Leah Gervais: Hello, visionaries. Welcome back to the podcast. This is Leah. And today I wanted to share a recap with you of the second trimester of my pregnancy at the time of this recording. I am in Dublin, Ireland, which has been so much fun. I’ll share a little bit more about our trip in a second. Uh, and I am in the final 12 weeks, which is so crazy to think about because the first 12 weeks, the first trimester was so slow. I mean, things move like molasses.

I don’t think I ever had been through like a slower time in my life. I literally remember at times watching the clock, just trying to count on the numbers or minutes waiting until I felt better waiting until I was in a safer place in terms of my, the development of the fetus being far further along waiting until I could tell friends and family just waiting, waiting, waiting.

And I really did not like living that way because obviously I believe in living in the present, but I struggled to do so. So the second trimester could not have been more different. It totally flew by. I felt like a whole new, I felt like myself again, really is what I felt like. And I have had a truly beautiful pregnancy, something I’m so grateful for. And I’m excited to share a little bit more behind the scenes with what that has looked like and also excited to just have this documented. 

Since I feel like the first pregnancy is probably really special in the sense that everything is so new and exciting, and you’re, you know, you’re just explaining, experiencing your body and, and this experience with your partner, um, in a completely new way. And with the second, um, you know, obviously then you have a baby or a toddler or, or kid, uh, in the mix where they’re probably more of the star of the show.

So I’m really kind of relishing in this pregnancy being just everything new. So let’s go ahead and dive in. Okay, let me give a little high level high overview recap of what I did in my life during the second trimester so that I can kind of fill in the blanks from there a lot happened in the second trimester. It was a very eventful few weeks, few months, um, even by non pregnancy standards. 

I’m so grateful that I was able to have such an active time because that’s exactly what I wanted after my first trimester being so almost debilitating and just challenging mentally and physically plus, not to mention after a year and a half of this pandemic and then finally feeling safe. Um, thanks to the power of the vaccine, uh, feeling safer, I guess I should say, I know that there’s still risks out there, but I felt a lot safer to kind of live my life once I got vaccinated.

And additionally, um, moving back to New York city where our friends and family were, uh, I was really ready to just kind of do to, to be busy, to travel, to focus a lot on work, to see friends and family, um, to just kind of be able to go out and about again and really enjoy the last few months in what I saw are kind of the last few months with just me and my husband, where we can, you know, go on these spontaneous date nights, um, traveled together and things like that in a way that is as easy as it has been because now I’m getting into later pregnancy. And then of course, then we will have a baby. Uh, so I really packed in these few months and decided to leave a lot of the bigger baby decisions until the third trimester, things like the nursery, um, his name focusing on birth itself.

And I ended up doing some of that in the second trimester after all which we’ll share, but that was kind of my mindset going into the second trimester is how can we have this last few months be really about, uh, my family, my husband and I, and then also my business and just myself and what I kind of want for myself. 

Then in the third trimester, as I’m sort of wanting to nest and as my body’s getting bigger and I’m probably going to get a bit slower, how can I like lean into that and kind of make the most of that natural progression and have that be when I do things that are more associated with our home, like our nursery and some of the bigger baby decisions and just totally shift into baby mode. So in my second trimester, I, we moved back to New York city after a year in Miami.

I think I mentioned that in my first trimester recap because I did my first trimester recap a few weeks into my second trimester since I just hadn’t publicly shared yet that I was pregnant until I think around week 18 or 19. Um, but we did move back. I think when I was around 17 weeks pregnant, 18 weeks pregnant, uh, and that has been just amazing. Um, I really missed in New York, especially there at the end of Miami was a lot of fun and it was the right decision for us considering everything that happened in New York during the pandemic. 

Also considering the fact that we didn’t know it at the time, but we would be expecting a baby by the time we left. So I’m really grateful. We were able to do that kind of thing while it was just my husband and I, and while we had the flexibility and the freedom to just pick up and leave, which obviously will be w will look a little different after the baby’s here.

