Nine Pregnancy Hacks To Make Pregnancy Easier
Looking for pregnancy hacks and pregnancy life hacks? If you’re pregnant and looking for tips and tricks to make your pregnancy easier, from food to jeans and maternity clothes, then read on.
Read The Best Pregnancy Hacks
Pregnancy is exciting, but it can be hard – emotionally and physically. I love reading lists of life hacks; these are the really simple but effective suggestions to make your life easier.
So I thought a pregnancy version of pregnancy hacks would be appropriate; when better for life hacks than when you’re growing a new life? And anything that can make the pretty tough nine months even slightly easier is a bonus.
Here’s some of my (new) life hacks – nine simple tips for pregnancy (you can also read my 15 parenting life hacks once you’ve had the baby and the best breastfeeding hacks).
If You’re Pregnant, Try These Hacks
Hide Your Fruit And Veg
The thought of fruit and veg makes most people feel sick in the first trimester as it’s a natural reaction to protect your tiny baby from the body-poisoning bugs, germs and nasties that may hide in it. It’s why it’s common to crave bland, beige, carby food instead. Stealth fruit and veg is the key here. innocent smoothies have two of your five a day. Dried fruit also counts. I also found it easier to eat fruit that looks less like fruit (e.g. the really pretty pre-packaged pots from M&S) Toddler fruit tactics, but on yourself
Strategic Naps
Nap whenever you can. If you already have a child, nap when they do during the day. Everyone will tell you to do this and you’ll probably ignore them first time, but second time…? You’ll be sneaking in some shut-eye whenever you can, trust me
Dehydrated? Try These Tips
Ice lollies will help keep you hydrated, and will also make you feel less sick. Chilling / part freezing fruit like grapes or cucumber slices also helps
The Best Pregnancy Jeans Hack
Make your normal jeans last longer with the pregnancy hairband trick. Loop an elastic hairband through itself around the eyelet, and then loop this over the button, for a couple of extra inches of stretch. This is also good post-baby when you just have to wear your old jeans again but aren’t quite…there yet
Don’t buy a bump band – buy longer vests instead to wear under tops, cover you / your hairband up and bridge any gaps (also useful for breastfeeding later on)
A Second Pregnancy hack
If it’s not your first child and you have lots of pregnancy-related medical appointments but no childcare, ask for your appointments to always be first thing in the morning. This means there is less likely to be the delay there always is in the middle of the day, so less waiting around in waiting rooms with a bored toddler, when you’re exhausted. In theory.
Maternity Book hack!
Instead of investing in loads of giant pregnancy books, get the app or the Kindle version instead. They are much easier to read in bed (and here’s a round-up of my favourite pregnancy apps)
You’ll probably want to suck up all the information you can find, like a big pregnant sponge, but don’t be tempted by any pregnancy books that are ‘written’ by celebrities. They probably haven’t written them, and really, what’s Jules, Denise or Tess et al going to add to your experience?
Maternity Clothes Hack For Pregnancy
My final pregnancy life hack – at some point you probably will need to invest in some form of maternity clothes, but they can be really expensive, especially when you know you’re only wearing them for a relatively short amount of time (you won’t wear them after, trust me). So for the more premium brands, watch out for sales, even if the clothes are for mega-bumps and you’re still at the ‘slightly bloated from lunch’ stage. The almighty ASOS almost always has a sale on too. Other cheaper places; eBay, NCT sales, friends, making them yourself out of flowery bedsheets (joke, unless of course you’re a really gifted seamstress).
The photo was me last time at 28 weeks pregnant; here’s what I currently look like, second time round.
You can also read all my weekly pregnancy updates.
19 Comments
fritha
May 26, 2014 at 2:10 pm
weirdly ALL I could stomach in the first trimester was nectarines and other fresh fruit, I just lived off fruit! Good tip on the ice lollies though, will have to give that a go (next time round) x
Alison Perry
May 26, 2014 at 10:13 pm
Love these. I did the long vest trick while breastfeeding and one mum even told me an amazing trick – buy some cheap long vests / tees and slash the boob area. Wear under normal tops and bingo, you can breastfeed without flashing tummy (I was way more concerned about that than flashing boob).
lori
May 27, 2014 at 12:33 am
I used to put a hair bobble through my jean button hole and around the button to avoid having to buy maternity jeans straight away. Obviously in the end i had to get one but it did help me stretch out wearing my normal clothes. Great tips x
Eleanor (thebristolparent)
May 27, 2014 at 7:08 am
I was ALL about double-vesting when I was breastfeeding. Pull one up, and one down, and bingo, no abominable boob errors. So much cheaper and more effective than nursing tops for someone who is heavy up top like me.
Plus, you get to maintain your awesome vest-top tan through the summer.
And, as you say, long ones are best. I can heartily recommend those well-known designers Primarni and Georgious Asada for this shopping trip.
laura redburn
May 29, 2014 at 1:24 pm
i find ice lollies are generally really good if you’re feeling a bit naseous and cant handle food. love the bit about the stealth fruit too.
Laura
June 1, 2014 at 10:22 pm
I too love life hack lists and this one is great! The ice lollies is a good idea and I did the jeans trick with the elastic band and it was only into my final trimester did I actually buy maternity jeans.
Great list
Laura x
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Kylie
June 29, 2014 at 12:47 pm
Love all these. I suffered with morning sickness for 15 weeks and it was always the ice drinks/blocks that made me feel better.
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Jac
March 10, 2015 at 10:33 pm
Thanks for the hairband trick! I will be trying this tomorrow…!
gillian
March 25, 2015 at 10:40 am
Good luck! x
Becky Brock
May 25, 2015 at 11:20 am
No. 2 is really really hard for me. When you have so much to do and you think you’re neck deep in terms of chores and office works, in my experience, I do those things when kids are asleep. Awesome list though. 🙂
Holly
June 13, 2015 at 1:40 pm
I have just started looking for maternity jeans at nearly 16 weeks. Most look like they would fall down at the moment, and I have enough trouble shopping for jeans as it is (until a discovered the wonder of Levi’s a couple of years ago!) so I’m going to try out the hairband trick. Just need to get some strong ones!
gillian
July 8, 2015 at 9:24 pm
Ahh it’s such a pain isn’t it?! Bizarrely when I was pregnant I had the best pair of jeans that I was convinced I could wear again by cutting off the bump band but now thwt are of course massively too big, which is a bit annoying. Hope the hairband does the trick x