So its been  a long long time since i've blogged, a really long time. I guess there's alot of reasons. College 100% took over my life last year and up until June of this year and I was pretty much using every brain cell to try and get the grades i needed, so there wasn't much brain capacity or time or blogging.

If you haven't guessed by the title, this is the first of hopefully alot of posts about my pregnancy journey of baby number two, and I guess it makes sense to start at the beginning. if you need the very very beginning then you can catch up with my previous post the second baby- dealing with PCOS to get a bit of background but for this story im going to start in september.

SEPTEMBER 11TH 2018
The long awaited appointment at the fertility clinic finally came around. I had everything crossed for this appointment, it was the one where id hopefully be given the medication i needed to finally get pregnant after months and months, lets call it years of trying. Trying to conceive (TTC) is such a lonely place. on top of it being lonely, there's pressure, heartache and a whole lot of day dreaming about the future. I was so ready to stop day dreaming and to start getting somewhere. To get the medication i had to get my BMI down to a certain number and and it kinda equated to 4,5lbs, not alot but to the NHS its everything. luckily a decent sized poop in the morning helped along with the lightest items of clothes i owned and i had lost the 4.5lbs i needed to loose to get the medication. I was so happy, i had a care plan, a real plan to get pregnant. I left the hospital happy and ready, we were going on holiday the following week and i wanted to enjoy it and then come back and get to business.

OCTOBER 1ST 2018

We had just come back from spending 10 days in Ibiza as a family, it was amazing and exactly what we needed. Time together and no pressure of baby making [ sharing a small apartment room with your mother in law does that]. October 1st brought the first day of my period which meant i could take the medication called clomid the next day and for the next 5 days. I had to call the fertility clinic and book in a scan for day 12 of my cycle to check for follicles on my ovaries and to make sure i wasn't over stimulated from the medication and end up with sextuplets! [IMAGINE!]

OCTOBER 12TH 2018

I had the scan and I was a nervous wreak. I was convinced the medication hadnt worked and i would just have to wait till the next cycle. The scan showed I had one follicle nearly ready for ovulation. I left the clinic with the advice of "go home and have lots of intercourse"!... niceeeee right ?  Theres something about being told when to have sex that makes you not want to have sex. Every bedtime was awkward, it wasnt romantic and the whole thing was a major turn off.

OCTOBER 16TH 2018

I was peeing on Ovulation sticks like a crazy lady and not one of them was positive. On cycle day 16 I had a really faint line, meaning that something was happening  But I wasn't sure.  I moaned to Ray about the lack of baby making going on and we had a proper talk about.  I was being impatient, in my mind this was the first go out of 6, the only 6 we would get without paying for private ivf. He said this is only the first one there's 5 more. This is where we are so opposite, I'm glass half empty he's glass half full. Although something must of clicked because I'm sure this was the day I concieved.

OCTOBER 26TH 2018

We had a night out planned(possibly the worst night ever but that's a story for a different day). Knowing I was going to be drinking I took a test in the morning and low and behold it was negative, along with the.negative Ovulation stick too so I rang the fertility clinic and they had me booked in for another appointment on the 1st of November. I remember telling my friend that it hadn't worked and that I will use our night out to have a final drink and get to it next cycle.

OCTOBER 30TH

 I had just finished a night shift and couldn't relax to nap so I was watching some videos on youtube and typed in "clomid successful cycle 1" and found a video describing this ladies symptoms and I felt as though it was me in the video. The heartburn for 3 days straight which could no longer be blamed on banana cake, the headaches the thirst. Something said to me take a test. But at that point I was tired so I napped for maybe an hour and a half got up and took a test and there was a line, a faint one but a line.. I sent the photo to my friend and my mum in complete dispair. I couldn't believe my eyes, literally. I tried to call Ray but he was still using a phone from 2001 and it had died and I couldn't get hold of him and I had to wait till he got home!! I told him that evening that I won't have to bug him for sex anymore and his reply was why? ( like honestly is he that stupid) and my reply was because I'm pregnant. Rays reply wasn't that of a typical happy dad to be because Ray isn't your typical man. He had the emotional range of a teaspoon. He said "cool" and walked off... [ side note; ray is now very excited as long as we dont talk about it alllllll they time!]

The next couple of weeks were strange, I kept peeing on sticks to "make sure" and I was using Dr Google to check every single thing. In the end I booked an early scan to help my nerves which helped for a few weeks but I was paranoid again and counting the days down till the 12 week scan. I found the trimester alot harder than I did with mason but I'll pop that in another post.