I don’t think that we’re going to have our freedom gone as much as I think some people are trying to warn us of, um, I’m a big fan of, you know, you do things your way and to not let other people dictate how you live your life, just because you have a baby or just because you’re a certain age or just because anything that they have preconceived. But nonetheless, I’m really grateful. We did it when we did, and I was really happy to move back to New York. I miss New York, I think it’s the best city. 

I was just excited to kind of start the new chapter in our life. The move itself was not the easiest thing being pregnant, um, but definitely could have gotten a lot worse. Uh, I have just an amazing Adam. My husband is just an amazing partner in that. He pretty much did all the heavy lifting quite literally of the move because we want it to protect my body and protect my back. Um, and I made sure to be in charge of Ruby, our puppy and help her move. She was fantastic on the flight in case you’re wondering. And so we love our new apartment in York. We just felt right at home right away. 

I loved decorating. We loved seeing our friends and family. Again, New York is such a fun place to be right now. Don’t let the crazy media tell you that it’s anything, but it’s really alive and just really vibrant. So that move was a big part of this. And, uh, our new apartment is just really a dream board come to life. If I do say so myself, it’s been so fun and such a privilege to decorate it the way we want and start from scratch. Um, you know, in Miami we moved into a furnished apartment. And then before that, we had lived in our apartment for, I think, three years. And our furniture in that apartment was kind of like a hodgepodge of things we had both inherited from like our college days. It was the first apartment that we lived in together.

So this has been kind of our first real apartment that we did entirely together from scratch. Um, since we got married or really since we’ve been together and that’s just been a lot of fun to do together. So that was one of the huge highlights of it. I also traveled quite a bit. So if you follow me in Instagram, you know that in July, I spent two weeks away from New York. Just a few days after we had moved, I left and spent a week in Los Angeles where I hosted my mastermind retreat. Um, and that was an incredible retreat. It was so amazing to see all of my masterminders in person, especially because our first retreat ended up virtual for obvious reasons at the beginning of the year. And it was just so fun to see LA, which also was kind of in a really, you know, things were starting to open again place.

Um, and it was just amazing to watch them have the breakthroughs that they did. And many of them just have had so much momentum since then. So I spent a week in LA at the beautiful one hotel, highly recommended, and also, uh, at the time of this podcast releasing I will be hosting my mastermind retreat in New York. So follow along on Instagram for some behind the scenes there. And if you’re interested in joining my mastermind for the 2022 cohort, be sure to get on the waitlist, you can join on my website at LeahGervais.com, just go into the coaching area and you can join the waitlist. There are already more spots taken than there are available for this mastermind. And it is September. So do not hesitate. Get on the waitlist. Um, you don’t want to hesitate and then your spot fill up and then you miss your opportunity.

So you will be invited to these fabulous retreats. It’s part of the mastermind. So we did a retreat in LA for a week, and then after that, I flew to Colorado to visit my mom and to see just my hometown. I wanted to be there while I was pregnant. Since I knew I would not be there for the holidays this year because our baby is due around the holidays. Um, and so, you know, won’t be able to fly presumably. And so that was incredible to do, to see, uh, my hometown and to be able to hike. And it was so nice to have that second trimester energy there because I was able to hike almost every day and just walk around the river and really enjoy Colorado, um, and be able to spend time with family. Of course. So that was a very fun part of the second trimester.

We also took a few small trips here and there, again, trying to see families since we didn’t know what the holidays would look like this year for us. And we don’t expect everyone to come from us, neither. My husband and I, or I are actually from New York. So we went and visited his family in Chicago for a weekend. I went and visited my grandparents in Virginia for a weekend. And as I record this, we are on a, um, we are on day. Gosh, I don’t know, like 12 of our Europe trip that we have done as kind of our baby moon, uh, through Croatia Croatia was really our babymoon destination. And then we spent some time in Paris where we celebrated my business crossing the six, or I’m sorry, the seven figure mark, which also has been an incredible part of the second trimester watching my business hit the million dollar mark.

