT I FELT POSSESSED. Yes you are Regan MacNeil (The Exorcist). Why? you can not control anything you feel, do or say. Baby brain is kicking in and you sound cognitively impaired most of the time, if you speak a second language just be prepared to invent a magnificent fusion of both (my case...fun times...). Hormones are making you sob about pizza commercials and of course, it doesn't matter if you "need" to do something, your body will decide what you "really need". So basically give in, your body will do what ever it wants when ever it wants.

• Tip 4: WALK AS MUCH AS YOU CAN!

Why walking? BECAUSE YOU ARE TOO TIRED TO GO TO THE GYM! You need to write, analyze data, collect data, work, or all of the above, when I was not pregnant, I would get up at 5 to go to the gym and then start my normal routine...yeah that is IMPOSSIBLE now. I have tried to go to the gym very unsuccessfully many times, but walking I can do. Just see it as your workout. I do have to warn you, try to do it early anyway, on your way to where ever you need to be. Because I can tell you in the afternoon, it seems like you can't walk anymore. You want to drop to the floor and be carried. Have you seen the movie "Inside out"? do you remember sadness? YEAH THAT'S HOW YOU FEEL AT THE END OF THE DAY! you need to be dragged or tele-transported, since in the majority of the cases neither one is possible, just try to do it early in the day.

• Tip 3: Always eat and stay aways from bad smells, that will result in a contained nausea.

I know I have been really lucky not to have horrible nausea (or being stubborned not to throw up, I mean I am already sleeping most of the day, I was not going to be throwing up all my awake hours). Being that said, I really had to time to be nauseated, so did everything in my power to avoid it. I also HATE throwing up so...that translated in eating a lot of times a day (which also helped with my stomach wanting food every hour). I did have some nausea but breathing slowly, carrying something with a strong soothing smell you do like (peppermint and eucalyptus worked perfectly for me) and eating actually made me successfully complete my first trimester without throwing up once.  In terms of smells, coffee for me is one horrible trigger, just can't stand the smell and you can imagine I felt it EVERYWHERE specially at every moment of the day in New York. Subway is specially terrible, because smells are concentrated and air is thicker, use busses or walk as much as you can. That helps you with nausea, and also to squeezes some exercise in the day.

• Tip 2: ALWAYS CARY FOOD WITH YOU! I can't emphasize this enough, REALLY CARRY FOOD ALWAYS.

This is also something I had no idea about. I mean I usually eat a lot, always have struggled with eating too much and weight (can't help loving food) but this is ridiculous. You feel you are dying if you don't eat, is not like you have been 24 hours without eating, or even 8, we are talking about 2 or 3 hours!!!! In all fairness you can't eat too much (can't eat a steak and fries) but you can perfectly eat a bagel, and then another and then another.....I recommend not to eat a bagel every two or three hours, trust me your body WILL know the difference. I always try to go healthy, so one bagel is ok, the yoghurt, fruit, a sandwich, boiled eggs, scrambled eggs, etc. How does this work when you are walking and in a library most of the day, well TAKE FOOD WITH YOU! This will translate in very heavy backpack, so invest in a good backpack, and pack food for the amount of hours you will be out. Husband, partner, family, friends or roommate can help a lot with all of this amount of food preparing (in my case my lovely hubby). Again if you have the resources you can always buy food, but because I couldn't the big heavy backpack is my only option.

First Trimester

• Tip 1: Crunch as much work as you can at any point in the day! Listening to text on audio and working for bits of time, will crunch work in at any point in your day, specially considering 6pm feels like 2am.

Now I am now sure that Sleeping Beauty was a pregnant single lady, maybe not accepted at that time and they had to created the story around her sleepiness .....YOU ARE SLEEPY ALL THE TIMEEEE!!! I usually sleep 6 to 7 hours and I am pumped for the day. But since the first month of my pregnancy, that was not the case any more....you would think, "ok maybe 8 hours should do the trick", considering is the normal average for an adult.....NOOOO, YOU WOULD BE WRONG! Your body just can't take being awake more than 12 hours or less! MEANING YOU NEED LIKE 12 HOURS OF SLEEP!!! So, had I'd known this, I would have made my life more efficient before. But I didn't know it would be sooooo drastic and intense. Your system just shuts down, and you turn in to the living dead, cranky, sleepy, brain dead and moody (So watch it family and friends, you better make sure this mom to be has her sleep!) Acknowledge you are a zombie and just go to bed. I am sure people would rather not see you, than seeing you as a sleepwalker that Tallahassee (Zombieland) or Rick (The Walking Dead) would need to kill.

Introduction and Background

First of all I should clarify that this might not apply to ALL PhD or of course to every pregnant women. I can only talk about my experience, a very modest, international student doing a PhD in Neuroscience in New York and getting pregnant before your proposal in my early 30's. I know what you are thinking (if you are in research) "what a genius idea to get pregnant at this time", well is more common that you might think and....well...nobody is asking you.

I know a lot about pregnancy and babies, I am a Early childhood Teacher and a researcher after all. Being that said, there are things I NEVER thought of or I didn't know until it happened. I basically  know what your body is going through, cognitively....but experiencing it is kind of different. So here are a couple of tips, in case you are thinking of embarking yourself in such a journey, or in case the journey follows you.

I will write as my trimesters pass by, so far I have only completed one, so I can talk (write) from what I know and have discovered in these three interesting months.