I want that One! What to read when you're knocked up...

A pregnancy book captured by My Little Ponies

I was quite excited when I heard New Zealand personality Jaquie Brown had written a book called I'm not fat, I'm pregnant. The book was, "The Ultimate guide to getting pregnant, being pregnant and surviving life with a crazy but wonderful newborn". That's what it says on the cover. 

Being a Mum who absolutely loved every minute of my indulgent, lazy, fat, spoilt pregnancy... I thought it would be nice to trek down memory lane and see if the advice and anecdotes in the book would have been helpful to the 'me' six years ago - pre Only Child.

The first thing that stood out to me was the humorous and witty tone of the book - I appreciated that, and I could relate to the awkward moments one experiences, but can't necessarily articulate. I remembered many moments with my midwife where I would retell a funny pregnancy fact or moment I experienced, and her reaction being somewhat indifferent (and not laughing!). Brown's book doesn't view these wonderful first time experiences as something women have been doing for 100s of years - she affords first-time pregnancy and conception all the detail and wonder that they deserve. 

Week by week - in glorious detail!

I loved that the book was set out week by week of each trimester - and in Brown's book, there are four trimesters. Of all the pregnancy material I was given or bought during my pregnancy, I always read the material that went week by week. When you are a first time Mum-to-be, everything is week by week. People talk about what to expect in a cumulative sense, and what you will feel, but everything is incremental and individual. And Brown's inclusion of her own pregnancy diary illustrates that. 

Broadly speaking, the book is a very reassuring, and friendly pregnancy bible for all new Mums-to-be. Comfort reading if you like. Not comfort as in 'everything is going to be okay for everyone', but comfort as in, it doesn't show you horrible photos of abnormalities and vast diagrams of mutation probabilities... we don't need those do we? We all know how to use google when we are pregnant and confused...

The nutritional advice is excellent, and the use of other experts' advice thrown in at the right time is a great touch. 

So, would the book have been helpful to me six years ago? Certainly. It is helpful to my sister currently. This is a good sign, as my sister is not exactly 'receptive' to advice...

Now, I would only ask that Miss Brown write a book entitled, I'm not fat, I had a baby (six years ago). I know someone who might need this currently....

Random House Publisher