Well, I have a six month baby bump has been a very, very rewarding and just awe inspiring and humbling experience. And then now we are in Dublin Ireland, my best friend lives here, and we are here to celebrate some of her pre-wedding events, um, as I am her maid of honor. So lots of travel, lots of events, lots of running around. And I’m so grateful I’ve been able to physically do that because that not none of this would have been able to happen in my first trimester. So with that, I want to kind of skip over to, um, have my physical feelings of the second trimester and kind of share a little bit about how I felt. And really though there’s been some challenges. It is like night and day compared to how I felt in my first trimester. So it’s really hard to complain about anything, but pregnancy is still a lot on your body.

So there are some things that I’ve gone through. I think that the hardest part of pregnancy, which was so much more present to me in the first trimester, and I’ve really only felt that a few times in the second, but I could see it getting a little bit more present in the third is just the feeling of, out of controlness of your body. And I know that that might sound obvious when you’re not pregnant, because you think, of course you feel somewhat out of control. You kind of are out of control. There’s a baby in you growing, and your body knows what to do to make that happen and to grow that baby and to nurture that baby, but your mind doesn’t always know how to keep up with that or how to control that or how to remedy some of the things that come along with that.

And that’s all very logical. What I didn’t really understand and how it actually has looked for me in practice at times is just almost, uh, sometimes paralysis about what you’re going through. And what could at any time sort of happen to you because of how out of control you feel like there could be an instant where I’ll just get a surge of hormones and kind of just a surge of like intensity in my body. And I’m not sure if I’m about to throw up or if I’m about to take a nap or if I’m about to, or if I’m about to, um, you know, get some sort of shooting pain or if I need medicine or if I need to exercise, or if I like am going to have a headache and it can just feel very intense, but so unpredictable that you don’t know how to kind of like handle it, um, or what your body needs in that moment.

That has been my experience. Anyway, maybe other women haven’t quite experienced that, but those moments are just challenging because I’m someone who really believes in listening to your body. And I believe a lot in food and nutrition and exercise as remedies for some of the elements that we have. Um, and I’m not always exactly sure how to address those moments because they feel so out of control and just unclear about what my body needs that it can just sort of almost all I really can do is lay down and sort of try to focus on my breath and try to tune in, or just try to rest and try to just like allow it to pass or allow my body to get clear on what I need, but it can be a little bit overwhelming. So I’ve had a few moments like that here and there, nothing too bad.

Um, and I have still napped almost every day. Uh, now I’m not nearly as tired as I was in my first trimester. I’ve actually had a great amount of energy, which has been a lot of fun. I’ve been able to I’ve exercised nearly every day, which has been a pleasant surprise. I didn’t think I would be able to do that. I, my eating habits are not quite as great as they were pre pregnancy, but that’s okay. I’m letting myself enjoy this time. And definitely just still making sure I get the nutrients as long as I get the nutrients my baby needs. And I get the protein, my baby needs everything that I want on top of that. I kind of just let myself have personally, um, so the energy has been great, but still, I will say once a day, usually I just come to a place where I need to shut my eyes for a little while.

And I just kind of welcomed that because I don’t know how much sleep I’ll be having once the baby’s actually here and I just let my body rest, um, better physical symptoms. Well, let me actually, there’s been one, one more kind of uncomfortable thing I want to touch on, which is the weight gain. Um, of course we all know that you’re going to gain weight pregnant. It isn’t any surprise. And from a mental perspective, I’ve been pleasantly surprised about how much it hasn’t bothered me. I definitely can understand and sympathize with the challenge of seeing the scale go up or the challenge of knowing that things don’t fit anymore, um, for, for women and just watching your body change so fast. But that hasn’t really bothered me in a way that I maybe would have thought or could have understood it too. And I’m really grateful for that.

