London was a place I fantasized about—you know, the fancy accent, the land of the queen, and the colonial gloss we read about in history class. The fact that Britain colonized Nigeria also made it a place I hoped to be able to visit in my lifetime so I could see my forefathers who were taken away long, long ago.
As a kid, I remember this uncle who travelled to the UK, and we all thought he was GOD. He was instantly elevated to celebrity status in my young, impressionable mind as if he’d gone to a place where golden double-decker buses would carry him around like royalty.
Fast-forward years later, as an adult, this point of view took a 360-degree turn. Almost every person I met until now—I’m talking people who were born and raised in the UK—had some not-so-nice things to say about the country, primarily the ‘sad’ weather, cost of living and taxes.
Many expats in the UAE are British who moved here for a better life and to keep a good chunk of money they work very hard for. Undoubtedly, this quickly changed my perspective about the UK. Plus, sometime back, I went down a rabbit hole reading about Britain’s history, countries they colonized, bla bla bla, and just made up my mind the place wasn’t all that.
Sorry, this intro is not precisely the point of this post. I even forgot to say ‘hi’ to you – whoever you may be. I blame this on the fact that I am writing this post from a hotel room in the UK, and I can say that the weather here is – sad. haha
Before I get too deep into my griping, let’s just call this my “Pregnancy Diaries: UK Edition” or, better yet, “Pregnancy Diaries, part 2.”
I’ll spare you the play-by-play of why and how we landed in the UK; maybe leave that gist for another day. Instead, I’ll focus on the recap/highlight of my second trimester and how I’m feeling overall.
Pregnancy so far…
Picture this and try to stay with me, okay….I’ll get to the point eventually.
It’s a lovely Sunday morning, and hubby decides to make the day special. I’m not allowed to know details. I just need to dress up and do my makeup – which I haven’t done in months. All I need to know is we are going to have a nice day out, just the two of us.
It starts with breakfast at a very serene restaurant. Birds chipping, and the sound of water from a fountain flowing as we chat about life and, of course, our baby.
It’s the perfect morning.
After brunch, my husband says, ‘We should go to the Dubai Mall.’ It didn’t matter that I still had morning sickness at this time; I am enjoying this day out. I agreed (hey, it’s Dubai mall dhurrr—who says no to potential shopping, and I need a gift for a friend’s baby anyway).
After Dubai Mall, he again says ‘let’s go to check what our interior designers are doing in the house we are moving to at a later time’ – again, tired, but I agree because I’m still enjoying this day out. It’s already noon by now. We get to the house, in and out. cool
It’s time to go home now, right? Uhmmm yeah.. wrong.
As we leave the site, he says, “Let’s check out a place at City Walk.” Again, I say, “Sure, why not?” I am still enjoying our day together, never mind how tired my body feels now.
Finally, we head home. I held his hands and thanked him for doing this; I needed it. It had been very long months, and to be honest, pregnancy was beginning to hit me mentally at this time, so this was a very welcome gesture.
Are you still picturing?…
We got home. I got out of the car, heels in my hands, and headed upstairs to yank my wig off, take off my makeup, and sleep. As I took the first step up the stairs, I sighted balloons in the living room. Balloons? What’s going on here, I said.
I reversed and headed to the living room,
BOOM
SURPRISEEEEEE…….
Baby shower? Who? What? How? When?
‘Surpriseee’, my friends and the sweetest little girl – their daughter said as I entered the living room. I might’ve shed a tear or two. Not because I’m not a hard girl – I AM, but because of the thought and effort behind this.
You see, at this point in my second trimester of pregnancy, I was not just physically sick, but also mentally stressed too…seemed like i’ve been pregnant for too long, I wasn’t really productive at work, and I was missing the old me. In fact, I decided not to talk to anyone for a week one time lol.
Seeing this, my friend and my husband decided to find a way to cheer me up, and they did this!
I always said I wouldn’t have a baby shower because, one, I don’t like stress, and organizing events is not my strong point, and two, I thought, I don’t really have that many people to invite – isn’t that the point of baby shower? – invite lots of friends, games and all the shebang I see on social media.
Clearly, they proved me wrong because we had a good time—just five of us. The ‘people’ matter more than ‘how many people’.. idk if that makes but you get the point haha. It’s one of the days that will remain in my memory, and I can’t wait to tell our baby about it.
This day couldn’t have been more perfect from start to finish.
Oh, this! Apparently, we didn’t go home straight after brunch because they needed more time to set up the decoration in the house, and each time he proposed going to another place, it still was because they hadn’t finished…smh lol
To this day, I still can’t believe I had zero clue and didn’t catch them while they were planning this.
Towards the middle of the second trimester, I felt so much better. Morning sickness disappeared like they said it would, and I could eat everything I had missed.
We moved houses, and I started buying baby stuff and setting up our baby’s nursery. So many lovely things happened, shaaaaaa. If I keep writing, you won’t leave today.
The only con of the second trimester was how fast it flew by – but was it really a con if it meant I was headed into the last lap of the journey? *wink*
To wrap this up, if you read the post before, I hope I also did justice to this too. Hopefully, you have the patience to wait for the last part of this series – assuming I also get the motivation to finish it..lol!