So that's the story, and I'll carry on documenting this journey. Something to look back on as I don't really have that from mason. I am so excited, its so crazy when something happens that youve been waiting for, for soooo long. The pressure is off and were over the moon.

Also if you have congratulated us on Instagram or Facebook I just want to say thank you so much. It means the world and I hope no one minds me documenting this crazily exciting time!

I'd be the first to admit that the room was certainly more cozy back then, but i think its because it was the darkness off the room.








After painting the whole room white, and hating it! we added the grey wall. When all the walls were painted white it was just too much  white, if thats even a thing.

A month a go i watched a documentary on netflix called "what the health". If you haven't already watched it, seriously you should. its a proper eye opener.

After watching it i made the decision there and then to go vegan, for me it was a pretty quick decision. I'm normally that person that can make decisions at all. So from that moment forward i was vegan., Without thinking about the impacts of family cooking, eating out, food bills etc. I didn't even give myself a chance to talk my out of it. The only person i had to convince was ray, and it was pretty easy. Having someone to do this with me was a whole lot better.

Our rules as a family; 

We were all going to do this together so we kind of had to set some sort of rules of what we can and cant have, what we are allowing mason to have that kind of thing.
Firstly we had to think about mase, he still has milk at bedtime and wont drink any other milk, I've tried. so he still has that. But the last month we have really cut it out. Maybe he has one bottle a week now which is so good for him. He hast asked me for cheese for a few weeks either. He will carry on eating fish, and he has things that have eggs and milk in, hes 4, we cant deprive him of a cupcake or ice cream when were out.

As for me the only thing I've allowed myself to have is quorn, which has re hydrated egg whites in, and some things with milk powder in.

Ray eats the same as me plus some tuna. He eats 6 meals a fay so feeding him full of quorn is expensive, impractical and smelly.


Food Shopping;

Our first food shop was a little pricey, because we went out and brought all the mill seeds, chia seeds and maca powder thinking we needed it, turns out they smell like ass and you " need " them. Like i said before we eat quorn so not officially vegans but vegan meat alternatives are expensive. A moth in and im trying to avoid quorn at every dinner time as we've found it gives us all a bit of a dodgy stomach, and i don't think its that great for you. I Started off shopping at aldi getting all my fruit, veg and grains from there and then going to tesco to get all the dairy free alternatives, and it was coming out about the same price as our normal food shop so around £65-80 a week depending on what we need. but the last couple of weeks I've been doing the whole shop at tesco, and its been more on the cheaper side, so we shall see when i need to do a big shop again.

Eating out;


When i stopped and actually thought about the practicalities of being vegan, i thought i would be ordering chips from every restaurant i go too, turns out that's not the case, just order the meat versions without the meat ad cheese. I had a very nice 'Pulled Pork Wrap' from the slug and lettuce the other day, no pulled pork no cheese, it was basically rice and veg in wrap, and the staff were really ice about it. Also if you have a Zizzi's near you check out their vegan pizza's!They're yummy,




So What Do I Eat 

A typical days for me goes a little like this,

Breakfast; Shreddies or muesli with soya milk

Lunch; Pitta with tomato pure and vegan cheese melted on top [dot have it unmelted,its horrid]

Dinner; Chickpea curry, rice and veg or quorn steak strips fajitas

Snacks; Fruit, carrots and cucumber with hummus.

I'd love to have those lush salad bowls that's you see all over instagram but the reality is, we now eat a lot of chips and salads never look that nice, who has the time!




Do I Miss Eating Meat?

The answer to that is no, not at all. Being at a BBQ this weekend confirmed that as well. The Meat looked nice then when i saw the bones afterwards i was immediately happy i didn't eat any of it. I do however miss ice cream and sweets, but I've substituted it with vegan friendly cakes/puddings which actually taste better than the real thing. Some of which i can post to the blog at some point.


Do I Feel Any Different?

Yes, I lost about half a stone in the first 2 weeks and my skin is a thousand times better than before. I no longer have acne and my skin is a lot less oily. I also have alot more energy even with working nights a my moods are more mellow. i don't tend to get that  moody anymore.


All i all I'm enjoying being "vegan" . Its not been as hard as i thought it would be, and I'm not singled out as we are all doing it. there are some good choices in supermarkets and its not as expensive as i thought it was going to be.

If anyone has any questions leave a comment below and i will respond as best as i can.