I’ve honestly loved watching my belly grow. I’ve loved what my body’s been able to do. I feel very strong. I’ve liked the physical change in many regards. The thing that’s been challenging about it is just the physical side effects that have come with gaining weight so quickly, which is that my joints are not used to carrying so much weight. My knees are not used to carrying so much weight, my calves and my feet aren’t either. So I’m just sore a lot of the time, you know, at the end of the day, especially if I take Ruby on a walk or something, or, um, if I’ve been kind of on my feet or I’ve noticed that there’s been to what I feel like really clear growth spurts that he’s had my baby, um, over the second trimester where it’ll be like a week. And I just can tell that he’s moving so much and moving so much.

And at the end of the day, I just can feel my legs and my joints just be so, so sore. Um, and I, and I, and I feel like those are when I’m rapping the most rapidly gaining weight. So that’s been, um, an experience and it’s nothing that is too uncomfortable. And it’s also helpful to have your, uh, partner massage your feet. At the end of the day, I have very, uh, supportive one who is happy to do so. So I recommend that if you’re going through this, but, um, other than that, uh, yeah, that, I think that that’s the hardest part of the weight gain for me is just like physically feeling the fact that my body is just so not used to it and how tired it’s making my body to literally carry that much weight on a more positive side from the physical aspect, is that because he’s been growing and I’ve been feeling it I’ve been able to feel him kick that has been so, so much fun.

Um, I think I started hearing or started feeling initially. Like I wish I could say they were flutters. I think a lot of women call them initial flutters. It did not feel like flutters to me, it felt like I was nauseous, but it was not nausea. And I just started realizing something in there is like moving, um, probably at around week 21, which is, I think, a little later than some. So that’s when it happened for me. And then it’s just grown and grown. And it was a very special time when, um, uh, my husband, Adam could first feel the kicks, um, himself, you know, obviously women go through this all so intensely and it’s kind of in the back of your mind all the time. And then your partner, your, if you’re in a male-female relationship, the man doesn’t go through this at all.

Uh, so it’s fun when he can kind of have his little taste of what is happening in the growth of your baby. And that was really fun. And, and now we can see him move. Um, you know, Adam doesn’t even have to feel my stomach. He can just look at my stomach and it’ll go up and down, no kick, and I can feel them. I’m not sure exactly which parts of the body that I’m feeling, but I can feel the former parts of my belly, um, that are really hard. And I think that that must either be like his head or his butt or a foot. So it’s been so fun, just feeling him more in my belly, especially when I’m a little bit when I’m resting and things like that, he’ll, he’ll get really active. And so I’ve absolutely loved that part of this.

And it’s been one of the more special experiences. I’m also grateful that I’ve still been able to sleep. I have an app that updates me every week with symptoms to expect and probably what I’m feeling and a common one that I’ve been reading, especially over the last few weeks as I was at the end of my second trimester, is that I’m probably struggling to sleep. I’m not yet. Um, I can’t really sleep more than seven hours at a time because I will have to go to the bathroom, but that’s why I typically nap usually, uh, at another point during the day. So I get a good eight hours, but I’m grateful for those seven hours. And I am pretty solidly through them, definitely helps to have a very clear nighttime routine, a very clear unwinding, um, and to also kind of cherish the moments when I first wake up.

So I do, you know, kind of do my part to sleep well, but I’m very, very grateful that it hasn’t gotten so uncomfortable yet that I can’t sleep. It’s gotten a little bit harder. It’s a little harder to adjust yourself. I did buy a pregnancy pillow. That’s been great here in Europe, as we’ve been traveling, I’ve always had to ask for like five pillows in every hotel because I need to kind of set them up manually myself. It’s, I’m kind of like in stock in the sea of pillows all the time. Uh, but those are really helpful to just kind of keep you in a comfortable position. And so, yeah, I’m really grateful for the fact that I am still sleeping, but stay tuned on that one because I did not sleep on my first trimester. So we will see what the third trimester brings, but I’m saying positive and I think I’m going to sleep great.

Okay. Moving along from physical symptoms and kind of the physical aspect of this, uh, I can share a little bit about some of the decisions that we have been making and where my focuses have been for the baby. So, first of all, for my business, I have been focusing a lot on preparing for maternity leave, which for us has looked a lot like investing in our team so that they feel very clear on everything that they will need to do and are doing for when I go on leave, um, that’s going really well. Let me know you guys should please, please DM me or email me if you would like to hear a whole episode on what I’m doing to prepare for it. I’m happy to share. And I’m sure there’s so many mistakes that I’m overlooking because I’ve never done this before, but happy to share what I’m doing.

Um, proactively. So that’s been a big focus. And then with him himself, there are some other decisions that we have made. Um, first thing we decided to do is hire a doula. Uh, this is specifically a doula that came at the recommendation of a good friend of mine, who is also an alum of my mastermind, and she just had a baby in July and she, she just had a really strong pregnancy. Um, she’s definitely been a support to me throughout this entire experience. And so when she recommended this doula, uh, we had a call with her and really liked her. So that was an exciting experience. We had an initial meeting with her that was like almost three hours. It was really long. And I think we have one more with her when I reached 37 weeks to celebrate that the baby’s been brought to term and show.

So she was really helpful. She taught me a lot about how to think about nutrition and which was not, which at first I had a little bit of anxiety about, honestly, just because I feel like there’s so much pressure on pregnant women as is like, you literally have a baby’s life in your hand, in your hands plus like your own life that you’re still trying to keep up with and your own work you’re still trying to do in your own relationships and all the things that make you, you you’re trying to juggle it all. And it’s just so much pressure. So kind of going through a whole nutrition piece as someone who considers herself relatively healthy to begin with was something that I just didn’t additionally want on my plate, but it was not as restrictive as I was worried. It would be. And it just helped me see some of the things that I can control a little bit more specifically.

She helped me see the power of eating a lot of protein, um, and really any form while pregnant and how that can reduce your risk of preeclampsia or other challenges that can come with pregnancy. Obviously it doesn’t totally eliminate them, but, um, I’ll do anything that I have my power on. So that’s been helpful just to focus a lot on protein and kind of give myself permission to eat quite a bit of me, honestly. Uh, and she has pointed out just some other things that are kind of helpful hacks, um, drinking bone broth and things like that. Uh, and she taught me a lot of other things like stretches. I can do things that Adam can help me do at night to stretch out my, uh, round ligament, um, and kind of give it a little bit of release, preparing for labor, things like that.

So we’re very excited about the doula. I am planning, currently on giving birth in a hospital. I’m totally planning on it. Actually. It’s not something that’s really up for discussion, but I’m just giving you a little bit of, um, a look into what I’m hoping the birth goes like. But yeah, so she will be there and we will be in a hospital and I’m actually really excited for the experience. Birth was something that I didn’t know how much I wanted to research, and I know that might sound weird. Like, of course you should research it, you’re about to do it. 

But I also didn’t want to go down this huge rabbit hole of almost overwhelming myself with something that I really believe we’re born to do, and that I really believe we have an innate ability to do. Uh, but I think I found a really healthy balance of just having clarity around what I want out of birth, which is to have a great intro introduction into motherhood and to have this experience working with my baby and trying to just be open and learning different ways in which that can hopefully happen.

Um, but not getting too attached to any birth plan or birth vision, because I know things will probably not go as I envisioned them because I literally have no idea what to expect and these things never do anyway, but I am very excited for the doula. Another thing that we decided were are in that we’re still deciding is thinking about childcare during the maternity phase, so, or the maternity leave phase. So during the first three months of his life, um, we interviewed a few nurses, night nurses, postpartum, doulas, and nannies. And that has made me feel a lot better because I was definitely overwhelmed thinking about what we are going to do in the first few weeks of his life, both not knowing really, exactly what to do. Uh, so getting support has been huge and, you know, obviously that’s something I hugely believe in.

That’s why I’m the coach. That’s why I always hire my own coaches. That’s why I invest in my team. I don’t think any of us can do this alone. And I don’t think any of us should. I think things are a lot more enjoyable when you have people helping you. So we interviewed some nurses and again, this is something I’m happy to include in my maternity leave plan episode. If you guys are interested that I’m not going to talk too much more about it here, uh, we have started decorating the nursery, which has been a lot of fun. Um, we are yeah, getting some help with that as well. And, um, that is really going to start coming together this month. So feel free,

Definitely follow me on Instagram for that. Cause I will be showing that we’ve decided the theme, um, and some of the big pieces of furniture and we are getting a painted, I think in a few weeks here. So that has started to come together and that’s been a lot of fun. I’ve also started creating his closet, which has been like the cutest thing ever. 

Oh, his little clothes are just so adorable. Another thing we did in the second trimester was our gender reveal. Um, if you follow me in Instagram, you probably saw that, but that was a really fun experience. We invited our friends to a rooftop bar in Midtown Manhattan and we actually through the connections of one of our good friends was eight, were able to change the color of one of the spiders in the New York city skyline. And so we counted down and we were able to change it to blue, to share with everyone that we were having a boy that was one of my favorite moments of pregnancy so far.

And another one of my favorite moments of pregnancy so far was a scan I had at around I think 26 weeks, 25 weeks, where they were able to for the first time do a 3d ultrasound. I’m not sure if you know what that is. I did not know what it was. I had never had it before and they just sort of did it. And I was a, it’s the differences that you’re sort of able to see your baby in 3d and almost look at him or her, uh, in a photographic way, not just kind of in this traditional ultrasound, like almost skeletal way. And so the next thing I knew, I looked up on the screen and his face was there and I could see his nose and his mouth and oh, it just made me tear up right away. It was one of the most special moments.

He just looked so real. And I know he’s real. I feel on every day and I talk about it and think about it so much, but it all still feels pretty abstract. Honestly, it feels crazy that there’s going to just be this baby here that is growing inside of me in a few months. So the 3d ultrasound is one of the most special moments of the entire pregnancy so far as well. And the final, very special part of our second trimester brings me to exactly where I am right now, which is my baby moon. If you are pregnant or you get pregnant soon, I highly recommend taking some time to go on a baby moon just between you and your partner. Um, I know that I will probably even be more grateful for it once the baby’s here that we had this time, just us two, but in this moment it just felt so nice to slow down a little bit.

I think that, you know, you find out you’re pregnant and then everything is kind of, it’s kind of all hands on deck trying to get ready for the baby. And it was just so nice to slow down and spend time with each other and pause and really take in the chapter in our lives that we’re in and what’s happening and how excited we were and how grateful we were for everything. That’s brought us to this point. And yeah, it’s just been a really wonderful vacation. I’m very grateful. I was able to go on this. Um, and then of course, very grateful. I was able to go to Paris to celebrate my seven figure mark, but that is a story for a different time. So the baby moon is how we topped it off and the timing couldn’t be more perfect because as I enter my third trimester, international travel becomes a little riskier.

And so I am going to now enter the third trimester with welcome arms for the coziness of fall, all the nesting that overcomes me, um, much slower pace than I’d been up to as I’ve as my belly gets bigger and just preparing for our little one to come here in a few months. So that is my second trimester recap. Thank you for listening. I hope that you guys enjoyed this episode. That’s very personal episode. And if you have any questions about, um, planning for maternity leave about pregnancy or really anything else that was touched in on this episode, you can always DM me.

If you’re interested in more content like this, be sure to check out the series we’re doing interviewing mothers about maternity leave about pregnancy, about motherhood while being an online business owner. Um, we’ve had some really incredible entrepreneurs on there and we have some more to come and they’ve given me a lot of insight as a new, as a, as an expecting mother. So I know that if you like this, you’ll, you’ll love hearing from them as well. All right, visionaries, I will talk to you soon. Here’s to your biggest vision.

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